The dress of a New Zealander is certainly, to a stranger at first sight, the most uncouth that can be imagined. It is made of the leaves of the flag, which has been described among the vegetable productions of this country: these leaves are split into three or four slips, and the slips, when they are dry, interwoven with each other into a kind of stuff between netting and cloth, with all the ends, which are eight or nine inches long, hanging out on the upper side, like the shag or thrumb matts, which we sometimes see lying in a passage. Of this cloth, if cloth it may be called, two pieces serve for a complete dress; one of them is tied over their shoulders with a string, and reaches as low as the knees; to the end of this string is fastened a bodkin of bone, which is easily passed through any two parts of this upper garment, so as to tack them together; the other piece is wrapped round the waist, and reaches nearly to the ground: the lower garment, however, is worn by the men only upon particular occasions; but they wear a belt, to which a string is fastened, for a very singular use. The inhabitants of the South Sea islands slit up the prepuce so as to prevent it from covering the glans of the penis, but these people, on the contrary, bring the prepuce over the glans, and to prevent it from being drawn back by the contraction of the part, they tie the string which hangs from their girdle, round the end of it. The glans indeed seemed to be the only part of their body which they were solicitous to conceal, for they frequently threw off all their dress but the belt and string, with the most careless indifference, but shewed manifest signs of confusion, when, to gratify our curiosity, they were requested to untie the string, and never consented but with the utmost reluctance and shame. When they have only their upper garment on, and sit upon their hams, they bear some resemblance to a thatched house; but this covering, though it is ugly, is well adapted to the use of those who frequently sleep in the open air, without any other shelter from the rain.

Voyaging Accounts