THE HAINANESE MIAO 47 



the porcupine, whose flesh is eaten, and whose shiny black 

 and white quills, often a foot long, have various uses. The 

 flying squirrel is a rarer victim, as only the poisoned dart shot 

 from the crossbow by a skilled hunter is quick enough to 

 strike it. Jungle fowl of all sorts are used for food. 



The fishing is usually done on a large scale. If a 

 youngster goes a-fishing, his outfit is a piece of bamboo and 

 a piece of hemp string with a noose on the end, where he 

 nooses his catch. But when the rivers are low a whole 

 village or perhaps several villages will join in a common 

 fishing expedition. Some of the men dam the river, others 

 go to the forest and come back laden with the bark of a 

 certain tree and a certain vine. These barks are pounded in 

 mortars until well macerated, mixed, and pounds and pounds 

 of the "medicine" are poured into* the river above the dam. 

 The mixture kills or stupifies the fish, which rise to the top of 

 the water and are easily secured. The catch often amounts 

 to a thousand-odd pounds of fish, not to mention crabs and 

 eels and other creatures. The fish are cleaned immediately 

 and the people eat them without fear although they say that 

 a chicken or duck that eats the entrails will sometimes die 

 from the poison. The fish not wanted for immediate con- 

 sumption are salted down with a variety of pooped rice and 

 kept for future use. This method may injure the small fish 

 in the river — undoubtedly it does injure them in the immediate 

 vicinity of the catching — but does not have any serious effect 

 on the total supply, apparently. 



The costume worn by the men differs very little from 

 that worn by an ordinary Chinese labourer except in the way 

 the coat fastens, as it laps a little to the left and fastens 

 slantingly down the front. The costume worn by the women 

 however, is the distinguishing feature of the people, and is a 

 very attractive outfit in its blue and red with touches of 

 other colours on the head kerchief. For a grown woman, the 

 costume consists of a kerchief, a coat and a short skirt, both 

 dark blue, and dark blue puttees. A narrow red silk girdle, 

 about an inch wide, woven by the women themselves and 

 ending in long fringe, is worn around the hips. The same 

 style of tie, only about a quarter of an inch wide, fastens 

 each puttee just below the knee. The material for the cloth- 

 ing is bought from the traders, and is a coarse, heavy, 

 unbleached cotton cloth. . The women dye the goods with 

 indigo and set the colour with pigs blood. The coat is made 

 quite like a Chinese woman's coat, but reaching to> the knees 

 and not lapping so far over to the side. A piece of turkey 

 red cotton is embroidered and put on as a narrow collar band ; 

 the bottoms of the rather loose sleeves are edged the same 



