Page:Journal of American Folklore vol. 12.djvu/570

 22 2 • Journal of American Folk-Lore.

��FOLK-LORE SCRAP-BOOK.

Fox Possession in Japan. — The "Japan Evangelist," May, 1900, fur- nishes a curious account of a case of this disease, taken by the reciter of the occurrences, Miss Harriet M. Browne, to be a case of actual demoni- acal possession. The patient, Nishiyama Tsugi, fifteen years old, was adopted in infancy by a man and his wife named Nishiyama. At the age of nine years she ran away from home, desiring something more exciting than the lonely country ; after a year she returned, only to steal and once more take her flight ; after this, according to her own account, she was servant and nurse girl in a prostitute house, and, leaving this, took to the life of the lowest beggars, sleeping in the mountains, in graveyards, or in beggars' huts, a companion of thieves and pickpockets as well as vagrants, and associating herself with a young man in the commission of a burglary. She then came to the orphanage, from which she had been kept by the popular belief that the blood of the children was taken from them while alive, and here manifested tokens of epilepsy and dangerous mania. The sequel may be told in the words of Miss Browne : —

" We found that she greatly feared the well god and the rice god, Inari, and his messengers, the foxes. She told us that, the first year after she ran away, a kind landlady told her that she had inquired of the oracle at a temple to tell her what was the matter with O Tsugi, and that it had said that O Tsugi's mother's spirit had possessed her child because the blind woman she was with had treated her cruelly.

" On the afternoon of the fifth of January she had a much worse attack than before. We tried to bind her, but could not, as she showed such strength, and it took several to manage her. She would not pay the least attention to what was going on around her, nor could she be roused^ nor would she turn her face toward any one. During the two former attacks she had acted in dumb pantomime, but during this one she talked inces- santly. At first the words and actions were those of an infant just learning to walk. Then after a time she changed and said, as if it were a third per- son addressing herself, 'Your father has come on an errand from your mother j ' and she replied angrily, ' What do I want with my father ? ' with other abusive words. Then, changing again, after further talk she said, personating the patron god of Chofu, ' You stole offerings from me, you did ! I saw you steal food from- Inari in Bakan, and I kept still, but now you have come to Chofu and stolen three eggs that were offered up to me. You return them at once, I tell you ! ' * I have n't any eggs. Please for- give me.' ' Return them, I tell you, or I will do something dreadful to you.' 'Well, forgive me, and I will work hard and replace them.' 'Mind that you present them as offerings. Just bringing them to me won't an- swer. If you don't, I '11 pinch you,' suiting the (invisible) action to the words ; at which she cried out, ' Aa itai ! [O, it hurts !] Do forgive me ! I '11 replace them.' ' Well, I '11 forgive you if you make me the offering, but if you don't, I '11 pinch you well.' Saying this, she fell as before and

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