JAPANESE GHOSTS.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXVIII, Issue 7965, 16 February 1906, Page 3

JAPANESE GHOSTS.

Japan, the land of telenhonps and electric light, of new guns and warships, is still the Japan which was a " dreamy ancient place an:! a happy hunting -ground for ghosts. There , are ghosts unsubstantial, mere wraiths that fade away ft a glance, and ghosts that eat and drink, and ' even marry with humans, and are ' never fornd out to be unsubstantial at all until they betray themselves f perhaps by a disagreeable habit of •; haunting grave-yards at night, or by a fancy for leaving even their sembJance of a body tenantless while they deport themselves amongst scenes afar. "G.J.," who writes on this subject in "Temple Bar," was badly haunted as a child simply by a stage representation of such ghosts. A sensible nurs«finally exercised these phantoms by contriving a vjsit to the green-room, where, with all the kindness of the Japanese for children, the actors reassured the little foreigner by showing precisely bow a mimic ghost was made. But the stage version is an exact rendering of the popular belief. The ghost proper in Japan, is very tall, willowy, and wailing, with the esnjecially weird feature of possessing no feet. Its trailing garments only support it, and disguise its deficiency, or it ends in a greyish mist. If a woman, it also proves unearthliness by "fastening the Kimono from right to left, instead of crossing IS in the true Japanese fashion, from left to right. There is au All Souls' Day in Japan, when spirts of the departed visit the household shrines, and once more eat the food of man. JJVbers sometimes re-acpear to their obildren at other dates, and, if alarming, this is counted a sign of great good luck. Sometimes a ghost has changed itself into "a monstrous black oat with fiery eyes," which gives a onriong instance Of kinship in superstitions between east and west. That black cat is so universally a doubtful charaocer. But the most touching superstition concerns a sea-shore cave, where on the rocky ledges about, and on the sandy floor are found towers of stones and pebbles. Those are built by children's ghosts, who come there to play by night, and leave their small, fresh footsteps on the sand. Always they remain children, fcr the grown-up,ghosts have no feet. The soft beach shows the marks of little bare toes, but pious people leave straw sandals in the cave, that they may climb the ledges, yec beep their tender flesh from hurt, such are things believed in Japan; at least, sb an educated young modern will teil you, by "very simple people, and—well— women."