Small carrying receptacles, or trinket baskets, frequently have designs produced by plaiting the rattan or bamboo of natural color with that which has been blackened (Plate XXXIVa). No uniform meaning or pattern name seems to be attached to the designs shown in this specimen, but an incised design on the wooden rim was readily identified as a crocodile.
The small baskets in the coiled weave sometimes have the fronts entirely covered with beads which are woven into the basket in parallel lines. The tobacco box shown in Plate XXXV has been covered with cloth and pitch, in which an artistic design made from the yellow cuticle of an orchid has been inlaid. Plate XXXVb shows the wooden tops of three tobacco boxes. Nos. 1 and 2 are carved and inlaid with beads and buttons in designs which "look pretty," but number 3 depicts a hunting scene in which two men and a dog are hunting the alligator. Several beads are missing so that it requires quite a stretch of the imagination to secure the impression the native artist meant to impart.
The prized trinket baskets of the women generally have the fronts covered with cloth, to which hundreds of colored beads are sewed, in elaborate designs (Plate XXXVI).
The patterns brought out in the weaving are as beautiful and intricate as they are confusing. Five typical specimens of cloth used in women's skirts are shown in Plate XXXVII. In them can be found several apparently different designs to some of which names were assigned, but as there was no agreement among my informers I refrain from giving them here. The pattern marked X in (c) was generally identified as "alligator," yet the weavers were by no means agreed.
The strip of cloth (Plate XXXVIII) was intended for the center breadth in a woman's skirt and shows the typical designs employed in the best garments.
The extensive use of beads is shown in Plates XXXIX-XL. Carrying bags, clothing, combs, necklaces, armlets, belts and sheath covers are partially covered with or made up of colored beads, always in designs, yet very few of these patterns have generally accepted meanings or names. The same holds true of the designs in shell disks, which, on the finer garments, take the place of beads. A few exceptions to this are found in which realistic patterns appear in (Plate XXXIb and Fig. 34).
Like the bead work, the embroidery and applique found on many garments are added "to make pretty." Some of this work is quite fine, but in general that of recent years is either inferior to that found on old garments or is borrowed from, or made by, the Bila-an women. Some garments, with designs produced by oversewing before dyeing, are seen here, but they are recent importations from the Kulaman or Tagakaolo tribes.
Necklaces and leglets are made of rattan and are decorated with burned lines or by being overlaid with platted strips of orchid and fern cuticle (Fig. 2).