ROKKO-TREES.
The rokko bark has a certain resemblance to the lime-bast, which is so important an article of commerce in Russia; its fibres, however, have not the smoothness and paper-like thinness of the Russian product, but are tangled together almost like a woven mass. By a partial maceration and a good deal of thrashing, the Moributtoo contrive to give the bark the appearance of a thick close fabric, which, in its rough condition, is of a grey colour, but after being soaked in a decoction of wood acquires a reddish-brown hue, something like ordinary woollen stuff. Fastened at the waist with a girdle, one of these pieces of bark is sufficient to clothe the body, from the breast downwards to the knees, with a very effective substitute for drapery. Representations of two Monbuttoo warriors in full array are given in the illustration on the preceding page.
The women go almost entirely unclothed; they wear nothing but a portion of a plantain leaf or a piece of bark about the size of their hand attached to the front of their girdle; the rest of the body being figured in laboured patterns by means of a black juice obtained from the Blippo (Randia malleifera). Whilst the Dinka women, leaving perfect nudity as the prerogative of their husbands, are modestly clothed with skins—whilst the Mittoo and Bongo women wear their girdle of foliage, and the Niam-niam women their apron of hides, the women of the Monbuttoo—where the men are more scrupulously and fully clothed than any of the nations that I came across throughout my journey—go almost entirely naked.
Whenever the women go out, they carry across their arm a strap which they lay across their laps on sitting down. These straps or scarfs are about a foot wide, and something like a saddle-girth, and as they form their first attempt in the art of weaving, their texture is of the clumsiest order, possessing no other recommendation than their durability; they are appropriated to the further use of fastening infants to their mothers’ backs.
TATTOOING OF THE WOMEN.
The women can be distinguished from one another by the different tattooed figures running in bands across the breast and back along the shoulders; their bodies, moreover, are painted with an almost inexhaustible variety of patterns. Stars and Maltese crosses, bees and flowers, are all enlisted as designs; at one time the entire body is covered with stripes like a zebra, and at another with irregular spots and dots like a tiger; I have seen these women streaked with veins like marble, and even covered with squares like a chess-board. At the great festivals every Monbuttoo lady endeavours to outshine her compeers, and accordingly applies all her powers of invention to the adornment of her person. The patterns last for about two days, when they are carefully rubbed off, and replaced by new designs.
Monbuttoo Woman.
Instead of this paint the men use a cosmetic prepared from pulverised cam-wood, which is mixed with fat and then rubbed over the whole body. The Niam-niam also make use of this powder, but they only apply it partially in irregular spots and stripes, delighting especially in staining the breast and face to increase the ferocity of their appearance.