Note 1 — V.—CHARMS, SPELLS, AMULETS AND DIVINATIONS.

There are in China a large number of generally believed Superstitions which it is difficult to class under any of the foregoing heads. The mysterious properties ascribed to the hare are peculiarly interesting. A prejudice against eating its flesh is coeval with Chinese history. In the Erh-ya1 we find it stated that the people of Yo-yang “considered the hare to be a telluric genius so that nobody dared to hunt it,” and throughout China it has always been looked upon (especially the red variety) as a divine animal.2 Albino hares are regarded as omens of good, and their appearance a mark of heavenly approval. In Dr. Eitel’s Handbook of Chinese Buddhism, Art. Sakchi, we read, that an unselfish hare who threw itself into the fire, to offer its flesh as food for others, was transferred by Indra to the centre of the Moon.3 The superstition concerning hares is common to China and India. Nor, though it does not take precisely the same form, is a belief in the portentous attributes of this animal wanting at home. For a hare to cross a man’s path early in the morning is an ill omen throughout Europe. And a Highlander of the 42nd Regiment, in his printed memoirs, notices the same harbinger of evil as having crossed his own path on a day of personal disaster in Spain.4 It is noteworthy that the Goddess Freya is represented as attended by hares, who act as train and light-bearers. The hare moreover is reputed to be the commonest disguise of a witch in all the Northern Countries of Europe.5