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Thereafter the camphor-cake is handed round to both women and men in turn who plunge their hands in the ashes and smear their faces with them; and so, after distribution of the offering of cocoanuts, sugar, and betel, the celebration closes.
But notwithstanding their general temperance their feasts are plentiful, and, according to their manner, magnificent. As they are Mahometans, wine and strong liquors professedly make no part of their entertainment, neither do they often indulge with them privately, contenting themselves with their betel and opium.
Then the gallant youth draws near the girl and offers her a necklace of glass beads, and, if he has any, some brass wire to make bracelets, receiving in exchange from his future bride a quid or two of betel.
In the hemp fields is an occasional shed where the fiber is sometimes stripped, but more often these buildings, thus hidden from the public gaze, house the forges on which the smiths fashion knives and spears, or cast the bells and betel nut boxes so dear to the heart of each Bagobo. Aside from the shrines or altars, which we shall describe later, the Bagobo erects no other buildings.
These women imitate the Indians in every particular; their dress is made of the same materials, their hair is worn in the same manner, and they are equally enslaved by the habit of chewing betel.
As the girl offered no objections, the party fell to discussing the price the groom should pay, and finally, after several hours of bargaining, decided that he should furnish her father with one agong, one horse, and a double betel box. Five days later, when he paid this sum, he received a return gift of one agong and ten skirts from the bride's mother.
The betel and areca, which are here called siri and pinang, and chewed by both sexes and every rank in amazing quantities, are all grown by these Indians: Lime is also mixed with these roots here as it is in Savu, but it is less pernicious to the teeth, because it is first slaked, and, besides the lime, a substance called gambir, which is brought from the continent of India; the better sort of women also add cardamum, and many other aromatics, to give the breath an agreeable smell.
The three thieves, glorying in their victory, and little understanding the meaning of the song and the intentions of the dancers, were proudly seated chewing betel and tobacco. Meanwhile the song was sung a third time. Ta tai tom had left the lips of the singer; and, before tadingana was out of them, the traders separated into parties of three, and each party pounced upon a thief.
During the ten years that he had resided upon this island he had never seen a European besides ourselves, except at the arrival of the Dutch ship, which had sailed about two months before we arrived; and he was to be distinguished from the natives only by his colour and his dress, for he sate upon the ground, chewed his betel, and in every respect adopted their character and manners: He had married an Indian woman of the island of Timor, who kept his house after the fashion of her country; and he gave that as a reason for not inviting us to visit him, saying, that he could entertain us in no other manner than the Indians had done, and he spoke no language readily but that of the country.
The most remarkable was the kombook, from the branches of which hung the pods of the large puswel bean. The pods are the most gigantic I have seen, measuring six feet in length, by five or six inches in width. From the calcined bark of this tree the natives extract a sort of lime, with which they mix the betel they are constantly chewing.
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