[64] See p. 110 note. [Transcriber's note: 30 pages earlier.]
Aside from clearing the land and helping somewhat with the rice crops, the men seldom concern themselves with work in the fields but leave the cultivation of corn, sweet potatoes, tobacco, and the like to the women.
A large part of the food of the tribe is furnished by the fruits and herbs of the jungle and here again the women are the chief providers. Although in the sago industry both sexes have well defined duties.
Along the edge of the cogon lands are many large buri palms,[65] from which a starch commercially known as sago is secured. The men cut down a tree close to its roots and remove the hard outer bark, thus exposing the soft fibrous interior (Plate LIII); then a section of bamboo is bent so as to resemble an adze[sic], and with this the men loosen or break up the soft interior portion of the trunk. This is removed to a near-by stream, and is placed in a bark vat into which water is led by means of bamboo tubes. Here a woman works it with her hands until the starch grains are separated from the fibrous matter. As the water drains slowly out the fine starch is carried with it into a coarse cloth sieve, which retains all the larger matter but allows the starch to be carried into another bark vat below. Fresh water passes slowly through this lower vat, removing the bitter sap from the flour, which is deposited on the bottom of the vat. From time to time this is scraped up and placed in baskets where it is kept until needed. The flour, while rather tasteless, is nutritious and in years of drought is the chief source of food supply.
[65] Corypha umbraculifera.
Preparation of the meals, care of the children, basket and mat making, weaving and decoration of clothing, take up most of the time of the women when they are not engaged in the cultivation of the fields or in search of forest products.
The hardest work in the fields falls to the men; they also strip the hemp needed in weaving, while a few of them are skilled workers in brass and copper and turn out bells and other ornaments not at all inferior to those of the coast natives. Their methods of casting as well as their manufactures are identical with those of the Bagobo from whom they probably learned the art. So far as could be learned no iron work is done by members of this tribe, and the few spears and knives possessed by the warriors seem to be trade articles.
The old men claim that until recent years the bow and arrow was their sole offensive weapon. It is certain that today they have a greater variety of arrows and are more skillful in the use of this type of weapon than are any of their neighbors. None of the weapons found on the gulf side of the divide appeared to be poisoned, but a number secured by Major Porter from the Lake Buluan region seem to have been so treated (Fig. 38). Different types of arrows have been developed for different purposes; one for fighting, another for deer and pig, another for monkeys, and still others for fish and birds (Fig. 39). Birds are killed also by means of reed blow guns, identical in type with those shown on page 73, Fig. 18. As a rule such weapons are used by boys. Pitch sticks (Fig. 40), chicken snares, and fish traps are in common use, but bird nets and wooden decoys seem to be unknown.
