The Bontoc Igorot Part 8

By far the majority of deaths among them is due to what the Igorot calls fever -- as they say, "im-po'-os nan a'-wak," or "heat of the body" -- but they cla.s.s as "fever" half a dozen serious diseases, some almost always fatal.

The men at times suffer with malaria. They go to the low west coast as cargadors or as primitive merchants, and they return to their mountain country enervated by the heat, their systems filled with impure water, and their blood teeming with mosquito-planted malaria. They get down with fever, lose their appet.i.te, neither know the value of nor have the medicines of civilization, their minds are often poisoned with the superst.i.tious belief that they will die -- and they do die in from three days to two months. In February, 1903, three cargadors died within two weeks after returning from the coast.

Measles, chicken pox, typhus and typhoid fevers, and a disease resulting from eating new rice are undifferentiated by the Igorot -- they are his "fever." Measles and chicken pox are generally fatal to children. Igorot pueblos promptly and effectually quarantine against these diseases. When a settlement is afflicted with either of them it shuts its doors to all outsiders -- even using force if necessary; but force is seldom demanded, as other pueblos at once forbid their people to enter the afflicted settlement. The ravages of typhus and typhoid fever may be imagined among a people who have no remedies for them. The diseased condition resulting each year from eating new rice has locally been called "rice cholera." During the months of June, July, and August -- the two harvest months of rice and the one following -- considerable rice of the new crop is annually eaten. If rice has been stored in the palay houses until it is sweated it is in every way a healthful, nutritious food, but when eaten before it sweats it often produces diarrhea, usually leading to an acute b.l.o.o.d.y dysentery which is often followed by vomiting and a sudden collapse -- as in Asiatic cholera.

In 1893 smallpox, ful-tang', came to Bontoc with a Spanish soldier who was in the hospital from Quiangan. Some five or six adults and sixty or seventy children died. The ravage took half a dozen in a day, but the Igorot stamped out the plague by self-isolation. They talked the situation over, agreed on a plan, and were faithful to it. All the families not afflicted moved to the mountains; the others remained to minister or be ministered to, as the case might be. About thirty-five years ago smallpox wiped out a considerable settlement of Bontoc, called La'-nao, situated nearer the river than are any dwellings at present.

About thirty years ago cholera, pish-ti', visited the people, and fifty or more deaths resulted.

Some twelve years ago ka-lag'-nas, an unidentified disease, destroyed a great number of people, probably half a hundred. Those afflicted were covered with small, itching festers, had attacks of nausea, and death resulted in about three days.

Two women died in Bontoc in 1901 of beri-beri, called fu-tut. These are the only cases known to have been there.

About ten years ago a man died from pa.s.sing blood -- an ailment which the Igorot named literally "in-is'-fo cha'-la or in-tay'-es cha'-la." It was not dysentery, as the person at no time had a diarrhea. He gradually weakened from the loss of small amounts of blood until, in about a year, he died.

The above are the only fatal diseases now in the common memory of the pueblo of Bontoc.

It is believed 95 per cent of the people suffer at some time, probably much of the time, with some skin disease. They say no one has been known to die of any of these skin diseases, but they are weakening and annoying. Itch, ku'-lid, is the most common, and it takes an especially strong hold on the babes in arms. This ku'-lid is not the ko'-lud or gos-gos, the white scaly itch found among the people surrounding those of the Bontoc culture area but not known to exist within it.

Two or three people suffer with rheumatism, fig-fig, but are seldom confined to their homes.

One man has consumption, o'-kat. He has been coughing five or six years, and is very thin and weak.

Diarrhea, or o-gi'-ak, frequently makes itself felt, but for only one or two days at a time. It is most common when the locusts swarm over the country, and the people eat them abundantly for several days. They say no one, not even a babe, ever died of diarrhea.

Two of the three prost.i.tutes of Bontoc, the cast-off mistresses of Spanish soldiers, have syphilis, or na-na. Formerly one civilian was afflicted, and at present four or five of the Constabulary soldiers have contracted the disease.

Lang-ing'-i, a disease of sores and ulcers on the lips, nostrils, and r.e.c.t.u.m, afflicted a few people three or four years ago. This disease is very common in the pueblo of Ta-kong', but is reported as never causing death.

Goiter, fi-kek' or fin-to'-kel, is quite common with adults, and is more common with women than men.

Varicose veins, o'-pat, are not uncommon on the calves of both men and women.

Many old people suffer greatly with toothache, called "pa-tug' nan fob-a'." They say it is caused by a small worm, fi'-kis, which wriggles and twists in the tooth. When one has an aching tooth extracted he looks at it and inquires where "fi'-kis" is.

They suffer little from colds, mo-tug', and one rarely hears an Igorot cough.

Headache, called both sa-kit' si o'-lo and pa-tug' si o'-lo, rarely occurs except with fever.

Sore eyes, a condition known as in-o'-ki, are very frequently seen; they doubtless precede most cases of blindness.

The Igorot bears pain well, but his various fatalistic superst.i.tions make him often an easy victim to a malady that would yield readily to the science of modern medicine and from which, in the majority of cases, he would probably recover if his mind could only a.s.sist his body in withstanding the disease.

One is surprised to find that sores from bruises do not generally heal quickly.

The Igorot attempts no therapeutic remedies for fevers, cholera, beri-beri, rheumatism, consumption, diarrhea, syphilis, goiter, colds, or sore eyes.

Some effort, therapeutic in its intent, is made to a.s.sist nature in overcoming a few of the simplest ailments of the body.

For a cut, called "na-fa'-kag," the fruit of a gra.s.s-like herb named la-lay'-ya is pounded to a paste, and then bound on the wound.

Burns, ma-la-fub-chong', are covered over with a piece of bark from a tree called ta-k.u.m'-fao.

Kay-yub', a vegetable root, is rubbed over the forehead in cases of headache.

Boils, fu-yu-i', and swellings, nay-am-an' or kin-may-yon', are treated with a poultice of a pounded herb called ok-ok-ong'-an.

Millet burned to a charcoal, pulverized, and mixed with pig fat is used as a salve for the itch.

An herb called a-k.u.m' is pounded and used as a poultice on ulcers and sores.

For toothache salt is mixed with a pounded herb named ot-o'-tek and the ma.s.s put in or around the aching tooth.

Leaves of the tree kay'-yam are steeped, and the decoction employed as a bath for persons with smallpox.

Death and burial

It must be said that the Bontoc Igorot does not take death very sorrowfully, and he does not take it at all pa.s.sionately. A mother weeps a day for a dead child or her husband, but death is said not to bring tears from any man. Death causes no long or loud lamentation, no tearing of the hair or cutting the body; it effects no somber colors to deaden the emotions; no earth or ashes for the body -- all widespread mourning customs among primitive peoples. However, when a child or mature man or woman dies the women a.s.semble and sing and wail a melancholy dirge, and they ask the departed why he went so early. But for the aged there are neither tears nor wailings -- there is only grim philosophy. "You were old," they say, "and old people die. You are dead, and now we shall place you in the earth. We too are old, and soon we shall follow you."

All people die at the instance of an anito. There have been, however, three suicides in Bontoc. Many years ago an old man and woman hung themselves in their dwellings because they were old and infirm, and a man from Bitwagan hung himself in the Spanish jail at Bontoc a few years ago.

The spirit of the person who dies a so-called natural death is called away by an anito. The anito of those who die in battle receive the special name "pin-teng'"; such spirits are not called away, but the person's slayer is told by some pin-teng', "You must take a head." So it may be said that no death occurs among the Igorot (except the rare death by suicide) which is not due directly to an anito.

Since they are warriors, the men who die in battle are the most favored, but if not killed in battle all Igorot prefer to die in their houses. Should they die elsewhere, they are at once taken home.

On March 19, 1903, wise, rich Som-kad', of ato Luwakan, and the oldest man of Bontoc, heard an anito saying, "Come, Som-kad'; it is much better in the mountains; come." The sick old man laboriously walked from the pabafunan to the house of his oldest son, where he had for nearly twenty years taken his food, and there among his children and friends he died on the night of March 21. Just before he died a chicken was killed, and the old people gathered at the house, cooked the chicken, and ate, inviting the ancestral anitos and the departing spirit of Som-kad' to the feast. Shortly after this the spirit of the live man pa.s.sed from the body searching the mountain spirit land for kin and friend. They closed the old man's eyes, washed his body and on it put the blue burial robe with the white "anito" figures woven in it as a stripe. They fas.h.i.+oned a rude, high-back chair with a low seat, a sung-a'-chil (Pl. XLI), and bound the dead man in it, fastening him by bands about the waist, the arms, and head -- the vegetal band entirely covering the open mouth. His hands were laid in his lap. The chair was set close up before the door of the house, with the corpse facing out. Four nights and days it remained there in full sight of those who pa.s.sed.

One-half the front wall of the dwelling and the interior part.i.tions except the sleeping compartment were removed to make room for those who sat in the dwelling. Most of these came and went without function, but day and night two young women sat or stood beside the corpse always brus.h.i.+ng away the flies which sought to gather at its nostrils.

During the first two days few men were about the house, but they gathered in small groups in the vicinity of the fawi and pabafunan, which were only three or four rods distant. Much of the time a blind son of the dead man, the owner of the house where the old man died, sat on his haunches in the shade under the low roof, and at frequent intervals sang to a melancholy tune that his father was dead, that his father could no longer care for him, and that he would be lonely without him. On succeeding days other of the dead man's children, three sons and five daughters, all rich and with families of their own, were heard to sing the same words. Small numbers of women sat about the front of the house or close in the shade of its roof and under its cover. Now and then some one or more of them sang a low-voiced, wordless song -- rather a soothing strain than a depressing dirge. During the first days the old women, and again the old men, sang at different times alone the following song, called "a-na'-ko"

when sung by the women, and "e-ya'-e" when by the men:

Now you are dead; we are all here to see you. We have given you all things necessary, and have made good preparation for the burial. Do not come to call away [to kill] any of your relatives or friends.

Nowhere was there visible any sign of fear or awe or wonder. The women sitting about spun threads on their thighs for making skirts; they talked and laughed and sang at will. Mothers nursed their babes in the dwelling and under its projecting roof. Budding girls patted and loved and dimpled the cheeks of the squirming babes of more fortunate young women, and there was scarcely a child that pa.s.sed in or out of the house, that did not have to steady itself by laying a hand on the lap of the corpse. All seemed to understand death. One, they say, does not die until the anito calls -- and then one always goes into a goodly life which the old men often see and tell about.

In a well-organized and developed modern enterprise the death of a princ.i.p.al man causes little or no break. This is equally true in Igorot life. The former is so because of perfected organization -- there are new men trained for all machines; and the latter is true because of absence of organization -- there is almost no machinery to be left unattended by the falling of one person.

On the third day the numbers increased. There were twenty-five or thirty men in the vicinity of the house, on the south side of which were half a dozen pots of basi,[21] from which men and boys drank at pleasure, though not half a dozen became intoxicated. Late in the afternoon a double row of men, the sons and sons-in-law of the deceased, lined up on their haunches facing one another, and for half an hour talked and laughed, counted on their fingers and gesticulated, diagrammed on their palms, questioned, pointed with their lips and nodded, as they divided the goodly property of the dead man. There was no anger, no sharp word, or apparent dissent; all seemed to know exactly what was each one's right. In about half an hour the property was disposed of beyond probable future dispute.

There were more women present the third day than on the second, and at all times about one-third more women than men; and there were usually as many children about as there were grown persons. In all the group of, say, 140 people, nowhere could one detect a sign of the uncanny, or even the unusual. The apparent everydayness of it all to them was what struck the observer most. The young women brus.h.i.+ng away the flies touched and turned the fast-blackening hands of the corpse to note the rapid changes. Almost always there were small children standing in the doorway looking into that blackened, swollen face, and they turned away only to play or to loll about their mothers'

necks. Always there were women bending over other women's heads, carefully parting the hair and scanning it. Women lay asleep stretched in the shade; they talked, and droned, and laughed, and spun.

During the second day men had succeeded in catching in the mountains one of the half-wild carabaos -- property of the deceased -- and this was killed. Its head was placed in the house tied up by the horns above and facing Som-kad', so the faces of the dead seemed looking at each other, while on the third day the flesh, bones, intestines, and hide were cooked for the crowd. During the third and fourth days one carabao, one dog, eight hogs, and twenty chickens were killed, cooked, and eaten.

On the fourth day the crowd increased. Custom lays idle all field tools of an ato on the burial day of an adult of that ato; but the day Som-kad' was buried the field work of the entire pueblo stood still because of common respect for this man, so old and wise, so rich and influential, and probably 200 people were about the house all the day. By noon two well-defined groups of chanting old women had formed -- one sitting in the house and the other in front of it. Wordless, melancholy chants were sung in response between the groups. The s.p.a.ces surrounding the house became almost packed -- so much so that a dog succeeded in getting into the doorway, and the threatenings and maledictions that drove it away were the loudest, most disturbed expressions noted during the four days.

Before the house, which faced the west, lay the large pine coffin lid, while to the south of it, turned bottom up, was the coffin with fresh chips beside it hewn out that morning in further excavation. Children played around the coffin and people lounged on its upturned bottom. Near the front of the house a pot of water was always hot over a smoldering, smoking fire. Now and then a chicken was brought, light wood was tossed under the pot, the chicken was beaten to death -- first the wings, then the neck, and then the head. The fowl was quickly sprawled over the blaze, its feathers burned to a crisp, and rubbed off with sticks. Its legs were severed from the body with the battle-ax and put in the pot. From its front it was then cut through its ribs with one gash. The back and breast parts were torn apart, the gall examined and nodded over; the intestines were placed beneath a large rock, and the gizzard, breast of the chicken, and back with head attached dropped in the pot. During the killing and dressing neither of the two men who prepared the feast hurried, yet scarcely five minutes pa.s.sed from the time the first blow was struck on the wing of the squawking fowl until the work was over and the meat in the boiling pot. The cooking of a fowl always brought a crowd of boys who hung over the fragrant vessel, and they usually got their share when, in about twenty minutes, the meat came forth. Three times in the afternoon a fowl was thus distributed. Cooked pork was pa.s.sed among the people, and rice was always being brought. Twice a man went through the crowd with a large winnowing tray of cooked carabao hide cut in little blocks. This food was handed out on every side, people tending children receiving double share. The people gathered and ate in the congested s.p.a.ces about the dwelling. The heat was intense -- there was scarcely a breath of air stirring. The odor from the body was heavy and most sickening to an American, and yet there was no trace of the unusual on the various faces.