In Bontoc and Samoki there are about one hundred and fifty gold earrings which came from the gold-producing country about Suyak, Lepanto Province.  Carabaos are almost invariably traded for these.  Sometimes one carabao, sometimes two, and again three are bartered for one gold earring.  During the months of March and April the pueblo of Balili traded three of these earrings to Bontoc men for carabaos, and this particular form of barter has been carried on for generations.

Balili, Alap, Sadanga, Takong, Sagada, Titipan and other pueblos between Bontoc pueblo and Lepanto Province to the west weave breechcloths and skirts which are brought by their makers and disposed of to Bontoc and adjacent pueblos.  Agawa, Genugan, and Takong bring in clay and metal pipes of their manufacture.  Much of these productions is bartered directly for palay.  If money is paid for the articles it is invariably turned into palay, because this is the greatest constant need of manufacturing Igorot pueblos.

Sale

The Spaniard left his impress on the Igorot of Bontoc pueblo in no realm probably more surely than in that of the appreciation of the value of money.

The sale instinct, and not the barter instinct, is foremost now in Bontoc and Samoki when an American is a party to a bargain, and this is true in all pueblos on the main trail to Lepanto and the west coast.  But one has little difficulty in bartering for Igorot productions if he has things the people want —­ such as brass wire, cloth for the woman’s skirt, the man’s breechcloth, a shirt, or coat.  In many pueblos the people try to buy for money the articles the American brings in for barter, although it is true that barter will often get from them many things which money can not buy.  To the northeast and south of Bontoc barter will purchase practically anything.

The conditions of peace among the pueblos since the arrival of the Americans and the money which is now everywhere within the area have been the important factors in helping to develop interpueblo commerce from barter to sale.

Most of the clothing worn in the pueblos of Lepanto Province is made from cotton purchased for money at the coast.  With few exceptions the breechcloths and blankets worn by Bontoc and Samoki are purchased for money, though it is not very many years since the bark breechcloth made in Titipan and Barlig was worn, and in Tulubin, only two hours distant, Barlig blankets and breechcloths of whole bark are worn to-day.

One week in April a Bontoc Igorot traded a carabao to an Ilokano of Lepanto Province for a copper ganza, the customary way of purchasing ganzas, and the following week another Bontoc man sold a carabao for money to another Lepanto Ilokano.

The Baliwang battle-ax and spear are now more generally sold for money than is any other production made or disposed of within the Bontoc area.  They are said to-day to be seldom bartered for.