The Nabab's seraglio was comparatively calm, but comparatively more gay. Every chamber was mildly lighted with fragrant silver and crystal lamps; there were fragrant flowers on the flower stands, over the pillars, and on the beds, the cushions and the persons of the inmates. The air was sick with the smell of the rose. No end of maids, clad in gold brocade, or in blue, yellow, black, or pale red chin cloth, were passing and repassing, their golden ornaments glittering in the light. Their fair mistresses sat each in her chamber, and all care and attention were engaged in making their toilette. That day, the Nabab would make merry with every one in his pleasure-house; there would be music and dancing; every one would that night obtain her desire. Some fair one (intending to secure a situation for her brother) was lustily applying the comb to her hair; another with the view of increasing the number of her maids had brought her curled locks down to her very breast; a third intended to secure some property in the shape of dower on behalf of her new-born son, and in order to make her neck blush, had rubbed it until blood had actually began to flow. Another woman envying a set of ornaments the Nabab had recently given to a favored mistress, was painting the under-lids of her eyes with kajjala through their whole lengths. A maid-servant in donning the cloth on the person of her gentle mistress, unwarily pressed her peshwaj[1] with her feet; and the gentle fair one administered her a goodly slap on her cheek. By the inexorable virtue of age, the hairs of some dame had grown rather thin, and a quantity came out with the comb which the maid had been applying to them. Seeing this, her mistress began to cry, the tears streaming down her cheeks.
- ↑ A piece of dress resembling the gown.
