Isabella Bird
Isabella Bird
Isabella Lucy Bird, married name Bishop FRGS, was a nineteenth-century English explorer, writer, photographer and naturalist. With Fanny Jane Butler she founded the John Bishop Memorial hospital in Srinagar. She was the first woman to be elected Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionExplorer
Date of Birth15 October 1831
baghdad deformed figures hands seen women wrinkled
If one's memories of Baghdad women were only of those to be seen in the streets, they would be of leathery, wrinkled faces, prematurely old, figures which have lost all shape, and henna-stained hands crinkled and deformed by toil.
barking breaks call falls melancholy women
Only the long melancholy call to prayer, or the wail of women over the dead, or the barking of dogs, breaks the silence which at sunset falls as a pall over Baghdad.
asserting children complete extinction gaining greed imitations independence men painful seen states ten western women
One of the most painful things in the Western States and Territories is the extinction of childhood. I have never seen any children - only debased imitations of men and women, cankered by greed and selfishness, and asserting and gaining complete independence of their parents at ten years old.
age attain begin carry change clothes drop except extreme harsh healthy laughter noisy pounds seldom sixty till voices wash weights women year
The Tibetans are dirty. They wash once a year and, except for festivals, seldom change their clothes till they begin to drop off. They are healthy and hardy; even the women can carry weights of sixty pounds over the passes. They attain extreme old age; their voices are harsh and loud, and their laughter is noisy and hearty.
further grey
Yokohama does not improve on further acquaintance. It has a dead-alive look. It has irregularity without picturesqueness, and the grey sky, grey sea, grey houses, and grey roofs, look harmoniously dull.
few groves pacific people seeing sight suppose time
I suppose that few people ever forget the first sight of a palm-tree of any species. I vividly remember seeing one for the first time at Malaga, but the coco-palm groves of the Pacific have a strangeness and witchery of their own.
afternoon below crowds endless except hurry japan life noisy passes remains
Malacca is such a rest after the crowds of Japan and the noisy hurry of China! Its endless afternoon remains unbroken except by the dreamy, colored, slow-moving Malay life which passes below the hill. There is never any hurry or noise.
degraded devoid elements indian solve till treachery treated
The Americans will never solve the Indian problem till the Indian is extinct. They have treated them after a fashion which has intensified their treachery and 'devilry' as enemies, and as friends reduces them to a degraded pauperism, devoid of the very first elements of civilization.
colour dazzling exceeding heartily leave skies stirring topics
I was heartily sorry to leave Leh, with its dazzling skies and abounding colour and movement, its stirring topics of talk, and the culture and exceeding kindness of the Moravian missionaries. Helpfulness was the rule.
account attained buffalo desperate dignity gambling gigantic grand popular rare reserved source sports tiger
Cock-fighting, which has attained to the dignity of a literature of its own, is the popular Malay sport; but the grand sport is a tiger and buffalo fight, reserved for rare occasions, however, on account of its expense. Cock-fighting is a source of gigantic gambling and desperate feuds.
barbarous brutally divers flower flowers grace grotesque individuality lace piece rings series stiff
Can anything be more grotesque and barbarous than our 'florists' bouquets,' a series of concentric rings of flowers of divers colours, bordered by maidenhair and a piece of stiff lace paper, in which stems, leaves, and even petals are brutally crushed, and the grace and individuality of each flower systematically destroyed?
aboriginal besides best books chiefly close customs ground historical publish strongly urged
At the close of my visit, my Hawaiian friends urged me strongly to publish my impressions and experiences, on the ground that the best books already existing, besides being old, treat chiefly of aboriginal customs and habits now extinct, and of the introduction of Christianity and subsequent historical events.
filled foot hole puts series track
An elephant always puts his foot into the hole which another elephant's foot has made so that a frequented track is nothing but a series of pits filled with mud and water.
balancing clerk extensive frequently generally himself leg marble morning owner paper roof seated seen store supported
An American store is generally a very extensive apartment, handsomely decorated, the roof frequently supported on marble pillars. The owner or clerk is seen seated by his goods, absorbed in the morning paper - probably balancing himself on one leg of his chair, with a spittoon by his side.