The African women wear two long strips of cotton cloth, either blue or white. One is tied round the waist and falls below the knees; the other is worn over the shoulders like a mantle. The latter garment is generally thrown aside when they are at work. The upper part of the person is almost universally exposed. The wealthy sometimes wear a kind of robe without sleeves, under their _pagnes_, or mantles. Mungo Park speaks of seeing women in Bondou, who wore a thin kind of gauze, called _byqui_, which displayed their shape to the utmost advantage. Sandals are sometimes worn, but they more frequently go barefoot. Women of the island of St Louis, who are generally handsome, and many of them fair, by frequent intermarriages with Europeans, wear a long garment of striped cotton fastened at the waist, with another four or five yards in length thrown over the shoulders in the antique style. Striped cloth is twisted round the head, so as to form a high turban. Their slippers are usually of red, yellow, or green morocco, and they are seldom without golden ear-rings, necklaces, and bracelets. The Kaffer women wear a cloak made of leopard or calf skins, dressed in such a manner as to be exceedingly soft and pliant. This garment, which is worn over the shoulders, and conceals all the upper part of the person, is never laid aside except in the very hottest weather. They wear no other clothing but a small apron. It is a singular fact that the Kaffer men care much more about ornaments than the women. Almost every individual wears necklaces of beads, or polished bone, with several ivory bracelets about his arms and ankles. Those who can afford it have wreaths of copper beads around their heads, from which brass chains are suspended. The women, on the contrary, seldom wear any other ornament than a row of beads, or small shells, around the edges of their aprons. Females of the royal family sometimes have a few brass buttons on their cloaks, and beads or shells on the skin caps they wear in cold weather. The other African women are very fond of ornaments. They decorate their heads with coral beads, sea-shells, and grains of gold and silver. Sometimes a small plate of gold is worn in the middle of the forehead. The gold dust, which they collect, is kept in quills, stopped with cotton; and these are frequently displayed in the hair. Sometimes strips of linen are stretched upon a stick, so as to form a turban in the shape of a sugar loaf, the top of which is covered with a colored handkerchief. In some places the hair is raised high by means of a pad, and decorated with an expensive species of coral brought from the Red sea. Among some tribes the women twist their woolly locks around straws greased with butter; and when the straws are drawn out, the hair remains curled in small tufts. This process requires a whole day. A more neat and simple style, is to braid the hair in several tresses, made to meet on the top of the head. Almost