[148] This dowry, if one may call it so, represented to the parents an indemnity for the care and vigilance that they had exercised in their daughter's education. The Filipina woman, never being a burden to any one (either to her parents or to her husband), but quite the contrary, represents a value, whose loss to the possessor must be substituted…. The Tagál wife is free, and treated with consideration; she trades and contracts, almost always with the approbation of her husband, who consults her in all his acts. She takes care of the money, and educates the children, half of whom belong to her…—Rizal.
[149] Bigay-káya, "to give what one can," "a voluntary offering, a present of good will" … This bigay-káya devolved entire to the married couple, according to Colin, if the son-in-law was obedient to his parents-in-law; if not, it was divided among all the heirs. "Besides the dowry, the chiefs used to give certain gifts to the parents and relatives, and even to the slaves, which were great or less according to the rank of the one married." (Colin).—Rizal.
[150] This good custom still exists, … although it is gradually passing away.—Rizal.
[151] Such is the law throughout most parts of Asia; in Siam the woman becomes free without having children. It is only in America that fathers could and did sell their own children into slavery.—Stanley.
[152] This condition of affairs and the collection of usury is true still [1890]. Morga's words prove true not only of the Indian, but also of the mestizos, the Spaniards, and even of various religious. So far has it gone that the government itself not only permits it, but also exacts the capital and even the person to pay the debts of others, as happens with the cabeza de barangay [head of a barangay].—Rizal.
[153] The tam-tam and the pum-piang are still used.—Rizal.
[154] The early Filipinos had a great horror of theft, and even the most anti-Filipino historian could not accuse them of being a thievish race. Today, however, they have lost their horror of that crime. One of the old Filipino methods of investigating theft was as follows: "If the crime was proved, but not the criminal, if more than one was suspected … each suspect was first obliged to place a bundle of cloth, leaves, or whatever he wished on a pile, in which the thing stolen might be hidden. Upon the completion of this investigation if the stolen property was found in the pile, the suit ceased." The Filipinos also practiced customs very similar to the "judgments of God" of the middle ages, such as putting suspected persons, by pairs, under the water and adjudging guilty him who first emerged.—Rizal.
[155] The Filipino today prefers a beating to scoldings or insults.—Rizal.
[156] From bago, new, and tao, man: he who has become a man.—Rizal.
[157] In speaking of a similar custom in Australia, Eyre (Central Australia, i, p. 213), says: "This extraordinary and inexplicable custom must have a great tendency to prevent the rapid increase of the population."—Stanley. [Stanley does not translate this paragraph of the text.]