292 The Tinguian 



and then to continue on "to the town where it lives." "It is like a 

 person, but is so light that it can be carried along by the wind when it 

 blows." 1 The people of Ba-ay, a mountain village partially made up of 

 immigrants from the eastern side of the Cordillera Central, claim that 

 the spirits of the dead go to a mountain called Singet, where they have 

 a great town. Here, it is also stated, the good are rewarded with fine 

 houses, while the bad have to be content with hovels. The general be- 

 lief, however, is that the spirit (kalading) has a body like that of the 

 living person, but is usually invisible, although spirits have appeared, 

 and have even sought to injure living beings. Immediately following 

 death, the spirit stays near to its old home, ready to take vengeance 

 on any relative, who fails to show his body proper respect. After the 

 blood and oil ceremony, he goes to his future home, Maglawa, carrying 

 with him gifts for the ancestors, which the people have placed about 

 his corpse. In Maglawa he finds conditions much the same as on earth ; 

 people are rich and poor ; they need houses ; they plant and reap ; and 

 they conduct ceremonies for the superior beings, just as they had done 

 during their life on earth. Beyond this, the people do not pretend to 

 be posted, "for Kaboniyan did not tell." With the exception of the 

 people of Ba-ay and a few individuals influenced by Christianity, the 

 Tinguian has no idea of reward or punishment in the future life, but 

 he does believe that the position of the spirit in its new home can be 

 affected by the acts of the living (cf. p. 289). No trace of a belief in 

 re-incarnation was found in any district inhabited by this tribe. 



Life and Death. — The foregoing details concerning birth, child- 

 hood, sickness, and death, seem to give us an insight into the Tinguian 

 conception of life and death. For him life and death do not appear to 

 be but incidents in an endless cycle of birth, death, and re-incarnation 

 ad infinitum, such as pictured by Levy-Bruhl; 2 yet, in many in- 

 stances, his acts and beliefs fit in closely with the theory outlined by that 

 author. In this society, there is only a weak line of demarcation between 

 the living and the dead, and the dead for a time at least participate more 

 or less in the life of the living. This is equally true of the unborn child, 

 whose future condition, physical and mental, may be largely moulded 

 by the acts of others. According to Levy-Bruhl, this would indicate 

 that the child at delivery is not fully born, is not as yet a member of the 



1 A folk-tale recorded in this town gives quite a different idea of the abode 

 of the spirits (Traditions of the Tinguian, this volume, No. I, p. 185; also 

 p. 28, note 2). 



2 Fonctions mentales dans les societes inferieures (Paris, 1910). 



