The full development of those visible properties which are essential to the human organism is universally recognized as indispensable to perfect beauty,—natural deformity, the unsymmetrical shape of the body, apparent traces of disease, &c., being regarded by every race as unfavourable to personal appearance. We distinguish between masculine and feminine beauty, and, in spite of racial differences, the ideas of what constitute these forms of beauty are fundamentally the same throughout the world. To be really handsome a person must approach the ideal type of his or her sex. The male organism is remarkable for the development of the muscular system, the female for that of fatty elements; and conspicuous muscles are everywhere considered to improve the appearance of a man, rounded forms that of a woman. According to v. Humboldt, the natives of Guiana, to express the beauty of a woman, say that “she is fat and has a narrow forehead.” A traveller found that a Kirghiz’s estimate of female beauty was regulated by the amount of fat, “for even when dilating on the beauties of his favourite wife, he laid the greatest stress on her _embonpoint_.”[1545] The Kafirs and Hottentots are charmed by their women’s long and pendant breasts, which, in certain tribes, assume such monstrous dimensions, that the usual way of giving suck, when the child is carried on the back, is by throwing the breast over the shoulder.[1546] Mr. Reade tells us that, among the Mpongwé of Gaboon, even very young girls “strive to emulate the pendant beauties of their seniors.”[1547] The Makololo women, according to Dr. Livingstone, make themselves fat and pretty by drinking a peculiar drink called “boyáloa”;[1548] and, among the Trarsa, a Moorish tribe in the Western Sahara, the women take immense quantities of milk and butter to make themselves more attractive.[1549] Such exaggerations, however repugnant to a more refined taste, indicate a general tendency in men’s notions of female beauty. Among Europeans, men are on an average two or three inches taller than women,[1550] and have a greater breadth of shoulder. A high-built and broad-shouldered figure is also regarded as an ideal of manly beauty, whereas women who are very tall or broad are apt to be rather awkward. A woman’s face is shorter, her mouth less broad, her nose less prominent, her neck longer, her pelvis wider, her waist narrower than a man’s; and her fingers are more slender and pointed, her hands and feet smaller. The halving line of a woman’s body is lower than that of a man’s, so that her steps are shorter and lighter.[1551] As a matter of fact, a long face, a broad mouth, and large hands and feet are much more objectionable in a woman than in a man. Women have a special liking for low-bodied dresses, which display the full length of the neck; and by means of a corset they make the waist narrower than it is by nature.