Chapter LII: Appendix: XIII

FEMALE BRIGANDAGE.

Millingen remarks in "Wild Life amongst the Koords"—Amongst the many acts of brigandage of which the Koords are guilty—a peculiar kind of highway robbery must here be stated, which is probably unparalleled. The culprits, the brigands, are in this case young women, who set out on plundering pursuits in order to turn a dishonest penny. A troop of fair bandits take up a station at the side of a road, there patiently to await for the arrival of the doomed traveller. As soon as the vedettes announce his approach, the fair troop starts off to meet him, welcoming him with dances and with fiery glances of irresistible power. He is compelled to stop, as a matter of course, and the fair maids then politely request him to alight. No sooner has the bewildered victim put his feet on the ground than he finds himself at close quarters with the whole troop. Immediately he is stripped of all he has on his back, and is left in that primitive state in which Adam was at one time. Then begins a series of dances and fascinating gestures in the style of those performed by the maids at the Lupercalian games, the object of which is to make the unfortunate victim lose his self-control. An attempt, however, on the part of the victim to reciprocate the advances of his alluring tyrants, becomes instantly fatal. The troop get hold of him in a summary way, declare him to have made attempts on the virtue of the fair maids, and condemn him to be pricked with thorns upon a very sensitive part of his person. These dances and the flagellations, which serve as entractes, are repeated several times over, till the sufferer, exhausted and bleeding, is nearly in a fainting condition. Then the female troop of bandits drag the wretched traveller before a court of matrons, which holds its sittings somewhere in the neighbourhood. There a charge of attempting a criminal assault is brought against the pretended culprit, who not only receives a good dose of upbraiding, but is also condemned to pay a fine.