ROCKY MOUNTAIN MEDICAL ASSOCIATION. 5 I 
cultivated the soil, and in the exercise of forethought 
in laying up provisions in summer for consumption 
leggings, but an additional large dressed skin or skins which they 
suspended from the shoulder and wrapped around the body. This 
also served as a couch at night. Among primitive races, where the 
great struggle of life is to provide food and to defend themselves 
against the attacks of rapacious animals, it is natural that clothing 
would receive but little consideration except for protection. If it be 
true that civilization multiplies our wants, religion supplies motives 
for human conduct which elevates the race ; the two add a new 
motive for dress by educating a sense of shame, which places the 
reason for clothing the body largely under the control of the mind. 
An inquiry into the dress of uncivilized races shows that the parts first 
covered by them are undoubtedly those requiring protection. A 
taste for ornamenting the body by painting, tattooing, anointing, and by 
decorations, such as wearing beads and strings of trophies of various 
kinds around the neck and limbs, is practiced by all primitive races. 
The apron or kilt is often used more as an adornment of the body 
than from any other motive. Much care is taken by most savage 
tribes to decorate the head, and to arrange the hair in a fanciful 
manner. Frequently the head and neck are dressed with elaborate 
care, while the rest of the body is left entirely uncovered. The apron 
is generally worn in front, but sometimes behind ; some wear two, one 
in front and the other behind, while others wear two but suspend them 
from the sides, and frequently they fail to meet in front and in the 
rear. It is true, however, that the use of an apron or breech-clout of 
some kind is among the earliest articles of dress worn ; perhaps next 
in order is the sandal, or moccasin, and particularly by males among 
tribes that live by the chase. The youth of both sexes of most unciv- 
ilized races in tropical regions are left entirely without clothing. 
About the age of puberty, and more from a desire of decorating the 
body than from any sense of propriety or shame, the apron is put on, 
but its use is not considered a matter of consequence or its omission 
an impropriety. The two sexes dress nearly in the same manner. 
It is generally known that among the Chinese and Japanese, and in- 
deed other eastern peoples, the same dress, nearly, serves for the two 
sexes. A wonderful advance has taken place in the ethics of dress 
since the advent of Christianity, but it cannot be denied that much of 
the love of dress is due to the mental delight and satisfaction it affords 
