It is noteworthy that in all parts of the world the desire for self-decoration is strongest at the beginning of the age of puberty, all the above-named customs being practised most zealously at that period of life. Concerning the Dacotahs, Mr. Prescott states that both sexes adorn themselves at their courtships to make themselves more attractive, and that “the young only are addicted to dress.”[1024] The Oráon, according to Colonel Dalton, is likewise particular about his personal appearance “only so long as he is unmarried.”[1025] Among the Let-htas in Indo-China, it is the unmarried youths that are profusely bedecked with red and white bead necklaces, wild boars’ tusks, brass armlets, and a broad band of black braid below the knee.[1026] Speaking of the Encounter Bay tribe of South Australia, the Rev. A. Meyer says that “the plucking out of the beard and anointing with grease and ochre (which belong to the initiatory ceremony) the men may continue if they please till about forty years of age, for they consider it ornamental, and fancy that it makes them look younger, and gives them an importance in the eyes of the women.”[1027] In Fiji, says Mr. Anderson, the men, “who like to attract the attention of the opposite sex, don their best plumage;”[1028] and when Mr. Bulmer once asked an Australian native why he wore his adornments, the native answered “that he wore them in order to look well, and to make himself agreeable to the women.”[1029] It is when boys or girls approach puberty that, in the north-west part of North America, they have their lower lip perforated for the labret;[1030] that, among the American Eskimo, the African Masarwas, and certain Australian natives, the cartilage between the nostrils is pierced for the reception of a piece of bone, wood, or shell.[1031] At the same age, among the Chibchas and the aborigines of the Californian Peninsula, holes were made in the ears.[1032] It is at this period of life, also, that the Chaymas of New Andalusia, the Pelew Islanders, and the natives of New Britain have their teeth blackened, as black teeth, both for men and women, are considered an indispensable condition of beauty;[1033] and that, in several parts of Africa and Australia, they knock out some teeth, knowing that otherwise they would run the risk of being refused on account of ugliness.[1034] Among the Nicobarese, among whom the men blacken their teeth from the period of puberty, this disfigurement is indeed so favourably regarded by the fair sex that a woman “would scorn to accept the addresses of one possessing white teeth, like a dog or pig.”[1035] Mr. Crawfurd tells us that, in the Malay Archipelago, the practice of filing and blackening the teeth, already referred to, is a necessary prelude to marriage, the common way of expressing the fact that a girl has arrived at puberty being that “she has had her teeth filed.”[1036] And, with reference to some of the natives of the Congo countries, Tuckey states that the