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They wear waist-cloths and bandolets of spun cotton in divers colours, and they ornament themselves by staining their bodies with black and red colours, extracted from the juice of certain fruits cultivated for that purpose in their gardens, just as did the Agathyrsi. Some of them stain the entire body, others only a part.
They passed through great rooms, with frescoes representing naked men with helmets; they were of a reddish color, and were making gestures of defiance. The sky was covered with great clouds like sponges. There were also men and women of marble clad in waist-cloths made of iron.
There were some very light-skinned Arabs at Dis, with long dark hair, which they dress with grease, wearing round their neck a cocoanut containing a supply of this toilet-requisite for the purpose. Most of them affect red plaid cotton turbans and waist-cloths, a decided relief to the eye from the perpetual indigo.
Both were well armed, and, as was usual with people of their origin on the war-path, they were clad only in the customary scanty covering of waist-cloths and leggings. The former, however, were of scarlet, and the latter were rich in the fringes and bright colors of Indian ornaments.
So all fell to; and though there was comparatively little to be done, the ship having been kept as far as could be in fighting order all night, yet there was "clearing of decks, lacing of nettings, making of bulwarks, fitting of waist-cloths, arming of tops, tallowing of pikes, slinging of yards, doubling of sheets and tacks," enough to satisfy even the pedantical soul of Richard Hawkins himself.
With this object in view, the fleet spent the thirteenth of December, St. Lucy's day, in making waist-cloths, arranging the artillery, getting ready the weapons, alloting men to their posts, and preparing themselves to fight on the next day, on which it was thought that they would fall in with the corsair.
Out goes his flag and pendants, also his waist-cloths and top-armings, which is a long red cloth ... that goeth round about the shippe on the out-sides of all her upper works and fore and main-tops, as well for the countenance and grace of the shippe as to cover the men from being seen. He furls and slings his main-yard. In goes his sprit-sail.
They came, as is the manner of their people, laden with heavy packs of sârongs, the native skirts or waist-cloths, trudging in single file through the forests and through the villages, hawking their goods to the natives of the place, with much cunning haggling or hard bargaining.
The same is true of most of the other tribes, with the exception of the men of Kenyah and Klemantan communities that inhabit the central highlands; these, when hauling their boats through the rapids, will divest themselves of all clothing, or will sit naked round a fire while their waist-cloths are being dried, without the least embarrassment.
To the English comprehension it is, for instance, surprising that in time of stress when Paris was besieged by a German army a hundred franc-tireur corps should spring into existence, who gravely decked themselves in sombreros and red waist-cloths, and called themselves the "Companions of Death," or some claptrap title of a similar sound.
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