Page:Malay Sketches.pdf/65

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THE JOGET

and gold. The girls’ hair, combed down in a fringe, was cut in a perfect oval round their foreheads and very becomingly dressed behind.

The bodices of their dresses were made of tight- fitting silk, leaving the neck and arms bare, whilst a white band of fine cambric (about 14 inches wide), passing round the neck, came down on the front of the bodice in the form of a V, and was there fastened by a golden flower.

Round their waists were belts fastened with large and curiously worked finding or buckles of gold, so large that they reached quite across the waist. The rest of the costume consisted of a skirt of cloth of gold (not at all like the sarong), reaching to the ankles, while a scarf of the same material, fastened in its centre to the waist-buckle, hung down to the hem of the skirt.

All four dancers were dressed alike, except that the elder girls wore white silk bodices with a red and gold handkerchief, folded cornerwise, tied under the arms and knotted in front. The points of the handkerchief hung to the middle of the back. In the case of the two younger girls the entire dress was of one material.

On their arms the dancers wore numbers of gold bangles, and their fingers were covered with diamond

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