Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 39.djvu/405

Rh They believe that the souls of those who die a natural death go to a land called Kadungayan, or the northern region, where they dwell, all gathered in a wood in their special trees, which appear as trees in the daytime, but are changed at night into huts like those of the Quianganes; and that these souls have plantations of sweet potatoes and other food-plants, and live on the invisible substance (or souls) of the animals, rice, and other provisions which their friends left behind offer up for them. Those who have committed robbery and murder on earth without justification receive suitable punishment in Kadungayan. If a murderer dies a natural death, his soul is pierced in that shadow-land by a resident spirit.

The Quianganes believe that the souls of the departed sometimes return from Kadungayan to the members of their families. Bearing upon this is the following story: There once thus came a spirit with his wife to his people, who fed the pair with the finest rice-meal. When this became too expensive to the relatives, they seated the couple in a canoe and turned it toward the mountains of the Mayoyaos, where the spirits landed. The man sat down upon a stone under the shadow of a tree. A bird in the tree dropped some excrement on the head of the spirit, who did not move. There grew from this a great tree which gradually inclosed within itself the whole of the sitting Quiangane. This tree is called balisé (it is identical with the banyan); and the Quianganes still make their breech-cloths from its bark. The souls of men who die a violent or sudden death, and the souls of women who die in childbirth, go to the heaven of the gods. By this are meant the stars, particularly the sun.

The feasts of the dead are of two kinds, according as the deceased has died a natural or a violent death. In the former case the survivors spend all their means, and even go in debt, to procure a sufficient number of swine and buffaloes for the spirit, who will have to subsist in Kadungayan on the "substances" of the offered beasts. The unburied corpse remains, in a sitting position, underneath the house, for at least three days, while the exhibition is sometimes extended to fifteen days, and even more. The more wealthy and prominent the dead man had been, the longer the feasting and exhibition. But if the man has been killed or has fallen a victim to the head-hunter, only one pig is slaughtered, and it is eaten by the old men of the village. For they say, "Wherefore slaughter beasts, when the dwellers in the sky have no use for them?" Opposed to this is the precept that the substances of the animals which are consumed at the victory-feast of a returned head-hunter will come to the benefit of the souls of those whose heads he has cut off.

The Quianganes say that the souls of the dead do not go at