
KNOWLEDGE AND ART 201 
ritualistic number. The Bagobo consider even numbers 
lucky and odd ones unlucky; except nine, which is 
always good. This is a point of view characteristic of 
European and Asiatic civilization, and therefore un- 
doubtedly imported. Really primitive people rarely 
have any feeling for odd or even, but fix on a certain 
number, such as four or seven, as being the most com- 
plete and perfect one, and then bring it into their 
ceremonials and beliefs at every possible opportunity. 
This is not a Filipino habit. 
Sanskrit Loan Words. It would be very strange 
if the many pieces of knowledge that were carried from 
India into the Philippines had entered without bringing 
in their names at least sometimes. This has actually 
happened; and all the lowland Filipino dialects contain 
a stock of Sanskrit words. Several of these have already 
been mentioned in connection with one or another phase 
of religion. From the coast a fraction of these words 
have spread to the interior districts, at any rate in the 
south. In northern Luzon words of Sanskrit origin are 
rare and perhaps wholly lacking, except as they may 
have been imported in recent centuries by the intrusive 
Ilokano. There is no doubt that the mountain region 
of this island has been in every way the part of the 
Philippines least subject to Hindu influence. 
As regards the greater nationalities, it is rather re- 
markable that the number of Sanskrit words is about 
twice as great in Tagalog as in Bisaya and the Mindanao 
dialects, in spite of the greater proximity of the latter 
to Borneo. This difference can scarcely be wholly ex- 
plained away as due to our more perfect knowledge of 
Tagalog. It seems likely that the latter people received 
their loan words, and with them a considerable body of 
Indian culture, through direct contact with the Malay 
Peninsula or the coast of Indo-china which they front 
