Several varieties of squash, [222] and beans, as well as peanuts (mani) are among the common products of the garden.  The former are trained to run over a low trellis or frame to prevent injury to the blossoms from a driving rain.  Both blossoms and the mature vegetables are used as food.

Among the minor products are ginger, laya (Zingiber officinale Rosc.) and a small melon, locally known as melod, which is used as a sweetening.  Sugar cane, onas (Saccharum), is raised in considerable quantity, and is used in making an intoxicating drink known as basi.  It is also eaten raw in place of a sweetmeat, but is never converted into sugar.  Nowadays the juice is extracted by passing the cane between two cylinders of wood with intermeshing teeth.  Motive power is furnished by a carabao attached to a long sweep.  This is doubtless a recent introduction, but it has entirely superseded any older method.

The cane is raised from cuttings which are set in mud-beds until ready to be transferred to the mountain-side clearings.  These lands are prepared in the same manner as the upland rice fields already described.  The men dig shallow holes and set each plant upright, while the women follow, filling the hole with water and then pressing earth in with fingers or toes.

In addition to these food crops, considerable plantings of cotton or kapas (Gossypium sp.) and tobacco or taba-o (Nicotiana tabacum) are raised in the clearings.  The former is planted on the hillsides, where it matures in three or four months.  The plant seldom reaches a height of two feet, and the bolls are small, doubtless due to lack of care and suitable fertilization. [223]

Tobacco seeds are sprouted in beds similar to those used for the rice, and the same magical device is used to insure a lusty growth.  The young plants are carefully watered and shaded until they reach a height of five or six inches.  They are then transplanted to hillside clearings, or to unused rice fields, where they are set out about three to a foot.  This transfer generally takes place near the beginning of the dry season, so that the crop will be sure to mature without the damaging effect of water on the leaves.  The plants while lusty do not attain the size of those grown in the valley regions of the interior.  As soon as the leaves begin to turn a dark yellow, they are cut off and are strung on slender bamboo sticks (Plate LX), which are then hung up in the house.  When nearly dry, they are laid in piles, and are occasionally turned to prevent rust or mildew from forming.

A small amount of indigo, tayum (Indigofera tinctoria) is raised, generally in open spots near the villages.  The plants receive little or no attention, yet still attain a height of about three feet.  The leaves and branches are placed in water for a few days, and are then boiled, together with a little lime, the resultant liquor being used as a dye for cotton thread.