Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 9, 1898.djvu/31

Rh the tray, and, looking to your host, you say: "Dēmi" (lit. "Always," meaning "May you ever live to do as much for me") ; but this must be omitted when a death has recently occurred in the household. To your "Dēmi," the reply is "Sherufta" ("I have been honoured by you"). You answer again: "Ta sherufta" (equivalent to "I also have been honoured by you"). Black Arab coffee is served in small cups just ere you leave. To produce this too quickly is as much as to say : "Pray, don't stay any longer." To omit any one of these tedious ceremonies on either side, before or after the special business of the call, is to insult host or guest. You must not — you cannot — hurry in the Lebanon. Among the poorer classes, women share in the hard outdoor manual labour of the men, as well as attend to indoor duties. Many of the ladies of the wealthier Druzes keep pretty much to their own apartments, and are seldom seen abroad, and then always with veiled faces. Indeed, the Druze women of all ranks wear fichus, which are to be drawn across the face at the approach af a male stranger. The sisterhood all through the mountains. Christian or Druze, is fond of jewellery ; and the amount of money locked up in coins, on head-dresses, necklaces, &c., is frequently considerable. The horns of silver or copper formerly worn by Druze brides have been bought up by curiosity-dealers, and are almost extinct. Old silver ornaments are, however, to be occasionally met with. When a child is born, it is rubbed with salt, or with oil in which green myrtle is ground. It is washed and tightly swaddled. The cradle is a curious structure, into which the child is so tightly strapped as to be unable to move hand or foot. It is unlucky to the child to rock an empty cradle. On coming into a room where lies a newly-born babe, it is unlucky not to salute it with "In the name of God, what a fine child !" If the name of God is omitted, the child is open to the influence of the Evil Eye, a thing fearfully dreaded everywhere. The same formula must be used on entering