Aritao.--_Bubud_.--Dúpax.--Start for Campote.
We all slept in the school-house, for Boné is a Christianized village,
and next day, April 28th, made a late start, for it was to be a
day of easy stages. By nine o'clock, passing through an undulating
champaign country, we reached Aritao, being met at the outskirts
by _gansa_-beaters and also by the Christian school-children with
medieval-looking banners, and all in their best bibs and tuckers;
the heathen and the Christians mingling apparently on the best of
terms. Aritao is an old town, now much decayed, but showing evidences
of former affluence. It has a brick church, the bells of which were
rung on our approach.
As there is some Government here, of course we had to pay a visit
of ceremony, and were accordingly received by the _presidente_ and
other dignitaries in an upper chamber, the little children with
their banners massing around the gate of the house and forming a
really pretty picture. When we were all in, the _presidente_ made
the Governor-General and his suite a dignified speech of welcome,
very well done, to which Mr. Forbes made answer in fluent and pretty
good Spanish.
_Bubud_ was then passed about--but this is going too fast! _Bubud_
(called _tapuy_ elsewhere) is an institution in the parts where we now
were, and I had been hearing of it for days. It is the native (Ifugao)
name of a drink produced by the fermentation of rice, a drink that
varies in color and in flavor, according to the care taken in its make,
but nearly always agreeable to the palate and refreshing. That offered
us to-day was greenish yellow, slightly acid and somewhat bitter from
the herbs added. Unfortunately, it will not bear transportation,
but we made up for this by carrying off personally as much as was
convenient. It had a happy effect on my pony, too: all the way to
Aritao he had been slower than the wrath to come, but from this on he
showed life and spirit; in fact, he danced and pranced through every
town we crossed for some days afterward. I always meant to ask if some
one had given him any _bubud_ at Aritao, during the speech-making;
on reflection I am inclined to doubt it, but at any rate, in honor
of the circumstances, he was known as Bubud the rest of the trip.
A short ride through the charming, smiling country (part of it might
have been France), over a really good road most of the way, brought
us to Dúpax. On the way we were met by some of the American officials
of the province, among them Mr. Norman Connor, Superintendent of
Education (Yale, 1900), and by two Belgian priests, De Wit of Dúpax
and Van der Maes of Bayombong. The natives met us, all mounted, with
a band, so that we made a triumphant entrance, advancing in line to
the _presidente's_ house, while the church-bell pealed out a welcome.
Dúpax must, like Aritao, have been a point of some importance in the
past. It has a large brick church with a decidedly Flemish facade,
and a detached pagoda-like belfry. Its streets are overgrown with fine
soft grass, and its houses had somehow or other an air of comfort and
ease. Here we made quite a stop, first of all quenching our thirst with
_bubud_, beer, cocoanut milk, anything, everything, for we had ridden
nearly all the way so far in the sun. We then sat down to an excellent
breakfast, and smoked and lounged about until two, when fresh ponies
were brought, and we set off on a side trip to Campote, where we were
to have our first contact with the real wild man, the Ilongot. [12]