There are many Christian women who, if offered the choice between
death and walking naked down the street, would choose death as being
preferable to eternal disgrace and social suicide. If they preferred
the other alternative, they would be arrested and, if known to be
respectable, sent to an insane asylum. The English legend relates that
"peeping Tom" was struck blind because he did not stay in the house as
commanded when the good Lady Godiva was obliged to ride naked through
the market-place. So strong, indeed, is the sentiment of modesty in
our community that the old-fashioned philosophers used to maintain it
was an innate instinct, always present under normal conditions. The
fact that every child has to be gradually taught to avoid indecent
exposure, ought to have enlightened these philosophers as to their
error, which is further made plain to the orthodox by the Biblical
story that in the beginning of human life the man and his wife were
both naked and not ashamed.
Naked and not ashamed is the condition of primitive man wherever
climatic and other motives do not prescribe dress. Writing of the
Arabs at Wat El Negur, Samuel Baker says (_N.T.A_., 265):
"Numbers of young girls and women were accustomed to
bathe perfectly naked in the river just before our
tent. I employed them to catch small fish for bait; and
for hours they would amuse themselves in this way,
screaming with excitement and fun, and chasing the
small fry with their long clothes in lieu of nets;
their figures were generally well-shaped.... The men
were constantly bathing in the clear waters of the
Athabara, and were perfectly naked, although close to
the women; we soon became accustomed to this daily
scene, as we do at Brighton and other English bathing
towns."