Filipino Popular Tales. Various
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the Buñgisñgis was pleased with the beautiful colors of the belt, and wanted to possess it: so he said to the monkey, “Put the belt around me, then, and we shall be friends.”
The monkey placed the boa-constrictor around the body of the Buñgisñgis. Then he pinched the boa, which soon made an end of his enemy.
Notes.
The pugut, among the Ilocanos and Pampangos, is a nocturnal spirit, usually in the form of a gigantic Negro, terrifying, but not particularly harmful. It corresponds to the Tagalog cafre.3 Its power of rapid transformation, however, makes it a more or less formidable opponent. Sometimes it takes the form of a cat with fiery eyes, a minute later appearing as a large dog. Then it will turn into an enormous Negro smoking a large cigar, and finally disappear as a ball of fire. It lives either in large trees or in abandoned houses and ruined buildings.
Buñgisñgis is defined by the narrator as meaning “a large strong man that is always laughing.” The word is derived from the root ñgisi, “to show the teeth” (Tag.). This giant has been described to me as being of herculean size and strength, sly, and possessing an upper lip so large that when it is thrown back it completely covers the demon’s face. The Buñgisñgis can lift a huge animal as easily as if it were a feather.
Obviously these two superhuman demons have to be overcome with strategy, not muscle. The heroes, consequently, are beings endowed with cleverness. After Suac has killed Pugut and has come into possession of his victim’s magic club, he easily slays a man-eating giant (see F⁴ in notes to preceding tale). The tricks played on the Buñgisñgis by the monkey (“ringing the bell” and the “king’s belt”) are found in the Ilocano story “Kakarangkang” and in “The Monkey and the Turtle,” but in the latter tale the monkey is the victim. It would thus seem that a precedent for the mixture of two old formulas by the narrator of “Kakarangkang” already existed among the Tagalogs (cf. the end of the notes to No. 3).
We have not a large enough number of variants to enable us to determine the original form of the separate incidents combined to form the cycles represented by stories Nos. 3, 4, and 55; but the evidence we have leads to the supposition that Carancal motifs ABCDF¹ are very old in the Islands, and that these taken together probably constituted the prototype of the “Carancal” group. I cannot but believe that the “interrupted-cooking” episode, as found in the Philippines, owes nothing to European forms of “John the Bear;” for nowhere in the Islands have I found it associated with the subsequent adventures comprising the “John the Bear” norm—the underground pursuit of the demon, the rescue of the princesses by the hero, the treachery of the companions, the miraculous escape of the hero from the underworld, and the final triumph of justice and the punishment of the traitors (see No. 17 and notes).
For a Borneo story of a “Deer, Pig, and Plandok (Mouse-Deer),” see Roth, 1 : 346. In this tale, as well as in another from British North Borneo (Evans, 471–473, “The Plandok and the Gergasi”), it is the clever plandok who alone is able to outwit the giant. In the latter story there are seven animals—carabao, ox, dog, stag, horse, mouse-deer, and barking-deer. The carabao and horse in turn try in vain to guard fish from the gergasi (a mythical giant who carries a spear over his shoulder). The plandok takes his turn now, after his two companions have been badly mishandled, and tricks the giant into letting himself be bound and pushed into a well, because the “sky is falling.” There he is killed by the other animals when they return. With this last incident compare the trick of the fox in the Mongolian story in our notes to No. 48. In two other stories of the cunning of the plandok, “The Plandok and the Tiger” (Evans, 474) and “The Plandok and the Bear” (ibid.), we meet with the “king’s belt” trick and the “king’s gong” trick respectively. For an additional record from Borneo, see Edwin H. Gomes, “Seventeen Years among the Sea Dyaks of Borneo” (Lond., 1911), 255–261.
1 Aba! a very common exclamation of surprise. It sometimes expresses disgust.
2 We seem here to have a myth element explaining why the Negrito’s hair is kinky. See notes for definition of pugut.
3 The root pugut is found in many of the dialects, and has two distinct meanings: (1) “a Negro or Negrito of the mountains;” (2) “decapitated, or with the hands or feet cut off.” Among the Tagalogs, Bicols, and Visayans, the word is not used to designate a night-appearing demon or monster. Tag. cafre, which is equivalent to Iloc. pugut, is Spanish for Kaffir. Blumentritt defines cafre thus: “Nombre árabe (kafir), importado por los Españoles ó Portugueses; lo dan los campesinos Tagalos de la provincia de Tayabas á un duende antropófago, al que no gusta la sal. En las provincias Ilocanas denominan asi los Españoles al Pugot.”
Speaking of the demons and spirits of northern India, W. Crooke writes (1 : 138) that “some of the Bhût [= pugut ?], like the Kâfari [= cafre ?], the ghost of a murdered Negro, are black, and are particularly dreaded.”
How Suan Became Rich.
Narrated by Bonifacio Ynares, a Tagalog living in Pasig, Rizal.
Pedro and Suan were friends. Pedro inherited a great fortune from his parents, who had recently died; but Suan was as poor as the poorest of beggars that ever lived. Early one morning Suan went to his friend, and said, “I wonder if you have a post that you do not need.”
“Yes, I have one,” said Pedro. “Why? Do you need it?”
“Yes, I need one badly, to build my house.”
“Very well, take it,” said Pedro. “Do not worry about paying for it.”
Suan, who had not thought evil of his friend, took the post and built his house. When it was finished, his house was found to surpass that of his friend. This fact made Pedro so envious of Suan, that at last he went to him and asked Suan for the post back again.
“Why, if I take it from its place, my house will be destroyed. So let me pay you for it, or let me look for another post in the town and get it for you!”
“No,” said Pedro, “I must have my own post, for I wish to use it.”
Finally Suan became so greatly annoyed by his friend’s insistence, that he exclaimed, “I will not give you back your post.”
“Take heed, Suan! for I will accuse you before the king.”
“All right! do as you please.”
“We will then go to the king Monday,” said Pedro.
“Very well; I am always ready.”
When Monday came, both prepared to go to the palace. Pedro, who cared for his money more than for anything else, took some silver coins along with him for the journey. Suan took cooked rice and fish instead. Noon came while they were still on the road. Suan opened his package of food and began to eat. Pedro was also very hungry at this time, but no food could be bought on the way. So Suan generously invited Pedro to eat with him, and they dined together.
After eating, the two resumed their journey. At last they came to a river. The bridge over it was broken in the middle, and one had to jump in order to get to the other side. Pedro jumped. Suan followed him, but unfortunately fell. It so happened that an old man was bathing in the river below, and Suan accidentally fell right on him. The old man was knocked silly,