The Inhabitants and Civil State Of Mindanao

Mindanao is not subject to one prince, neither is the language one and the same. But the people are much alike in colour, strength, and stature.

They are all or most of them are Muslim. Their customs and manner of living are alike. The Mindanao people are the largest nation in the island. They trade by sea with other nations and are therefore the more civil.

THE HILLANOONES, SOLOGUES, AND ALFOORES.

There are besides the Mindanayans, the Hilanoones (as they call them) or the Mountaineers, the Sologues and Alfoores.

The Hilanoones live in the heart of the country. They have little or no commerce by sea, yet they have proas that row with 12 or 14 oars apiece. They enjoy the benefit of the gold-mines and with their gold buy foreign commodities of the Mindanao people. They have also plenty of beeswax which they exchange for other commodities.

The Sologues inhabit the north-west end of the island. They are the least nation of all. They trade to Manila in proas and to some of the neighbouring islands but have no commerce with the Mindanao people.

The Alfoores are the same with the Mindanayans and were formerly under the subjection of the sultan of Mindanao, but were divided between the sultan’s children, and have of late had a sultan of their own; but having by marriage contracted an alliance with the sultan of Mindanao this has occasioned that prince to claim them again as his subjects; and he made war with them a little after we went away, as I afterwards understood.

THE MINDANAYANS, PROPERLY SO CALLED; THEIR MANNERS AND HABITS.

The Mindanayans properly so-called are men of mean statures; small limbs, straight bodies, and little heads.

Their faces are oval, their foreheads flat, with black small eyes, short low noses, pretty large mouths; their lips thin and red, their teeth black, yet very sound, their hair black and straight, the colour of their skin tawny but inclining to a brighter yellow than some other Indians, especially the women.

They have a custom to wear their thumb-nails very long, especially that on their left thumb, for they do never cut it but scrape it often. They are endued with good natural wits, are ingenious, nimble, and active, when they are minded but generally very lazy and thievish, and will not work except forced by hunger.

This laziness is natural to most natives.

But the Mindnayan’s laziness seems to come from the severity of their prince of whom they stand in awe, and not from their natural inclinations.

The prince deals with his people very arbitrarily. He takes from them what they get. This damps their industry, so they never strive to have anything but from hand to mouth.

They are generally proud and walk very stately.

They are civil enough to strangers and will easily be acquainted with them and entertain them with great freedom; but they are implacable to their enemies and very revengeful if they are injured, frequently poisoning secretly those that have affronted them.

They wear but few clothes. Their heads are circled with a short turban, fringed or laced at both ends; it goes once about the head, and is tied in a knot, the laced ends hanging down. They wear frocks and breeches, but no stockings nor shoes.

THE HABITS AND MANNERS OF THEIR WOMEN

The women are fairer than the men. Their hair is black and long which they tie in a knot that hangs back in their poles.

They are more round-visaged than the men and generally well-featured; only their noses are very small and so low between their eyes that in some of the female children the rising that should be between the eyes is scarce discernible; neither is there any sensible rising in their foreheads.

At a distance they appear very well; but being nigh these impediments are very obvious. They have very small limbs.

They wear but 2 garments:

• a frock
• a sort of petticoat.

The petticoat is only a piece of cloth, sowed both ends together: but it is made two foot too big for their waists, so that they may wear either end uppermost: that part that comes up to their waist, because it is so much too big, they gather it in their hands and twist it till it fits close to their waists, tucking in the twisted part between their waist and the edge of the petticoat, which keeps it close.

The frock fits loose about them and reaches down a little below the waist. The sleeves are a great deal longer than their arms and so small at the end that their hands will scarce go through. Being on, the sleeve fits in folds about the wrist, wherein they take great pride.

The better sort of people have their garments made of long cloth; but the ordinary sort wear cloth made of plantain-tree which they call saggen, by which name they call the plantain. They have neither stocking or shoe, and the women have very small feet.

The women are very desirous of the company of strangers, especially of white men; and doubtless would be very familiar if the custom of the country did not debar them from that freedom, which seems coveted by them. Yet from the highest to the lowest they are allowed liberty to converse with or treat strangers in the sight of their husbands.

A COMICAL CUSTOM AT MINDANAO

There is a kind of begging custom at Mindanao that I have not seen elsewhere in all my travels. I believe it is owing to the little trade they have.

When foreigners arrive here, the Mindanao men will come aboard and invite them to their houses and inquire who has a comrade (which word I believe they have from the Spaniards) or a pagally, and who has not.

A comrade is a familiar male friend; a pagally is an innocent platonic friend of the other sex.

All foreigners are in a manner obliged to accept of this acquaintance and familiarity, which must be first purchased with a small present and afterwards confirmed with some gift or other to continue the acquaintance.

As often as the foreigner goes ashore, he is welcome to his comrade or pagally’s house, where he may be entertained for his money, to eat, drink, or sleep; and complimented as often as he comes ashore with tobacco and betel-nut, which is all the entertainment he must expect gratis.

The richest men’s wives are allowed the freedom to converse with her pagally in public, and may give or receive presents from him.

Even the sultans and the generals wives, who are always cooped up, will yet look out of their cages when a stranger passes by and demand of him if he wants a pagally: and, to invite him to their friendship, will send a present of tobacco and betel-nut to him by their servants.

THEIR HOUSES, THEIR DIET, AND WASHINGS.

The chiefest city on this island is also called Mindanao.

It is on the south side of the island, in latitude 7 degrees 20 minutes north on the banks of a small river, about 2 mile from the sea.

The manner of building is somewhat strange yet generally used in this part of the East Indies.

Their houses are all built on posts about 14, 16, 18, or 20 foot high. These posts are bigger or less according to the intended magnificence of the superstructure.

They have but one floor but many partitions or rooms, and a ladder or stairs to go up out of the streets.

The roof is large and covered with palmetto or palm-leaves. So there is a clear passage like a piazza (but a filthy one) under the house. Some of the poorer people that keep ducks or hens have a fence made round the posts of their houses with a door to go in and out; and this under-room serves for no other use. Some use this place for the common draught of their houses but, building mostly close by the river in all parts of the Indies, they make the river receive all the filth of their house; and at the time of the land-floods all is washed very clean.

The sultan’s house is much bigger than any of the rest. It stands on about 180 great posts or trees a great deal higher than the common building, with great broad stairs made to go up. In the first room he has about 20 iron guns, all Saker and Minion, placed on field-carriages.

The general and other great men have some guns also in their houses. About 20 paces from the sultan’s house there is a small low house built purposely for the reception of ambassadors or merchant strangers. This also stands on posts but the floor is not raised above three or four foot above the ground, and is neatly matted purposely for the sultan and his council to sit on; for they use no chairs but sit cross-legged like tailors on the floor.

The common food at Mindanao is rice or sago, and a small fish or two. The better sort eat buffalo or fowls ill dressed, and abundance of rice with it.

They use no spoons to eat their rice but every man takes a handful out of the platter and, by wetting his hand in water, that it may not stick to his hand, squeezes it into a lump as hard as possibly he can make it, and then crams it into his mouth. They all strive to make these lumps as big as their mouth can receive them and seem to vie with each other and glory in taking in the biggest lump; so that sometimes they almost choke themselves. They always wash after meals or if they touch anything that is unclean; for which reason they spend abundance of water in their houses.

This water, with the washing of their dishes and what other filth they make, they pour down near their fireplace: for their chambers are not boarded but floored with split bamboos like lath, so that the water presently falls underneath their dwelling rooms where it breeds maggots and makes a prodigious stink. Besides this filthiness the sick people case themselves and make water in their chambers, there being a small hole made purposely in the floor to let it drop through. But healthy sound people commonly ease themselves and make water in the river. For that reason you shall always see abundance of people of both sexes in the river from morning till night; some easing themselves, others washing their bodies or clothes.

If they come into the river purposely to wash their clothes they strip and stand naked till they have done then put them on and march out again: both men and women take great delight in swimming and washing themselves, being bred to it from their infancy. I do believe it is very wholesome to wash mornings and evenings in these hot countries at least three or four days in the week: for I did use myself to it when I lived afterwards at Bencoolen, and found it very refreshing and comfortable. It is very good for those that have fluxes to wash and stand in the river mornings and evenings. I speak it experimentally for I was brought very low with that distemper at Achin; but by washing constantly mornings and evenings I found great benefit and was quickly cured by it.

THEIR LANGUAGES AND TRANSACTIONS WITH THE SPANIARDS

In Mindanao city, they speak 2 languages indifferently:

• their own Mindanao language
• the Malaya

But in other parts of the island they speak only their proper language, having little commerce abroad.

They have schools and instruct their children to read and write and bring them up in Islam. Therefore many of the words, especially their prayers, are in Arabic. Many of the words of civility the same as in Turkey, especially when they meet in the morning or take leave of each other they express themselves in that language.

Many of the old people both men and women can speak Spanish for the Spaniards were formerly settled among them and had several forts on this island.

They sent 2 friars to the city to convert the sultan of Mindanao and his people. At that time these people began to learn Spanish, and the Spaniards encroached on them and endeavoured to bring them into subjection.

• But the Spanish were drawn off from Mindanao island to Manila to resist the Chinese, who threatened to invade them there.

When the Spaniards were gone, the old sultan of Mindanao, father to the present, in whose time it was, razed and demolished their forts, brought away their guns, and sent away the friars. Since that time, will not suffer the Spaniards to settle on the islands.

THEIR FEAR OF THE DUTCH, AND SEEMING DESIRE OF THE ENGLISH.

They are now most afraid of the Dutch, being sensible how they have enslaved many of the neighbouring islands. This is why, for a long time they wanted the English to settle among them and have offered them any convenient place to build a fort in, as the general himself told us. They did not find the English so encroaching as the Dutch or Spanish.

The Dutch are no less jealous of their admitting the English for they are sensible what detriment it would be to them if the English should settle here.

THEIR HANDICRAFTS, AND PECULIAR SORT OF SMITH’S BELLOWS

There are but few tradesmen in the Mindanao city.

The chiefest trades are goldsmiths, blacksmiths, and carpenters. There are but 2-3 goldsmiths.

These will work in gold or silver and make anything that you desire: but they have no shop furnished with ware ready-made for sale. Here are several blacksmiths who work very well, considering the tools that they work with. Their bellows are much different from ours. They are made of a wooden cylinder, the trunk of a tree, about three foot long, bored hollow like a pump and set upright on the ground, on which the fire itself is made. Near the lower end there is a small hole, in the side of the trunk next the fire, made to receive a pipe through which the wind is driven to the fire by a great bunch of fine feathers fastened to one end of the stick which, closing up the inside of the cylinder, drives the air out of the cylinder through the pipe: two of these trunks or cylinders are placed so nigh together that a man standing between them may work them both at once alternately, one with each hand.

They have neither vice nor anvil but a great hard stone or a piece of an old gun to hammer upon: yet they will perform their work, making both common utensils and iron-works about ships to admiration. They work altogether with charcoal. Every man almost is a carpenter for they can work with the axe and adze.

Their axe is but small and so made that they can take it out of the helve, and by turning it make an adze of it. They have no saws but when they make plank they split the tree in two and make a plank of each part, planing it with the axe and adze. This requires much pains and takes up a great deal of time; but they work cheap, and the goodness of the plank thus hewed, which has its grain preserved entire, makes amends for their cost and pains.

THEIR SHIPPING, COMMODITIES, AND TRADE

They build good and serviceable ships or barks for the sea, some for trade, others for pleasure; and some ships of war. Their trading vessels they send chiefly to Manila.

Thither they transport beeswax, which, I think, is the only commodity besides gold that they vend there.

The inhabitants of the city of Mindanao get a great deal of beeswax themselves: but the greatest quantity they purchase is of the Mountaineers, from whom they also get the gold which they send to Manila; and with these they buy their calicoes, muslins, and China silk. They send sometimes their barks to Borneo and other islands; but what they transport thither, or import from thence, I know not.

THE MINDANAO AND MANILA TOBACCO

The Dutch come here in sloops from Ternate and Tidore and buy rice, beeswax, and tobacco. A lot of tobacco grows on Mindanao island, more than in any island or country in the East Indies that I know of, Manila only excepted.

It is an excellent sort of tobacco; but these people have not the art of managing this trade to their best advantage as the Spaniards have at Manila.

The seeds were first brought here from Manila by the Spaniards, and even thither, in all probability, from America.

The difference between the Mindanao and Manila tobacco is that the Mindanao tobacco is of a darker colour and the leaf larger and grosser than the Manila tobacco, being propagated or planted in a fatter soil. The Manila tobacco is of a bright yellow colour, of an indifferent size, not strong, but pleasant to smoke.

The Spaniards at Manila are very curious about this tobacco, having a peculiar way of making it up neatly in the leaf. For they take two little sticks, each about a foot long and flat and, placing the stalks of the tobacco leaves in a row, 40 or 50 of them between the two sticks, they bind them hard together so that the leaves hang dangling down. One of these bundles is sold for a rial at Fort St. George: but you may have 10 or 12 pound of tobacco at Mindanao for a rial; and the tobacco is as good or rather better than the Manila tobacco, but they have not that vent for it as the Spaniards have.

A SORT OF LEPROSY THERE, AND OTHER DISTEMPERS

The Mindanao people are much troubled with a sort of leprosy, the same as we observed at Guam.

This distemper runs with a dry scurf all over their bodies and causes great itching in those that have it, making them frequently scratch and scrub themselves, which raises the outer skin in small whitish flakes like the scales of little fish when they are raised on end with a knife.

This makes their skin extraordinary rough, and in some you shall see broad white spots in several parts of their body. I judge such have had it but were cured; for their skins were smooth and I did not perceive them to scrub themselves: yet I have learnt from their own mouths that these spots were from this distemper.

Whether they use any means to cure themselves or whether it goes away of itself, I know not: but I did not perceive that they made any great matter of it, for they did never refrain any company for it; none of our people caught it of them, for we were afraid of it, and kept off. They are sometimes troubled with the smallpox but their ordinary distempers are fevers, agues, fluxes, with great pains and gripings in their guts. The country affords a great many drugs and medicinal herbs whose virtues are not unknown to some of them that pretend to cure the sick.

THEIR MARRIAGES

The Mindanao men have many wives. The ceremony is commonly a great feast made by the bridegroom to entertain his friends, and the most part of the night is spent in mirth.

THE SULTAN OF MINDANAO, HIS POVERTY, POWER, FAMILY, ETC.

The sultan is absolute in his power over all his subjects. He is but a poor prince since they have but little trade and therefore cannot be rich.

If the sultan understands that any man has money, if it be but 20 dollars, which is a great matter among them, he will send to borrow so much money, pretending urgent occasions for it; and they dare not deny him. Sometimes he will send to sell one thing or another that he has to dispose of to such whom he knows to have money, and they must buy it and give him his price; and if afterwards he has occasion for the same thing he must have it if he sends for it.

He is but a little man, between 50 or 60 years old, and by relation very good-natured but overruled by those about him. He has a queen and keeps about 29 women, or wives, more, in whose company he spends most of his time. He has one daughter by his sultaness or queen, and a great many sons and daughters by the rest. These walk about the streets and would be always begging things of us; but it is reported that the young princess is kept in a room and never stirs out, and that she did never see any man but her father and Raja Laut her uncle, being then about fourteen years old.

When the sultan visits his friends he is carried in a small couch on four men’s shoulders, with eight or ten armed men to guard him; but he never goes far this way for the country is very woody and they have but little paths, which renders it the less commodious.

THE PROAS OR BOATS HERE

When he takes his pleasure by water he carries some of his wives along with him. The proas that are built for this purpose are large enough to entertain 50 or 60 persons or more.

The hull is neatly built, with a round head and stern, and over the hull there is a small slight house built with bamboos; the sides are made up with split bamboos about four foot high, with little windows in them of the same to open and shut at their pleasure. The roof is almost flat, neatly thatched with palmetto-leaves. This house is divided into two or three small partitions or chambers, one particularly for himself. This is neatly matted underneath and round the sides; and there is a carpet and pillows for him to sleep on. The second room is for his women, much like the former.

The third is for the servants, who tend them with tobacco and betel-nut; for they are always chewing or smoking. The fore and after-parts of the vessel are for the mariners to sit and row. Besides this they have outlayers, such as those I described at Guam; only the boats and outlayers here are larger. These boats are more round, like a half moon almost; and the bamboos or outlayers that reach from the boat are also crooked. Besides, the boat is not flat on one side here, as at Guam; but has a belly and outlayers on each side: and whereas at Guam there is a little boat fastened to the outlayers that lies in the water; the beams or bamboos here are fastened traverse-wise to the outlayers on each side, and touch not the water like boats, but 1, 3 or 4 foot above the water, and serve for the barge-men to sit and row and paddle on; the inside of the vessel, except only just afore and abaft, being taken up with the apartments for the passengers. There run across the outlayers two tier of beams for the paddlers to sit on, on each side the vessel. The lower tier of these beams is not above a foot from the water: so that, upon any the least reeling of the vessel, the beams are dipped in the water and the men that sit are wet up to their waist, their feet seldom escaping the water. And thus, as all our vessels are rowed from within, these are paddled from without.