THE MARQUESANS. 315 
manner. They manifest a singular taste in cutting 
their hair, sometimes the fore-part of the head is 
shaved, at other times the whole of the head, ex¬ 
cepting two small patches, one above each ear, 
where the hair is tied up in a sort of knot, 
giving to their naked heads a very strange 
appearance. Their eyebrows are good; their 
eyes are not large, but black, and remarkably 
brilliant and quick. Their features are small, and 
well formed, but the pleasing effect they would 
naturally produce is almost entirely destroyed by 
the use of tatau. The Vignette to the present 
Volume, representing the natives on the rocks 
near the landing-place, when the Dauntless an¬ 
chored near the shore, exhibits their singular 
appearance. 
In the practice of tatauing they surpass all 
other nations, both as to the extent of the 
human body to which it is applied, and the 
varied images and patterns thus impressed. Their 
tatauing is less rude than that of the Sandwich 
and Palliser islanders, less curious and intricate 
in its figures than that impressed on the counte¬ 
nance of the New Zealanders, equally elegant, 
and far more profuse, than that of the Tahitians. 
The colouring matter itself is of a jet-black, but, 
as seen through the white skin beneath which it 
lies, it gives the limbs, and those parts of the body 
to which it is applied, a blue or dark slate- 
coloured hue. The females do not use it more 
than those of Tahiti, but many of the men cover 
the greater part of their bodies. The face is 
sometimes divided into different compartments, 
each of which received a varied shade of colour; 
sometimes it is covered with broad stripes, crossing 
each other at right angles; and sometimes it is 
