It Represents To
Them All The Good Of Which They Know, Or Can Conceive.
Beastly
intoxication is the highest happiness to which these poor savages
aspire, and the condition is sanctified to them under the fiction
of "drinking to the gods." Men and women alike indulge in this
vice.
A few, however, like Pipichari, abstain from it totally,
taking the bowl in their hands, making the libations to the gods,
and then passing it on. I asked Pipichari why he did not take
sake, and he replied with a truthful terseness, "Because it makes
men like dogs."
Except the chief, who has two horses, they have no domestic animals
except very large, yellow dogs, which are used in hunting, but are
never admitted within the houses.
The habits of the people, though by no means destitute of decency
and propriety, are not cleanly. The women bathe their hands once a
day, but any other washing is unknown. They never wash their
clothes, and wear the same by day and night. I am afraid to
speculate on the condition of their wealth of coal-black hair.
They may be said to be very dirty - as dirty fully as masses of our
people at home. Their houses swarm with fleas, but they are not
worse in this respect than the Japanese yadoyas. The mountain
villages have, however, the appearance of extreme cleanliness,
being devoid of litter, heaps, puddles, and untidiness of all
kinds, and there are no unpleasant odours inside or outside the
houses, as they are well ventilated and smoked, and the salt fish
and meat are kept in the godowns.
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