Home Life

The general condition of the Negritos, although not one of extreme misery, is indeed pitiable. Their life is a continual struggle for sufficient food, but their efforts to provide for themselves stop short at that; clothing and houses are of secondary importance. The average Negrito takes little pride in his dwelling place. A shelter sufficient to turn the beating rains is all he asks. He sees to it that the hut is on ground high enough so that water will not stand in it; then, curled up beside his few coals of fire, he sleeps with a degree of comfort.

The most easily constructed hut, and therefore the most common, consists simply of two forked sticks driven into the ground so they stand about 8 feet apart and 4 feet high. A horizontal piece is laid in the two forks, then some strips of bamboo are inclined against this crosspiece, the other ends resting on the ground. Some cross strips are tied with bejuco to these bamboos and the whole is covered with banana leaves. With the materials close at hand a half hour is sufficient for one man to construct such a shelter. Where a comparatively long residence in one place is contemplated more care may be given the construction of a house, but the above description will apply to many dwellings in a rancheria two or three years old. Instead of two upright pieces make it four, somewhat higher, and place a bamboo platform within so the occupants do not have to sleep on the ground, and you have an approved type of Negrito architecture. Sometimes as an adjunct to this a shelter may be erected in front, provided with a bamboo seat for the accommodation of visitors. The more prosperous Negritos in the long-established rancherias have four-posted houses of bamboo, with roof and sides of cogon grass. The floors are 4 feet from the ground and the cooking is done underneath the floors. A small fire is kept burning all night. The inmates of the house sleep just above it, and in this way receive some benefit of the warmth. If it were not for these fires the Negrito would suffer severely from cold during the night, for he possesses no blanket and uses no covering of any sort.

For two reasons he never lets his fire go out; first, because he likes to feel the warmth continually, and second, because it is something of a task to build a fire, once it has gone out. (See Pls. XXXVIII, XXXIX.)

The method of making fire used universally by the Negritos of Zambales is that of the flint and steel, which apparatus they call “pan-ting.” The steel is prized highly, because it is hard to get; it is procured in trade from the Christianized natives. Nearly every Negrito carries a flint and steel in a little grass basket or case dangling down his back and suspended by a fiber string from his neck. In the same basket are usually tobacco leaves, buyo, and other small odds and ends. Sometimes this pouch is carried in the folds of the breechcloth, which is the only pocket the Negrito possesses.

The flint-and-steel method of fire making has almost entirely supplanted the more primitive method of making fire by rubbing two sticks together; but in some instances this method is still followed, and everywhere the Negritos know of it. They do not know whether the method is original with them or, not, but they admit they borrowed the flint-and-steel idea from the Filipinos. When the friction process is employed a piece of bamboo with a hole in it, in which are firmly held some fine shavings or lint, is violently rubbed crosswise against the edge of another piece until the friction ignites the lint. It is called “pan-a-han.” When two men are working together one holds the lower piece firmly while the other man rubs across it the sharpened edge of the upper piece. If a man is working alone the piece with the sharpened edge is held firmly between the ground and the man’s waist; the other piece of bamboo with the slit in is rubbed up and down on the sharp edge. (See Pls. XL, XLI.)

In lieu of other vessels, rice and similar foods are cooked in joints of green bamboo, which are placed in the coals and hot ashes. When the food is cooked the bamboo is split open and the contents poured out on banana leaves. This is by far the most common method employed, though not a few Negritos possess earthenware pots, and some few have a big iron vessel. Meats are always roasted by cutting into small bits and stringing on a strip of cane. Maize is roasted on hot coals. Everything is eaten without salt, although the Negritos like salt and are very glad to get it.

It has already been noted that the Negrito has a hard time to get enough to cat, and for that reason there is scarcely anything in the animal or vegetable kingdom of his environment of which he does not make use. He never has more than two meals a day, sometimes only one, and he will often start early in the morning on a deer hunt without having eaten any food and will hunt fill late in the afternoon. In addition to the fish, eels, and crayfish of the streams, the wild boar and wild chicken of the plain and woodland, he will eat iguanas and any bird he can catch, including crows, hawks, and vultures. Large pythons furnish especially toothsome steaks, so he says, but, if so, his taste in this respect is seldom satisfied, for these reptiles are extremely scarce.

Besides rice, maize, camotes, and other cultivated vegetables there is not a wild tuber or fruit with which the Negrito’s stomach is not acquainted. Even some that in their raw state would be deadly poisonous he soaks and boils in several waters until the poison is extracted, and then he eats them. This is the case with a yellow tuber which he calls “ca-lot.” In its natural form it is covered with stiff bristles. The Negritos peel off the skin and slice the vegetable into very thin bits and soak in water two days, after which it is boiled in two or three waters until it has lost its yellow color. In order to see if any poison still remains some of it is fed to a dog, and if he does not die they themselves eat it. In taste it somewhat resembles cooked rice. This was told me by an old Negrito who I believe did not possess enough invention to make it up, and is in part verified by Mr. O. Atkin, division superintendent of Zambales, who says in a report to the General Superintendent of Education, October, 1903, concerning the destitution of the town of Infanta, that the people of that town were forced by scarcity of food to eat this tuber, there called “co-rot.” He was told that it was soaked in running water five or six days before cooking, and if not prepared in this way it would cause severe sickness, even death. In fact, some cases were known where persons had died eating co-rot.

A white, thin-skinned tuber, called “bol-wi,” which is found in the forests, is highly prized by the Negritos, although it grows so deep in the ground that the labor of digging it is considerable. Among the cultivated vegetables are the common butter beans, called “an-tak,” and black beans, known as “an-tak ik-no” or “sitting-down beans” from the fact that the pods curl up at one end. Ga-bi and bau-gan are white tubers, and u-bi a dark-red tuber—which they eat. Other common products are maize, pumpkins, and camotes.

The Negrito has ordinarily no table but the bare ground, and at best a coarse mat; he has no dishes but banana leaves and cocoanut shells, and no forks or spoons but his fingers. He brings water from a stream in a piece of bamboo about three joints long in which all but one joint has been punched out, and drinks it from a piece of cocoanut shell. If he needs to cut anything to eat he has his ever-ready bolo, which he may have used a moment before in skinning a pig and which is never washed. He is repulsively dirty in his home, person, and everything he does. Nothing is ever washed except his hands and face, and those only rarely. He never takes a bath, because he thinks that if he bathes often he is more susceptible to cold, that a covering of dirt serves as clothing, although he frequently gets wet either in the rain or when fishing or crossing streams. This is probably one reason why skin diseases are so common.

Agriculture

The Negrito can not by any stretch of imagination be called a worker. His life for generations has not been such as to teach habits of industry. But for the fact that he has to do some work or starve, he would spend all his days in idleness except that time which he devoted to the chase. Yet when under pressure or urged on by anticipation of gain from the white man, whose wealth and munificence appear boundless, he is tireless. He will clear ground for a camp, cut and split bamboo, and make tables and sleeping platforms, which he would never think of doing for himself. He can get along without such things, and why waste the time? Yet when the camp is abandoned he will carry these things to his house. Most Negritos have seen the better style of living followed by the more civilized Filipinos in the outlying barrios; yet they seem to have no desire to emulate it, and I believe that the lack of such desire is due to a disinclination to perform the necessary manual labor.

By far the greater part of the Negrito’s energies are directed to the growing of tobacco, maize, and vegetables. He does not plant rice to any extent. All planting is done in cleared spots in the forest, because the soil is loose and needs no plowing as in the case of the lowland. The small trees and underbrush are cut away and burned and the large trees are killed, for the Negrito has learned the two important things in primitive farming—first, that the crops will not thrive in the shade, and second, that a tree too large to cut may be killed by cutting a ring around it to prevent the flow of sap. The clearings are never large.

Usually each family has its clearing in a separate place, though sometimes two or more families may cultivate adjoining clearings. The places are selected with a view to richness of soil and ease in clearing. In addition to preparing the ground it is necessary to build a fence around the clearing in order to keep out wild hogs. A brush fence is constructed by thrusting sticks in the ground a few inches apart and twining brush between them.

All work of digging up the soil, planting, and cultivating is done with sharpened sticks of hard wood, sometimes, but not always, pointed with iron, for iron is scarce. This instrument is called “ti-ad,” the only other tool they possess being the bolo, with which they do all the cutting.

Men, women, and children work in these clearings, but I did not see any division of labor, except that the men, being more adept with the bolo, do whatever cutting there is to be done. Once planted, the weeding and care of the crops falls largely on the women and children, while the men take their ease or hunt and fish.

The piece of ground for planting is regarded as the personal property of the head of the family which cleared it, and he can sell it or otherwise dispose of it at his pleasure. No one else would think of planting on it even though the owner has abandoned it, unless he declared that he had no more use for it, then it could be occupied by anyone else.

An instance of the respect which the Negritos have for the property rights of others was given me by a native of the town of Botolan. His grandfather had acquired a piece of land near Mount Pinatubo from a Negrito who had committed some crime in his rancheria and fled to the pueblo to escape death. In return for protection the Negrito had given him the land. This fact became known to the other Negritos, but although the new owner made no use of the land whatever, and never even visited it, it has never been molested or cultivated by others. Now two generations later they have sent down to the grandson of the first Filipino owner asking permission to buy the land. Land may be sold to others, but of course there exists no record of such transactions other than that of memory.

Manufacture and Trade

The Negrito knows little of the art of making things. Aside from the bows and arrows which he constructs with some degree of skill he has no ingenuity, and his few other products are of the most crude and primitive type. The bows of the Negritos of Zambales are superior to any the writer has seen in the Philippines. They are made from the wood of the well-known palma brava and are gracefully cut and highly polished. The strings are of twisted bark, as soft and pliable and as strong as thongs of deerskin. Although made from the same wood, the bows of the Negritos of Negros are not nearly so graceful, and the strings consist simply of one piece of bejuco with a small loop at either end which slips over the end of the bow, and, once on, can neither be loosened nor taken up. The Negritos of Panay generally use a bamboo bow, much shorter and clumsier than those of palma brava.

Also, while the Negritos of the southern islands generally use arrows with hardwood points and without feathered shafts, those used in Zambales are triumphs of the arrow maker’s art. In either case the shafts are of the light, hard, and straight mountain cane, but instead of the clumsy wooden points the Zambales Negritos make a variety of iron points for different purposes, some, as for large game, with detachable points. (See Pl. XLII.) The shafts are well feathered with the feathers of hawks and other large birds. Three feathers are placed about the arrow and securely wrapped at each end with a thin strip of bejuco or some strong grass.

The war arrows, in addition to having more elaborately barbed points, are further embellished by incised decorations the entire length of the shaft. These incisions consist simply of a series of lines into which dirt has been rubbed so that they offer a striking contrast to the white surface of the arrow.

The women weave some coarse baskets out of bamboo, but they are neither well shaped nor pretty. Sometimes to adorn them one strand or strip of bamboo is stained black and the other left its natural color. Other objects of manufacture are their ornaments, already described in Chapter III, and musical instruments. (See Chap. VI.)

The Negrito knows that the people of the lowlands for some reason have more food than he. He can not go down and live there and work as they do, because, being timid by nature, he can not feel secure amid an alien people, and, besides, he likes his mountain too well to live contentedly in the hot plains. He makes nothing that the lowlands want, but he knows they use, in the construction of their houses, bejuco, of which his woods are full, and he has learned that they value beeswax, which he knows where to find and how to collect. Moreover, there are certain mountain roots, such as wild ginger, that have a market value. His tobacco also finds a ready sale to the Filipinos.

The bolo is the only tool necessary to cut and strip the bejuco, which he ties into bunches of one hundred and takes into his hut for safety until such a time as a trade can be made. These bunches never bring him more than a peseta each. He collects the beeswax from a nest of wild bees which he has smoked out, melts it, and pours it into a section of bamboo.

It is not always necessary that he take his products down to the town, for the Filipinos are eager enough to trade with him to go out to his rancheria carrying the little cloth, rice, iron, or steel that he is willing to take for his hard-gained produce. Perhaps the townspeople go out because they can drive better bargains. However that may be, the Negrito always gets the worst of the deal, whether in town or at his own home.

Hunting and Fishing

The Negrito is by instinct, habits, and of necessity a hunter. Although he has advanced somewhat beyond that stage of primitive life where man subsists wholly from the fruits of the chase, yet it is so necessary to him that were he deprived of it the existence of his race would be seriously threatened. Since the chase has furnished him a living for centuries, it is not strange that much of the ingenuity he possesses should be devoted to the construction of arms and traps and snares with which he may kill or capture the creatures of the woods and streams. His environment does not supply a great variety of game, but there are always deer and wild boars in abundance. Then there are wild chickens and many birds which none but the Negrito would think of eating, and the mountain streams have a few small fish.

It is the capture of the deer which makes the greatest demands on the Negrito’s skill. Doubtless his first efforts in this direction were to lie in wait by a run and endeavor to get a shot at a passing animal. But this required an infinite amount of patience, for the deer has a keen nose, and two or three days might elapse before the hunter could get even a glimpse of the animal. So he bethought himself of a means to entrap the deer while he rested at home. At first he made a simple noose of bejuco so placed in the run that the deer’s head would go through it and it would close on his neck like a lasso. But this was not very effective. In the first place it was necessary that the run be of the right width with underbrush on either side, because if the noose were too large the deer might jump through it and if too small he might brush it to one side.

The results of this method were so uncertain that the practice has fallen into disuse. Recourse is now had to the deadly “belatic.” I do not believe that this trap, which is common nearly all over the Philippines, is original with the Negrito. It is probably the product of the Malayan brain. A trap almost identical with this and called “belantay” is described by Mr. Abraham Hale1 as belonging to the Sakai of the Malay Peninsula, whom the Philippine Negrito resembles in many ways. The similarity between the two words “belatic” and “belantay” is apparent. In Ilokano and Pampanga this trap is called “balantic,” accented, like the Sakai term, on the last syllable. In Tagalog and Bisayan the letter “n” is dropped and the word is pronounced “be-lat-ic.” Mr. Hale does not state whether the word is Sakai or is borrowed from the Malay. But according to Clifford and Swettenham’s Malay Dictionary the pure Malay term is “belante,” which, as it is even more similar to the terms in use in the Philippines, puts an end to the doubt concerning the origin of the word.

The belatic consists of a long arrow or spear, which is driven, with all the force of a drawn bough or other piece of springy wood, across the path of the animal which strikes the cord, releasing the spring. (See fig.1.)

When the string C is struck it pulls the movable ring G, releasing K, which immediately flies up, releasing the string I and hence the spring F. The spear, which is usually tied to the end of the spring, though it may simply rest against it, immediately bounds forward, impaling the animal. The spring is either driven into the ground or is firmly held between the two uprights L. This trap is almost invariably successful.

Wild chickens and birds are caught with simple spring traps. The hungry bird tugging at an innocent-appearing piece of food releases a spring which chokes him to death. The noose snare for catching wild chickens invented by the Christianized natives is also used to some extent by the Negritos. This trap consists of a lot of small nooses of rattan or bejuco so arranged on a long piece of cane that assisted by pegs driven into the ground they retain an upright position. This is arranged in convex form against a wall or thicket of underbrush so that a bird can not enter the space thus inclosed except by way of the trap. In this inclosed area is placed a tame cock whose crowing attracts the wild one. The latter, spoiling for a fight, makes for the noisy challenger and runs his head through a noose which draws the tighter the more he struggles.

The Negrito, as has been said, is remarkably ingenious in the construction of arrows. Those with which he hunts the deer are provided with cruelly barbed, detachable iron point. (Figs. 8, 9, Pl. XLII.) When the animal is struck the point leaves the shaft, unwinding a long woven coil with which the two are fastened together. The barbs prevent the point from tearing out of the flesh and the dangling shaft catches on the underbrush and serves to retard the animal’s flight. In spite of this, however, the stricken deer sometimes gets away, probably to die a lingering death with the terrible iron point deeply embedded in its flesh. A similar arrow is mentioned by De Quatrefages as having been found by Alan among the Mincopies of the Andamans.2

The arrows which are used to kill smaller animals and birds have variously shaped iron heads without barbs. (Figs. 10, 11, 12, 13, Pl. XLII.) However, in shooting small birds a bamboo arrow is used. One end is split a little way, 5 or 6 inches, into three, four, or five sections. These are sharpened and notched and are held apart by small wedges securely fixed by wrappings of cord. If the bird is not impaled on one of the sharp points it may be held in the fork. (Figs. 2, 3, 4, Pl. XLII.) The fish arrows have long, slender, notched iron points roughly resembling a square or cylindrical file. The points are from 4 to 8 inches in length. Sometimes they are provided with small barbs. (Figs. 5, 6, 7, Pl. XLII.)

The Negritos of Zambales are not so expert in the use of bows and arrows as their daily use of these weapons would seem to indicate. They seldom miss the larger animals at close range, but are not so lucky in shooting at small objects. I have noticed that they shoot more accurately upward into the trees than horizontally. For instance, a boy of 10 would repeatedly shoot mangoes out of a tree, but when I posted a mark at 30, yards and offered a prize for the best shot no one could hit it.

The Negritos usually hunt in bands, and, because they have little else to do and can go out and kill a deer almost any time, they do not resort much to the use of traps. A long line of thirty men winding down the path from their village, all armed with bows twice their height and a handful of arrows, their naked bodies gleaming in the early morning sun, presents a truly novel sight. They have with them five or six half-starved dogs. When the haunts of the deer are reached, a big gully cutting through the level table-land, thick with cane and underbrush through which a tiny stream finds its way, half a dozen boys plunge into the depths with the dogs and the rest walk along either side or lie in wait at runs. The Negritos in the thicket yell continually and beat the brush, but the dogs are silent until game is scented. Then the cries of the runners are redoubled and the din warns those lying in wait to be alert. Presently from one of the many runs leading out of the ravine a deer appears and, if there happens to be a Negrito on the spot, gets an arrow. But, unless vitally wounded, on he goes followed by the dogs, which never give up the chase of a wounded deer. When a deer is killed it is hung up in a tree and the hunt proceeds.

Sometimes the thick canebrakes along the river beds are beaten up in this way, or the lightly timbered mountain ravines; for the Negrito knows that the deer lie in a cool, sheltered place in the daytime and come forth to browse only at night. On clear, moonlight nights they sometimes attempt to stalk the deer while grazing in the open field, but are not usually successful. Quite often in the chase a long rope net, resembling a fish net but much coarser and stronger, is placed in advance of the beating party in some good position where the deer is likely to run if started up. These are absolutely sure to hold the deer should the unfortunate animal run into them—a thing which does not happen often.

The Negritos are tireless in the chase. They will hunt all day without eating, unless they happen to run across some wild fruit. Women frequently take part, especially if dogs are scarce, and they run through the brush yelping to imitate the dogs. But they never carry or use the bows and arrows. This seems to be the especial privilege of the men. Boys from an early age are accustomed to their use and always take part in the hunt, sometimes performing active service with their little bows, but girls never touch them. Not infrequently the runners in the brush emerge carrying wild pigs which they have seared up and killed, and if, by chance, a big snake is encountered, that ends the hunt, for the capture of a python is an event. The snake is killed and carried in triumph to the village, where it furnishes a feast to all the inhabitants.

This sketch of hunting would not be complete without mention of a necessary feature of every successful hunt—the division of the spoils. When the hunt is ended the game is carried back to the village before the division is made, provided the hunters are all from the same place. If two or more villages have hunted together the game is divided in the field. A bed of green rushes or cane is made on which the animal is placed and skinned. This done, the bead man of the party, or the most important man present, takes a small part of the entrails or heart, cuts it into fine bits and scatters the pieces in all directions, at the same time chanting in a monotone a few words which mean “Spirits, we thank you for this successful hunt. Here is your share of the spoils.” This is done to feed and appease the spirits which the Negritos believe inhabit all places, and the ceremony is never neglected. Then the cutting up and division of the body of the animal takes place. The head and breast go to the man who first wounded the deer, and, if the shot was fatal, he also receives the backbone—this always goes to the man who fired the fatal shot. One hind quarter goes to the owner of the dog which seared up the deer, and the rest is divided as evenly as possible among the other hunters. Every part is utilized. The Negritos waste nothing that could possibly serve as food. The two hunts I accompanied were conducted in the manner I have related, and I was assured that this was the invariable procedure.

The mountain streams of the Negrito’s habitat do not furnish many fish, but the Negrito labors assiduously to catch what he can. In the larger streams he principally employs, after the manner of the Christianized natives, the bamboo weir through which the water can pass but the fish can not. In the small streams he builds dams of stones which he covers with banana leaves. Then with bow and arrow he shoots the fish in the clear pool thus formed. Not infrequently the entire course of a creek will be changed. A dam is first made below in order to stop the passage of the fish, and after a time the stream is dammed at some point above in such a way as to change the current. Then, as the water slowly runs out of the part thus cut off, any fish remaining are easily caught.