3*8 AN ACCOUNT OF 
CHAPTER XXVI. 
Of the People and their Cufioms.—-Of their Marriages. — Of 
their Funerals .— Of their Religion.—General Character of 
the Natives. 
H E natives of thefe iflands are a flout, well-made 
people, rather above the middling flature; their com¬ 
plexions are of a far deeper colour than what is underflood 
by the Indian copper, but not black.—Their hair is long and 
flowing, rather difpofed to curl, which they moflly form into 
one large loofe curl round their heads ; fome of the women, 
who have remarkably long hair, let it hang loofe down their 
backs.—It has already been obferved, that the men were en¬ 
tirely naked; the women wore only two little aprons, or 
rather thick fringes, one before and one behind, about ten 
inches deep and feven wide ; thefe were made of the hufks 
of the cocoa-nut flripped into narrow flips, which they dyed 
Sa plate V. with different fhades of yellow : this, their only drefs, they 
J' g 4 ’ tied round their waifls, commonly with a piece of line, though 
fuch as were of higher rank ufed a firing of fome kind of 
beads; the one figured in plate VI. fig. i, was of a coarfe fort 
of cornelian, and was worn by Erre Bess ; who, under- 
ftanding that Captain Wilson had a daughter, gave it to 
Mr. 
