Page:Things Japanese (1905).djvu/457

Rh, and in the efficacy of charms against fire, shipwreck, and disease. There exist also various superstitious notions about numbers. For instance, 7 and all numbers into which 7 enters, as 17, 27, etc., are unlucky. Certain numerical proportions must be observed between the ages of man and woman in wedlock. By the rule known as yo-me tō-me, you should not marry a girl whose age differs by 4 years or by 10 years from your own. (But as Far-Eastern reckoning is always inclusive,—see page 12,—the real numbers are 3 and 9; thus a man of 21 must not marry a girl of 18, nor a man of 26 a girl of 17). Ages also exercise an influence on certain occupations. Thus, trees must be grafted only by young men, because of the special need of vital energy in the graft. The notion that certain days are lucky, others unlucky, is still so firmly rooted that some news papers which cater for the lower classes publish lists of them. For example, what are known as tomo-biki no hi are days exercising such irresistible influence on the future that if a funeral takes place on one of them, there will certainly soon be another funeral in the same family. The general idea that "misfortunes never come singly," is expressed by the adage Ni-do ant koto wa, san-do aru, "What happens twice will happen thrice."

Questions of place must be attended to no less carefully than proper times and seasons, if ill-luck is to be avoided. Thus, no Japanese would sleep with his head to the North (that is, facing South),—for that is the direction in which corpses are laid out. The East is the luckiest side, the next best being the South. There is always danger to be feared from the North-East, which quarter has received the name of the "demon's gate:"—no openings are left in a house on that side, and no well is ever dug there, but Buddhist temples are often built on the North-East of a city as a means of protection. Sometimes, in shifting house from one locality to another, it may be prudent not to go straight to the objective, but to make a circuit via some other point of the compass, and stop a night—maybe a longer period, according as the soothsayer shall indicate—on the way. Certain