who might have drawn her for an Amazon. I have never seen another
woman of such superb carriage. Her hair was blood-red, her brow lofty,
and an indescribable air of majesty and pride spoke eloquently of
her descent from fathers and mothers of power. She had wonderful legs,
statuesque in mold, and tattooed from ankles to thigh in most
amazing patterns. To a Marquesan of her generation the tattooed legs
of a shapely woman were the highest reach of art.

Titihuti was very proud of her legs. Though she was devout Catholic
and well aware of the contempt of the church for such vanities,
religion could not entirely efface her pride. During the first few
days she passed and repassed my cabin in her walks about her
household duties, lifting her tunic each day a little higher. Her
vanity would no doubt have continued this gradual course, but that
one day I came upon her in the river entirely nude. Her
gratification was unconcealed; naively she displayed the innumerable
whirls and arabesques of her adornment for my compliments, and
thereafter she wore only a _pareu_ when at home, entirely dropping
alien standards of modesty and her gown.

She said that people came from far valleys to see her legs, and I
could readily believe it. It was so with the leg of the late Queen
Vaekehu, a leg so perfect in mold and so elaborately and
artistically inked that it distinguished her even more than her rank.
Casual whites, especially, considered it a curiosity, and offended
her majesty by laying democratic hands upon the masterpiece. I had
known a man or two who had seen the queen at home, and who testified
warmly to the harmonious blending of flesh color with the candle-nut
soot. Among my effects in the House of the Golden Bed I had a
photograph showing the multiplicity and fine execution of the