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KOTTŌ

BEING JAPANESE CURIOS, WITH

SUNDRY COBWEBS

COLLECTED BY

LAFCADIO HEARN

Lecturer on Literature in the Imperial University of Tōkyō, Japan

WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY

GENJIRO YETO

New York

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY

LONDON: MACMILLAN & CO. LTD.

1903


[Illustration]

TO

SIR EDWIN ARNOLD

IN

GRATEFUL REMEMBRANCE

OF

KIND WORDS


[Illustration]

Contents

    Old Stories:

       I. The Legend of Yurei-Daki
      II. In a Cup of Tea
     III. Common Sense
      IV. Ikiryō
       V. Shiryō
      VI. The Story of O-Kamé
     VII. Story of a Fly
    VIII. Story of a Pheasant
      IX. The Story of Chūgorō

    A Woman's Diary
    Heiké-gani
    Fireflies
    A Drop of Dew
    Gaki
    A Matter of Custom
    Revery
    Pathological
    In the Dead of the Night
    Kusa-Hibari
    The Eater of Dreams




Old Stories

_The following nine tales have been selected from the
"Shin-Chomon-Shū" "Hyaku Monogatari," "Uji-Jūi-Monogatari-Shō," and
other old Japanese books, to illustrate some strange beliefs. They are
only Curios._

[Illustration]




The Legend of Yurei-Daki


Near the village of Kurosaka, in the province of Hōki, there is
a waterfall called Yurei-Daki, or The Cascade of Ghosts. Why it
is so called I do not know. Near the foot of the fall there is a
small Shintō shrine of the god of the locality, whom the people
name Taki-Daimyōjin; and in front of the shrine is a little wooden
money-box--_saisen-bako_--to receive the offerings of believers. And
there is a story about that money-box.

*

One icy winter's evening, thirty-five years ago, the women and girls
employed at a certain _asa-toriba_, or hemp-factory, in Kurosaka,
gathered around the big brazier in the spinning-room after their
day's work had been done. Then they amused themselves by telling
ghost-stories. By the time that a dozen stories had been told, most
of the gathering felt uncomfortable; and a girl cried out, just to
heighten the pleasure of fear, "Only think of going this night, all
by one's self, to the Yurei-Daki!" The suggestion provoked a general
scream, followed by nervous bursts of laughter.... "I'll give all the
hemp I spun to-day," mockingly said one of the party, "to the person
who goes!" "So will I," exclaimed another. "And I," said a third. "All
of us," affirmed a fourth.... Then from among the spinners stood up
one Yasumoto O-Katsu, the wife of a carpenter;--she had her only son,
a boy of two years old, snugly wrapped up and asleep upon her back.
"Listen," said O-Katsu; "if you will all really agree to make over to
me all the hemp spun to-day, I will go to the Yurei-Daki." Her proposal
was received with cries of astonishment and of defiance. But after
having been several times repeated, it was seriously taken. Each of
the spinners in turn agreed to give up her share of the day's work to
O-Katsu, providing that O-Katsu should go to the Yurei-Daki. "But how
are we to know if she really goes there?" a sharp voice asked. "Why,
let her bring back the money-box of the god," answered an old woman
whom the spinners called Obaa-San, the Grandmother; "that will be proof
enough." "I'll bring it," cried O-Katsu. And out she darted into the
street, with her sleeping boy upon her back.

*

The night