DECEIVING THE SPIRITS.

Waikato Times, Volume XXXI, Issue 2504, 28 July 1888, Page 6 (Supplement)

DECEIVING THE SPIRITS.

A Chinaman seems to combine with fear of spirits a marvellous faith in their stupidity, as is witnessed by the expedients he adopts to circumvent and deceive them. He apparently attributes to them, among other things, a curious incapacity for recognising their claims upon their own people if only they i»g he got to enter upon their spiritual existence on the premises of others. In such a case the penalty of any neglect will most probably be visited on these latter unfortunate persons. Ir is they who had better provide the funeral and pay the expense of it, lest the spirit, starved and piqued, should return to the place whence he had set out to wreak , his vengeance. An incident that occurred in the experience of a Shanghai missionary somewhat amusingly illustrates a bold attempt to remove altogether the risk that men ordinarily provide against by their ancestor worship :—" The missionary was sitting one cold winter evening at his study table. A servant came in and informed his master that a dead man had been found in the garden. The missionary went out to look into the matter. Sure enough, under the wall of the garden lay a human body, loosely covered over with straw. An economical family had evidently brought the dying man and laid him there that they might save themselves the expenses of the funeral by throwing them on the foreign missionary, and the ruling passion of thrift had further dictated the substitution of a covering of straw for his personal clothing. The missionary felt the body all over and found it already cold ; but, ou tbe chance of their being life left, he had it carried indoors, where he poured do.vnits throat a dose of patent medicine in which he had great faith, at the same time ordering more straw to be thrown upon it. He then returned to his study. Rome time later he thought he would go and see how his corpse-patent was getting ou. On this second examination he fancied he detected a faint sign of life in the region of tho heart. More of the patent medicine was given and more straw. To make a long story short, the dead man came to life again aud stood up in all the naked dignity of his manhood. Well, tho missionary, who was a particularly tall and large man, rigged out the little Chinaman as best he could in clothes from his own wardrobe, and, as soon as he was well enough, sent him back to his loving wife and filial sons. As he approached the house some of the latter saw and recognised him, notwithstanding the strangeness of his garb, and, being sincere believers in tbe doctrine of transmigration, rushed to their mother, crying aloud that their father had come back again to earth, and that this time he had been born a foreigner.