[194]The effect of this in some Australian dances, is said to be very striking. The favorite device, is to draw the outline of a skeleton, on the front of the body, with white paint. As the dancers twirl round, the pattern is plainly perceptible when their faces are turned toward the spectator, but when their black backs are turned, the whole vanishes, and gives the impression of a number of ghastly skeletons, alternately appearing and disappearing, by the dim flicker of the firelight. [195]Here we see one of the earliest traits of primitive music. The use of a plain, rhythmic accompaniment, without tune. [196]From the “Illustrated London News,” Oct. 8, 1863. [197]Wood’s Nat. Hist. of Man, v. I, p. 68. [198]Meinicke, Inseln des Stillen Oceans, v. I, p. 329. [199]Wood’s Hist. of Man, v. I, p. 162. [200]Meinecke, Inseln d still. Oceans, v. I, p. 330. [201]A conundrum from Java may be interesting to the reader. Here is one,— _Q._—What is lower than the knee, yet higher than the mountain? _A._—The road which crosses the mountain. [202]De Backer, L’Archipel Indien, p. 185. [203]De Backer, L’Archipel Indien, p. 207. [204]Quoted in Ainsworth, Round the World, p. 246. [205]Engel’s Musical Myths, e. c., v. 2, p. 150. [206]A voyage round the World (Cook’s) Forster, p. 398, v. 1. [207]Wood’s Nat. History of Man, v. 1, p. 285. [208]An account of a Government mission to the Fiji Islands, p. 116. [209]Fetis, Histoire de la Mus., v. 1, p. 96. [210]Wood’s Nat. History, v. 2, p. 288. [211]All Kaffir chiefs aspire to obesity as an emblem of rank. [212]The Heart of Africa, v. 2, p. 29. [213]Schweinfurth, Heart of Africa, v. 2, p. 30. [214]Central Africa, or Naked Truths about Naked people, p. 278. [215]Wood’s Nat’l History of Man, v. 2, p. 498. [216]Journal of the discovery of the source of the Nile, by Capt. Speke, page 210. [217]Captain Speke’s Journal, p. 222. [218]Heart of Africa, v. 1, p. 287. [219]Heart of Africa, v. 1, p. 289. [220]Ismailia, By Sir S. W. Baker, page 391. [221]Ismailia, p. 355. [222]See “Ismailia,” p. 372. [223]It will be recollected that the Abyssinians belong to a sect of the Christian Church. [224]Coomassie and Magdala, by H. M. Stanley, p. 310 [225]Coomassie and Magdala, page 488. [226]Ismailia, page 282. [227]Baker’s “Ismailia,” page 351. [228]Stanley’s “How I found Livingstone,” page 622. [229]Brendel, Gesch. d. Musik, p. 7. [230]According to Clemens Romanus, a contemporary of St. Paul. [231]Tertullian, Apologia, 39. Evidently a custom derived from the _skolion_ of Greece. [232]Ambros, Geschichte d. Musik, v. II, p. 5. [233]Gesch. d. Musik, v. II p. 11 [234]Marcillac, Histoire de la Mus. Modern, p. 25. [235]Fetis, Histoire Gen. de la mus, v. 4, p. 6. [236]Letters, v. 5, p. 7.