CULTURE OP PEOPLE OF SOUTHEASTERN PANAMA 103 



also the example of cultural practice enforced by tribal tradition — all 

 these factors, probably others as well, have been causal in developing 

 the peculiar ornamental and protective bodily coverings and sus- 

 pended appendages employed by the Indian tribes of Darien. 



Wafer writes about the apparel of the interior tribes as he found 

 them in the late seventeenth century: 



The men go ordinarily quite naked, without so much as a clout about them, 

 which few other Indians are without. But these have only a small vessel of 

 gold or silver, if they are able, or at least a piece of plantain-leaf, conicle like 

 a candle snuffer. They forceably bear back the penis within its own tegu- 

 ment, close to the pubes ; and they keep it there with this funnel tied hard 

 upon it, with a string coming from it, and going about their waists. 



Such use of a penis cap was clearly a protective measure asso- 

 ciated, according to the same and other writers, with a sense of mod- 

 esty or shame regarding exposure. Another peculiar combination 

 of the moral factor and the associated protective function of apparel 

 may be witnessed to-day among the Guaymies inhabiting the region 

 west and north of the Canal Zone. In the mountains and valleys 

 several thousand Guaymies live scattered on the plains and in the 

 forest. These were early brought under the influence of Catholic 

 missions, but have gone back to ancient ways. The long flowing 

 gown of the women, tight at the neck, represents a feeling of 

 shame, but they still wear the primitive bark skirt underneath it. 

 When rain approaches, women strip off their long robe, wrap their 

 clothes in a large Heliconia leaf and place the parcel on their 

 heads. Men do the same on the hunt. They hang their blue trousers 

 to a limb and wrap the shirt around their loins. 



R O. Marsh describes the garb of a male Indian encountered at 

 Yavisa on the lower Chucunaque that features the ornamental 

 factor of bodily covering rather than its protective functions. The 

 Indian is described as wearing about his head a circlet one inch or 

 more broad ; about his body, profuse strings of white and gaily 

 colored beads placed in symmetrical design over the right shoulder 

 and under the left arm, and repeating the arrangement over the 

 left shoulder and under the right arm, forming a broad band four 

 to five inches wide crossing over his upper chest ; lower down on 

 his chest were two parallel bead bands each two inches wide, reaching 

 down to the waist muscles on his side and crossing in front on his 

 lower chest region, exposing a strip of flesh between; around his 

 abdomen and hips like a low hung belt, was another band of bead 

 strings six inches wide, running underneath the small shield-like 

 breech cloth. On his wrists were apparently solid silver bands 

 three inches wide; four or more tassels of beads about a foot long 

 and suspended from the upper chest bands hung vertically down at 



