Page:Descent of Man 1875.djvu/599

Rh peculiarity. Many American Indians are known to admire a head so extremely flattened as to appear to us idiotic. The natives on the north-western coast compress the head into a pointed cone; and it is their constant practice to gather the hair into a knot on the top of the head, for the sake, as Dr. Wilson remarks, "of increasing the apparent elevation of the favourite conoid form." The inhabitants of Arakhan "admire a broad, smooth forehead, and in order to produce it, they fasten a plate of lead on the heads of the new-born children." On the other hand, "a broad, well-rounded occiput is considered a great beauty" by the natives of the Fiji islands.

As with the skull, so with the nose; the ancient Huns during the age of Attila were accustomed to flatten the noses of their infants with bandages, "for the sake of exaggerating a natural conformation." With the Tahitians, to be called long-nose is considered as an insult, and they compress the noses and foreheads of their children for the sake of beauty. The same holds with the Malays of Sumatra, the Hottentots, certain Negroes, and the natives of Brazil. The Chinese have by nature unusually small feet; and it is well known that the women of the upper classes distort their feet to make them still smaller. Lastly, Humboldt thinks that the American Indians prefer colouring their bodies with red paint in order to exaggerate their natural tint; and until recently European women added to their naturally bright colours by rouge and white cosmetics; but it may be doubted whether barbarous nations have generally had any such intention in painting themselves.

In the fashions of our own dress we see exactly the same principle and the same desire to carry every point to an extreme; we exhibit, also, the same spirit of emulation. But the fashions of savages are far more permanent than ours; and whenever their bodies are artificially modified, this is necessarily the case. The Arab women of the Upper Nile occupy about three days in dressing their hair; they never imitate other tribes, "but simply