Page:Castes and Tribes of Southern India, Volume 2.djvu/255

Rh pair was 10. In only three cases, out of the seventy-four, was there no issue. In fifty cases, which were examined, of married men, with an average age of 34,207 children had been born, of whom 91 had died, for the most part in early life, from 'fever' and other causes. The racial position of Eurasians, and the proportion of black blood in their veins, are commonly indicated, not by the terms mulatto, quadroon, octoroon, sambo (or zambo), etc., but in fractions of a rupee. The European pure breed being represented by Rs. 0-0-0, and the Native pure breed by 16 annas (= 1 rupee), the resultant cross is, by reference to colour and other tests, gauged as being half an anna in the rupee (faint admixture of black blood), approaching European types; eight annas (half and half); fifteen annas (predominant admixture of black blood), approaching Native types, etc. The Eurasian body being enveloped in clothes, it was not till they stripped before me, for the purpose of anthropometry, that I became aware how prevalent is the practice of tattooing among the male members of the community. Nearly all the hundred and thirty men (of the lower classes) whom I examined were, in fact, tattooed to a greater or less extent on the breasts, upper arms, forearms, wrists, back of the hands, or shoulders. The following varied selection of devices in blue, with occasional red, is recorded in my case-book: —
 * Anchor,
 * Ballet girl with flag, stars and stripes,
 * Bracelets round wrists,
 * Burmese lady carrying umbrella,
 * Bird,
 * Bugles,
 * Conventional artistic devices,
 * Cross and anchor,
 * Crown and flags.