No dressmaker had ever played
fantastic tricks with it: it was pure and simple in its entireness as it
came from the loom.
Other women, of the laboring class, and very poor, passed to and fro on
the street, half naked, their legs and shoulders bare, and with only a
piece of dirty cloth--blue, red, or yellow--around the loins and hips;
while here and there some superfine baboo's wife floated past in her
close palanquin, or sat with her children on the flat roof of her house,
or peeped through her narrow windows into the street, arrayed in fancy
bodice and petticoat,--Mohammedan fashion.
But the simplicity of Mrs. Karlee's attire began and ended with her
drapery. Her ornaments were cumbersome, clumsy, and grotesque. On her
arms and ankles were many fetter-like bands of silver and copper; rude
rings of gold and silver adorned her fingers and great toes; small
silver coins were twisted in her hair; and the naturally delicate
outline of her lips was deformed by a broad gold ring, which she wore,
like a fractious ox, in her nose. This latter vanity is as precious as
it is ugly; in some of the minor castes its absence is regarded as a
badge of widowhood; and for no inducement would the pious ayah have
removed it from its place, even for an instant.
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