When the crop is ripe for cutting, the oldest
woman of the family or a sorcerer goes out to look for her. The
first stalks seen to bend under a passing breeze are the
Rice-mother, and they are tied together but not cut until the
first-fruits of the field have been carried home to serve as a
festal meal for the family and their friends, nay even for the
domestic animals; since it is Saning Sari's pleasure that the beasts
also should partake of her good gifts. After the meal has been
eaten, the Rice-mother is fetched home by persons in gay attire, who
carry her very carefully under an umbrella in a neatly worked bag to
the barn, where a place in the middle is assigned to her. Every one
believes that she takes care of the rice in the barn and even
multiplies it not uncommonly.
When the Tomori of Central Celebes are about to plant the rice, they
bury in the field some betel as an offering to the spirits who cause
the rice to grow. The rice that is planted round this spot is the
last to be reaped at harvest. At the commencement of the reaping the
stalks of this patch of rice are tied together into a sheaf, which
is called "the Mother of the Rice" (_ineno pae_), and offerings in
the shape of rice, fowl's liver, eggs, and other things are laid
down before it.
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