SKETCHES FROM STERSDAL. 915 
owing to his national peculiarities and independence of 
bearing. 
He wears his hair cropped close, ‘stiff, like the bristles 
of a pig; but in front, bordering on the forehead, he 
allows it to grow into a pigtail (or spdr), which he 
takes a pride in plaiting and twisting behind the ear. 
He is as proud of his pigtail as the Oriental of his 
beard, and would not part with this ornament at any 
price ; and the principal cause of his dislike to soldier- 
ing is a fear of the brutal military scissors, which would 
clip off his pride, his joy, his darling pigtail, the moment 
he is enrolled. He differs from the Indian only in this, 
that the one wears his pigtail in front—the other farther 
back. With both people it has a sort of challenging 
air about it; but in the one case it refers to a scalp, in 
the other to an eye. In a fight, for instance, the 
Seetersdal peasant, with that precision and certainty 
which only long habit can give, seizes with his fore- 
finger the pigtail of his enemy, and with his thumb 
endeavours, and often succeeds, in gouging out his eye. 
Many a living testimony now wanders about with one 
eye, as Odin, a victim to the conservative predilections 
of his opponent for eye-squeezing. Not unfrequently, 
too, the nose and ear bear marks of the contest. To 
bite off and swallow his opponent’s nose or ear is 
thought just as little of as squeezing out his eye, and is 
not considered as any disgrace in a Setersdal fight. 
