656 THE DESCENT OF MAN. 



is the Papuan's pride and glory."* In Northern Africji '* a 

 man requires a period of from eight to ten years to perfect 

 his coilfure/' With other nations the head is shaved, and in 

 parts of South America and Africa even the eyebrows and 

 eyelashes are eradicated. The natives of the Upper Nile 

 knock out the four front teeth, saying that tliey do not 

 wish to resemble brutes. Farther south the Batokas knock 

 out only the two upper incisors, which, as Livingstonef 

 remarks, gives the face a hideous appearance, owing to the 

 prominence of the lower jaw; but these people think the 

 presence of the incisors most unsightly, and on beholding 

 some Europeans, cried out: *^ Look at the great teeth V 

 The chief Sebituani tried in vain to alter this fashion. In 

 various parts of Africa and in the Malay Archipelago the 

 natives file the incisors into points like those of a saw, or 

 pierce them with holes, into which they insert studs. 



As the face with us is chiefly admired for its beauty, so 

 with savages it is the chief seat of mutilation. In all 

 quarters of the world the septum, and more rarely the 

 wings of the nose are pierced; rings, sticks, feathers and 

 other ornaments being inserted into the holes. The ears are 

 everywhere pierced and similarly ornamented, and with the 

 Botocudos and Lenguas of South America the hole is 

 gradually so much enlarged that the lower edge touches 

 the shoulder. In North and South America and in Africa 

 either the upper or lower lip is pierced; and with the Boto- 

 cudos the hole in the lower lip is so large that a disk of wood, 

 four inches in diameter, is placed in it. Mantegazza gives 

 a curious account of the shame felt by a South American 

 native, and of the ridicule which he excited, when he sold his 

 tembeta the large colored piece of wood which is passed 

 through the hole. In Central Africa the Avomen perforate 

 the lower lip and wear a crystal, which, from tlie movement 

 of the tongue, has ''^ a wriggling motion, indescribably ludi- 

 crous during conversation. '' The wife of the chief of Latooka 

 told Sir S. Baker, ;[ that Lady Baker ^' would be much im- 

 proved if slie would extract her four front teeth from the 

 lower jaw and wear the long-pointed polished crystal in her 



*0n the Papuans, Wallace, "The Malay Archipelago," vol. li, p. 

 445. On the coiffure of the Africans, Sir S. Baker, "The Albert 

 N'yanza," vol. i, p. 210. 



+ "Travels," p. 533. 



\ ' The Albert N'j^anza," 1866, vol. i, p. 317. 



