e ashes with water, and with this mixture drew the figure upon
my skin; he then retraced it, by pricking the lines with needles, so as
at every puncture just to draw the blood, and the blood mixing with the
ashes of the straw, forms a figure which can never be effaced." See
Travels through Louisiana, vol. i, p. 107.

So far this note is by Dr Hawkesworth. Some observations on the practice
of staining or tattowing the body, have been offered in another part of
this work. It may be worth while to add here the account which
Krustenstern has given of the mode adopted in Nukahiwa, one of the
Washington Islands: "As soon as a Nukahiewer arrives at the age of
puberty, his whole body is tatooed; an art carried to a much greater
perfection in this island than in any other, as they paint, in fact,
their bodies with different figures, rubbing a pleasing colour into the
skin, which is first scratched until it bleeds. Black is the colour
generally used for this purpose, which, after some time, takes a bluish
tinge. The king, his father, and the high-priest, were the only persons
who were coloured quite black, nor was any part of their bodies left
unadorned; the face, eye-lids, and even a part of their heads, from
which the hair had been shaved, being tatooed. Neither in the Society
nor the Friendly Islands is this customary. In the latter, the king
alone is not tatooed; and it is only in New Zealand, and the Sandwich
Islands, as Captain King relates, where the face is tatooed. The New
Zealander and the Nukahiwer have a similar mode of performing this
operation; for instance, they not only mark the body with single upright
figures, or animals, as in the Sandwich Islands, but represent upon it,
in the most perfect symmetry, connected ornaments in concentric rings
and knots, which added greatly to the beauty of its appearance. The
women only tatoo their hands and arms, the ends of their ears, and their
lips. The lower classes are less tatooed, and many of them not at all;
and it is therefore not improbable that this ornament serves to point
out a noble, or, at any rate, a distinguished personage. There are some
among them who have particularly acquired this art; one of whom took up
his residence on board the ship, where he found sufficient employment,
as almost all the sailors underwent the operation." Figures of animals
are favourite decorations for the skin with some people. Hutchinson, in
his History of Massachusets Bay, second editi