polka jacket

— All the dresses were en suite, and consisted of a pair of very full trousers, joined together half way up the leg, a robe called a yebek, with tight sleeves, and either opening half-way down the chest and then buttoning to the waist, or closed from the throat; the skirt is divided into three parts, the back hanging down so as to form a long train, the two front ones coming off into points which, as they showed me, they tuck into the scarf: this is twisted as a belt round the waist when they sit down, and held between their ankles when they walk; and as they shuffle along, never raising their feet from the ground, the ends do not drop down, as they would infallibly do with us. A polka jacket completes the costume. The embroidery on the dresses was literally sumptuous; what I most admired was a dove-coloured watered silk with a deep embroidery of wheat-ears in pure gold, the finest jeweller’s gold laid on in solid pieces for the leaves and ears, the stalks in gold thread.