On other days they may be "on a journey," or asleep.
Whenever a Nuisairiyeh woman is in sorrow or trouble or fear, she goes to the zeyareh and cries in a piteous tone, "zeyareh, hear me!" Their women do not veil themselves, and consequently there is more of freedom among them than among Moslems and Druzes, and in their great festivals, men and women all dance together.
When a young man sees a girl who pleases him, he bargains with her father, agreeing to pay from twenty dollars to two hundred, according to the dignity of her family; of which sum she receives but four dollars, unless her father should choose to give her a red bridal box and bedding for her outfit.

She rides in great state to the bridegroom's house amid the firing of guns and shouts of the women, and on dismounting, the bridegroom gives her a present of from one to three dollars, called the "dismounting money." Divorce needs only the will of the man, and polygamy is common.

Lane says in speaking of Egypt, "The depraving effects of this freedom of divorce upon both sexes, may be easily imagined.

There are many men in this country who, in the course of ten years, have married as many as twenty, thirty or more wives; and women, not far advanced in age, who have been wives to a dozen or more men successively." The Nusairiyeh women smoke, swear, and use the most vile and unclean language, and even go beyond the men in these respects.

Swearing and lying are universal not only among the Nusairiyeh, but among the most of the Syrian people.