Page:A Lady's Cruise in a French Man-of-War.djvu/309

Rh to the discomfort of the people, insist on every man being dressed from head to foot. But throughout the Christianised isles, including Tahiti, the prohibition was on the score of idolatry, and a law was passed, affixing a graduated scale of penalty for repeated offences; a man was condemned to make so many fathoms of road or of stone-work, and a woman to make so many mats, or so many fathoms of native cloth, for the use of the king and of the governor. Nevertheless, the desire to embellish nature was so great, that many were content to work out the penalty rather than forego the adornment.

There never was a better illustration of the old proverb, "Il faut souffrir pour être belle;" for it was necessarily a painful process, followed by swelling and inflammation, which often lasted for a considerable time, and sometimes even proved fatal. The process was simple: the victim of vanity was made to lie flat on the ground, while the artist sketched his design with charcoal on the skin, which was then punctured by little bundles of needles, made of the bones of birds or fishes, though human bones were preferred. Some were so arranged as to resemble the teeth of a saw, and were used in producing straight lines. Others had but one fine point for giving delicate finishing touches, and for working on such sensitive spots as could not endure the sharper pain. The needles having previously been dipped in a black dye, made from the kernel of the candle-nut, reduced to charcoal and mixed with oil, were struck sharply with a small hammer, thus puncturing the skin, carrying with them the dye, which, seen through the transparent and very silky skin, had the effect of being blue.

The custom of tattooing was certainly widespread. Herodotus has recorded its existence even among the Thracians, of whom he remarked that the "barbarians could be exceedingly foppish after their fashion. The man who was not tattooed amongst them was not respected." If tattooing was in fashion so near Phoenicia, who knows but that those roving traders may have been the first to suggest to our fair-skinned forefathers the attractions of blue woad as high art decoration?

Not only have such practices as tattooing died out in Tahiti,