er, shows his love by
athletic bounds, posing, and pursuit, and by the spearing of
imaginary enemies, etc., before her, to attract her attention. If
the girl reciprocates his love she will employ a small girl to
give to him an _ugauga gauna_, or love invitation, consisting of
an areca-nut whose skin has been marked with different designs,
significant of her wish to _ugauga_. After dark he is apprised of
the place where the girl awaits him; repairing thither, he seats
himself beside her as close as possible, and they mutually share
in the consumption of the betel-nut." This constitutes betrothal;
henceforth he is free to visit the girl's house and sleep there.
Marriages usually take place at the most important festival of
the year, the _kapa_, preparations for which are made during the
three previous months, so that there may be a bountiful and
unfailing supply of bananas. Much dancing takes place among the
unmarried girls, who, also, are tattooed at this time over the
whole of the front of the body, special attention being paid to
the lower parts, as a girl who is not properly tattooed there
possesses no attraction in the eyes of young men. Married women
and widows and divorced women are not forbidden to take part in
these dances, but it would be considered ridiculous for them to
do so. (R.E. Guise, "On the Tribes of the Wanigela River,"
_Journal of the Anthropological Institute_, new series, vol. i,
1899, pp. 209, 214 et seq.)

In the island of Nias in the Malay Archipelago, Modigliani
(mainly on the excellent authority of Sundermann, the missionary)
states, at a wedding "dancing and singing go on throughout the
day. The women, two or three at a time, a little apart from the
men, take part in the dancing, which is very well adapted to
emphasize the curves of the flanks and the breasts, though at the
same time the defects of their legs are exhibited in this series
of rhythmic contortions which constitute a Nias dance. The most
graceful movement they execute is a lascivious undulation of the
flanks while the face and breast are slowly wound round by the
_sarong_ [a sort of skirt] held in the hands, and then again
revealed. These movements are executed with jerks of the wrist
and contortions of the flanks, not always graceful, but which
excite the admiration of the spectators