not more clothed.

Let us watch the typical group of the three women and the youth:
Each has a sharpened wooden turning stick, the kay-kay, a pole about
6 feet long and 2 inches in diameter. The four stand side by side
with their kay-kay stuck in the earth, and, in unison, they take one
step forward and push their tools from them, the earth under which
the tools are thrust falling away and crumbling in the water before
them. While it is falling away the toilers begin to sing, led by the
elder woman. The purport of the most common soil-turning song is this:
"It is hard work to turn the soil, but eating the rice is good." The
song continues while the implements are withdrawn from the earth
and jabbed in again in a new place, while the syllable pronounced
at that instant is also noticeably jabbed into the air. Again they
withdraw their implements and, singing and working in rhythmic unison,
again jab kay-kay and syllable. The implements are now thrust about
8 inches below the surface; the song ceases; each toiler pries her
section of the soil loose and, in a moment, together they push their
tools from them, the mass of soil -- some 2 feet long, 1 foot wide,
and 8 inches deep -- falls away in the water, and the song begins
again. As the earth is turned a camote, passed by in the camote
harvest, is discovered; the old woman picks it up and lays it on
the dry ground beside her. The little girl shyly comes for it and
stores it in a basket on the terrace wall with a few dozen others
found during the morning.

After a section of earth 10 or 15 feet square has been turned the
rhythmic labor and song ceases. Each person now grasps her kay-kay
with one hand at the middle and the other near the sharpened end and
with it rapidly crumbles and spreads about the new-turned soil. Now
they trample the bed thoroughly, throwing out any stones or pebbles
discovered by their feet, and frequently using the kay-kay further
to break up some small clod of earth. Finally a large section of
the sementera is prepared, and the toilers form in line abreast and
slowly tread back and forth over the plat, making the bed soft and
smooth beneath the water for the transplanting.

It is a delightful picture in the soil-turning season to see the acres
of terraces covered by groups of toilers, relieving their labors with
almost constant song.

I saw only one variation from the above methods in the Bontoc area. In
some of the large sementeras in the flat