4 PROCEEDINGS OF THE ANATOMICAL AND ANTHROPOLOGICAL 



dealing with the native in his primitive state, before he was brought 

 into contact with the new ideas and customs of Christianity or 

 civilisation. 



Physically the Yao is the most powerful of the tribes I have 

 mentioned. His tall strong frame, his broad-shaped skull, his 

 features often with little of the negro type about them, his general air 

 of strength and intelligence easily mark him off from his neighbours. 

 The Yao tribal mark consists of a few short tattoo lines running down 

 the centre of his forehead, and one or two similar marks on either 

 temple. The Mang'anja, on the other hand, displays a broad 

 cicatrix sometimes two or three drawn from the middle of his 

 forehead down over his cheeks and neck to meet in the middle of his 

 back. His lips and chin, as well as his breast, are not unfrequently 

 covered with such marks. The Angoni is recognised by a hole bored 

 in the lobe of the ear, into which a small plug of horn or wood is 

 inserted, while the Anguru makes a large crescent-shaped cicatrix on 

 either cheek, and often also in the middle of the forehead, sometimes 

 cut so deep that I have known a man take the quid of tobacco from 

 his mouth and lay it in the hollow of the cicatrix while he was 

 speaking. The Yao women bore the upper lip and gradually distend 

 the opening till a piece of wood, ivory, or even stone, an inch and a 

 half or two inches in diameter, may be inserted, causing the lip to 

 protrude in what to us is a hideous custom, but to them is the 

 fashion and fashion reigns supreme there as elsewhere. The 

 Mang'anja women also follow this custom, and so too the Anguru, 

 but the latter, in order to further enhance their charms, bore the 

 under lip and insert a brass nail five or six inches long which hangs 

 down over the chin. Sometimes the weight of the lip ornament 

 breaks through the flesh of the upper lip. In this case the defect is 

 repaired by plastering the two ends together with a piece of India- 

 rubber a rough method of surgery which has the desired effect of 

 keeping the ornament in its place. 



The primitive garment of the Yao is made of bark cloth. A roll 

 of bark of the mjombo tree is stripped off by beating it with a piece 



