DISTINGUISHING ORNAMENTS OF VIRGINS.

Among the country people, particularly in the southern countries, the virgins (anak gaddis, or goddesses, as it is usually pronounced) are distinguished by a fillet which goes across the front of the hair and fastens behind.  This is commonly a thin plate of silver, about half an inch broad:  those of the first rank have it of gold, and those of the lowest class have their fillet of the leaf of the nipah tree.  Beside this peculiar ornament their state is denoted by their having rings or bracelets of silver or gold on their wrists.  Strings of coins round the neck are universally worn by children, and the females, before they are of an age to be clothed, have what may not be inaptly termed a modesty-piece, being a plate of silver in the shape of a heart (called chaping) hung before, by a chain of the same metal, passing round the waist.  The young women in the country villages manufacture themselves the cloth that forms the body-dress, or kain-sarong, which for common occasions is their only covering, and reaches from the breast no lower than the knees.  The dresses of the women of the Malay bazaars on the contrary extend as low as the feet; but here, as in other instances, the more scrupulous attention to appearances does not accompany the superior degree of real modesty.  This cloth, for the wear both of men and women, is imported from the island of Celebes, or, as it is here termed, the Bugis country.

MODE OF FILING TEETH.

Both sexes have the extraordinary custom of filing and otherwise disfiguring their teeth, which are naturally very white and beautiful from the simplicity of their food.  For files they make use of small whetstones of different degrees of fineness, and the patients lie on their back during the operation.  Many, particularly the women of the Lampong country, have their teeth rubbed down quite even with the gums; others have them formed in points; and some file off no more than the outer coat and extremities, in order that they may the better receive and retain the jetty blackness with which they almost universally adorn them.  The black used on these occasions is the empyreumatic oil of the coconut-shell.  When this is not applied the filing does not, by destroying what we term the enamel, diminish the whiteness of the teeth; but the use of betel renders them black if pains be not taken to prevent it.  The great men sometimes set theirs in gold, by casing, with a plate of that metal, the under row; and this ornament, contrasted with the black dye, has by lamp or candlelight a very splendid effect.  It is sometimes indented to the shape of the teeth, but more usually quite plain.  They do not remove it either to eat or sleep.