allowed to grow to full length, so as to reach to the ground, or is
combed into a compact frizzled mop, which is the Papuan s pride and
glory. (46. On the Papuans, Wallace, The Malay Archipelago, vol. ii.
p. 445. On the coiffure of the Africans, Sir S. Baker, The Albert
N yanza, vol. i. p. 210.) In northern Africa a man requires a period
of from eight to ten years to perfect his coiffure. With other nations
the head is shaved, and in parts of South America and Africa even the
eyebrows and eyelashes are eradicated. The natives of the Upper Nile
knock out the four front teeth, saying that they do not wish to
resemble brutes. Further south, the Batokas knock out only the two
upper incisors, which, as Livingstone (47. Travels, p. 533.) remarks,
gives the face a hideous appearance, owing to the prominence of the
lower jaw; but these people think the presence of the incisors most
unsightly, and on beholding some Europeans, cried out, Look at the
great teeth! The chief Sebituani tried in vain to alter this fashion.
In various parts of Africa and in the Malay Archipelago the natives
file the incisors into points like those of a saw, or pierce them with
holes, into which they insert studs.
As the face with us is chiefly admired for its beauty, so with savages
it is the chief seat of mutilation. In all quarters of the world the
septum, and more rarely the wings of the nose are pierced; rings,
sticks, feathers, and other ornaments being inserted into the holes.
The ears are everywhere pierced and similarly ornamented, and with the
Botocudos and Lenguas of South America the hole is gradually so much
enlarged that the lower edge touches the shoulder. In North and South
America and in Africa either the upper or lower lip is pierced; and
with the Botocudos the hole in the lower lip is so large that a disc of
wood, four inches in diameter, is placed in it. Mantegazza gives a
curious account of the shame felt by a South American native, and of
the ridicule which he excited, when he sold his tembeta, the large
coloured piece of wood which is passed through the hole. In Central
Africa the women perforate the lower lip and wear a crystal, which,
from the movement of the tongue, has a wriggling motion, indescribably
ludicrous during conversation. The wife of the chief of Latooka told
Sir S. Baker (49. The Albert N yanza, 1866, vol. i. p. 217.) that
Lady Baker would be much improved if she would extract her four front
teeth from the lower jaw, and wear the long pointed polished crystal in
her under lip. Further south with the Makalolo, the upper lip is
perforated, and a large metal and bamboo ring, called a pelele, is worn
599