itiative may be taken
by the woman, who can, of course, imagine that she has been
charmed, and then find a willing aider and abettor in the man,
whose vanity is flattered by the response to the magic
power which he can soon persuade himself that he did really
exercise.[248]

If this attempt at suggestion failed, we should have a case of lively
embarrassment in the woman, and her discomfiture would be heightened
if the other women and men of the community were aware of her attempt.
Similarly on Jervis Island in Torres Straits, if an unmarried woman
was interested in a man, she accosted him, but the man did not address
the woman "for, if she refused him, he would feel ashamed, and maybe
he would brain her with a stone club, and so 'he would kill her for
nothing.'"[249]

A wholesale unsettling of habit is seen when a lower culture is
impinged upon by a higher. The consciousness of other standards of
behavior causes new forms of modesty in the lower race. Haddon reports
of the natives of Torres Straits:

The men were formerly nude, and the women wore only a leaf
petticoat, but I gather that they were a decent people; now
both sexes are prudish. A man would never go nude before
me--only once or twice has it happened to me, and then only
when they were diving.... Amongst themselves they are, of
course, much less particular, but I believe they are becoming
more so.... I have not noticed any reticence in their
speaking about sexual matters before the young, but missionary
influence has modified this a great deal; formerly, I imagine,
there was no restraint in speech, now there is a great deal
of prudery;... and I had the greatest possible difficulty
in getting the little information I did about the former
relationships between the sexes. All this, I suspect, is not
really due to a sense of decency _per se_, but rather to a
desire on their part not to appear barbaric to strangers; in
other words, the hesitancy is between them and the white man,
not as between themselves.[250]

Bonwick says also:

I have repeatedly been amused at observing the Australian
natives prepare for their approach to the abode of
civilization by wrapping their blankets more decently around
them and putting on their ragged trousers or petticoats.[251]

There are numerous cases found among the lower races where the wearing
of clothing and orname