No stress has been laid upon the appearance in all parts of the world of "back scratchers" or "scratch my backs," made of ivory, bone, or wood, and which were used for toilet purposes to remove irritation from between the shoulder blades or along the spine where the hand itself could not reach. They are to the present day in use among the Chinese and Japanese, were once to be found among the Romans and other nations of Europe, and instances of their occasional employment until a very recent date might be supplied. THE DRINKING REED. Exactly what origin to ascribe to the drinking reed is now an impossibility, neither is it probable that the explanations which the medicine-men might choose to make would have the slightest value in dispelling the gloom which surrounds the subject. That the earliest conditions of the Apache tribe found them without many of the comforts which have for generations been necessaries, and obliged to resort to all sorts of expedients in cooking, carrying, or serving their food is the most plausible presumption, but it is submitted merely as a presumption and in no sense as a fact. It can readily be shown that in a not very remote past the Apache and other tribes were compelled to use bladders and reeds for carrying water, or for conveying water, broth, and other liquid food to the lips. The conservative nature of man in all that involves his religion would supply whatever might be needed to make the use of such reeds obligatory in ceremonial observances wherein there might be the slightest suggestion of religious impulse. We can readily imagine that among a people not well provided with forks and spoons, which are known to have been of a much later introduction than knives, there would be a very decided danger of burning the lips with broth, or of taking into the mouth much earthy and vegetable matter or ice from springs and streams at which men or women might wish to drink, so the use of the drinking reed would obviate no small amount of danger and discomfort. Water was carried in reeds by the Dyaks of Borneo, according to Bock.[215] The manner in which the natives of the New Hebrides and other islands of the South Pacific Ocean carry water in bamboo joints recalls the Zuñi method of preserving the sacred water of the ocean in hollow reeds.[216] [Illustration: FIG. 432.--The scratch stick and drinking reed.]