Chinese Life in the Tibetan Foothills/Book 4/Ghosts
Ghosts.
Anathematizing the ghost, chou hsiao shên tzŭ (咒小神子), is done by such persons as the travelling fortune teller or the itinerant Taoist priest called a 遊方道士. He may go to a house on the excuse that he desires to tell a boy's fortune, for which purpose the horoscope is necessary. He mentally carries away the particulars of the horoscope. The bark is then peeled from a growing tree, and the horoscope pasted on the bared part, and anathematized by him for forty-nine days, after which time the piece of the tree with the horoscope is gouged out and taken home, and a small idol made of it, which is also anathematized, till such time as the image speaks ; at this juncture it is believed that the child dies. This little idol is further worshipped and taught to do as it is bid. It may even enter houses and steal for its master. Or it may be let loose in an enemy's house for revenge, intimidation or robbery. This last is practised by the following people:
Nuns (尼姑), ni ku, Tao ku (道姑); hua ku (花姑), embroidery women, who very seldom have husbands and are sometimes men in disguise; toothache witch doctors (牙婆), ya p‘o, who pretend to extract the worm from a diseased tooth by way of the eye; wen p‘o (穩婆) and ch‘ü shêng (取生) p‘o, midwives; or 藥媽媽, medicine mothers; hsiang (相) p‘o, physiognomists; fortune tellers, suan ming (算命) p‘o; and go-betweens in marriages, mei (媒) p‘o.
The above classes, on entering a house, are sure to make trouble. If they are meanly or harshly treated, they may let loose a ghost in the house, which will manifest itself in the following ways: short hair will be found in the rice-steamer, or filth of various kinds will find its way into the rice; reeds become transformed into darts and fly at people; the rope on which tobacco leaves are dried becomes a snake to bite the family; twigs become fire-darts to set the house on fire; a paper image steals the family property; tiles are pulled from the roof of the house in the night, or brickbats are thrown into the house in the night; the house is set on fire at any time, but specially in the night, or the shell of the bamboo sprout becomes a living being to frighten people; or they annoy by making the rooster crow at bedtime and the dogs bark all the night through.
Sometimes large sums of money are paid to have a ghost taken out of the house, but twenty or thirty taels is quite a common price. If the person who let loose the ghost is invited to remove it, he will demand much more than another, but another can do it. When he does find the wooden idol it is burned and it is popularly believed that the person who let the ghost go will suffer, because the spirit will go and harass him. Most Chinese have a great dread of certain objects and houses which are supposed to be haunted, and it is with the greatest difficulty that they can cut clear of this superstition; it should always be borne in mind that such things are very real to them, however silly they may appear to us.