A TURKISH PICNIC.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume VIII, Issue 49, 5 December 1891, Page 648

A TURKISH PICNIC.

A PLEASANT side of Turkish girl life is that which may be seen any day in early summer at the Sweet Waters of Europe or some other favourite resort on the outskirts of Gonstantinople. The family will set out in the morning, and, spreading their rugs in some field, spend the day there doing nothing, and apparently very contented with the occupation. The women squat on the ground with their feet under them in that peculiar manner to which they are indebted for their bandy legs. It is not romantic, but truth conmels me to state that all Turkish girls ultimately become banuy-legged ; The fine well-made women one occasionally meets in Stamboul are mostly Circassians. A few cakes and some rahat lakhoum or other sweet suffices for young and old. A stranger is invariably struck with the prematurely serious air that Turkish children wear. The older girls do not play and run in the manner that English people expect of healthy children. They sit or stroll about, quietly and gravely, their yashmaks loosened and forming a snow-white framework which displays to advantage their complexion, as yet unspoilt by paint and powder. On the approach of a man they will hastily draw over their yashmak, not so close, however, that the stranger cannot admire their face if he has a fancy for Turkish beauty, which, though in girls and young women is sometimes very attractive, is too frequently of the half-bred Tartar type, intelligence and refinement.