PHILIPPINES, 
121 
CHAPTEE VII, 
AIIETAS, OR NEGRITOS OF THE PHILIPPINES. 
OISTRIBimOX OF THK AHETAS IN THE PH [LIPPINES— ACCOUNTS 
OF EARLY VOYAGERS — NATUBX OF THE COU>'TaT — PHYSICAL 
CHARACTERISTICS OF THE AHKTA3— 'FOOD— HABITS— SINGULAR 
PRACTICE — N-OSTALOIA OH, nOMB-SlCKN£SJ — IXUIVIOUALS RE- 
SIDING WITH THE FOREIGN M. DE LA GIRONIEHE's 
VISIT TO A MOUNTAIN TftlBE — FIEST I >5TB,0THTCT ION — PERSONAL 
APPEARANCE HABITS— WOttSUIP CUSTOMS ON THE DEATH OF 
ONE OF THEIK TRIBE — MODE OF COURTSHIP — RESPECT VOK OLD 
AGE — STYLE OF LANGUAGE — POlBOltfED AftROWS — AGILITV OF 
THE AEBTAS. 
The wooUy-haired tribea are more numerous in the 
Philippines than in any other group of the Indian Archi- 
pelago, with the exception of New Guinea. M. Mall at, 
as already stated, gives the amount of the " Negrito^' 
population in 1842 as 25,000. This can only be con- 
sidered as approximative, still it is^ probably not far from 
tbc true amount. The race, therefore, can scarcely be 
less numerous now than on the first arrival of the Spa- 
niards more than three centuries ago. Indeed, their 
distribution among the islands of the group seems to have 
