Page:Voyage in search of La Perouse, volume 1 (Stockdale).djvu/390

362 utensils, consisting of three earthen pots of their own manufacture, some square bottles, which they had bought from the Europeans, and spoons which they had formed of the large shells common at Amboyna. Among those shells we recognized different species of the nautilus, many pearl-oysters, and also a kind known by the name of pinna rudis.

We observed besides, under the bed, a pickaxe and a large knife, in the form of a butcher's chopping-knife, called pissau in the Malayan language. They had both those instruments from the Europeans.

As the temperature of the climate renders cloathing unnecessary, their wardrobe contains nothing but what is strictly requisite to conceal the parts which decency forbids them to expose to view.

A pair of drawers, which does not reach lower than the middle of the thigh, or a bit of blue stuff tied round the loins, is the only cloathing of the men who are employed in agriculture.

The dress of the women is naturally more expensive. They wear a kind of shift of the same stuff which descends to the middle of the leg, and is fastened round the loins with a girdle.

Our presents had excited their gratitude. The girl, having disappeared for a few minutes, re- turned