Page:The Philippine Islands, 1493-1803 (Volume 05).djvu/137

 eaten anything of this world, or drunk any pitarrillas, he does not love them, and so kills them.

The god Lalahon. It is said that the divinity Lalahon dwells in a volcano in Negros island, whence she hurls fire. The volcano is about five leagues from the town of Arevalo. They invoke Lalahon for their harvest; when she does not choose to grant them good harvests she sends the locusts to destroy and consume the crops. This Lalahon is a woman.

Burials. These natives bury their dead in certain wooden coffins, in their own houses. They bury with the dead gold, cloth, and other valuable objects—saying that if they depart rich they will be well received in the other world, but coldly if they go poor.

How they guard the dead. When anyone dies, the people light many fires near his house; and at night armed men go to act as sentinels about his coffin, for fear that the sorcerers (who are in this country also) may come and touch the coffin; for then the coffin would immediately burst open and a great stench issue from the corpse, which could not any longer remain in the coffin. For this reason they keep watch for several nights.

Slaves killed at the death of chiefs. When any chief descended from Dumaguet dies, a slave is made to die by the same death as that of the chief. They choose the most wretched slave whom they can find, so that he may serve the chief in the other world. They always select for this a slave who is a foreigner, and not a native; for they really are not at all cruel. They say that the reason for their killing slaves, as we have said, at the death of any chief is very ancient. According to their story, a chief called Marapan, more than ten thousand years ago, while easing his