42

Many years ago there was a woman whose name was Bagutayka.  She had had only one daughter whose name was Bagan.  A boy who lived in Lantagan wished to marry Bagan, but she did not wish to marry him because she had no vagina, and she was ashamed.  Her mother said, “Take this little pot with pictures on the outside, and this sucker of banana and go to the roadside where people are passing.  When people are passing, you will make them sick in their knees or feet.”  Then poor Bagan went by the roadside.  In a short time a man passed by her; after that he was sick in his knees and did not walk, he only lived in his house, and could not move his hands or feet.  His parents were troubled to find medicine for him, for none they found did him good.  They used all the medicine that they knew.  Then Bagan went to see him in his house and told him to make bawi. [337] The sick man said to her, “How do we make bawi, for we have never heard about that?” Bagan said, “Bring me a white cloth, a basket of rice, some thread, a betel-nut, coconut, a rooster, and toknang.” [338] They brought all of these, and Bagan took them.  Then they built a bawi in the garden and planted the sucker by it.  They broke the coconut shell, killed the rooster, and took his feathers to put in the coconut husk, and they broke the coconut meat.

They made sablau near the bawi and put the coconut meat in it.  When they had done this, the man who was sick was as good as if he had not been sick, he could walk just as before.  This is the way the Tinguian people learned to make bawi.

43 [339]

In the first times Kaboniyan told a sick man to go to the mango tree at the edge of the village.  “Take a feather for your hair, a clay dish with oil, a headaxe, a spear, and a small jar of basi, when you go to the tree.”  He did as he was bidden, and when he reached the tree the pinaing [340] were there.  “Ala! now kill a small pig and offer its blood mixed with rice.  Oil the heads of the stones well, and decorate them with yellow head bands.  When you do this Apadel will always guard the town.”  The man and his companion always did as Kaboniyan said, and when they made balaua, or were sick, or went to fight, they did this.  They ate of the pig, they played the gansas and danced.  All who obeyed were always well, but one man who urinated on the stones became crazy.

One day when the people were preparing to go and fight against Manabo, [341] they went to the pinaing, and while they danced a red rooster with long tail feathers came out of the stones and walked around them.  When they stopped dancing, he went again into the stones.  Since that time a white cock has sometimes appeared and once a white dog came out while the people danced.

44 [342]

One night a man saw a woman, who wore a black cloth, walking near the pinaing.  When she would not speak to him, he cut her in the thigh with his bolo. [343] She ran to the stones and vanished.  Next morning the man went to the guardian stones and found one of them cut in the middle, as it is now.  The man soon died of smallpox.