It is true that some destitute parents among the refugees from the Caucasus are willing to part with their young girls for a reasonable sum of money, but only on obtaining a sufficient guarantee beforehand that these young girls will be adopted by the buyers (well-to-do families without daughters often adopt orphans and other poor girls), or else that the girls sold in this fashion will be married either by the buyers themselves or by some relation of theirs.
From the moment of the final conquest of their country by Russia up to the present time, thousands of these natives of the Caucasus have immigrated into the Sultan's dominions. A short time ago there appeared a piece of news in the papers, stating that an arrangement had been made between Russian and Ottoman authorities for the settlement in Turkey of about sixty thousand more Circassians who desired to leave the Caucasus _en masse_. Russia does not object to their emigration nowadays, as she wishes to colonise their land with peasants of the Russian race. On the other hand, the Turkish Government grants them facilities for settling in the thinly inhabited portions of Asia Minor. The Circassians are a healthy and hardy people, and they improve the physical constitution of races with whom they intermingle.
An English reader will naturally want to know how, in a state of affairs in which boys and girls never meet after about their thirteenth year, the matter of marriage is managed; I will therefore explain the system of matrimony.
As is the case in most parts of the world, in Turkish towns betrothal precedes marriage, but 'courtship' is hardly possible in that country. Young girls and men are not allowed to meet one another, and consequently anything in the way of flirting is out of the question. In some exceptional cases they may, perhaps, be able to get a glimpse of each other from a distance, possibly from the windows of neighbouring houses, and quietly exchange greetings or make signs of mutual admiration, but this is all they can ever do in the direction of flirtation. Of course, girls may see, though they do not speak with, the men whose wives they may be destined to become some day, but men are strictly prohibited from meeting the marriageable members of the secluded sex. It is scarcely possible for a man to admire and love a woman except on the testimony of others as to her good looks and good qualities. In the same way, the engagements must be made through the medium of the man's lady-relations, or through that of the professional marriage-brokers. The latter are mostly old women, who will endeavour to bring about marriages, not out of good-will to the young couple or for the sake of amusing themselves, but as a matter of business. They visit houses where there are girls suitable for a would-be bridegroom; they make their proposal on his behalf to the family of that young lady of whom they most approve, a proposal which is made in a most roundabout manner, and with great tact. The answer must not come from the prospective bride; that would be considered highly improper. The decision rests with her parents or guardians. She is, no doubt, consulted, but her voice in the matter is of secondary importance. Probably, too, she does not know her own mind so well as do her sisters in more advanced lands. The matrimonial agent often repeats her visits three or four times that the matter may be well talked over, as the girl's people need to reflect, and also to make a searching inquiry about the man. If the answer be in the negative, it must be made very tactfully and politely. In some parts of Turkey they have a curious way of letting the proposers know that their offer has been declined. Over their ordinary shoes people almost always wear goloshes, and on entering a house they take them off and leave them in the entrance-hall. The servants of the house make a point of arranging the goloshes heel outwards, in such a way that when the visitor goes out he can put his feet straight into them, without having the trouble of turning them round. Now, when the agent of suitor for a lady's hand, on leaving the house, finds that her goloshes are turned with the toes towards her, she knows that the proposal has been declined.