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h 



THE WESTERN DENES. 115 



Everybody knows that one of the characteristics of the aborio^inal 

 facies is the almost total absence of beard. Nevertheless, our 

 Denes evidently thought that nature had provided them with too 

 much of that appendage of manhood so much prized by the Aryan 

 races. kSo, to correct its work, they assiduously picked ofF the few 

 hairs that would grow on their chin and upper lip with small copper 

 pincers, which they constantly wore suspended from their neck. 

 In the same way, they used to trim their eyebrows, giving them the 

 ■tiniest possible shape. 



As for extraneous ornaments of every day wear, they consisted 

 mainly of haliotis ear-rings and nose pendants often of enormous 

 size, hanging from the perforated septum. These were common to 

 both sexes. The wives and daughters of influential persons wore, 

 also, bracelets hammered out of copper bartered from the coast 

 Indians. A sub-tribe of the Carriers did not consider these "jewels " 

 sufficient. Among them, to attain the j)lus ultra of feminine beauty 

 and be reputed something in society circles, women added to the 

 tattooing, ear-rings, nasal pendants and bracelets, a blunt wooden 

 peg or tabret passed through the lower lip, thereby jH-eventing its 

 contact with the teeth so as to give it the utmost possible promil^ 

 ence, somewhat after the fashion of the Papuans of New Guinea. 

 This cii-cu instance led to their being called " Babines," or " Lippy " 

 in corrupted French, by the early French-Canadians in the North- 

 West Company's employ, which name they have retained to this day. 



In common with the Nazarenes of old, men and women jmrted 

 their haii- in the middle and wox'e it at full length (exce[)t when in 

 mourning), the men letting it fall on their back tied together in a 

 knot when in repose, and rolled up like that of the Cliinese when 

 travelling, while women had it resting on the forepart of their 

 shoulders in two skilfully plaited tresses adorned with a species of 

 small, elongated shell, {Dentalium Indianorum) which was higlily 

 prized among the natives, and which they obtained from the coast 

 Indians^ On grand festival occasions, pei-sons of rank and influence 

 wore wigs made of plaited human hair in its natural length, inter- 



'The Nestorian Bishop of Samarkand, writing to the Catholics of Bagdad, says of the 

 'Tartar Karaites : " They do not wash their faces, nor cut their hair ; but plait and tie it to- 

 gether at the top of their heads."— Ftrfe, Aboutfaraije Chron : Syr. in Assemani. Volume 

 III, part 2, chapter ix, page 488. 



