A very curious little object now comes slowly floating down the river,
and I do not think that you could possibly guess what it is.
The Hotoke, or Buddhas, and the beneficent Kami are not the only
divinities worshipped by the Japanese of the poorer classes. The deities
of evil, or at least some of them, are duly propitiated upon certain
occasions, and requited by offerings whenever they graciously vouchsafe
to inflict a temporary ill instead of an irremediable misfortune. [4]
(After all, this is no more irrational than the thanksgiving prayer
at the close of the hurricane season in the West Indies, after the
destruction by storm of twenty-two thousand lives.) So men sometimes
pray to Ekibiogami, the God of Pestilence, and to Kaze-no-Kami, the God
of Wind and of Bad Colds, and to Hoso-no-Kami, the God of Smallpox, and
to divers evil genii.
Now when a person is certainly going to get well of smallpox a feast is
given to the Hoso-no-Kami, much as a feast is given to the Fox-God when
a possessing fox has promised to allow himself to be cast out. Upon a
sando-wara, or small straw mat, such as is used to close the end of
a rice-bale, one or more kawarake, or small earthenware vessels, are
placed. These are filled with a preparation of rice and red beans,
called adzukimeshi, whereof both Inari-Sama and Hoso-no-Kami are
supposed to be very fond. Little bamboo wands with gohei (paper
cuttings) fastened to them are then planted either in the mat or in the
adzukimeshi, and the colour of these gohei must be red. (Be it observed
that the gohei of other Kami are always white.) This offering is then
either suspended to a tree, or set afloat in some running stream at a
considerable distance from the home of the convalescent. This is called
'seeing the God off.'