--- title: Names of Incense Used., part 1 — In Ghostly Japan · full text with trees · page 2 description: Names of Incense Used., part 1, «In Ghostly Japan» by Lafcadio Hearn: the whole chapter, every sentence with its dependency tree and pragmatics. It begins: I. “Tasogare” (“Who-Is-there?” --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg8128/3/page/2/) [home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [In Ghostly Japan](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg8128/) / Names of Incense Used., part 1 # Names of Incense Used., part 1 · page 2 [1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg8128/3/) **2** \[6\] Among the curious Tōkyō inventions of 1898 was a new variety of cigarettes called \_Hangon-sō\_, or “Herb of Hangon,”—a name suggesting that their smoke operated like the spirit-summoning incense.[68](../../68/ "tree and pragmatics") As a matter of fact, the chemical action of the tobacco-smoke would define, upon a paper fitted into the mouth-piece of each cigarette, the photographic image of a dancing-girl.[69](../../69/ "tree and pragmatics") Although the power of making visible the forms of the dead has been claimed for one sort of incense only, the burning of any kind of incense is supposed to summon viewless spirits in multitude.[70](../../70/ "tree and pragmatics") These come to devour the smoke.[71](../../71/ "tree and pragmatics") They are called \_Jiki-kō-ki\_, or “incense-eating goblins;” and they belong to the fourteenth of the thirty-six classes of Gaki (\_prêtas\_) recognized by Japanese Buddhism.[72](../../72/ "tree and pragmatics") They are the ghosts of men who anciently, for the sake of gain, made or sold bad incense; and by the evil karma of that action they now find themselves in the state of hunger-suffering spirits, and compelled to seek their only food in the smoke of incense.[73](../../73/ "tree and pragmatics") A Story of Divination[74](../../74/ "tree and pragmatics") I once knew a fortune-teller who really believed in the science that he professed.[75](../../75/ "tree and pragmatics") He had learned, as a student of the old Chinese philosophy, to believe in divination long before he thought of practising it.[76](../../76/ "tree and pragmatics") During his youth he had been in the service of a wealthy daimyō, but subsequently, like thousands of other samurai, found himself reduced to desperate straits by the social and political changes of Meiji.[77](../../77/ "tree and pragmatics") It was then that he became a fortune-teller,—an itinerant \_uranaiya\_,—travelling on foot from town to town, and returning to his home rarely more than once a year with the proceeds of his journey.[78](../../78/ "tree and pragmatics") As a fortune-teller he was tolerably successful,—chiefly, I think, because of his perfect sincerity, and because of a peculiar gentle manner that invited confidence.[79](../../79/ "tree and pragmatics") His system was the old scholarly one: he used the book known to English readers as the \_Yî-King\_,—also a set of ebony blocks which could be so arranged as to form any of the Chinese hexagrams;—and he always began his divination with an earnest prayer to the gods.[80](../../80/ "tree and pragmatics") The system itself he held to be infallible in the hands of a master.[81](../../81/ "tree and pragmatics") He confessed that he had made some erroneous predictions; but he said that these mistakes had been entirely due to his own miscomprehension of certain texts or diagrams.[82](../../82/ "tree and pragmatics") To do him justice I must mention that in my own case—(he told my fortune four times),—his predictions were fulfilled in such wise that I became afraid of them.[83](../../83/ "tree and pragmatics") You may disbelieve in fortune-telling,—intellectually scorn it; but something of inherited superstitious tendency lurks within most of us; and a few strange experiences can so appeal to that inheritance as to induce the most unreasoning hope or fear of the good or bad luck promised you by some diviner.[84](../../84/ "tree and pragmatics") Really to see our future would be a misery.[85](../../85/ "tree and pragmatics") Imagine the result of knowing that there must happen to you, within the next two months, some terrible misfortune which you cannot possibly provide against\![86](../../86/ "tree and pragmatics") He was already an old man when I first saw him in Izumo,—certainly more than sixty years of age, but looking very much younger.[87](../../87/ "tree and pragmatics") Afterwards I met him in Ōsaka, in Kyōto, and in Kobé.[88](../../88/ "tree and pragmatics") More than once I tried to persuade him to pass the colder months of the winter-season under my roof,—for he possessed an extraordinary knowledge of traditions, and could have been of inestimable service to me in a literary way.[89](../../89/ "tree and pragmatics") But partly because the habit of wandering had become with him a second nature, and partly because of a love of independence as savage as a gipsy’s, I was never able to keep him with me for more than two days at a time.[90](../../90/ "tree and pragmatics") Every year he used to come to Tōkyō,—usually in the latter part of autumn.[91](../../91/ "tree and pragmatics") Then, for several weeks, he would flit about the city, from district to district, and vanish again.[92](../../92/ "tree and pragmatics") But during these fugitive trips he never failed to visit me; bringing welcome news of Izumo people and places,—bringing also some queer little present, generally of a religious kind, from some famous place of pilgrimage.[93](../../93/ "tree and pragmatics") On these occasions I could get a few hours’ chat with him.[94](../../94/ "tree and pragmatics") Sometimes the talk was of strange things seen or heard during his recent journey; sometimes it turned upon old legends or beliefs; sometimes it was about fortune-telling.[95](../../95/ "tree and pragmatics") The last time we met he told me of an exact Chinese science of divination which he regretted never having been able to learn.[96](../../96/ "tree and pragmatics") “Any one learned in that science,” he said, “would be able, for example, not only to tell you the exact time at which any post or beam of this house will yield to decay, but even to tell you the direction of the breaking, and all its results.[97](../../97/ "tree and pragmatics") I can best explain what I mean by relating a story.[98](../../98/ "tree and pragmatics") “The story is about the famous Chinese fortune-teller whom we call in Japan Shōko Setsu, and it is written in the book \_Baikwa-Shin-Eki\_, which is a book of divination.[99](../../99/ "tree and pragmatics") While still a very young man, Shōko Setsu obtained a high position by reason of his learning and virtue; but he resigned it and went into solitude that he might give his whole time to study.[100](../../100/ "tree and pragmatics") For years thereafter he lived alone in a hut among the mountains; studying without a fire in winter, and without a fan in summer; writing his thoughts upon the wall of his room—for lack of paper;—and using only a tile for his pillow.[101](../../101/ "tree and pragmatics") “One day, in the period of greatest summer heat, he found himself overcome by drowsiness; and he lay down to rest, with his tile under his head.[102](../../102/ "tree and pragmatics") Scarcely had he fallen asleep when a rat ran across his face and woke him with a start.[103](../../103/ "tree and pragmatics") Feeling angry, he seized his tile and flung it at the rat; but the rat escaped unhurt, and the tile was broken.[104](../../104/ "tree and pragmatics") Shōko Setsu looked sorrowfully at the fragments of his pillow, and reproached himself for his hastiness.[105](../../105/ "tree and pragmatics") Then suddenly he perceived, upon the freshly exposed clay of the broken tile, some Chinese characters—between the upper and lower surfaces.[106](../../106/ "tree and pragmatics") Thinking this very strange, he picked up the pieces, and carefully examined them.[107](../../107/ "tree and pragmatics") He found that along the line of fracture seventeen characters had been written within the clay before the tile had been baked; and the characters read thus: ‘\_In the Year of the Hare, in the fourth month, on the seventeenth day, at the Hour of the Serpent, this tile, after serving as a pillow, will be thrown at a rat and broken.[108](../../108/ "tree and pragmatics") \_’ Now the prediction had really been fulfilled at the Hour of the Serpent on the seventeenth day of the fourth month of the Year of the Hare.[109](../../109/ "tree and pragmatics") Greatly astonished, Shōko Setsu once again looked at the fragments, and discovered the seal and the name of the maker.[110](../../110/ "tree and pragmatics") At once he left his hut, and, taking with him the pieces of the tile, hurried to the neighboring town in search of the tilemaker.[111](../../111/ "tree and pragmatics") He found the tilemaker in the course of the day, showed him the broken tile, and asked him about its history.[112](../../112/ "tree and pragmatics") “After having carefully examined the shards, the tilemaker said: —‘This tile was made in my house; but the characters in the clay were written by an old man—a fortune-teller,—who asked permission to write upon the tile before it was baked.’[113](../../113/ "tree and pragmatics") ‘Do you know where he lives?’ asked Shōko Setsu.[114](../../114/ "tree and pragmatics") ‘He used to live,’ the tilemaker answered, ‘not very far from here; and I can show you the way to the house.[115](../../115/ "tree and pragmatics") But I do not know his name.’[116](../../116/ "tree and pragmatics") [1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg8128/3/) **2** - ← previous: [page 1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg8128/3/) - next →: [Names of Incense Used., part 2](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg8128/4/) - ↑ back to [In Ghostly Japan](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg8128/)