THE ADMIRALTY ISLANDS. 463 



on the chest and shoulders. These cicatrizations are in the form 

 of circular spots about the size of half-a-crown. 



Tattooing is almost entirely confined to the women, with 

 whom it is universal. Two males, however, were tattooed. One, 

 a small boy, had a simple ring-mark round one eye. The other, 

 an adult, had rings round both eyes. These were, however, 

 exceptional cases. The tattooing is not made up of fine dots or 

 pricks, but of a series of short lines or cuts.* The colour is an 

 indigo blue. The women are tattooed with rings round the eyes 

 and all over the face, and in diagonal lines over the upper part 

 of the front of the body, the lines crossing one another so as to 

 form a series of lozenge-shaped spaces. The tattooing is sparse 

 and scarcely visible at a short distance, and nowhere are the 

 marks placed so close to one another as to form coloured patches 

 on the body, as in Fijian women or Samoan men. 



The male natives occasionally had their chests and faces 

 reddened with a burnt red clay. Sometimes one lateral half of 

 the face is reddened, the other being left uncoloured. When 

 vermilion was given to the natives they put it on cleverly and 

 symmetrically in curved lines, leading from the nose under each 

 eye, showing that they understood how to use it with effect. I 

 had expected to find Magenta a popular article of trade, but it 

 was of no use at all. It is too transparent to show on a dark- 

 brown skin, and the natives rejected it directly they tried it. No 

 doubt the reason why they do not tattoo themselves is because 

 the tattooing would show so little. Perhaps it is on account of 

 their dark colour that Melanesians generally have adopted 

 cicatrization as a substitute so largely. 



No doubt the natives paint themselves elaborately on festive 

 occasions and in war time. They were fond of being painted, 

 and two natives who were painted on board all over with engine- 

 room oil-paint, yellow and green, in stripes and various facetious 

 designs, were delio-hted. 



The natives were also often coloured black, the colouring 

 matter used being an ore of manganese, which gives their bodies 

 a metallic lustre, like that given by plumbago or boot blacking. 



* Probably made with obsidian flakes. I am informed that the 

 Soloman Islanders are tattooed with short cuts thus made. 



