[11] Father Camel mentions that the little animal is said to live only on coal, but that it was an error, for he ate the ficus Indica (by which we here understand him to mean the banana) and other fruits. (Camel de quadruped. Phil. Trans., 1706–7. London.) Camel also gives (p. 194) an interesting account of the kaguang, which is accurate at the present day.—Ibid., ii. S. 2197.
XX
Pearl divers from the Carolines.In Guiuan I was visited by some Micronesians, who for the last fourteen days had been engaged at Sulangan on the small neck of land south-east from Guiuan, in diving for pearl mussels (mother-of-pearl), having undertaken the dangerous journey for the express purpose.[1]
Hardships and perils of their voyage.They had sailed from Uleai (Uliai, 7° 20′ N., 143°57′ E. Gr.) in five boats, each of which had a crew of nine men and carried forty gourds full of water, with coconuts and batata. Every man received one coconut daily, and two batatas, which they baked in the ashes of the coco shells; and they caught some fish on the way, and collected a little rain-water. During the day they directed their course by the sun, and at night by the stars. A storm destroyed the boats. Two of them sank, together with their crews, before the eyes of their companions, and of these, only one—probably the sole individual rescued—two weeks afterwards reached the harbor of Tandag, on the east coast of Mindanao. The party remained at Tandag two weeks, working in the fields for hire, and then proceeded northwards along the coast to Cantilang, 8° 25′ N.; Banouan (called erroneously Bancuan by Coello), 9° 1′ N.; Taganaan, 9° 25′ N.; thence to Surigao, on the north point of Mindanao; and then, with an easterly wind, in two days, direct to Guiuan. In the German translation of Captain Salmon’s “History of the Oriental Islands” (Altona, 1733), it is stated that:
Castaways from the Pelews.“Some other islands on the east of the Philippines have lately been discovered which have received the name of the New Philippines because they are situated in the neighborhood of the old, which have been already described. Father Clan (Clain), in a letter from Manila, which has been incorporated in the ‘Philosophical Transactions,’ makes the following statement respecting them:—It happened that when he was in the town of Guivam, on the island of Samar, he met twenty-nine Palaos (there had been thirty, but one died soon after in Guiuan), or natives of certain recently discovered islands, who had been driven thither by the east winds, which prevail from December to May. According to their own statement, they were driven about by the winds for seventy days, without getting sight of land, until they arrived opposite to Guivam. When they sailed from their own country, their two boats were quite full, carrying thirty-five souls, including their wives and children; but several had died miserably on the way from the fatigue which they had undergone. When some one from Guivam wished to go on board to them, they were thrown into such a state of terror that all who were in one of the boats sprang overboard, along with their wives and children. However, they at last thought it best to come into the harbor; so they came ashore on December 28, 1696. They fed on coconuts and roots, which were charitably supplied to them, but refused even to taste cooked rice, which is the general food of the Asiatic nations. Previous castaways.Two women who had previously been cast away on the same islands acted as interpreters for them....
Lived by sea-fishing and rain water.“The people of the country went half naked, and the men painted their bodies with spots and all kinds of devices.... As long as they were on the sea they lived on fish, which they caught in a certain kind of fish-basket, with a wide mouth but tapering to a point at the bottom, which was dragged along underneath the boats; and rain-water, when they could catch it (or, as is stated in the letter itself, preserved in the shells of the coconut), served them for drink. When they were about to be taken into the presence of the Father, whom, from the great respect which was shown to him, they took for the governor, they colored their bodies entirely yellow, an operation which they considered highly important, as enabling them to appear as persons of consideration. They are very skilful divers, and now and then find pearls in the mussels which they bring up, which, however, they throw away as useless things.”
Not the first time for one.But one of the most important parts of Father Clain’s letter has been omitted by Capt. Salmon:—“The oldest of these strangers had once before been cast away on the coast of the province of Caragan, on one of our islands (Mindanao); but as he found only heathens (infidels), who lived in the mountains or on the desert shore, he returned to his own country.”
Yap camotes from Philippines.In a letter from Father Cantova to Father d’Aubenton, dated from Agdana (i.e. Agaña, of the Marianne Islands), March 20, 1722, describing the Caroline and Pelew Islands, it is said:—“The fourth district lies to the west. Yap (9° 25′ N., 138° 1′ E. Gr.),[2] which is the principal island, is more than forty leagues in circumference. Besides the different roots which are used by the natives of the island instead of bread, there is the batata, which they call camote, and which they have acquired from the Philippines, as I was informed by one of our Caroline Indians, who is a native of the island. He states that his father, named Coorr, ... three of his brothers, and himself had been cast away in a storm on one of the provinces in the Philippines, which was called Bisayas; that a missionary of our society (Jesus) received them in a friendly manner ... that on returning to their own island they took with them the seeds of different plants, amongst others the Other arrivals of Micronesians.batata, which multiplied so fast that they had sufficient to supply the other islands of the Archipelago with them.” Murillo Velarde states that in 1708 some Palaos were wrecked in a storm on Palapag (north coast of Samar); and I personally had the opportunity, in Manila, of photographing a company of Palaos and Caroline islanders, who had been the year before cast on the coast of Samar by foul weather. Apart from the question of their transport, whether voluntary or not, these simply were six examples, such as still occur occasionally, of Micronesians cast up on the shore of the Philippines; and probably it would not be difficult to find several more; but how often, both before and after the arrival of the Spaniards, might not vessels from those islands have come within the influence of the north-east storms, and been driven violently on the east coast of the Philippines without any record of such facts being preserved?[3] Even as, on the west side of the Archipelago, the type of the race seems to have been modified by its long intercourse with China, Japan, Lower India, and later with Europe, so likewise may Polynesian Possible influence on Filipinos.influences have operated in a similar manner on the east side; and the further circumstance that the inhabitants of the Ladrones[4] and the Bisayans[5] possess the art of coloring their teeth black, seems to point to early intercourse between the Bisayans and the Polynesians.[6]
A futile sea voyage in an open boat.At Guiuan I embarked on board an inconveniently cranky, open boat, which was provided with an awning only three feet square, for Tacloban, the chief town of Leyte. After first experiencing an uninterrupted calm, we incurred great danger in a sudden tempest, so that we had to retrace the whole distance by means of the oars. The passage was very laborious for the crew, who were not protected by an awning (temperature in the sun 35° R., of the water 25° R.[7]), and lasted thirty-one hours, with few intermissions; the party voluntarily abridging their intervals of rest in order to get back quickly to Tacloban, which keeps up an active intercourse with Manila, and has all the attractions of a luxurious city for the men living on the inhospitable eastern coast. Beauty of Samar-Leyte strait. It is questionable whether the sea anywhere washes over a spot of such peculiar beauty as the narrow strait which divides Samar from Leyte. On the west it is enclosed by steep banks of tuff, which tolerate no swamps of mangroves on their borders. There the lofty primeval forest approaches in all its sublimity close to the shore, interrupted only here and there by groves of cocos, in whose sharply defined shadows solitary huts are to be found; and the steep hills facing the sea, and numerous small rocky islands, are crowned with little castles of blocks of coral. At the eastern entrance of the strait the south coast of Samar consists of white limestone, like marble, but of quite modern date, which in many places forms precipitous cliffs.[8] At Nipa-Nipa, a small hamlet two leagues from Basey, they project into the sea in a succession of picturesque rocks, above one hundred feet in height, which, rounded above like a dome, thickly covered with vegetation, and corroded at the base by the waters of the sea, rise out of the waves like gigantic mushrooms. A peculiar atmosphere of enchantment pervades this locality, whose influence upon the native mariner must be all the more powerful when, fortunately escaping from the billows outside and the buffeting of the north-east wind, he suddenly enters this tranquil place of refuge. No wonder that superstitious imagination has peopled the place with spirits.