For Trying The Parity Of Gold, They Use The
Touch-Stone As With Us, But With This Addition:
Having first rubbed the
gold to be tried on the touch-stone, they rub over the mark with a
Ball
of some sort of composition resembling wax, by which all that is not
fine gold disappears, and the marks or spots of gold remain, by which
they have an exact proof of the fineness of the gold. When the ball
becomes full of gold, they melt it in the fire, to recover the gold
which it contains; yet are these men very ignorant even of the art which
they profess. In buying or selling merchandise they employ the agency of
brokers; so that the buyer and seller each employs a separate broker.
The seller takes the buyer by the hand, under cover of a scarf or veil,
where, by means of the fingers, counting from one to a hundred thousand
privately, they offer and bargain far the price till they are agreed,
all of which passes in profound silence.
The women of this country suckle their children till three months old,
after which they feed them on goats milk. When in the morning they have
given them milk, they allow them to tumble about on the sands all foul
and dirty, leaving them all day in the sun, so that they look more like
buffaloe calves than human infants; indeed I never saw such filthy
creatures. In the evening they get milk again.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 167 of 842
Words from 44898 to 45148
of 230997
