The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume 48, 1751-1765: Explorations by early navigators, descriptions of the islands and their peoples, their history and records of the Catholic missions, as related in contemporaneous books and manuscripts, showing the political, economic, commercial and religious conditions of those islands from their earliest relations with European nations to the close of the nineteenth century
History
The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume 48, 1751-1765: Explorations by early navigators, descriptions of the islands and their peoples, their history and records of the Catholic missions, as related in contemporaneous books and manuscripts, showing the political, economic, commercial and religious conditions of those islands from their earliest relations with European nations to the close of the nineteenth century
Demarcation line of Alexander VI; Missions -- Philippines; Philippines -- Discovery and exploration; Philippines -- History -- Sources
Each band, usually containing twenty-five to thirty persons, goes by
itself, with one man to whom the rest pay respect, generally the one
who is most daring and valiant. In the summer they go down to live
on the banks of the streams, seeking the fresh air; but in times of
rain, or when the north winds blow hard, they huddle together in the
thickets, so dense that the wind hardly enters them. If one of them
dies, as soon as he expires they bury him in a very shallow grave;
and then they take to flight, in order that death may not seize
another person and carry him away, as they say. When the time for
[gathering] honeycombs arrives--and the stores of honey which the bees
[42] gather in those dense forests are without limit--they are busy in
searching for these; and if they come across a honey-tree the person
who finds it immediately makes a mark on the trunk of the tree, and
possesses it as securely as if he had it in his own house. For, even if
another person goes there and finds it, when he sees the mark he says:
"This tree already has an owner," and therefore he goes on. Afterward,
they go at a convenient time, and, waiting until there is no wind,
so that the smoke may not be prevented from rising perpendicularly,
they make a fire [under the tree]; and, the bees being scared away,
men climb the tree, carrying a sort of sling, strongly made from a
palm-leaf, very broad, [from the tree] which they call anao. [43]
They take out the comb entire, with wax and all, placing it in this
receptacle; and then tie it together and carry it down. They eat
the honey, and sell the wax in order to buy tobacco for smoking,
without which they cannot pass the time. So long as such people have
their tobacco, their bows and arrows, their half-cutlass, and their
outfit for striking fire, they do not desire anything else--money, or
clothing, or lands--neither do they envy any person for anything. They
shoot arrows with the greatest dexterity, and will pierce a deer with
one from side to side in his most rapid flight. When they have food
they eat it in a barbarous manner; but if on account of bad weather
they have not been able to obtain any game, they boil water and drink
it, and compress their bellies with cords. They are also accustomed to
dig in the ground and search for a root called sucbao, [44] with which,
when it is roasted, they can subsist, although in summer they never
lack fruits in the woods. They are always happy, and keep themselves
plump and contented; and among them are persons who are quite old.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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