With the former I rode, played chess, and engaged in such sports as are not forbidden to my profession; but my female cousins I seldom saw, as they rarely left their Zenana, into which I was not permitted to enter.

The Zenana then caught my eye, and I felt irresistibly impelled to enter it.

"She had by this time approached a small gate, which communicated with the apartments on the ground-floor of the Zenana; when, turning to me, she said, "You can return the way you came, but I must leave you here;" and, making a slight bow, she sprung like a young fawn through the gate, and was out of sight in a moment.

"The next day I went to the garden betimes; and as it communicated with the shrubbery and grounds attached to the Zenana, and the males of the family occasionally entered it when the ladies were not present, I prevailed on the gardener to grant me admission, under the pretext of gathering some uncommonly fine mangoes, which were then ripe.

During a vacation, Gurameer, being on a visit to an uncle in the country, one day, when the family had gone to witness a grand spectacle in honour of an important festival in their calendar, which he could not himself attend consistently with the rules of his caste, was tempted to visit the deserted Zenana, or ladies' apartment, where he accidentally meets with a beautiful young female.

The Zenanas are supplied with everything that can please and gratify a reasonable wish, and it is well known that the women of the East have influence and power, more flattering and solid, than the free unsecluded beauties of the Western world.]

The following morning, before presenting ourselves to Aman ul Mulk, we sent him the following presents, viz., a Waziri horse, two revolvers, a pair of binoculars, several pieces of chintz and linen, twenty pounds of tea, sugar, salt, and several pairs of shoes of Peshawar manufacture, as well as trinkets for his zenana.

We came to the conclusion that the mistress of this abode must have been a Eurasian lady, probably one of the zenana of the master of the house, who during the exodus from the city had fled with, or been forcibly carried away by, her protector.

They afterwards sold at a good price, and I possessed myself of some twenty of the most beautiful, comprising portraits of Zeenat Mahal, the favourite wife of the King, other ladies of the zenana, and pictures of the Taj and Jama Masjid, besides other mosques throughout India.

There are those who know tint he was strangled by one of those wretches, that a grave was dug for him under the marble floor of his zenana, a grave in which his bones were found less than a year ago, in my presence, and fitly entombed at my bidding.

In zenana families even the most devoted husband has little voice in his wife's movements, as all arrangements are left in the hands of the mother-in-law.

Quite close to the zenana there was a large kitchen garden which supplied all the vegetables consumed daily in the house; and so plentiful was the produce that large trays filled with vegetables were sent out every day as presents to friends, relatives and to the neighbouring temples.

They had their romances and their tragedies, and although the Mohammedan custom kept them closely imprisoned in the zenanas, they nevertheless exerted a powerful influence in arranging the destinies of the Mogul empire.

No man is ever admitted to the zenanas, no matter what may happen, and thousands upon thousands, yes, millions upon millions, of poor creatures have suffered and died for lack of ordinary medical attention because of the etiquette of caste.

The missionaries who work in the zenanas, or harems, of India tell me that the prejudice and resistance they are compelled to overcome is much stronger and more intolerant among women than among men, for the former have never had an opportunity to see the outside of their homes; have never come in contact with foreigners and modern ideas, and are perfectly satisfied with their condition.

As I told you in a previous chapter, ninety per cent of the Hindu population of India will not admit men physicians to their homes to see women patients, and the only relief that the wives, mothers and daughters and sisters in the zenanas can obtain when they are ill is from the old-fashioned herb doctors and charm mixers of the bazaars.

In an English country-house of 1650, there were no magazines, no newspapers, no lawn tennis or croquet, no afternoon-teas or glee-concerts, no mothers' meetings or zenana missions, no free social intercourse with neighbours, none of the thousand and one agreeable diversions with which the life of a modern girl is diversified.

Teach the Zenana Woman and Purdah Lady to Come Forth instead of Bring Forth.

We made a fairly early start, getting off about six, and, having skirted the town and passed the neat little Zenana Mission Hospital, we had a pretty but uneventful march of some six miles to Bawan, where, under a big chenar, we halted for the greater part of the day.

THE NAJINA MASJID.On the left of the throne-room, at the end of the corridor, is a door leading into a small mosque of white marble, built by Aurangzîb for the ladies of the zenana.

Small wonder that seclusion became the order of the daya woman would better spend her life behind the purdah of her own home than be added to the zenana of her conqueror.

Think of Nur Jahan's descendants, hidden in the zenanas of India.

All that was a part of yesterdaya story of rise and fall; of woman's repression, with outbursts of greatness; of countless treasures of talent and possibilities unrecognized and undeveloped, hidden behind the doors of Indian zenanas.

As he paced up and down beneath the tamarind trees, pondering the problem of India's womanhood, shut in the zenanas beyond the reach of the Gospel which he was bringing to the little villages, there fell at his feet a feather from a vulture's wing.

He told her of the millions of girls shut up in those "citadels of heathenism," the zenanas of India,a problem which only Christian women might hope to solve.