The chief drawback to a Kaffir girl’s beauty lies in her face, which is never a beautiful one, according to European ideas on this subject. It is mostly a pleasant, good-humored face, but the cheek-bones are too high, the nose too wide, and the lips very much too large. The two which have been already represented are by far the most favorable specimens of the collection, and no one can say that their faces are in any way equal to their forms. It may be that their short, crisp, harsh, woolly hair, so different from the silken tresses of European women, produces some feeling of dislike; but, even if they were furnished with the finest and most massive head of hair, they could never be called handsome. People certainly do get used to their peculiar style, and sometimes prefer the wild beauty of a Kaffir girl to the more refined, though more insipid, style of the European. Still, few Englishmen would think themselves flattered if their faces were thought to resemble the features of a Kaffir of the same age, and the same rule will apply to the women as well as to the men. Unfortunately, the rapidity with which the Kaffir women deteriorate renders them very unsightly objects at an age in which an European woman is in her prime. Among civilized nations, age often carries with it a charming mixture of majesty and simplicity, which equally command our reverence and our love. Among this people, however, we find nothing in their old age to compensate for the lost beauty of youth. They do not possess that indefinable charm which is so characteristic of the old age of civilized woman, nor is there any vestige of that spiritual beauty which seems to underlie the outward form, and to be even more youthful than youth itself. Perhaps one reason for this distinction may be the uncultivated state of the mind; but, whatever may be the cause, in youth the Kaffir woman is a sylph, in old age a hag. CHAPTER IV. DRESS AND ORNAMENTS -- DRESS OF THE MEN -- DRESS DEPENDENT ON COUNTRY FOR MATERIAL -- SKIN THE CHIEF ARTICLE OF DRESS IN SOUTHERN AFRICA -- FUR-PRODUCING ANIMALS -- A KAROSS OR CLOAK OF MEERKAT SKIN -- ANOTHER OF JACKAL SKINS -- NATIVE TASTE IN DRESS -- PROFESSIONAL KAROSS MAKERS -- NEEDLE USED BY THE KAFFIRS -- ITS CLUMSY SHAPE AND DIMENSIONS -- ITS LEATHER SHEATH -- A FASHIONABLE NEEDLE AND ITS BELT OF BEADS -- TASTEFUL ARRANGEMENT OF COLOR -- THREAD USED BY KAFFIRS -- SINGULAR MATERIAL AND MODE OF PREPARING IT -- HOW A KAFFIR SEWS -- A MAN’S ORDINARY DRESS -- THE APRON OR “TAILS” -- SPECIMEN IN MY COLLECTION -- BRASS BUTTONS -- THE “ISINENE” AND “UMUCHA” -- PORTRAIT OF GOZA -- OBESITY OF THE CHIEFS -- FULL DRESS AND UNDRESS -- A KAFFIR AIDE-DE-CAMP.