Note 29 — Chapter VII

Each band, usually containing twenty-five to thirty persons, goes by itself, with one man to whom the rest pay respect, generally the one who is most daring and valiant. In the summer they go down to live on the banks of the streams, seeking the fresh air; but in times of rain, or when the north winds blow hard, they huddle together in the thickets, so dense that the wind hardly enters them. If one of them dies, as soon as he expires they bury him in a very shallow grave; and then they take to flight, in order that death may not seize another person and carry him away, as they say. When the time for [gathering] honeycombs arrives—and the stores of honey which the bees29 gather in those dense forests are without limit—they are busy in searching for these; and if they come across a honey-tree the person who finds it immediately makes a mark on the trunk of the tree, and possesses it as securely as if he had it in his own house. For, even if another person goes there and finds it, when he sees the mark he says: “This tree already has an owner,” and therefore he goes on. Afterward, they go at a convenient time, and, waiting until there is no wind, so that the smoke may not be prevented from rising perpendicularly, they make a fire [under the tree]; and, the bees being scared away, men climb the tree, carrying a sort of sling, strongly made from a palm-leaf, very broad, [from the tree] which they call anao.30 They take out the comb entire, with wax and all, placing it in this receptacle; and then tie it together and carry it down. They eat the honey, and sell the wax in order to buy tobacco for smoking, without which they cannot pass the time. So long as such people have their tobacco, their bows and arrows, their half-cutlass, and their outfit for striking fire, they do not desire anything else—money, or clothing, or lands—neither do they envy any person for anything. They shoot arrows with the greatest dexterity, and will pierce a deer with one from side to side in his most rapid flight. When they have food they eat it in a barbarous manner; but if on account of bad weather they have not been able to obtain any game, they boil water and drink it, and compress their bellies with cords. They are also accustomed to dig in the ground and search for a root called sucbao,31 with which, when it is roasted, they can subsist, although in summer they never lack fruits in the woods. They are always happy, and keep themselves plump and contented; and among them are persons who are quite old.