116 ANNALS NEW YORK ACADEMY OF SCIENCES 



ask you to take care of us and to protect us from the bad buso 

 and from the things that might hurt us while we celebrate the 

 Ginum. You, Tigbanua Balagan 194 and Tigbanua Kayo, I plant 

 this taming for you, and I beg you not to come to make men fight 

 at the festival. You, too, the bad Sickness that goes all around 

 the world, I plant this taming for you, so that you will not hurt 

 ii-. but have a kind heart for the Bagobo." 



After this, we retraced our steps toward the Long House, passed 

 by it. and went on up the path leading to the other houses in Mati. 

 At a point not over forty or fifty feet from the house, the second 

 part of the Taming rite was performed, the branches being placed 

 on the left-hand side of the way. When all was ready, Oleng 

 turned toward the figure in its thicket of potent charms l ' 5 and. 

 while facing- the north, he invoked the most dreaded of the buso, 

 the diseases and the magic plants themselves. 



"For all of you, the evil Tigbanua, and for you, the bad Diseases, 

 I plant this sarabak and this badbad to make you feel kindly toward 

 us. Xow you, the Taming that we plant, Balekayo and Dalinding, 

 watch over us and be all-knowing in respect to us. ,9 ° If the 

 Sickness approaches, or if the Buso tries to come to our Ginum. 

 you must not let them pass by this spot, or go from here to our 

 house." 



After the ceremony, Oleng repeated to me the names of the 

 plants that Buso fears, and that hence are used for the Taming: 

 sarabak, kapalili, terikanga, ramit, dalinding, hula/a. balekayo, I><t<ll><t<l. 

 "There should be ten names," the old man said, "but I can now 

 remember only eight of them." One of the plants that he had 

 momentarily forgotten must have been terinagum, branches of which 

 were brought in by Kaba for the ceremony. "Long ago," added 

 Oleng, "the old men told the Hagobo to plant the branches for the 

 Taming ceremony, and that is why we do it now." 



'•* Tigbanuii Balagan is the Buso of the Kattan, and Tigbanua Kayo is the Buso of 

 the Forest. 



1 • * Thickets consecrated to spirits, as well as groves and reserved places in the forest, 

 are frequently mentioned bj the Recollects aud by other missionaries as elements asso- 

 ciated with the ancient worship of the Filipino. Cf. Bolinao's sketch of religions customs 

 in Zambales and Marivelcz. Bi.aiu and ROBERTSON: The Philippine Islands, vol. 21, 

 pp. 144—140, 270, 272, 270—277, 282. 1905. Some of these thickets may possibly 

 have been buso-scarcrs, rather than consecrated places. 



• »• See pp. 27—28. 



