Note 2 — The Ilongot or Ibilao of Luzon

There have been no successful attempts to subdue or civilize these people. Between 1883 and 1893, the missionary friar, Francisco Eloriaga, founded the Mission of Binatangan in the forested hills east of Bayombong, and the Spanish government had the project of erecting it into a “politico-military commandancia,” but so far as I know did not reach the point of sending there an officer and detachment. Something was learned about the most accessible Ibilao, but no permanent results followed.2 Since the American occupation, however, progress has been made in our knowledge and control of this people. In October, 1902, the writer, at that time chief of the Bureau of Non-Christian Tribes, and engaged in a preliminary reconnaissance of the pagan peoples of northern Luzon, made a trip with a small party to one of their communities in the mountains east of Bambang. Photographs, measurements and notes on their language and social institutions were made. In January, 1906, Mr. Dean C. Worcester, secretary of the interior, approached these people from the north, by ascending the Kagayan river. His party started from a station of the Tabacalera Company, south of Echague, and from there rode through fine forest to a “sitio” called Masaysayasaya. From here they “started at dawn and about noon passed the ’dead line’ set by the Ilongotes. A little before sundown reached Dumabato, an Ilongote and Negrito settlement, which had been the headquarters of Sibley,3 the deserter. Here were found a few filthy Ilongotes and some fine Negritos.”