Page:Village life in Korea (1911).djvu/230

194 so there are baskets filled with cloth and clothes which have been dedicated to the spirits and put away in some safe place, where they are most religiously kept and handed down from one generation to another. Then there are other offerings made of bits of paper, old shoes, sackcloth, and shoes made especially for the spirits hanging around in different parts of the house.

The entrance to our village is guarded by a group of wooden posts, the tops of which are carved into the form of faces which, judging from their hideous appearance, would frighten off the bravest of the spirits. On these devil posts, as they have been well named, are often seen bits of paper, strips of cloth, and bunches of human hair which have been tied there as offerings to the spirits.

At almost every place where a road crosses a hilltop there is a shrine to the spirit of the mountain, and on many hill and mountain tops where there is no road these are also found. These shrines are of great variety, the most common ones consisting of a pile of stones under a tree, to the branches of which are tied offerings to the spirits consisting of fancy-colored silks and other cloth, bits of paper, hair, old shoes, old garments, little bags filled with offerings such as are supposed to be acceptable to the spirits. At some of these there are well-built houses. These are always small, some covered with tile and others with straw. In them are pictures of old men to represent the spirit of the mountain, and a considerable collection of offerings such as above described, in addition