It is probable that the glass, porcelain, and agate beads, which
are second only to the jars in importance, are exceedingly old. Many
ancient specimens are still in use and are held for as fabulous prices
as are those found among the interior tribes of Borneo. Nieuwenhuis
has shown that the manufacture of beads had become a great industry
in the middle ages, and had extended even to China and Japan, whence
the products may have spread contemporaneously with the pottery [82].

We have seen that, for the most part, the life, customs, and beliefs
which appear in our reconstruction of "the first times" agrees
closely with present conditions; certain things which seem formerly
to have been of prime importance--such as the sending of a betel-nut
covered with gold to invite guests to a festival or ceremony--appear
to have their echo in present conditions. The betel-nut which played
such a momentous part in the old times still holds its place in the
rituals of the many ceremonies, although it is not now much used in
daily life. The magic of to-day is less powerful than formerly, but is
still a tremendous force. The communication of the ancient people with
other members of the animate world, as well as with the inanimate and
spiritual, and their metamorphosis into animals and the like, offers
nothing strange or inconsistent to the people of to-day. They even now
talk to jars, they converse with spirits who come to them through the
bodies of their mediums, and people only recently deceased are known to
have had the power of changing themselves, at will, into other forms.

In short, there is no sharp break between the mode of thought of to-day
and that exhibited in the folklore. It is true that the tales give
sanction to some things not in agreement with Tinguian usage--such,
for instance, as the marriage of relatives, or the method of disposing