In Ghostly Japan
In Ghostly Japan
Book Excerpt
ire"); together with
rules for pressing the ashes of a censer into various artistic
designs corresponding to season and occasion.... A special
chapter should certainly be given to the incense-bags (kusadama)
hung up in houses to drive away goblins,--and to the smaller
incense-bags formerly carried about the person as a protection
against evil spirits. Then a very large part of the work would
have to be devoted to the religious uses and legends of incense,
--a huge subject in itself. There would also have to be
considered the curious history of the old "incense-assemblies,"
whose elaborate ceremonial could be explained only by help of
numerous diagrams. One chapter at least would be required for the
subject of the ancient importation of incense-materials from
India, China, Annam, Siam, Cambodia, Ceylon, Sumatra, Java,
Borneo, and various islands of the Malay archipelago,--places all
named in rare books about incense. And a final chapter should
treat of the romantic literature of incense,--the poems, stories,
a
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