PERSIAN CUSTOMS.

Northland Age, Volume V, Issue 16, 7 December 1908, Page 2

PERSIAN CUSTOMS.

Persia has long been one of the stumbling blocks in the way of perfect friendship between England and Russia, but by the recent agreement affairs appear to have been placed on a more stable footing. Some of the customs of Persia, according to a well-informed writer in "Harper's Magazine,'' appear very strange to our eyes. A Persian mounts hi's horse on the right side ; he writes from right to left. These may seem unimportant, trifling characteristics, but they are mentioned as forcible

illustrations of the radical and permanent difference between the nations of East and West. When one comes to study Persian life, three points are especially noticeable. One is the fact that it is essentially an out-of-door life ; another point is the seeming publicity of life there, the absence of reserve ; and thirdly, in direct contrast with this characteristic is the profound seclusion and mystery of the dome»* tic life of Persia.

A third ot the population of Persia is still composed of nomads, and amongst them are numerous beggars and dervishes, who travel from town to town mounted on asses, mules, or oxen ; they are generally hideously unkept and filthy, and claim alms on account of their sanctified rags. The most precious article fn Persia is water. Agriculture Is entirely dependent upon irrigation, and the absence of either rain or dew for ten months requires the expenditure of enormous labour to bring water from the mountains. In spite of this scarcity of water, public baths abound at Teheran, and everyone visits them at least once a week ; many do it daily. Christians are never permitted to enter the public baths—a point on which the Persians are far more fanatical than the Turks. The water in these baths becomes foul from frequent use and insufficient care to change it, and diseases are undoubtedly thus communicated. The out-of-door-ness of Teheran life is very noticeable. All • the shops are open to the streets like booths, the buyer standing outside, liable to be jostled- or run over by the bustling throng of the pedestrians and riders, porters, horses, and loaded mules. Even the schools’ are /open to the streets and the old master, with goggles on his I nose, glances alternately at the passers-by i'n the street and on the pupils seated on their heels in rows before him. As the evening approaches all the male population appears to be out bent on recreation. Ths tea-houses —of which there are a great number in Teheran—ale well patronised, and here one may listen to recitations from the poets and watch the public dancers, who by law are . invariably men. In the streets may be seen a crowd amused bv baboons dancing to the beat of tambourines, or a chained lioness put through her paces or lying fast asleep on the pavement. But the sight which always draws the. biggest crowd is a match of trained wrestlers or athletes exercising with clubs, at both of which the Persians are very expert.