Page:The International Folk-Lore Congress of the World's Columbian Exposition, Chicago, July, 1893.djvu/368

 306 the nether regions," was overtaken by a storm, and could find shelter nowhere except in the hut of a poor man named Somin. The next day the other villagers died from a plague; but Somin and his family, wearing each a belt of twisted grass, were saved. This is said to have been also the origin of the practice of fastening a straw rope across the entrance of a house at New Year's time, to keep out the plaguegod; for thus Susanro had instructed his hospitable Somin to do.

The uncanny fox of the witch of Mount Vesuvius is duplicated probably a thousand-fold in Japanese folk-lore. And, as under Mount Ætna was supposed to lie a giant (Enceladus) who, by the movements of his body, "made all Trinacria to tremble," so under the Japanese islands is said to be a huge catfish (or "trout," or "backbone fish of the world," among the Ainos), which is similarly responsible for the frequent earthquakes in Japan. The dragon-centipede, mentioned by Dr. Griffis, is an easy reminder of the hydra slain by Hercules, and the story of Raiko and the flesh-eating demon, Shutendoji, naturally seems an Oriental version of the tale of Theseus and the Minotaur. Again, as Neptune, assisted by Æolus, the Tritons, the Nereids and the very fish ("cete") themselves, propelled the fleet of Æneas; so, when the Empress Jingu made her expedition against Korea, "the Wind-god sent a breeze; the Sea-god raised the billows; all the great flshes of the ocean rose to the surface and encompassed the ships;" so that "without the labor of the oar" they reached Sylla.

A story of a Japanese hamadryad, living in a willow tree, is related by Lafcadio Hearn, in the Atlantic Monthly, for July, 1892.

The deification of emperors and heroes is not only Roman but also Japanese: and the worship of the lares and the penates is duplicated in Japan in the worship of family ancestors.

To such an extent, moreover, had all the superstitious worship become a mere form among both the Occidentals and the Orientals, that they soon learned to practise deceit: in Rome; by offering not human, but garlic heads, not a living, but a dough or wax animal, to the gods; and in Japan, by appeasing the spirit of a deceased prince, not with the en-