ict letter of the law, he
cannot refrain from gratifying those interested in the honour he is about
to confer by the value of the promised dowry, and, therefore, he names a
very heavy sum, which perhaps his whole generation never could have
collected in their joint lives. This sum would of itself be a barrier to
divorce; but that is not the only object which influences the Mussulmaun
generally to waive the divorce; it is because they would not publish their
own disgrace, by divorcing an unfaithful or undutiful wife.

If the first wife dies, a second is sought after on the same principle
which guided the first--'a superior to head his house'. In this case there
would be the same public display which marked the first wife's marriage;
all the minor or secondary wives being introduced to the zeenahnah
privately; they are in consequence termed Dhollie[3] wives, or brought
home under cover.

Many great men appear to be close imitators of King Solomon, with whose
history they are perfectly conversant, for I have heard of the sovereign
princes in Hindoostaun having seven or eight hundred wives at one time in
their palaces. This is hearsay report only, and I should hope an
exaggeration.[4]

The first marriage is usually solemnized when the youth is eighteen, and
the young lady thirteen, or fourteen at the most; many are married at an
earlier age, when, in the opinion of the parents, an eligible match is to
be secured. And in some cases, where the parents on both sides have the
union of their children at heart, they contract them at six or seven years
old, which marriage they solemnly bind themselves to fulfil when the
children have reached a proper age; under these circumstances the children
are allowed to live in the same house, and often form an attachment for
each other, which renders their union a life of real happiness.

There are to be found in Mussulmaun society parents of mercenary minds,
who prefer giving their daughters in marriage as dhollie wives to noblemen
or men of property, to the preferable plan of uniting them with a husband
of their own grade, with whom the girl would most likely live without a
rival in the mud-walled tenement; this will explain the facilities offered
to a sovereign or nobleman in extending the numbers of his harem.

Some parents excuse themselves in thus disposing of their daughters on the
score of poverty, and the difficulty they find in defraying the expenses
of a wedding: this I concei