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Show 318 SEXUAL SELECTION: J\IAN. PAin' H. In several of the tribes of North America tlte l~ttir on the head grows to a wonderful length; and Ottt]jn gives a curious proof how much this is esteemed, for 1 he chief of the Crows was elected to this oHice from having the longest hair of any man in tho tribe, namely ten feet and seven inches. 1'he Aymaras and QuichuaH of S. Americ-n, likewise have very long hair; and this, as Mr. D. ForGes informs me, is so much valued for the sake of beauty, that cutting it off was the severest punishment which he could infiict on them. In both halves of the continent the natives sometimes iucrease ~he apparent length of their hair by ' weaving into It fibrous substances. Although the hair on t.hc head is thus cherished, that on the face is considered by tile North American Indians "as very vn]rrar" and • b ' ev~ry hair is carefully eradicated. This praetice pre-vails throughout tho American continent from Vancouver's Island in the north to 1'ierra, del Fuen·o in tl1e south. ·when York Minster, a Fuegian on b~ard the "l~eagle" was taken back to his country, the natives told l1im he ought to pnll out the few short hairs on his face. They also threatened a young missionary, who was left for a ~ime with. them, to strip him naked, and pluck the hmrs from Ius face and hocly, yet he wa far from a hairy man. This fashion is carried to such an extreme that the Indians of Paraguay eradicate their eyebrows and eyelashes, saying that they do not wish to he like horses.57 It is remarkable that throughout the world the races cl'~rl'gny, ns quoted in Prichard,' Phys. IIist. of Mo.nkinu,' vol. v. 3rd ecl!t. p. 47G. H 'No~·~h Amcricnn Indians,' by G. Cntli11, 3rrl edit.. 1 42, vol. i. p. 4.!); vol. 11. p. 227. On the natives or Vancouver Island StC Spront 'Scenes and Studies of Sovagc Ufe,' 1868, p. 25. On th~ I1 ~<1in.ns 0 (· P .• ro.guay, Azo.ra, 'Voyages,' tom. ii. p. 10.). '!!AI'. XIX. 'CEAUTY. 349 which are almost completely destitute of a beard dislike hairs on the fnce and body, and take pains to eradicate them. The 1\almucks arc beardless, nncl they are well known, like tho Americans, to pluck out all straggling hairs; and so it is with the Polynesians, some of the Malays, and the Siamese. 1\'Ir. Veitch states that tho Japanese ladies "nll o~jected to our whiskers, consider" ing them very ugly, and told us to cut them off, nnd "be like Japanese men." The New Zealanders are beardless; they carefully pluck out the hairs on the face, rmd haYe a saying that "rrhere is no woman for a "hairy man." 58 On the other hand, bearded races admire and greatly value their "beards; among the Anglv-Snxons every pru't of the body, according to their laws, had a recognised value ; "the loss of the beard being estimated at twenty "shillings, while the breaking of a thigh was fixed at ,; only twelre." G9 In the East men swear solemuly by t.l1eir beards. We have seen that Chinsnrdi, the chief of the Makalolo in Africa, evidently thought that beards were a great ornament. 'With the l!'ijians in the Pacific the "Leard is "profuse and busby, and is his "greatest priuo;" whilst the inhabitants of the adjacent archipelagoes of 1,onga and Samoa arc ''beardless, " and auhor a rough chin." In one island alone of the Ellice group "the men are heavily bearded, and not a " little prond thereof." 60 ~s On the Sinmese, rricho.rd, ibid. vol. iv. p. 533. On the Jo.pancfe, Veitch in' Gardeners' Cb~·oniclc,' 1860, p.ll04. On the New Zea.landors Mantegnzza, • Yinggi c Studi,' 18G7, p. 52G. For tho other notions mentioned, sec references in Lawrence, 'Lectures on Physiology,' &c. 1822, p. 272. 59 Lubbork, 'Origin of Civilisntion,' 1870, p. 321. 60 Dr. Rurnnrd Davis quotes l\fr. Pritchard and otl1crs for these fncts in rcgord to the Polynesians, in 'Anthrnpologico.l Review,' April, 1870, .185, }!)]. |