Perhaps one reason for preferring boys is that the girls marry so young, just as they might begin to be of some use to their mothers; and the father has to pay a sum of money to his daughter’s husband on her marriage. A son, on the other hand, does not generally marry till he is grown up, and then he almost invariably brings his little wife home and continues to live with his parents.
A greater reason is that the Persians are Muhammadans, as you have already heard, and in a Muhammadan country the men are allowed to treat the girls and women very badly, and parents who care at all for their girls must always feel great anxiety as to their future.
We shall never get the Persians to treat their girls and women much better till we teach them the religion of our loving Saviour, Who cares for us all equally and wants us to be equally kind to one another.
Persian boys and girls are white, almost as white as ourselves, though they generally have black hair and dark eyes. The chief difference in appearance between Tommy Jones and ‘Ali Muhammad is that Tommy wears trousers while ‘Ali Muhammad appears to wear a skirt. Tommy’s sister on the other hand wears a skirt, and ‘Ali Muhammad’s sister wears trousers.
The fact is that if ‘Ali Muhammad is a poor boy, his trousers are short and so very wide as to be practically a divided skirt. Indeed they catch like a skirt in running, so that if he wants to go fast he pulls one trouser-leg up out of the way. If he wears a coat at all, it is a long cotton one, or more probably two long cotton ones, reaching nearly to his knees and adding to the skirt-like appearance.
The sons of well-to-do men often wear frock coats with the skirts pleated all round almost like a kilt, so that in spite of their longer and narrower trousers they still have a look of wearing skirts.
[Illustration: LADIES’ OUT-DOOR AND IN-DOOR COSTUMES]
‘Ali Muhammad’s girdle too, which binds his coats to him and prevents their blowing about in the wind, is more suggestive of a sash than a belt. I once saw a little boy putting on his girdle on New Year’s Day. It was a long folded scarf or _shāl_ and he put one end round his waist while his brother took the other to the far end of the long room and drew it tight. Then my little friend turned round and round, so winding his _shāl_ round him, gradually moving up the room as the length grew less, and he finished by tucking in the end. But whether they wear long trousers or short ones, wide trousers or narrow ones, the boys all fasten them by drawing them up with a string round the hips--braces are not the fashion.