[Illustration: WOMAN WITH UNDRESSED HAIR.]
[Illustration: ABYSSINIAN HAIR DRESSER.]
Abyssinian women have an extraordinary head of hair. The hair, though
not very long, is very bushy, so that it takes the capillary artist no
less than a day to succeed in reducing this forest into a small bulk.
As it requires some force to draw the comb through the hair, the
operation is painful, and this is why the Abyssinian women have it
performed every forty or fifty days only. The Abyssinian women of rank
pass their life in almost complete idleness, occupied almost
exclusively in bedecking themselves and in making or receiving calls.
It is not the same with the women of the people. They have many labors
to perform, and are the ones who manipulate the grains, hydromel and
beer, and grind pepper in the _matt-biett_. This latter operation is
very painful, and so they take the precaution to first close the
nostrils with plugs of cotton. Women who have children of a tender age
go at these operations with their progeniture upon the back, after the
manner of negro peoples.--_L'Illustration._
[Illustration: A PEPPER GRINDER.]
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