232 ANNALS NEW YORK ACADEMY OF SCIENCES 



Method of Burning. A widely-used method of extracting the 

 virtue of a medicinal element is that of burning or of charring. 

 Here the Bagobo recognize two distinct methods of manipulation, 

 which they set apart from each other by their definition of the 

 two terms, tiduk and gubo. (a) To burn with flame is called tiduk j 

 (b) To burn with smoke is called gibbo. 



By the method of tiduk the medicine is burned to ashes, and 

 the ashes are either mixed, while hot, with water and swallowed, 

 or are applied dry to the diseased part. The ashes of many kinds 

 of non-succulent roots, and of various species of rattan, are used 

 for sore throat, for cold on the chest and for stomach ache. The 

 foot and the beak of the crow, when burned to ashes, are both 

 highly esteemed as a cure for pain in the belly and for a number 

 of other ailments. 



A very common method of cure is by gubo, which includes all 

 medicinal agents that can be readily charred, or from which smoke 

 may be drawn. In the charring process, the curative object is held 

 in the fire until it is blackened at one end and then the charred 

 part is rubbed on the throat, or chest, or other suffering member. 

 Sometimes this is done in silence, sometimes witli word-charms. 

 Favorite objects used for charring are pieces of tortoise-shell for 

 bronchial colds; the shell of tabun-tdbun nut for pain in the stomach 

 and for intestinal disorders; and a great variety of woods, roots, 

 barks and leaves, all of which are charred and stroked on the 

 painful part of the body in a manner which, for each form of ache 

 and pain, is prescribed with more or less definiteness. Galls pro- 

 duced by insects and forming excrescences on certain trees are 

 highly esteemed as a means of (aire for sore throat and sore chest. 

 The healer holds the gall in a flame for twenty or thirty seconds, 

 rubs off a bit of the charred part while it is still glowing, and 

 applies it to the chest or the throat with a downward stroke that 

 Leaves a black mark about two inches long. She does this twice 

 three times, while repeating the numbers, "Usha, <//i<t, tolug; usha, 

 dud, tolug." (One, two, three; one. two, three). She must say no 

 mure, and may make but the six strokes. 



The other form of treatment included under gubo is the use of 

 smoke produced by burning vegetable gums, or the hair of the 

 flying lemur, or deserted birds' nests 303 (particularly the nest of 



""Skeat notes the Malay practice of treating a fretful child by smoking it over a 

 lire obtained from burning the nest of a weaver-bird. Cf. Malay magic, \>. 338. 190U. 



