Page:TASJ-1-3.djvu/161

 It now became possible for Ninigi no mikoto to descend and take possession of his realm. Before starting from the sun he received from the goddess, his grandmother, the three divine insignia, called kusanagi no tsrugi (a sword, which is enshrined at Atsuta in Owari), the Yasakani no maga tama (a stone) and the mirror which is worshipped at the Naikû in Isé as the representative of goddess of the sun. Accompanied by a number of inferior gods, he descended on the Ama no uki-hashi, or floating bridge of heaven, to Taka-chi-ho no mine, now called Kirishima yama, which lies on the boundary between Hiuga and Ohosumi in Kiushiu. On this occasion grains of rice were thrown broadcast in the air to dispel the darkness which covered the sky, and it is said that rice grows wild on Kirishima yama to this day.

The Ama no uki hashi was a thing by which communication took place between heaven and earth in those days. It floated in the air, and was also called Ama no iwa-fune, literally, the heavenly rock-boat. It was on this that Izanagi and Izanami took their stand when they stirred about with the sacred spear to find land. There are still remains of the hashidate, lofty mounds by which the uki-hashi was reached, in the provinces of Harima and Tango. After the descent of the Sublime Grandchild, the sun and the earth, which had already receded from each other to a considerable distance, gradually became further separated, and communication by the floating bridge ceased. The hashidate fell down, and have since lain on their longest side: that near Miyadzu in Tango measures twenty-two thousand two hundred and ninety feet in length.

The sun having thus ascended, became fixed in the centre of space, where it constantly revolves on its axis from left to right. The earth is far removed from it in space, and moves round it from right to left, one revolution being called a year. At the same time the earth revolving on itself, produces the phenomena of day and night. The moon which split off from the earth about the same period revolves round the earth in a little over twenty nine days and a half, waxing