have passed." He added, "I have heard your wish that the child should be called 'Miriam;' it is sufficient, and I am reconciled to having a daughter instead of a son, because she may thus take your name. If after three years you will undertake the charge of her and teach her even as you have been taught, I shall think myself happy."
He afterward explained to me that the messenger who had brought the false tidings to him of the birth of a son knew perfectly well that it was a daughter which had been born to him; "but," he added, "in this land people are so foolish that my servant was ashamed and afraid to announce to me, in public, the birth of a female child, for it is thought no honor to be the 'father of girls.'"[1]
He assured me that he did not himself entertain this prejudice, though he certainly showed more pleasure and pride in his sons than in his daughters. This was natural, for he had the opportunity of educating the former and training them according to the best of his judgment, while the latter were a subject of great perplexity to him. He had become convinced that the civilization of a country depends very much on the character and position of its women, and he had liberal and enlightened notions about the advantageous influences of female education and freedom, but he did not know how to take any steps in the way of reform. He wisely observed that any sudden change would be dangerous, and lead to more harm than good. This was a subject on which I also had thought deeply and seriously. I found it rather difficult to come to any practical conclusions.
Reform in any system or institution, to be safe and sure, and on a firm foundation, must arise naturally and from
- ↑ Not only among the Moslems does this prejudice exist, but among the native Christian population also; and I am assured that in Southern Italy the same feeling prevails. Miss Cobbe, in an article on "Women in Italy, 1862," says: "An English lady, long resident in Naples, and married to a Neapolitan, informed me that till quite of late years it was customary among the poorer classes to hang a small black flag out of the window of the apartment wherein a girl was born, to save the painful necessity of informing inquirers of the unfortunate sex of the infant."
