AN IFUGAO BURIAL CEREMONY. 245 



This stick is curved slightly, is about 00 centimeters long, and is held in one 

 hand suspended by a rattan string so that the vibrations are not interferred with. 

 It is beaten with a drum stick as is also the shield. The gaiT^ha, or bronze gong, 

 is never used in the funeral of a beheaded man. 



Each of the two head men of each procession carried two spears. 

 Behind the head men came a man carrying spear and shield. The two 

 men in front faced the oncoming procession, stepping most of the 

 time backward, and making thrasts toward the bearer of the spear and 

 shield. The latter returned the thrusts and executed various "fancy 

 steps," the whole being a dance which in some respects resembles one 

 of the head-dances of the Bontok Igorot. From the high place on the 

 trail all moved slowly along the walls of the rice terraces toward the 

 central village. The columns appeared in the distance like gigantic cen- 

 tipedes or files of ants. It usually takes an hour for such a procession 

 to cover 1 mile. It was a still morning and the beating of shield and 

 stick could easily be heard across the wide valley. 



Arriving at Aligiiyun's house we found him sitting on a block facing 

 the sun, and leaning against his shield which was supported by the 

 side of the house. The body was in an advanced state of decomposition. 

 It was swollen to three times its living girth. Great blisters had col- 

 lected under the epidermis which broke from time to time, a brownish- 

 red fluid escaping. The spear wound in his neck was plugged by a 

 wooden spear-head. In each hand Aliguyun held a wooden spear. No 

 attempt whatever had been made to prevent decomposition of the body 

 or the entrance to it of flies. Two old women on each side with pen- 

 holder-shaped loom-sticks a half meter long continually poked at Ali- 

 giiyun's face and the wound to wake him up. From time to time 

 the3^ caught the gniesome head by the hair and shook it violently 

 shouting : 



Who-oo-oo Aliguyun, wake up! Open your eyes. Look down on KurOg.^ 

 Take his father and his mother, his wife and his children, and his first cousins 

 and his second cousins, and his relatives by marriage. They wanted him to kill 

 you. All your kin are women. [They say this in order to deceive Aligflyun 

 into avenging himself.] They can't avenge you. You will have to avenge 

 yourself. There is ord^n^'' now; no one can kill them but you. Take them 

 all. You are to be pitied.. You will be lonesome. Accompany their spirits '". 

 If they eat, eat with them. If they sleep, sleep with them. If they go to get 

 water, go with them. If they go to get wood, turn the ax into their bodies. If 

 they go on a journey, push them over a precipice. So, you will have com- 



^* KurOg being the rancheria from which came Aligflyun's murderer. 

 ^Law: referring to the establishment of American authority and the prohibi- 

 tion of head-hunting. 



'"The spirits of the kin of the murderer. 



