NO. 4 RFJ.IGTON TN SZKCIl UAN PROVINCE — GRATTAM 35 



About 80 li up the J\Iiu River froui Kiating" is Shiang Pih Si, or 

 Elephant's Nose Monastery, where there is an unfinished pagoda. 

 When the pagoda was being constructed, two noted scholars suddenly 

 died, and it was concluded that the pagoda was injuring instead of 

 helping the fciigsliiti. Work was discontinued, and the pagoda has 

 never been finished. If it had been in the right spot, it would have 

 imi)roved the fciigsliui, and a result would have been that more 

 scholars would be born and developed, and that scholarship in the 

 district would be generally improved. 



Before a house is built or a grave is dug, it is necessary to have 

 a specialist tell whether or not the fcngshui is good. If the fcngshui 

 of the ancestral grave is good, the family will increase and prosper. 

 If it is bad, the family will decline. The same can be said of the house 

 in which the family lives. Merchants are more apt to enjoy financial 

 prosperity if the fengsliiii of the store is good. 



In the summer of 1923 I took a trip to Tatsienlu, which is often 

 called the gateway of Tibet. On the way I saw where the robbers had 

 attacked the home of a wealthy farmer. The father and another rela- 

 tive had been killed, the house had been badly smashed up, and a 

 servant had been wounded, although the robbers had been driven ofif 

 and no money stolen. The farmer was asked why he did not move 

 into a city where the militia could protect him. The reply was that 

 the fcngshui of that place was good, so that anybody living on that 

 farm would get rich. 



What is this mysterious power or force called fcngshui? Feng 

 means wind, and sJiui means water. The expression stands for mys- 

 terious forces that operate for good or evil on families, cities, and 

 districts. It is apt to be localized in strange or peculiar trees and 

 stones. 



Let us note that the man who in English is generally called a 

 geomancer is in Szechuan called a yinyang sliicnscn or a fcngshui 

 shiensen, the two terms being interchangeable. The former term is 

 commonly heard, and means a professor of yinyang. The latter term 

 means a professor of fcngshui. This suggests a close and vital rela- 

 tion between yinyang and that strange, mysterious force known as 

 fcngshui. 



So far the writer has drawn entirely from his own experience. A 

 quotation from Mr. Mortimore and another from the Encyclopaedia 

 Sinica will further elucidate the meaning of fcngshui and its con- 

 nection with the yinyang. 



It is now high time that tlie location of the grave be determined. In the case 

 of the more wealthy, such an important matter will probably have been attended 



