Observations of these relatively most primitive tribes--and this is especially worth noting---show them to be remarkably similar. If we read a description of the characteristics, habits, and customs of the Negritos of the Philippines and then pass on to the Malaccans, to the Semangs and Senoi, or, further, to the Veddahs of Ceylon, we constantly meet with almost the same phenomena, there being but slight differences depending on the specific character of the natural environment. We are thus in possession of data that are now observable. The statements and conclusions which these enable us to make are more than mere speculations with regard to the past; and they are more than inferences drawn from the silent fragments of the bones and from a few of the art products of primitive man. According as the phenomena are simpler in character and require fewer antecedent conditions for their explanation, may we be confident that we are really dealing with primitive conditions. This in itself implies that the criteria of primitive culture are essentially _psychological_ in nature, and that racial characteristics and original tribal relationships are probably negligible so far as this question is concerned. A culture would be absolutely primitive if no antecedent mental development whatsoever could be presupposed. Such an absolute concept can never be realized in experience, here any more than elsewhere. We shall, therefore, call that man primitive in the relative sense of the term--our only remaining alternative--whose culture approximates most nearly to the lowest mental achievements conceivable within the limits of universal human characteristics. The most convenient measure of these achievements, and the one lying nearest at hand, is that afforded by _external_ culture, as expressed in dress, habitation, and food, in self-made implements, weapons, and other productions serving to satisfy the most urgent needs of life.
2. THE CULTURE OF PRIMITIVE MAN IN ITS EXTERNAL EXPRESSIONS.
Following the above-mentioned criteria as to what may be regarded as primitive, the question concerning the external culture of primitive man may, in general, be briefly answered. Of dress there are only meagre beginnings: about the loins a cord of bast, to which twigs of trees are attached to cover the genitals--that is generally all, unless, through secret barter with neighbouring peoples, cotton goods, leather, and the like, have been imported. As regards personal decoration, conditions are much the same. On the next stage of development, the totemic, there is, as we shall later see, a desire for lavish decoration, especially as regards the adornment of the body by painting and tatooing. Little of this, however, is to be found among primitive tribes, and that which exists has probably been introduced from without. Some examples of such decoration are the scanty tatooing in single lines, the painting of the face with several red and white dots, and the wooden plug bored through the bridge of the nose. The Negritos of the Philippines bore holes through their lips for the insertion of a row of blades of grass. Other decorations found are necklaces and bracelets, fillets, combs, hair ornaments made of twigs and flowers, and the like.