582 ANNUAL. REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1911. 



skillfully tailored, as in our county. It adapts itself to the shoul- 

 ders, and is fitted to the neck by a cord passed through a fold in the 

 upper border of the piece of goods. The mantle and the skirt com- 

 prise the entire costume. 



The Chinese at one time offered for sale their cotton fabrics and 

 recently those imported from Europe. The Lolos now purchase 

 these, and even in the remote districts of Leang Shan nearly all the 

 men wear cotton pantaloons and blouse, and the women wear a skirt 

 and waist of like material. I have, however, in the mountains of 

 Mao Nieou Shan seen some women slaves wearing coarse, gray or 

 black, woolen petticoats, which are never white, though you fre- 

 quently see white mantles. The petticoats are the natural color of 

 the wool. I have not ascertained whether the Lolos know the art of 

 dyeing fabrics, but at the present time, however it may have been 

 heretofore, it is certain that for a long period the cotton fabrics 

 spotted with bright colors (red, green, blue, and violet), which the 

 women as well as the men have sought for the turban and their 

 blouse, have been furnished by the Chinese. Once, says Vou Ka, 

 the turban of the young man, as well as the hat of the young woman, 

 or the bonnet of the young girl, were of wool. The fleece of his 

 sheep furnished the Lolo with all his clothing, even his head 

 covering. 



The carpenter is the man who is but little employed, who works 

 both with the hoe in the field and with the axe in the village. The 

 squaring of timbers tor structural work is so primitive, mortising so 

 rarely done, the framing so rudimentary, by simply laying beams 

 together to hold them in place, that it is useless to look for art from 

 the Lolo carpenter. 



As to what we term a cabinet maker, that profession is never 

 found among those tribes, for the simple reason that the Lolo con- 

 siders all furniture as useless. 



The shoemaker would have little to do, for the Lolo either goes 

 barefooted or wears straw sandals that nearly anyone can plait. 



The blacksmith trade is the most important of all. Hoes are 

 needed for the farmer, as well as a small plowshare, a very primi- 

 tive kind of implement borrowed from the Chinese. And above all, 

 the Lolo must have iron heads for lances and arrows, and ordinary 

 blades for cutlasses, fine blades being purchased from the Tibetans. 



The blacksmiths make nothing at all for structural work, not even 

 hinges or handles for the doors; not a nail or a bolt — some strips of 

 bamboo or bindweed answering for all these things. This is because 

 the simple Lolo house is built as by a turn of the hand and can be 

 completed in a day. This fact was proved by me several times, and 

 I was not at all astonished in the case .of the ordinary hut, the real 

 home of the primitive mountaineer. Of course, more care is taken 



