Among our numerous visitors we occasionally saw a woman or two, but none were favourable specimens of their kind. Unlike the men, whose only covering was the breech-cloth formerly described, the women wore a short petticoat of grass-like stuff, probably the pandanus leaf divided into fine shreds--worked into a narrow band which ties round the waist. They usually, when alongside the ship, held a small piece of matting over the head with one hand, either to protect them from the sun or partially to secure themselves from observation, as in their manners they were much more reserved than the men.
At Coral Haven we have already seen considerable variety displayed in the various styles of painting the body. Pounded charcoal mixed up with coconut oil, and lime obtained from burnt shells similarly treated, are the pigments made use of. The most common fashion of painting is with a broad streak down the forehead, and a circle round each eye. Occasionally the entire body is blackened, but often the face only--with daubs of paint on the temples, cheek, and round the mouth and one or both eyes, rendering a forbidding countenance inexpressibly hideous in our sight.
The ornaments worn by these savages are very numerous, besides which they are fond of decorating the person with flowers and strong-scented plants. In what may be considered as full dress, with the face and body painted, they are often decked out with large white cowries appended to their waist, elbows and ankles, together with streamers of pandanus leaf. Among many kinds of bracelets or armlets the most common is a broad woven one of grass, fitting very tightly on the upper arm. There are others of shell--one solid, formed by grinding down a large shell (Trochus niloticus) so as to obtain a well polished transverse section, and another in two or three pieces tied together, making a round smooth ring; of the former of these five or six are sometimes worn on one arm. But the most curious bracelet, and by no means an uncommon one, is that made of a human lower jaw with one or more collar bones closing the upper side crossing from one angle to the other. Whether these are the jaws of former friends or enemies we had no means of ascertaining; no great value appeared to be attached to them; and it was observed, as a curious circumstance, that none of these jaws had the teeth discoloured by the practice of betel chewing.