incense in his hand, and preceded by banners and an idol in a shrine. Arrived at the temple the noise was deafening. Drums and gongs clashed, innumerable crackers spluttered, and the air was heavy with the smoke of incense. My father knelt before the grim idol. The priest shook together a lot of bamboo slips, from which my father took one, and the priest handed to him the corresponding response of the idol. Anxiously he stepped outside and read. Would it be favorable? Would the angry gods regard his prayer at last? He read the printed slip, and a look of intense disappointment passed over his face, for he read thus:
From sickness no release;
In lawsuits no success;
Your children hard to rear;
From false charges no redress;
The lost will not be found,
Nor flocks nor herds increase;
From marriage no good luck,
And from labor no release.
Such was the result of many prayers and much fasting. Truly the gods keep their wrath for ever.
