80 PEOPLES OF THE PHILIPPINES 
measures of rice, both as standards of value and in 
actual transfers. The greatest article of wealth among 
so thoroughly pagan a people as the Ifugao is the rice 
field. A man that inherits enough of these is thereby 
rich and his position in society established. Rice 
fields are the last of his possessions which an Ifugao 
willingly allows to pass from the tenure of his blood line. 
Every tribe whose religion has not broken down before 
Christianity or Mohammedanism, practices at least one 
important ceremony whose main purpose is the produc- 
tion of rice; frequently a whole series of such rituals are 
performed for each stage of rice agriculture—the clear- 
ing of the ground, the planting, the cultivation, the 
harvesting, and the preservation of the crop. It is sig- 
nificant that even though other crops are grown, they 
very rarely have special ceremonies devoted to them. 
The native point of view is clearly that if the success of 
the rice is insured by the necessary magical and cere- 
monial means, other crops will automatically take care 
of themselves. When plant food is offered to the spirits 
in any connection, it is almost invariably rice. In short, 
the Filipino not only eats rice, but thinks in terms of 
rice, and if his civilization is to be described in a single 
phrase it can only be named a rice culture. 
Something like a hundred varieties of rice are distin- 
guished by the natives. But from the point of view of 
the student of Filipino life, these fall into two great 
classes; swamp rice, which can be grown only in marshes 
or under irrigation; and upland or mountain rice, which 
needs no watering beyond that supplied by the rains. 
The distinction between these two types is important 
because of its effect on the habits of the people. Swamp 
rice keeps its cultivators in the lowlands, or forces them 
to construct irrigation works which become elaborate in 
proportion as the country follows rugged contours. 

