868 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1900. 



which watflies over the wealth concealed from mortals. Modem 

 superstition has further ori}i:inated the idea of four dragon kings, 

 each bearing rule over one of the four seas which form the borders 

 of the habitable earth. The huang-lung or yellow dragon is the 

 most honored of the tribe; and this it was, which, rising from the 

 waters of Lo, presented to the eyes of Fuhsi the elements of writing 

 (see No. 36). The dragon, as chief among the beings divinely con- 

 stituted, is peculiarly symbolical of all that pertains to the Son of 

 Heaven — the Emperor, whose throne is termed Iniifj-irei, the dragon 

 seat, and whose face is described as huuj-yeii, the dragon counte- 

 nance (^■'ee Mayer's Chinese Readers' Manual No. 451 ). At his death 

 the Emperor is believed to be liorne by dragons to the regions of the 

 blessed. The dragon thus intimately associated with the Emperor 

 is always depicted with five talons on each claw, and it is he alone, 

 properly speaking, who can use such a device upon his property; 

 the dragon borne by the princes of the blood has but four talons on 

 each claw. The distinction, however, is not at present rigidly 

 maintained, and the five-clawed dragon is met with embroidered 

 on officers' uniforms. 



"In Chinese Buddhism," says Dr. Anderson, in his Catalogue of Japan- 

 ese and Chinese Paintings in the British Museum, "the dragon plays 

 an important part, either as a force auxiliary to the law, or as a 

 malevolent creature to be converted or quelled. Its usual charac- 

 ter, however, is that of a guardian of the faith under the direction 

 of Buddhas, Bodhisattvas, or Arhats. As a dragon king it officiates 

 at the baptism of S'akyamuni, or bewails his entrance into Nirvtlna; 

 as an attribute of saintly or divine personages it appears at the feet 

 of the Arhat Panthaka, emerging from the sea to salute the goddess 

 Kuanyin, or as an attendant upon or alternative form of Sarasvati, 

 the Japanese Benten; as an enemy to mankind it meets its Perseus 

 and St. George in the Chinese monarch Kao Tsu ( of the Han dynasty) 

 and the Shmto God, Susano no Mikoto. * * * As to the origin 

 of the relation of the cobra to Indian Buddhism, there appears to be 

 little doubt that the Cobra kings represented a once hostile Scythic 

 race of serpent-worshipers which first invaded India in the seventh 

 century B. C, and that a subsequent alliance with portions of the 

 foreign tribes gave rise to the stories of converted Nagas and o' 

 Nagas who defended the faith. When the religion made its way into 

 China, where the hooded snake was unknown, the emblems shown 

 in the Indian pictures and graven images lost their force of sugges- 

 tion, and hence became replaced by a mythical but more familiar 

 emblem of power. The multiplication of the cobra head seen in the 

 AmravAti topes becomes lost in Chinese Buddhism, but perhaps may 

 be traced in the seven-headed dragons and serpents of Japanese 

 legend. The high position occupied by the dragon in Chinese imagi- 

 nation may perhaps be a relic of ancient serpent worship in that 

 country. Illustrations of the identity of the dragon and serpent in 

 Japanese art and the portrayal of creatures in transitional forms 

 between the two are suggestive of such an origin." 



Ff^ruj, the name of the male, and Intang, of the female, of a fabulous bird 

 of wondrous form and mystic nature, the second among the four 

 supernatural creatures. The compound of the two, feng-huang, is the 

 generic designation usually employed for the bird, and is frequently 



