other arm. Their caps are
made of pasteboard covered with gay-colored silk, embroidered and
studded with precious stones or pearls. The form of a Parsee's shirt
is a matter of vital importance, both in regard to respectability and
religion. It must have five seams, neither more nor less, and be made
to lap on the breast exactly in a certain way. Both sexes wear around
the body a double string, which they loosen when at prayer, and which
a Parsee is never, under any circumstances, permitted to dispense
with. No engagement or business transaction is legally binding if by
any chance this talismanic cord was left off by either party when the
contract was made. The cord is first placed on children when they have
completed their ninth year, and this serves to mark the most important
epoch of their lives. Before the investiture the eating of food with
Christians or heathen does not defile the juvenile Parsee, and girls
may even go about in public with their fathers; but after the bestowal
of the sacred cord the girls must be kept in seclusion and the boys
eat only with their own people.

Only the most liberal Parsees will permit those of other creeds to eat
under the same roof with themselves, and even these never eat at the
table with their guests. The table is first covered for the visitors,
and they are waited on with the utmost assiduity, often by the members
of the family in addition to the servants. When the guests leave the
board not only is the cloth changed, but the table itself is washed
before being recovered: salts, castors and other similar articles are
all emptied and washed, and the table newly laid in every particular.
Small flat cakes are distributed round the board to do service as
plates, and the various dishes arranged in the centre within reach of
all. The family then wash hands and faces and the father says a short
prayer, after which all take their seats and the meal begins. Neither
knives nor forks are used, but the meat is torn from the bones with
the fingers only, and with the left hand each one dips, from time to
time, bread, meat or vegetables into the broth or gravy as he wishes,
and then tosses it into his mouth, without allowing his fingers to
touch his lips. This requires some dexterity, and children are not
permitted at the family board till they have learned thus to acquit
themselves. If, however, the fingers of any one, child or adult,
should chance to come in contact with the lips, though ev