HOW NATIONS GREET EACH OTHER.

Cromwell Argus, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 2046, 24 June 1907, Page 7

HOW NATIONS GREET EACH OTHER.

Greenlanders have no particular method of salutation, and laugh at the idea of one being inferior to another. Islanders near the Philippines take a person’s hand or foot and rub it over their face, while Laplanders apply their noses strongly against the person they salute. In New Guinea the natives place the leaves of trees upon the head of those they salute. In the Straits of the Sound the native raises the loft foot of the person saluted, passes it gently over the right leg, and thence over the face. The inhabitants of the Philippines bend very low, place their hands on their cheeks, and raise one foot in the air, with the knee bent. An Ethiopian takes the robe of another and lies it about him, so as to leave his friend almost naked.

The Dutch, who are great eaters, are said to have a morning salutation, common amongst all ranks — “Smaakelyk ceten ?” (“May you eat a hearty dinner”). Another is, "Hoe vaart awe?” (“How do you sail?") adopted, no doubt, in the early days of the Republic, when the Dutch were all navigators and fishermen.

The usual salutation at Cairo is, ‘TIow do you sweat?” a dry hot skin being a sure indication of a destructive ephemeral fever. Some author has observed, in contrasting the haughty Spaniard with the frivolous Frenchman, that the steady gait and inflexible solemnity of the former were expressed in his mode of salutation : “Gome esta ? (“How do you stand?”) whittst the “Comment vous portez vous ?” (“How do you carry yourself ?”) was equally expressive of the gay motion of the latter.