women.

I said "younger," for owing to racial and climatic conditions the Persian
female is a full-grown woman in every way at the age of ten or twelve,
sometimes even younger. They generally keep in good compact condition
until they are about twenty or twenty-five, when the fast expanding
process begins, deforming even the most beautiful into shapeless masses
of flesh and fat. They are said, however, to be capable of bearing
children till the mature age of forty to forty-five, although from my own
observation thirty-five to forty I should take to be the more common
average at which Persian women are in full possession of prolific powers.

In the case of Sayids, the descendants of Mahommed, both sexes of whom
are reputed for their extraordinary powers and vitality, women are said
not to become sterile till after the age of fifty.

Whether this is a fact or not, I cannot say, but it is certain that the
Sayids are a superior race altogether, more wiry and less given to
orgies--drinking and smoking,--which may account for their natural powers
being preserved to a later age than with most other natives of Persia.
Their women are very prolific. Sayid men and women are noticeable even
from a tender age for their robustness and handsome features. They are
dignified and serious in their demeanour, honest and trustworthy, and are
a fine race altogether.

Infanticide after birth is not very common in Persia, but abortion
artificially procured has, particularly of late, become frequent for the
prevention of large families that cannot be supported. This is done by
primitive methods, not dissimilar to those used in European countries.
Medicine is occasionally also administered internally. These cases are
naturally illegal, and although the law of the country is lenient--or,
rather, short-sighted--in such matters, any palpable case, if discovered,
would be severely punished.

The umbilicus of newly-born children is inevitably tied by a doctor and
not by a member of the family, as with some nations. Circumcision is
practised on male children when at the age of forty days. It is merely
performed as a sanitary precaution, and is not undergone for religion's
sake.

There are few countries where deformities and abnormalities are as common
as they are in Persia. In women less than in men; still, they too are
afflicted with a good share of Nature's freaks. The harelip is probably
the most common abnormality. Webbed and additional fin