Wayside Shrines—The Fox God—Old Druggists’ Shops—Punishing Refractory
Idols.
Few things interested me more than the numerous shrines on mountains, in
the forests, or on the sea-shore, loaded with the votive offerings of
poor peasants. Such was the shrine of a hermit famous for his strong
legs. Round this were hung hundreds of half-worn straw sandals, a silent
appeal from their late owners to have strength such as his bestowed on
them. Some had presented gigantic new sandals, and a few had hung up
roughly-outlined pictures of the same.
Specially dear to the farmers is Inari-Sama, generally called “the
Fox-god,” whom they reverence as the special protector of the
rice-crops. Inari means literally “riceman,” and the two Chinese
characters used in writing the name mean “rice-bearing.” We passed
quaint little shrines in the forest, where the wayfarers halted to say a
prayer and cast small offerings into an alms-box, which bore an
inscription to state its purpose, namely, “For feeding hungry demons.”
Thus were the spirits of the forest propitiated. Every here and there in
the steep wooded hills we came to two well-sculptured stone (or perhaps
wooden) foxes sitting on pedestals. Passing between them, we found stone
steps, and as we ascended we came to another couple, and then another,
and another, till perhaps a long way up we reached a neat little shrine
with a god riding on a fox, and before him were laid tempting little
sugar foxes and bowls of rice.
Some of his numerous temples in the towns have beautiful wood-carving,
and bronze foxes carrying urns with five flames rising from them. They
are always in couples, doubtless that one wily beast may watch over the
other. We found a very interesting fox-shrine near Kobe on the summit of
a steep hill, at the foot of which (on the outskirts of a pretty village
of thatched houses) we had noticed a whole row of wooden _torii_ about
twelve feet high, painted a warm red colour. (The _torii_, or
“bird-rest,” are simply two upright pieces of timber, supporting a
third, which form the symbolic gateway at the approach to Shinto
temples.) These were votive offerings from farmers, and led up to a
great _torii_ of stone, guarded on either side by two large stone foxes
mounted on pedestals.
At Kuzunomia, a famous Shinto temple near Osaka, I saw hundreds of these
scarlet _torii_ arranged in avenues, all leading to a very popular
fox-temple. The approach to the main temple is by a fine _cryptomeria_
avenue, beneath which stand a multitude of great stone lanterns—a pretty
and quaint scene. Round this and several neighbouring temples it is
accounted a work of merit to walk a hundred times, keeping reckoning by
means of bunches of string. Of course this has originally been the
sun-wise turn, common throughout the world, but here the pilgrims go
either sun-wise or “widder-shin.” (In Scotland the latter was equivalent
to invoking a curse.)
Some people say that the origin of fox-worship was simply a form of
homage to Uga, the benefactor of mankind, in that he first cultivated
the rice-plant. He is represented in ivory _netzkies_ and other carvings
under the symbol of a snake encircling a bag of rice. Is it not strange
in how many lands we find the same association of the serpent with the
harvest, and his worship as one of the corn-gods? The attendants of
Inari-Sama are foxes, ever ready to do his will, and therefore entitled
to much propitiation by the farmers. So shrines in his honour and that
of his retainers are multiplied all over the land, and children and
peasants rejoice to celebrate various rustic but most picturesque
festivals in honour of the fox-gods, whose images abound in every
direction, and who hold so large a place in legendary lore.
Thus we learn how a noted sword-smith, driven to his wits’ end by a
sudden order from the Mikado to forge a special blade, prayed to
Inari-Sama, who straightway appeared and bade him do his work and fear
nothing. The pious smith obeyed, and having decked his anvil like an
altar with sacred ropes of rice-straw and symbolic _goheis_ of white
paper, prepared to work single-handed, when suddenly the fox-god, in the
likeness of a man, appeared and aided him so powerfully that the fame of
that blade went forth throughout the land. In various tales of old Japan
the fox figures as a most exemplary being; one especially tells of a
peasant who saved the life of a young fox, and soon after, when his
child was dying and the doctor prescribed the liver taken from a living
fox as the only remedy which could save it, the grateful parent-foxes
suddenly appeared, bringing their own young one for this purpose, as an
offering to the good peasants.[64]
On the other hand, here as in China, people often firmly believe in a
form of demoniacal possession[65] in which an evil fox-spirit has
entered into a woman or child, and can only be driven out by priestly
exorcism. Such scenes are represented in many picture-books. I also saw
a finely painted scroll, many yards in length, representing the dire
mischances which befell certain irreligious persons who had malignantly
compassed the death of some foxes, an act which is accounted quite as
criminal in Japan as in England. I wish I could have secured that scroll
as an offering for a certain Master of Fox-Hounds.
At the Kitano-ten-jin, which is a fine temple near Kioto, I saw near the
fox-shrine a handsome bronze bull, and two others of black and red
marble. Amongst the votive offerings to these were many of straw shoes
belonging to sick cattle, and also pictures of bulls presented by
grateful farmers. Also innumerable metal mirrors (Shinto emblems of the
sun) and beautiful brass lanterns inside the temple, and great stone
lanterns in the outer court, all votive offerings.
In many places I saw shrines adorned with locks of human hair, and this
particular offering figures prominently at Kioto, where a great Buddhist
temple, the Hon-gwan-ji, which was burned in an awful fire, has been
magnificently rebuilt, a sum equivalent to £850,000 having been raised,
largely by poor peasants. It is built entirely of wood, supported on
huge pillars imported from the forests of Formosa, and is adorned with a
profusion of admirable wood-carving of flowers, birds, and beasts.
From one of the beams hang about fifty very stout ropes, each about
fifty feet in length, made entirely from the glossy black tresses of
Japanese women, who, having no money to offer, brought this votive
offering—a sacrifice of their most precious possession. These ropes
represent the offerings of many thousands of women.[66] The men likewise
contributed masses of their hair, which was woven into ropes of such
strength that by them at least one of the heavy beams was hauled into
position. It was estimated that 358,883 heads had been shaven to produce
that rope!
Of course the regular method of hairdressing for a man, according to
true Japanese custom, necessitates always shaving the front and middle
of the head, so that only the hair from the back and sides is available
to produce that quaint little tail, stiff with pomatum, which is brought
forward to the top of the head. Now that young Japan allows his hair to
grow, the work of the professional barber must be greatly diminished.
All hairdressing, male and female, is done at the shop, where feminine
hairdressers attend to girls and women, and with skilled hand arrange
those glossy loops and chignons which are always so neat, as if fresh
from the artist’s hand, although they were perhaps dressed a day or two
previously. But the careful damsels have been trained from infancy only
to let their neck rest on the little padded wooden pillow, which just
raises the head sufficiently to prevent its being ruffled on the mat. It
is interesting to find what is practically the same pillow or neck rest,
devised for the same purpose, in Japan, Kaffraria, and the South Sea
Isles.
The Hon-gwan-ji temples, to one of which I referred just now, are those
of a very remarkable sect of Reformed Buddhists who separated from the
main body in the year A.D. 1262. Hence they are called the Shin-shiû, or
New Doctrine, but they are also known as the Monto. Their founder was a
saint of the name of Shinran Shônin. He seems to have attained to a
conception of a life of faith, scarcely to be distinguished from
Christianity, from which it was doubtless adapted.
In place of the cold, unsympathetic teaching of pure Buddhism, with its
faultless standard of well-nigh impossible morality, and requiring a
perfection to which every man must attain by his own merit, without any
aid whatsoever from any Superior Being (for Buddha only left an example
of superhuman purity and self-extinction, which his disciples must
strive to follow without any help from him). In place of this cold
teaching, Shinran taught that Buddha the Supreme is full of tender
compassion for all his creatures, and that of his boundless mercy he
desires to help all who rely on his aid and his merit to attain the
blessedness of Nirvana, a state which, to the Shin-shiûist, implies no
cold extinction, but rather the blessedness of eternal happiness.
The impracticable standard of pure Buddhism, which sanctioned no direct
worship of any sort, had led to the growth of a complex mythology in
which innumerable beings who were believed to have attained to the
perfect state were not only recognised as Buddhas, but received actual
worship.
The Shin-shiû sect, while recognising that all these have attained the
rank of Buddhas, maintain that they did so only by the help and merit of
Amida Buddha, who alone is to be worshipped, and that the true way of
salvation is to have a saving faith in him, to keep his mercy ever in
the heart, to invoke his name in order to remember him, and especially
to cultivate gratitude for his great goodness. Thus the distinctive
doctrine of this reformed sect is a belief in “help from another,” and
the vain repetition of forms of words is discouraged.
This help does not extend to things temporal, for it is not lawful to
pray for happiness in this present life, that being a matter beyond the
control of any save the individual concerned, who must make or mar his
own present condition according to his diligence or carelessness in the
practice of morality.
This is the teaching of the learned; but we may be sure that as regards
the mass of the worshippers who have thus been taught to commune with
Amida Buddha as with a personal Saviour, the craving of the human heart
will not express itself only with respect to things spiritual.
It is evident that the humanity and comfort to be found in this reformed
Buddhism has given it a hold on the affections of the people which the
other sects are rapidly losing, for whereas they are for the most part
growing weaker and weaker, and their temples falling into decay from
sheer neglect, those of the Monto continue to be thronged by devout
worshippers, who prove their devotion to their church by the most
open-handed offerings for its support, and for the repair of its vast
temples—temples which were built on so gigantic a scale, that there
might be room for all the multitude who should assemble to hear the
preaching that proclaimed the welcome news of a Mighty Helper.
In its appeal to the human sympathies, and consequently to the masses,
the Shin-Shiû seems to me to hold the same position with regard to other
Buddhist sects that the worship of Juggernath (with its festival of Holy
Food, to be eaten in common by prince and pariah,) does to all other
sects among the Hindoos.
Even the priests are exempt from the life-long struggle to attain
self-righteousness by asceticism, and are freely allowed to eat both
fish and flesh—and also to marry and make their homes as happy as they
can. They are required to be diligent in preaching, that they may make
known to all men this better creed, and theological colleges have been
established in order to bestow such thorough training, that the
preachers may be fitted to cope with all rival teachers, whether
Christian or Shintoist.
With all its advantages, the Monto creed nevertheless retains a full
belief in transmigration, with all its weary succession of stages in an
interminable existence; so that the man who, failing to claim the
merciful aid of Amida Buddha, continues to be the slave of evil passions
(such as anger or covetousness), must inevitably at the close of his
present life be reborn as a lower animal, there to be met by the same
mercy, offered to him in a new phase.
I do not know why these temples are built in couples, but both at Osaka
and Kioto there are two close together, the Nishi, or Western, and the
Higashi, or Eastern, Hon-gwan-ji, whose gigantic twin thatched roofs are
conspicuous objects. I visited them all, and (notwithstanding the Monto
repudiation of a belief in heaping up merit by vain repetitions) I found
outside each of these, large revolving scripture-wheels, just the same
as one at the Chi-on-in monastery of the Jō-do sect, and many other
places.
Nevertheless there is a simple solemnity about these vast interiors,
where there is comparatively little of obtrusive idolatry—only the great
gilt images of Buddha and his disciples, dimly seen in the cool, deep
shadow. Leaving our boots in the verandah not to sully the beautifully
clean mats, we admired the exquisite uncoloured wood-carving of birds,
beasts, flowers, phœnix, and dragons. In the first we entered, a group
of priests in richly-coloured vestments, were chanting their litanies
before the altar, occasionally ringing a small bell—and the fragrance of
incense filled the air. There were only a handful of worshippers
present, but they were unmistakably in earnest. As we passed behind a
very respectable-looking woman, my companion overheard her simple
petition: “O Buddha,” she said, “I have been very rude to you; I pray
you to forgive me.” And when she had ended her prayer, she uttered a
fervent “_Arigato, arigato_”—“I thank you,” with deeper feeling than
goes with many an Amen.
There is said to be room in the temple for two thousand worshippers, who
need no seats nor church accommodation other than the soft clean mats on
which they kneel.
Beyond this house of prayer, there is a hall of preaching, where a
black-robed priest, with crimson hood, expounds the law to a few
attentive hearers, emphasising his words by tapping on his reading-desk
with his fan. What a sensation it would produce in London if some of our
great preachers carried fans into the pulpit on hot summer days. And yet
what could be more sensible?
An extremely interesting Buddhist temple of quite another type, is that
of Tennō-ji, in Osaka, which is dedicated to the Goddess of Mercy, but
has many other shrines. In one small metal pagoda three thousand tiny
images of many Buddhas receive homage, and near them are paintings of
four mythological kings, each wearing the invariable halo, and holding
“The Wheel of the Law.” Small wheels inscribed with Sanscrit characters
are fastened on the gateways, and the worshippers gave them a twirl;
also (as usual in a building by itself) stands a revolving
scripture-wheel containing all the sacred Buddhist books, inviting the
faithful to give it a turn on its pivot.
Above all towers a lofty five-storied pagoda, each finely curved roof
supported by many dragons’ heads, and terminating in carved elephants’
heads, the red woodwork gleaming against the blue sky.
But a specially pathetic interest centres round two temples, one on each
side of the great court, at which mothers offer the clothes, dolls, and
other playthings of their sick or dead children, quite regardless of the
contagion or infection which these may scatter. To put herself in
communication with the Goddess of Mercy, the sorrowing mother holds the
end of the rope which the priest pulls while tolling the great bell. (In
all the temples there are long silken bell-ropes which the worshippers
pull to call attention to their prayer, that they may not waste them on
inattentive deities.)
But what interested me most of all in that neighbourhood was the
discovery of two shops which at first I took to be taxidermists, well
filled with specimens of their art. Like all their neighbours, they were
open to the street, so we were able to take a leisurely survey of their
strange contents; and it was some time before I could quite realise that
these really were druggists’ shops of the pure and unadulterated old
Chinese school, happily quite untouched by foreign innovations.
So rapidly has the scientific study of medicine been taken up by the
Japanese medical practitioners, that the survival of such chemists was
quite remarkable, and I was greatly struck by the evident annoyance of a
Japanese gentleman, to whom I expressed my interest in having seen these
curious mediæval shops; he evidently felt it humiliating that a
foreigner should have seen such a relic of the days of foolish
ignorance! He could not possibly understand how this glimpse of the
little shops in Osaka enabled me to realise, as I had never done before,
what strange medicines were administered to our British ancestors in the
Middle Ages, and indeed within the last two centuries.
The quaint old men, whose loyal adherence to the customs of their
forefathers afforded me such an interesting illustration of old Japan
and old Britain, were compounders and sellers of CUROYAKIE, _i.e._
carbonised animals—in other words, animals reduced to charcoal, and
potted in a multitude of small covered jars of earthenware, neatly
ranged on shelves, to be sold as medicine for the sick and suffering.
Formerly all these animals were kept alive in the back premises, and
customers selected the creature for themselves, and stood by to see it
killed and burnt on the spot, so that there could be no deception, and
no doubt as to the freshness of their calcined skin or bone medicine.
Doubtless some insensible foreign influence—very likely some police
regulation—may account for the disappearance of the menagerie of waiting
victims and their cremation-ground. Now the zoological back-yard has
vanished, and only the strange chemist’s shop remains, like a
well-stored museum, wherein are ranged portions of the dried carcases of
dogs and deer, foxes and badgers, fishes and serpents, rats and mice,
toads and frogs, tigers and elephants.
The rarer the animal, and the further it has travelled, the more
precious, apparently, are its virtues. From the roof hung festoons of
gigantic snake-skins, which certainly were foreign importations from
some land where pythons flourish, Japan being happily exempt from the
presence of such beautiful monsters. I saw one very fine piece of skin,
which, though badly dried and much shrunken, measured twenty-six inches
across; but it was only a fragment ten feet in length, and was being
gradually consumed, inch by inch, to lend mystic virtue to compounds of
many strange ingredients. I was told that the perfect skin must have
measured nearly fifty feet in length. I saw another fragment twenty-two
feet long and twelve inches wide—this also had evidently shrunk
considerably in drying, and must, when in life, have been a very fine
specimen.
There were also some very fine deers’ horns, (hart’s-horn in its pure
and simple form), a highly-valued rhinoceros horn, and ivory of various
animals. My companion was much tempted by a beautiful piece of ivory
about ten feet in length. I think it was the horn of a narwhal, but the
druggist would only sell it for its price as medicine, namely ten cents
for fifty-eight grains—whence we inferred that the druggists of old
Japan, like some nearer home, fully understand the art of making a
handsome profit on their sales!
Tigers’ teeth and claws were also esteemed very precious, and some
strips of fur of the woolly tiger of China (a much handsomer animal than
the hairy tiger of India), and fragments of other skins and furs, proved
that these also held a place in the pharmacopœia of old Japan, as they
continue to do in China (the source whence Japan derived many branches
of learning besides the use of letters).
Unfortunately for the little lizards, which dart about so joyously in
the sunlight, they too are classed among the popular remedies, being
considered an efficacious vermifuge, so strings of these ghastly little
corpses are hung in festoons in many village shops where I have often
looked wonderingly at them. So lizards and dried scorpions (imported as
medicine) also found a place in these strange druggists’ shops, which,
with their general litter of oddities of various sorts, strongly
resembled old curiosity-shops, while the eccentric old men in the midst
of it all might have passed for mediæval wizards, rather than for grave
dispensers of drugs as, in dark caps and flowing robes, they sat
crouching over their little _hibachis_ (fire-pots) boiling broth of
abominable things in small vessels.
On my return to England, I borrowed from several old libraries
(especially the Advocates’ Library in Edinburgh) various books on
Anglo-Saxon Leechdoms, and sundry medical works of the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries, especially such as related to the use of calcined
animals, and as I read the medicine-lore of our very recent ancestors, I
realised how accurately I had seen it represented in Osaka.[67] Although
we cannot flatter ourselves that our ancestors were as exquisite in
their neatness as the Japanese, or their earthenware jars as dainty and
refined, there must have been just similar assortments of vessels
containing the ashes of goat’s flesh, of dead bees, of wolf’s skull, or
swine’s jaw, nay even of human skulls and bones. On the walls hung
remains of birds, lizards, rats, and moles, together with skins of
serpents, portions of mummies, horns of stags, rhinoceros, narwhal, and
many other items of the strange _materia medica_ of our own ancestors.
In Hogarth’s illustrations of _Marriage à la Mode_, Plate III. shows a
druggist’s shop in London in 1745, with shelves well stocked with little
jars, and surmounted by a stuffed wolf’s head, while on another cupboard
(which stands open to reveal a skeleton) hangs a large narwhal horn,
part of a sword-fish, two dried crocodiles, and sundry other reptiles.
Doubtless such quaint shops were then found near majestic Westminster
Abbey and St. Paul’s, just as the little Osaka drug-stores still existed
side by side with the latest innovations of science, such as the
numerous Japanese doctors, highly trained in England and America, the
railway, telegraph, gas, and, most remarkable of all, a magnificent
Mint, with fine large English houses for its foreign employees, and all
the latest improvements in all its machinery, making it far more perfect
than our own in London. So I was told by the English Master of the Mint,
who most kindly took me all over it and entertained me most hospitably
during my visit to Osaka.
In these streets every shop is a temptation to linger, and every group
of figures suggests sketching, especially those of children playing
happily, although each has a baby securely strapped on his or her back.
Often while I was busily sketching I found quite a crowd of these
courteous little people silently watching my work, and on one occasion I
counted twelve small boys, each thus carrying the family baby! They were
all so quiet that I should scarcely have known they were there, but that
occasionally one of the boys would whisper some kind remark to the grave
little one whose small face appeared above his shoulders. They were most
picturesque in their gay dressing-gowns, with long sleeves and open neck
lined with some bright colour, and gay waist-cloth.
The commonest game of these little folk, encumbered with babies and long
garments, is a variety of battledore and shuttlecock, in which the sole
of the foot acts as battledore,—very jerky for the babies!
One of the quaintest national festivals in honour of children is the
feast of the _Nobori_, which are large paper fishes, floating from tall
bamboos; these are attached to the roof of every house in which a son
has been born in the previous twelvemonth. The emblematic fish is the
carp, which is the emblem of perseverance, a characteristic which he is
said to display in working his way up difficult rapids. As Japanese
babies are legion, a considerable number of houses in every street are
entitled to hang up this curious announcement, which I have no doubt
fills the happy mother with considerable pride. The open mouth of the
carp catches the breeze, which puffs it out like a balloon, and keeps it
constantly in movement.
As the elder brothers might be jealous of a baby who had such an honour
all to himself, the day is made joyful to them by gifts of boys’
playthings—warrior dolls, and little heroic demi-gods, with any number
of flags and banners; and to these national toys are now added miniature
cannon, guns, and other modern innovations. I need not say that to me
only the purely native toys were attractive, and their variety is
surprising.
Fascinating as are even the commonest kinds of Japanese dolls (such are
now so freely imported to Europe) I was tantalised by accounts of the
delightfully quaint doll-army which holds sway throughout the land for
one day in every year—namely, the third day of the third month. It is
known as the Hina Matsuri, that is to say “The Dolls’ Festival.” The
dolls in question all represent historical or mythological
characters—gods and demi-gods, Mikados and Shoguns, warlike heroes,
Empress and other ladies of note, minstrels, courtiers, priests. They
vary in size from tiny things to about twelve inches in height, and are
made of wood or baked clay or china, but all alike are beautifully
dressed in correct costume.
Two of these are presented to every baby girl at the first festival
after her birth, and as they are carefully treasured from year to year,
and fresh dolls are occasionally added, the family doll-house requires
to be capacious. When a girl marries she takes her original brace of
dolls with her to her new home, as an early offering for her prospective
family! The dolls are provided with miniature properties of all sorts,
tiny but exquisitely lacquered tables, with complete dinner or tea-sets,
all requisites for the toilet and for painting, and making music.
These well-brought-up little Japanese maidens commence their festival by
making formal offerings of sweetmeats and rice-wine to the dolls who
personate the Mikado and the Kôgô—and then devote the whole long, happy
day to play with the delightful companions who at night will be hidden
from them, not to be seen again for twelve long months. I have had the
luck to be shown some of these precious dolls, but they are only offered
for sale at the orthodox season.
Japanese ingenuity seems never at a loss for something on which to
expend itself, and as kite-flying is one of the popular amusements of
old and young, much care is bestowed on decorating the kites. These are
generally simply of a square form, a canvas (sometimes five or six feet
square!) on which to depict strange mythological, theatrical, or
historic scenes. But sometimes the kite-maker wearies of so prosaic a
form, so he shapes his kite like some great bird or flying dragon, or
other strange object. And he fastens to it a narrow strip of bamboo or
whale-bone, so placed that as it flies through the wind it shall produce
a low humming sound like an Eolian harp.
When grown up men take to kite-flying, they dip the upper end of the
string in glue, and then in powdered glass, so that it may become a
sharp cutting-instrument. Then several go out together and take sides
(sometimes they adopt the names of the grand old families to give point
to their mimic warfare) and each tries to fly his kite higher than that
of his opponent, and then suddenly to draw it down, and in so doing cut
loose his rival.
As all the shops are open to the street, and the workers never seemed at
all to object to our halting to watch them, I saw much of the processes
of manufacture, from that of exquisitely delicate patterns of enamel on
copper or china, to that of idols being rough-hewn from the original
timber, and thence up to the highly coloured and gilded article, ready
to receive worship.
On several occasions, in rural districts, I saw a regular ecclesiastical
“spring-cleaning” going on, which was exceedingly curious. Thus on the
shores of beautiful Lake Biwa we halted at a tumble-down old temple
called Go-Hiyaku-Rakkan, sacred to the five hundred disciples of Buddha,
and there found a painter of images repairing five hundred very cleverly
carved old images, every one different, and all full of character; a
large number of them representing devout women. The artist was endowing
each with a new halo, which, with the gaudy fresh paint, vulgarised
them. About half had been thus renovated, and their arms, heads, and
legs were stuck on sticks to dry. The great Amida Butzu was represented
with a wife on either side, one riding on a lion, and the other on a
white elephant.
A few months later I saw various similar scenes in the course of my
wanderings in China, and heard much about the very peculiar attitude of
the Chinese towards the celestial powers, and their mode of dealing with
refractory gods, who cannot be induced to grant the humble prayers of
their worshippers. This is most strikingly shown in regard to those gods
who are supposed to have special control of the weather, and whose
neglect to send rain in due season (or rather, their grievously
irregular distribution of this gift) results in the terrible droughts
and awful floods which so frequently devastate vast tracts of the
Chinese Empire.
In the first instance the gods are approached in all humility, with
fasting and prayer, the temples are thronged, and the officials of
inferior rank even go thither on foot. Should they fail to obtain their
petition, officials of higher grade take the matter in hand; first the
City Prefect, then the Governor-General of the Province, clothed in
sack-cloth, and loaded with chains and fetters, and escorted by the
Arch-Abbots of both Buddhist and Taonist temples. Failing these, a
Prince of the Imperial family tries his persuasive power, and should the
Water Dragon still prove obdurate the Emperor himself assumes his
highest office as High Priest of his people.
Should the Imperial prayer be granted, the good Dragon is rewarded by a
general repair of his temples, and by the official award of a new title,
which is duly chronicled in the _Peking Gazette_. Thus in 1867, when
after a season of prolonged drought the scorched earth at last hailed
refreshing showers, a certain well near his temple at Han-tan, in the
Province of Honan, was officially canonised as “The Holy Well of the
Dragon God.”
But when the gods prove obdurate, their worshippers sometimes lose
patience and resort to most irreverent methods of bringing them to
reason, such as carrying the idols from the cool shade of their temples,
and depositing them in the scorching sun till they are cracked and
blistered, and their paint and gilding all falls off. Thus they are
supposed to realise something of the discomfort to which they are
subjecting poor human beings.
For it must not be imagined that the idols are incapable of feeling! Dr.
Dudgeon of Peking, who examined a number, while in process of demolition
in various old temples, told me that inside the idols he found the
various organs of the chest, heart, lungs, abdomen, and intestines in
general, all accurately figured according to Chinese notions of anatomy.
Some of these were several hundred years old, but all in wonderful
preservation, being generally made of rich silk or satin, the heart
being of red silk, with veins of variously coloured silk proceeding from
it. To the heart is frequently attached a small brass mirror, to enable
the god to reflect the heart of his worshipper, and to this is also
attached an invocation written on silk and wound round a stick. The
bowels are all enveloped in a large piece of silk or satin, so as to
keep all compact.
In certain cases, though no visible idol is made to suffer, the
invisible Water Dragon is made exceedingly uncomfortable by the
application of an iron gag. In the well to which I have already
referred, in the Court of the Temple of the Water Dragon, outside the
gates of the city at Han-tan, there is kept an iron plate six inches
long and half an inch thick, on which is inscribed a petition for
abundance of rain. When all other means to obtain relief in times of
excessive drought have proved in vain, the Emperor sends a special
officer to travel all the way to the Province of Honan, to bring this
plate to Peking. Its arrival having been duly notified in the _Gazette_,
it is reverently placed on the altar in the great Temple of the National
gods, where it is supposed to act as a key to lock the mouth of the
great Water Dragon, who is chief of the Rain-gods, and this makes him so
extremely uncomfortable, that he hastens to send rain, to induce his
troublesome worshippers to remove the gag!!
It is not only the gods of the weather who are dealt with in this
extraordinary fashion. On the same principle that a surgeon sometimes
bandages the eyes of his patient during some horrible operation, so
while a temple is undergoing repair, and the dilapidated images are
irreverently stowed away in a corner, their eyes are covered with little
strips of paper, as a hint that they are requested not to observe what
is going on, till all is restored to order.
But the most startling of all human relations to celestial beings, are
when the former venture to sit in judgment on the latter, and, finding
them guilty of misdemeanour, condemn the idols to decapitation—the form
of execution which is held in the utmost abhorrence, and is deemed
infinitely worse than hanging or crucifixion, because its evil
consequences follow the dead beyond this present life, a decapitated
spirit being immediately recognised as quite unfit company for
respectable spirits, whose bodies were buried intact. It is therefore
evident that to subject a god to such treatment, represents the very
acme of contempt.
Yet this was done in 1889 at Foo Chow, where amongst the numberless
temples to gods of every description, there is one temple specially
frequented by persons desiring to be revenged on their foes. A few
months previously the Tartar military commander died suddenly, and his
death was forthwith attributed by the populace to the gods of this
temple. Hearing this, the Viceroy of the province issued commands to the
Prefect of the city that they should be legally arrested, and judicially
punished.
Armed with the Viceroy’s warrant, the Prefect proceeded to the temple
and arrested fifteen wooden idols, averaging five feet in height—hideous
beings gaudily painted. Their eyes were at once destroyed, in order that
they might not see who was their judge, nor be able to trouble him in
this world or in the life to follow. Thus sightless, they were brought
before the judgment-seat of the Prefect, who having fully investigated
the case, sent his report to the Viceroy, who pronounced the terrible
verdict that all fifteen should be beheaded, their bodies be cast into a
neighbouring pond, and there left to decay, while their temple should be
sealed with the Government seal, which no man dare break, and thus be
deserted for evermore. Thus were these injudicious gods banished from
Foo Chow never more to trouble the peace of its inhabitants!