26. The souls who live in the trees or the rocks, and the Kuyoh-Hohs for them.

Plants contribute to animals very much. Though plant-bodies consist of various kinds of amoebas, souls in higher rank than amoeba-souls sometimes live in the bodies. We call them 'plant-souls'.

 If you cut down a divine tree (the tree where some god or some other powerful spirit lives), you will be possessed with the tree-souls, so that you will become inactive in your behavior, or the joints of your limbs will be paralyzed little by little. You have to study with care if you are afflicted with an indefinable illness. A plant-soul may live in any kind of tree. For instances, if you even cut down a bamboo thicket without any previous notice, you will be haunted by it, and have no end of trouble. However, you can escape from the trouble with Kuyoh-Hoh. And, there was also a conspicuous instance where a certain person was haunted and hurt by the soul who lived in the ginkgo tree a piece of which was used for the Ranma (a wooden board sculptured for airing, lighting, and decoration, and used in place of the wall between a ceiling and a lintel) when his house was built, and he became seriously ill, and also his family experienced a series of illness. In this case, also, they could escape from the disaster with this Kuyoh-Hoh. You have to look back upon your past as the trees, especially, such as pine trees, nettle trees, fig trees, persimmon trees, ginkgo trees, and chestnut trees among many kinds of trees often tend to hurt you. It is foolish of you to be financially unhappy due to the disasters of the trees. This is the reason a carpenter and a man who deals with lumber makes much money, but, suddenly may become hard up financially. You had better not have a Sakaki tree, a willow, a ginkgo tree, a white birch, and Shikibi tree within your grounds.

 A ginkgo tree is a dioecious tree, and therefore, when it grows up, it is likely to cause jealousy if a he-ginkgo tree and a she-ginkgo tree are not planted near each other. In an extreme case, a he-ginkgo tree will take women's lives, and on the other hand, a she-ginkgo tree will take men's lives. When there is a big ginkgo tree with nuts, many of the wives who live near it are apt to be widows. You must be careful when you plant this kind of tree because many people can be subject to trouble. The tree will influence upon residents within about 400 feet from it. If you have one big ginkgo tree near your houses, you will have to escape from the disaster beforehand with the Kuyoh-Hoh.

 Followings are the instances where some persons were haunted by a ginkgo tree-soul.

 A certain man did not want to marry, but he suddenly became impatient to marry after the Kuyoh. The family produced widows one generation after another. All the male persons there either died young or left home. Even such people can escape from these disasters with the Kuyoh for tree-souls.
Souls sometimes live in the rock and in the earth. I became aware that a certain soul who lived in a rock, which was in a madman's house, possessed him, and so I secretly took it away from the house. The madman who could not know this fact made a noise saying "Hey, where's our dwelling to live in? I heard from his family that the children there had often gotten feverish when they stepped on the rock.

 There was also an instance where a certain person died of fever and ague three days after he took away the rock which the villagers were afraid of, saying "The rock haunts anyone who touches it." Another person heard this, and said that was absolutely impossible, and he let his four fellows carry the rock away, but all of the four injured themselves. There sometimes also live various souls in the ground, and so you need to do Jichinsai (a religious ceremony: Chapt. 15) before you do public works and other works.

 We can say Konjins (gods) are the most representative souls of all the souls who live in the rocks and in the ground. And, in the grounds, Kohjins often live at the foot of the trees which persons do not step into and on. You must also be careful about this. If you are haunted by them, sometimes you will die of high fever, or be afflicted with various diseases from lack of calcium. This is the reason stonemasons and earthworkers are often haunted by the Kohjins (gods: Chapt. 17), or the Konjins (gods: Chapt. 27), so that they lose their fortunes, and have unlucky fates. However, they can escape from these disasters by sincerely apologizing to the souls for their faults and by using the Kuyoh-Hoh. The disasters like these descend to your posterity.

 You have to look back upon the fates of your ancestors.



<Contents>