138 
VISITS TO MADAGASCAR. 
CHAP. V. 
of water to moisten their hair, arranged their toilette by 
one holding the glass for another. The Hova women wear 
their hair plaited in extremely fine braids, and tied in a 
number of small knots or bunches all over the head, as seen 
in the accompanying portrait. The Betsimasaraka women 
wear their hair braided for two or three inches, and then 
arranged in a sort of circular mass or ball, two or three 
hanging down on each side. The men usually cut their hair 
short, after the European fashion. 
I was, for some time, surprised to see so few people with 
grey hair, either among the straight or woolly haired races; 
and on remarking, on one occasion, how few either of chiefs 
or people, masters or slaves, were greyheaded, I was told 
that all classes were scrupulously careful to remove their grey 
hairs, and that this accounted for the thinness of hair with 
many, and the rarity of any mixture of grey amongst the 
black. It appeared to be a matter of some importance with all 
to avoid, as much as possible, any symptom of age, and an 
object of great desire to appear or to be thought young. I 
was also struck with the taste of the men in adjusting their 
hair. They did not comb it up from the forehead to show 
the development of their intellectual organs, and certainly 
rather drew it over the side of the temples than forced it 
back. I presumed, however, that they followed the mode 
most esteemed among their countrymen; and I was struck 
with the remarkably European cast of many of their counte¬ 
nances. Phrenologically they are a fine people, having fre¬ 
quently high foreheads with a considerable amount of those 
developments which are supposed to indicate intellectual 
capacity, as well as moral excellence. 
The portrait of a Hova chief, on the following page, exhibits 
a type of head that I met with occasionally on the coast and 
at the capital. The olive tinge in the complexion of this 
chief and in that of his wife was exceedingly slight, and in 
