Page:Things Japanese (1905).djvu/458

446 mountains and lakes must not be approached; for the inevitable result is a typhoon, especially if the intruder should disturb or carry off any of the water.

There are various superstitions connected with fire, that arch-enemy of a people whose cities are built of wood. Do not throw any nail-parings into the fire:—if you do, the fire will take vengeance by burning either you or your house. Do not throw persimmon-stones into the fire, or you will become a leper. Do not bring in any of those delicately beautiful Lent lilies (higan-bana, lit. equinox flowers,) that bloom in scarlet profusion on the margins of the rice-fields at the time of the spring and autumn equinox. Your house may be burnt down. Perhaps this idea was suggested by the colour and shape of the flower resembling tongues of flame, besides which the word "equinox" is connected with the idea of death, it being at that festival that the departed spirits cross over the Buddhist Styx. In former days it was supposed that any one gazing on the Mikado would be struck blind, and accordingly that sacred personage's "dragon face" was always veiled by a fine bamboo mat from those to whom an audience was granted. Photography, when first introduced, was also considered dangerous, because likely to absorb some portion of the life or spirit of the person photographed. Belonging to a different set of ideas, and not without a touch of quiet humour, is a charm in the shape of a short inscription which, at this very moment of writing (1904), is to be found pasted in every room of one of the best-known hotels in Japan. It keeps out ants, by informing them that "For every hundred cubic inches of ants, a charge of sixteen cash will be levied." The ant, being a thrifty creature, refuses to enter even on such moderate terms.

The above are samples merely, culled at haphazard. Of other superstitions concerning names, concerning clothes, concerning