Page:Brinkley - Japan - Volume 5.djvu/244

 of the great might be thus requited after the death of the sufferer, but, on the whole, the restless ghost with a mission of revenge never seriously disturbed the public mind. Haunted houses, however, are so common that in every city two or three may be seen standing untenanted. Educated men might have no hesitation in renting or purchasing such places, but they would certainly find difficulty in getting servants to live there, from which it may be inferred that the reality of ghostly appearances is not questioned by the masses. When a girl warns her faithless lover that her spirit will haunt him (tottsuku), she does not doubt her ability to make the threat good, and when folks allege that they have seen the soul of the newly dead float away over eaves and roof, a transparent globe (hito-dama) of impalpable essence, their faith in the accuracy of their eyesight is honest. When rain falls at midnight ghosts love to walk abroad, and timid mortals arc correspondingly careful to remain within doors. Yet there is never much hesitation to take part in a spirit-summoning réunion. The convives sit within a circle of a hundred lamps and recount a hundred legends (hiyaku-monogatari), one lamp being extinguished for each legend. When the last light has disappeared, the party are in a mental condition suitable to welcome the ghosts, demons, or other supernatural beings that inevitably come upon the scene.

Death is not an essential preliminary to the ex-