range mixture of Christian Filipinos and primitive, pagan Igorots--was
unusual. The Filipinos wore typical Western dress, and actually dressed
pretty warmly. The Igorot men wore the breechcloth, perhaps with a shirt
or sweater, perhaps with nothing at all. Most of the men had tiny
pillbox caps of woven straw on the backs of their heads. The little
round boxes were decorated with such oddments as boar's tusks and coke
bottle caps. The Igorot women wore a tight-fitting skirt of colorful
wool, usually patterned in red or yellow. They wore blouses of
embroidered white cotton, or jackets of colored wool. Their skirts had
balls of yarn on the hips. The women wore no hats. Both sexes were
usually barefoot.

There were contrasts. For example, next to a great Christian cathedral
was the Igorot dog market. The Igorots were eaters of dog meat.

But it was not the Igorots or the mountains that had made Baguio famous
and turned it into the summer capital of the Philippines--it was the
climate. While Manila burned in the tropical sun, Baguio, thousands of
feet higher, had cool, fall-like weather. There was hardly a night
during the year when blankets were not comfortable. Even the foliage was
temperate rather than tropical. Baguio had pine trees, a welcome sight
to the Spindrift trio.

There was a tall, fragrant pine just outside the window of the room
shared by Rick and Scotty. When the boys returned to their rooms to wash
up for an early dinner, Rick leaned out and broke off a pine cone. Then,
by reaching only a bit further, he grabbed a cluster of purple-red
blossoms from a bougainvillea vine that had climbed the tree to their
second-floor height.

In the comfortable dining room, they chose a table in front of a roaring
fireplace, glad of the warmth. It was chilly in Baguio. While they
waited to be served, Rick mentioned the pine tree to Tony and commented
that it was odd that a tree should be left so close to a building.

"The forest practices of the Igorots and Ifugaos could well be copied by
us," Tony told the boys. "Anyone who cuts down a tree for anything other
than genuine use is severely punished. In the old days the punishment
might have been loss of his head. That's how much respect they have for
their water supply, which is dependent directly on their forests."

"You talk as though these were civilized people," Scotty commented.

Tony grinned. "Depends on what you call civilization. But they have a
very highly dev