CHINESE FOLKLORE AND SOME WESTERN ANALOGIES. 579 



over, I will discuss it particularlj^ with the deities of Hades. Look 

 not at me.' Havino- thus spoken, she went back inside the palace, and 

 as she tarried there very long- he could not wait. So having taken and 

 broken off one of the end teeth of the multitudinous and close-toothed 

 comb stuck in the august left bunch of his hair, he lit one light and 

 went in and looked. Maggots were swarming and she was rotting, 

 and in her head dwelt the Great Thunder, and in her breast dwelt the 

 Fire Thunder, and in her belly dwelt the Black Thunder, and in her 

 private parts dwelt the Cleaving Thunder, and in her left hand dwelt 

 the Young Thunder, and in her right hand dwelt the Earth Thunder, 

 and in her left foot dwelt the Rumbling Thunder, and in her right foot 

 dwelt the Couchant Thunder. Altogether eight thunder deities had 

 been l)orn and dwelt there. Hereupon his Augustness Izanagi, over- 

 awed at the sight, fled l)ack. Whereupon his younger sister said: ' Thou 

 ha.st put me to shame,' and at once sent the Ugly Female of Hades to 

 pursue him. So his Augustness Izanagi took his black august head- 

 dress and cast it down, and it instantl}" turned into grapes. While she 

 picked them up and ate them he fled on. But as she still pursued him, 

 he took and broke the multitudinous and close-toothed comb in the right 

 bunch of his hair and cast it down, and it instantly turned into bam- 

 boo sprouts. While she pulled them up and ate them, he fled on. 

 Agahi, later his younger sister sent the eight thunder deities with a 

 thousand and Ave hundred warriors of Hades to pursue him. So he, 

 drawing the ten-grasp saber that was augustly girded on him, fled for- 

 ward, l)randishing it in his l)ack hand [i. e., behind him], and as they 

 still pursued he took, on reaching the base of the Even Pass of Hades, 

 three peaches that were growing at its base, and waited and smote his 

 pursuers therewith, so that they all fled back. . . • Last of all his 

 younger sister, her Augustness Izanami, came out herself in pursuit. 

 So he' drew a thousand-draft rock, and with it blocked up the Even 

 Pass of Hades, and placed the rock in the middle; and they stood oppo- 

 site to one another and exchanged leave-takings, and her Augustness 

 Izanami said: 'My lovely elder brother, thine Augustness! If thou 

 do like this, I will one day strangle to death a thousand of the folks of 

 thy land.^ Then his Augustness Izanagi replied: ' My lovely younger 

 sister, thine Augustness! If thou do this, I will in one day set up a 

 thousand and five hundred parturition houses. In this manner each 

 day a thousand people would surely die, and each day a thousand and 

 five hundred people would surely be born.' So^her Augustness Iza- 

 nami is called the Great Deity of Hades . . ."etc' 



Izanagi, though now forever deprived of his helpmeet, manages 

 very creditably by himself to continue the business of creatmg clivmi- 

 ties, who exude from his person while he washes off the pollution of 

 hades, and from whom in time are descended the human mhabitimts 



1 "The Kojiki," translated by B. H. Chamberlain, in Transactions of the Asiatic 

 Society of Japan, Vol. X. Supplement. 



