In winter they forgo bathing, and rub themselves with liberal applications of grease.
The old blacks used to have very good teeth; they never ate without afterwards rinsing out their mouths, and sometimes munched up charcoal to purify them. But the younger generation have discarded the mouth-rinsing habit, and not yet attained to a tooth-brush: result, gradual deterioration in teeth, a deterioration probably helped by the drinking of hot liquids. Blacks of the old time drank nothing hot. Perhaps, too, their tough meats gave muscular strength to their jaws.
To blacks, kissing is a 'white foolishness,' also handshaking; in olden times even to smell a stranger was considered a risk.
CHAPTER XV
THE AMUSEMENTS OF BLACKS
A very favourite game of the old men was skipping—Brambahl, they called it.
They had a long rope, a man at each end to swing it. When it is in full swing in goes the skipper. After skipping in an ordinary way for a few rounds, he begins the variations, which consist, amongst other things, of his taking thorns out of his feet, digging as if for larv' of ants, digging yams, grinding grass-seed, jumping like a frog, doing a sort of cobbler's dance, striking an attitude as if looking for something in the distance, running out, snatching up a child, and skipping with it in his arms, or lying flat down on the ground, measuring his full length in that position, rising and letting the rope slip under him; the rope going the whole time, of course, never varying in pace nor pausing for any of the variations.
The one who can most successfully vary the performance is victor. Old men of over seventy seemed the best at skipping.
There is great excitement over Bubberah, or come-back boomerang throwing.