academy ot sciences] DOMESTIC LIFE: PREGNANCY, BIRTH, AND CHILDHOOD 113 



the Manobo follows a Mandaya custom by erecting over the grave, which is always under the 

 house, an inverted cone of bamboo slatwork, about 30 centimeters high and 60 centimeters in 

 diameter. The usual feelings of fright are not displayed on these occasions as on the death of 

 one that has died an ordinary death, for the child has not yet been consociated with its two 

 soul companions. Neither is the house abandoned, as would ordinarily be done on the death of 

 an older person. 



THE APPROACH OF PARTURITION 



THE MIDWIFE 10 



About the seventh month when the expectant mother feels the quickening impulse of life 

 within her, she selects a midwife and undergoes almost daily at her hands a massage, without 

 which it is thought she would be in danger of a painful delivery. As far as I could learn, the 

 method followed is such as to keep the creature in a vertical position within the womb, with the 

 head downward. The massage is said to take place at the beginning of a lunar month. The 

 midwife is eminently the most important personage in all that concerns birth. She is not neces- 

 sarily a priestess, but is usually a relative of the prospective mother. She is always a woman 

 of advanced age who has had abundant experience, and "has never lost a case." She is reputed 

 to be versed in many secret medicines and devices necessary for the cure of any ailment pro- 

 ceeding from natural causes and connected with childbirth. I always found the midwife very 

 reluctant to disclose the secrets of her profession. 



When the woman announces the maternal pains, the midwife goes at once to the house, 

 taking with her various herbs and other things, all carefully concealed on her person. She is 

 not alone on such occasions, but is usually accompanied, if not preceded, by the greater portion 

 of the female population in the community. Few of the male portion, and none of the bachelors, 

 attend, but they keep themselves informed of the progiess of the patient by frequent yells of 

 inquiry from the neighboring houses. 



The midwife bids the patient lie upon her back and, aided by a few relatives of the parturient, 

 proceeds to administer one of the most ferocious massages imaginable. I witnessed one case in 

 which the mother was tightly bound with swathing clothes and the husband called upon to exert 

 his strength in an endeavor to force delivery. 



As soon as it becomes apparent that the patient is in great pain, the midwife, and perhaps 

 others expert in such matters, resort to means which are designed to produce an easy and speedy 

 delivery. 



PRENATAL MAGIC AIDS 11 



During several childbirths which I attended in various parts of the valley, I observed the 

 use of the following aids to delivery: 



1. A piece of rattan 12 is taken by one of the women present and, after being slightly burnt, is extinguished 

 by the midwife and held close to the person 13 of the parturient. With her hands the midwife then wafts the 

 smoke over the patient, muttering at the same time a formula. 



The explanation of this procedure, as given to me in all cases, was the following: The rattan is symbolic of 

 the various fleshy bonds with which the child is confined within the mother and as the rattan, wound round and 

 round the various portions of the house, is an impediment to the removal of the piece which it retains, a piece 

 of it is burnt in order that by some mystic power the puerperal bonds may be undone. During the burning the 

 child is exhorted not to resemble the tardy rattan but to come forth free and untrammeled from its mortal tene- 

 ment. 



This charm, it was explained to me, counteracts the violations of the taboos whereby husband or wife, or 

 both, are enjoined not to wear necklaces or bodily bindings, and not to work in rattan and resin, or to carry any- 

 thing on the head. Should the burning of a piece of rattan be omitted, it is believed that the umbilical cord u 

 would be found to have actually become tangled around the neck or body of the child during the act of delivery, 

 thereby increasing the difficulty and the danger. 



2. The burning of a small piece of the house ladder 18 and the subsequent fumigation of the person of the par- 

 turient are practiced in identically the same manner as the above, and are thought to neutralize the evil effects 



>• Pa-na-g&m-non. ■> Vulva. 



" Ta-gi-a-mo. » Pd-tud. 



ii Li-gw. H Pa-sung. 



