It is quite necessary to give a few words of introduction to the following little story, as without it the meaning and drift of it would be quite unintelligible to many British readers. Not all are aware that it is the custom of Mohammedans of the upper classes to seclude their women from sight; so that to allow the face to be seen by any man except a husband or very near relative is accounted a shame and disgrace. This custom is called “pardah,” and it has spread beyond the Mohammedans to some of the Hindus, &c. A. L. O. E. has seen an old lady start from her seat as if in great alarm, and hide herself behind a chair, because an aged gentleman had chanced to come in sight. Sometimes sufferers are shut out from receiving medical aid on account of pardah. At this moment pardah is one of the greatest obstacles to baptism being received by one whom we believe to be quite convinced of the truth of Christianity, and whose husband is a noble-hearted Christian. Sometimes pardah is actually kept up by native _converts_; and this is a grievous hindrance to them, and besets their path with needless difficulties. There is in our mission church a little pardah room, indeed, in which women can, if they wish it, hear unseen; but how can a woman in pardah ever share the Holy Communion—how can she be actively useful amongst the heathen around her! Pardah is the napkin under which a few native converts would hide their talent, and one cannot but regard it rather as a kind of _fashion_, a piece of Oriental worldliness, than a token of superior delicacy of mind. A woman actually in the act of hiding her face will sometimes shock our feelings of refinement in some other way.