Page:Occult Japan - Lovell.djvu/222

204 if not the actual author of its being, is clothed from the start with a certain fatherly prestige. His importance is heightened by the fact of his having made the pilgrimage several times before. Indeed, he goes usually every year, and paternally expounds the wonders of the way to the brethren, who listen agape and retail it all in their turn to a no less spellbound audience at home. For, like the month of March, though in another way, they come in like lions who went out like lambs.

The worthy man is not only the head but the only dead-head of the party. He alone pays no scot. There are thus more substantial benefits accruing to the post of club president than simply a cicerone's gratified sense of importance. That he does not have to pay reminds one of directors' cars at home. However, so holy a person is otherwise superior to money considerations; the purse being carried by the tori-shimari-nin or treasurer.

The treasurer is the club's man-of-affairs, of very small affairs indeed. The Japanese are not above a monetary system which descends in decimals to the thousandth part