Human Animals

When questioned as to how he managed to turn into a wolf, he said that a neighbour, called Pierre la Tilhaire, had introduced him in the forest to the Lord thereof, who had given wolf-skins to both, as well as a salve for anointing themselves. When asked where he kept the skins and the pot of ointment he replied that they were in the hands of the Lord of the Forest, from whom he could obtain them whenever he wished.

He declared that he had changed into a wolf and gone coursing four times with his companion Pierre la Tilhaire, but they had killed no one. The best time for the hunt was an hour or two a day when the moon was on the wane, but he also went out at night on some occasions.

When asked whether his father knew of these proceedings, he replied in the affirmative, and declared that his father had rubbed him three times with the ointment and helped him into the wolf's skin.

The inquiry into Jean Grenier's case was a very lengthy one and was adjourned several times, but eventually he was sentenced to imprisonment for life at Bordeaux on September 6th, 1603, his youth and want of mental development being pleaded in extenuation of the crimes of infanticide he had undoubtedly committed. The president of the Court declared that lycanthropy was a form of hallucination and was not in itself a punishable crime. Jean's father was acquitted of complicity, and allowed to leave the court without a stain on his character, and Jean was sent to a monastery.

In 1610, after Jean had been at the Monastery of the Cordeliers in Bordeaux for seven years, De Lancre, who relates his story, went to see him. He was then about twenty years of age and of diminutive stature. His black eyes were haggard and deep-set, and he refused to look anyone straight in the face. His teeth were long, sharp, and protruding, his nails were also long and black, and his mind was a mere blank.

He told De Lancre, not without pride, that he had been a wer-wolf, but that he had given up the practice. When he first arrived at the monastery he had preferred to go on all fours, eating such food as he found on the ground. He confessed that he still craved for raw human flesh, especially the flesh of little girls, and he hoped it would not be long before he had another opportunity of tasting it. He had been visited twice during his confinement by the Lord of the Forest, as he called the mysterious person who had given him the wolf-skin, but that both times he had made the sign of the cross and his visitor had departed in haste.

In other respects his tale was identical with the experiences he had related before the court.

De Lancre thought that the name Grenier or Garnier was a fatal name in connection with wer-wolves.

Evidence was given as to the times, places, and number of murders, and many of the facts were proved incontestably.

Jean's evidence as to the part his father had played in his misdeeds was hazy. He said that on one occasion his father had accompanied him, also wearing a wolf-skin, and that together they had killed a young girl dressed in white, and that they had devoured her flesh, the month being May of 1601.

He also added curious details regarding the Lord of the Forest, who had forbidden him to bite the thumbnail of his left hand, which was thicker and longer than the others, and that if he lost sight of it while in the form of a wolf he would quickly recover his human shape.

When confronted with his father Jean altered some of the details of his story, and it was agreed that long imprisonment and extended cross-examination had worn out his already feeble intellect.

It is worth pointing out that in the cases of Rollet, the tailor of Châlons, and the Gandillon family, the prisoners were accused of murder and cannibalism, but not of association with wolves, and that in the trial of Garnier evidence was given as to the depredations of the wolf rather than of the accused. There was doubtless a difficulty in proving the identity of the perpetrator of the murders.

A new era in these trials begins with that of Jean Grenier, for from that time onward medical men became more enlightened, and the belief spread that lycanthropy was a mental malady, with cannibalistic tendencies which had developed under diseased conditions.

In his "Dæmonologie," 1597, a reply to Reginald Scott's "Discovery of Witchcraft," James I of England declared that wer-wolves were victims of a delusion induced by a state of melancholia, and about the same period wolves became practically extinct in England, and only harmless creatures such as the cat, hare, and weasel were left for the sorcerer to change into with any possibility of a safe and natural disguise.

For many years afterwards the confessions of witches, who were executed for their crimes, bore striking resemblance to those made by wer-wolves, and many strange facts which were published at these trials have never been, and may never be, satisfactorily explained on a purely materialistic basis.

CHAPTER IX

THE WER-WOLF IN MYTH AND LEGEND

An extraordinary story about a wer-wolf comes from Ansbach in 1685:

The supposed incarnation of a dead burgomaster of that town was said to be ravishing the neighbouring country in the form of a wolf, devouring cattle as well as women and children. At last the ferocious beast was caught and slaughtered, and its carcass was encased in a suit of flesh-coloured cere-cloth, while its head and face were adorned with a chestnut-coloured wig and long white beard, after the animal's snout had been cut off and a mask resembling the dead burgomaster's features had been substituted. This effigy was hanged, its skin stuffed and put in a museum, where it was pointed out as a proof of the actual existence of wer-wolves. This incident appears to prove that the belief in wer-wolves had been shaken at that date, but it has never been finally eradicated, and it is only natural that a theme which has had such world-wide credence should occur again and again in mythology and literature. It is dealt with in the story of the festival of the god Zeus, which was held every nine years on the Wolf mountain in Arcadia. During the banquet a man, having tasted of a flowing bowl in which human and animal flesh were mixed, was turned into a wolf and remained a wolf nine years. If he had abstained from eating human flesh in the interval he became once more a man. The tradition appears to have originated in the existence of a society of cannibal wolf-worshippers, a member of which perhaps represented the sacred animal for nine years in succession.

This compares in some degree with the practices of the Human Leopard Society, which is of comparatively recent origin.

Lycaon, the King of Arcadia and father of Callisto, was turned into a wolf because he offered human sacrifices to Jupiter, or, in the version given by Ovid, because he tried to murder Jupiter, who was his guest. Others believe that Lycaon is the Constellation of the Wolf, and that in him were the united qualities of wolf, king, and constellation.

Pliny points out that the origin of transformation into wolves was due to Evanthes, a Greek author of good repute, who tells the story of Antheus, the Arcadian, a member of whose family is chosen by lot and then taken to a certain lake in the district, across which he swims and is changed into a wolf for a space of nine years. So, too, Demæntus, during a sacrifice of human victims, tasted the entrails of a boy who had been slaughtered, upon which he turned into a wolf, but ten years later he was victorious in the pugilistic contests at the Olympic games.

The following quaint story is taken from Petronius, being told by one Niceros, at a banquet given by Trimalchio.

"It happened that my master was gone to Capua to dispose of some second-hand goods. I took the opportunity and persuaded our guest to walk with me to our fifth milestone. He was a valiant soldier, and a sort of a grim water-drinking Pluto. About cock-crow, when the moon was shining as bright as midday, we came amongst the monuments. My friend began addressing himself to the stars, but I was rather in a mood to sing or count them; and when I turned to look at him, lo! he had already stripped himself and laid his clothes near him. My heart was in my nostrils, and I stood like a dead man; but he made a mark round his clothes and on a sudden became a wolf. Do not think I jest, I would not lie for any man's estate. But to return to what I am saying. When he became a wolf he began howling and fled into the woods. At first I hardly knew where I was, and afterwards, when I went to take up his clothes, they were turned into stone. Who then was more like to die from fear than I? Yet I drew my sword, and cutting the air right and left came thus to my sweetheart's house. When I entered the courtyard I was like to breathe my last, perspiration poured from my neck, and my eyes were dim. My Melissa met me to ask where I had been so late, and said, 'Had you only come sooner you might have helped us, for a wolf came to the farm and worried our cattle; but he had not the best of the joke, for all he escaped, as our servant ran a lance through his neck.' When I heard this I could not doubt what had happened, and as the day dawned I ran home as fast as a robbed innkeeper. When I came to the spot where the clothes had been turned into stone I could find nothing except blood. But when I got home I found my friend, the soldier, in bed, bleeding at the neck like an ox, and a doctor dressing his wound. I then knew he was a turnskin; nor would I ever have broken bread with him again, no not if you had killed me."

The expression turnskin or turncoat is a translation of the Latin versipelles, a term used to describe a wer-wolf.

Another story in which the human being suffers from the wound inflicted on the wer-wolf concerns a fine lady of Saintonge, who used to wander at night in the forests in the shape of a wolf. One day she caught her paw in a trap set by the hunters. This put an end to her nocturnal wanderings, and afterwards she had to keep a glove on the hand that had been trapped, to conceal the mutilation of two of her fingers.

Eliphas Levi, the occultist, has endeavoured to explain this sympathetic condition between the man and his animal presentment.

"We must speak here of lycanthropy, or the nocturnal transformation of men into wolves, histories so well substantiated that sceptical science has had recourse to furious maniacs, and to masquerading as animals for explanations. But such hypotheses are puerile and explain nothing. Let us seek elsewhere the solution of the mystery, and establish—First, that no person has been killed by a wer-wolf except by suffocation, without effusion of blood and without wounds. Second, that wer-wolves, though tracked, hunted, and even maimed, have never been killed on the spot. Third, that persons suspected of these transformations have always been found at home, after the pursuit of the wer-wolf, more or less wounded, sometimes dying, but invariably in their natural form....

"We have spoken of the sidereal body, which is the mediator between the soul and the material organism. This body remains awake very often while the other is asleep, and by thought transports itself through all space which universal magnetism opens to it. It thus lengthens, without breaking, the sympathetic chain attaching it to the heart and brain, and that is why there is danger in waking up dreaming persons with a start, for the shock may sever the chain at a blow and cause instantaneous death. The form of our sidereal body is conformable to the habitual condition of our thoughts, and in the long run it is bound to modify the features of the material organism. Let us now be bold enough to assert that the wer-wolf is nothing more than the sidereal body of a man whose savage and sanguinary instincts are represented by the wolf, who, whilst his phantom is wandering abroad, sleeps painfully in his bed, and dreams that he is a veritable wolf. What renders the wer-wolf visible is the almost somnambulistic over-excitement caused by the fear of those who see it, or their disposition, more particularly among simple country-folk, to place themselves in direct communication with the astral light which is the common medium of dreams and visions. The blows inflicted on the wer-wolf really wound the sleeper by the odic and sympathetic conjestion of the astral light and by the correspondence of the immaterial with the material body...."[39]

This peculiarity of the wound dealt to the wer-wolf being reproduced in the human being is emphasised by an incident which occurred about 1588 in a tiny village situated in the mountains of Auvergne. A gentleman was gazing one evening from the windows of his castle when he saw a hunter he knew passing on his way to the chase. Calling to him, he begged that on his return he would report what luck he had had. The hunter after pursuing his way was attacked by a large wolf. He fired off his gun without hitting the animal. Then he struck at it with his hunting knife, severing one of the paws, which he picked up and put in his knapsack. The wounded wolf ran quickly into the forest. When the hunter reached the castle he told his friend of his strange fight with a wolf, and to emphasise his story opened his knapsack, in which to his horror and surprise he saw, not a wolf's paw as he had expected, but the hand of a woman which had a gold ring on one of the fingers.

The owner recognised the ring as belonging to his wife, and hastening into the kitchen to question her he found her with one arm hidden beneath the folds of a shawl. He drew it aside and saw she had lost her hand. Then she confessed that it was she who, in the form of a wolf, had attacked the hunter. She was arrested and burnt to death soon afterwards at Ryon.

In another variation of the wer-wolf story, the human being retains a material object acquired by his animal replica and is freed thereby from his obsession.

A man, who from his childhood had been a wer-wolf, when returning one night with his wife from a merrymaking, observed that the hour was at hand when the transformation usually took place. Giving the reins to his wife, he got out of the cart and said, "If anyone comes to thee, strike at it with thy apron." Then he went away and a few minutes later the poor woman was attacked by a wolf. Remembering what her husband had told her, she struck at it with her apron, and the animal tore out a piece and ran off. Presently the man himself returned holding in his mouth the torn fragment of the apron. Then his wife cried out in terror, "Good Lord, man! Why, thou art a wer-wolf!" "Thank thee, mother!" replied he, "but now I am free!" and after this incident he kept human form until the day of his death.[40]

In "William of Palermo," the old romance known as "William and the Wer-Wolf," translated from the French at the command of Sir Humphrey de Bohun about A.D. 1350,[41] the wer-wolf appears as a sort of a guardian angel. The brother of the King Apulia, envious of the heir-apparent, bribes two women to murder the king's son. While the boy William is at play a wer-wolf runs off with him, swims across the Straits of Messina, and carries him into a forest near Rome, where it takes care of him and provides him with food. The wer-wolf in reality is Alphonso, heir to the Spanish throne, who has been transformed by his stepmother Queen Braunde, who desires her own son Braundinis to wear the crown of Spain.

While the wer-wolf seeks provender, a cowherd finds William and takes him to his hut, where the Emperor meets him when out hunting. Placing him behind him on his horse he takes him to Rome and gives him in charge of his daughter Melior, to be her page.

William and Melior fall in love with one another, and to avoid the Emperor's wrath devise an escape, disguised in the skins of white bears, helped by Melior's friend Alexandrine. When Melior asks whether she makes a bold bear, Alexandrine answers, "Yes, Madame, you are a grisly ghost enough, and look ferocious." Together the lovers wander out of the garden on all fours and making their way to the forest hide in a den. Meanwhile the wer-wolf has followed William's fortunes, and finding the wanderers in need, he sets on a harmless passer-by who carries provisions, and seizing bread and boiled beef out of his bag, lays it before the lovers, then runs off and, attacking another traveller, secures two flagons of wine.

Being pursued, the lovers escape to Palermo, led always by the wer-wolf, Alphonso, half-brother to Braundinis, who was destined by Melior's father to become his son-in-law. William does battle with the proposed suitor and, still helped by the wer-wolf, whose symbol is painted on his shield, overcomes his rival, takes the King and Queen of Spain prisoner and refuses to let them go until Queen Braunde promises to transform the rightful heir from a wolf back into a human being. "Unless she disenchants you, she shall be burnt," he says forcibly. Braunde takes her stepson, the wolf, into a private chamber, draws forth a magic ring with a stone in it that is proof against all witchcraft and binds it with a red silk thread round the wolf's neck. Then she takes a book out of a casket and reads in it a long time till he turns into a man. The wer-wolf is delighted, but apologises to his stepmother for having no clothes on, and she commands him to choose who shall fetch his clothes. He answers that he will take his attire and the order of knighthood from the worthiest man alive, William of Palermo. William, being called, enters the chamber, where he sees a man who is an utter stranger and is only satisfied when he hears Alphonso's explanation, "I am the wer-wolf who saved you from many perils." William and Melior are married, all ends happily and William becomes Emperor of Rome.

The Bretons give the name of Bisclavaret to the wer-wolf, or wer-fox, which throws itself upon the hunter's horse and terrorises it. The same thing is called Garwal by the Normans. Bisclavaret is supposed to be a wizard, and if in olden times an unknown lady offered food to the hunters at the moment the animal appeared she was thought to be a witch.

Marie de France in her "Lay of the Bisclavaret" used the idea of a wer-wolf, and again in this case the animal has no savage instincts except against his enemies, a faithless wife and her perfidious lover.

A gallant knight of Brittany, a favourite with the king, weds a fair lady whom he loves tenderly. Only one cloud darkens the wife's horizon. Her husband leaves her invariably three days a week and she does not know where he goes. One day she has the temerity to ask him, and he warns her that the information may be dangerous, but when she pleads with him he says:

"Learn then that I become a wer-wolf during my absence. I go into the forest, hide in the thickets and seek my prey."

"But, my dear, tell me whether you take off your clothes," says the wife, "or whether you keep them on?"

"I am naked when the transformation occurs, Madame."

"And where do you leave your clothes?"

"I must not tell you, because if I were seen when I take them off I should remain a wer-wolf for the rest of my life. I can only recover human form at the moment I put them on again. After that you will not be surprised if I say no more." But she urges him to tell her, and finally he says that he hides his clothes under a bush near an old stone cross in the corner of a chapel, and there he puts them on when he wishes to resume his original shape.

Frightened by his awful story the wife decides to live with him no more and immediately sends for a young man who is in love with her, tells him the story and enjoins him to go and take away her husband's clothes. Thus she betrays her husband, the wer-wolf, who does not return and is given up for dead, and some time after she marries her false lover.

About a year later the king goes on a hunting expedition in the forest. There he comes across the wer-wolf, and the hounds immediately take up the scent and give chase the whole day long. Wounded by the hunters and wearied nigh unto death, the wolf seizes the bridle of the king's horse and licks his majesty's foot. The king, in great fear, calls his companions to look at the extraordinary wild beast that is capable of this humble action. He refuses to allow the wolf to be slaughtered and takes it back, in his train, to the castle. There the wolf lives in great comfort like a domestic pet and harms no one.

Presently a great function is held at the court and the wer-wolf's former wife comes there with her new husband. The moment the wolf sets eyes on him he springs at his throat, and would surely have killed him had not the king beaten him off with a whip. For the rest of the gentleman's visit the wolf is kept under strict discipline.

Some time afterwards, the king, accompanied by his faithful wolf, pays a visit to the lady, and the animal springs at her ferociously and bites off her nose. Then the courtiers say that the matter must be inquired into, for the wolf only turns savage when in the presence of this lady and her new husband. The king decides to have the couple arrested and the lady has to confess what happened, saying she thinks the wer-wolf must be her transformed husband. After hearing her story the king orders the wer-wolf's clothes to be placed where he can get them privately, and after waiting outside the room in which the metamorphosis is to take place, for some time, he enters and finds the former knight, his old friend whom he thought dead, lying quietly asleep. He restores all his honours and has his faithless wife chased out of the kingdom in company with her false lover. All their daughters are born without noses as a punishment for the wicked fraud practised on the wer-wolf.[42]

Olaus Magnus[43] declares that although the inhabitants of Prussia, Livonia, and Lithuania suffer considerably from the depredations of wolves as far as their cattle are concerned, their losses are not so serious in this quarter as those they suffer at the hands of wer-wolves.

On Christmas Eve multitudes of wer-wolves gather at a certain spot and band together to attack human beings and animals. They besiege isolated houses, break in the doors and devour every living thing. They burst into the beer-cellars and there empty the casks, thus proving their human tastes. A ruined castle near Courland appears to have been their favourite meeting-place, where thousands congregate in order to test their agility. If any of them fail to bound over the castle wall they are slain by the others, as they are considered in that case to be incompetent for the work in hand.

It is believed that a messenger in the person of a lame youth is sent round the neighbourhood to call these followers of the devil to a general conclave. Those who are reluctant to attend the meeting are beaten with iron scourges. When the gathering is assembled the human forms vanish and the whole multitude become wolves. The troops follow the leader, "firmly convinced in their imagination that they are transformed into wolves." The sorcery lasts for twelve days, and at the expiration of this period the human forms are resumed.

Referring further to these Courland wer-wolves, it is said of them that Satan holds them in his net in three ways. Firstly they execute certain depredations, such as mangling cattle, in their human shapes, but in such a state of hallucination that they believe themselves to be wolves and are regarded as such by others in a like predicament. Though not true wer-wolves they hunt in packs. Secondly they leave their bodies lying asleep and send forth their imagination in a dream that they believe they have injured the cattle, but that it is the devil who does what is suggested to them by their thoughts, and thirdly that the evil one induces real wolves to do the horrid deeds, but impresses the scene so vividly on the mind of the sleeper that he considers himself to be guilty of the act.

The following stories exemplify these conditions. The first is told of a man who when starting on a journey saw a wolf attacking one of his sheep. He fired and it fled wounded into the thicket. On his return he was told that he had fired at one of his tenants, called Mickel.

Mickel's wife, when questioned, said that her husband had been sowing rye and had asked her how he could get some meat for a feast. She said on no account was he to steal from the master's flock as it was well guarded by dogs. Mickel ignored her advice and had attacked the sheep. He came home limping badly and in a passion had fallen upon his own horse and had torn its throat. It seemed as though he were bewitched or in a trance.

In 1684 a curious incident occurred to a man who had gone hunting in a forest. At dusk a pack of wolves had rushed towards him, and as he levelled his gun with the intention of aiming at the leader a voice arose from their midst, saying, "Don't fire, Sir, for no good will come of it." Then the phantom pack rushed onwards and he saw it no more.

The third story is about a man-wolf who was accused of sorcery of the most flagrant kind. Finding a difficulty in getting evidence against the criminal, the judge sent a peasant to his cell who was charged with the unpleasant task of forcing a confession. The prisoner was told that he might avenge himself upon another peasant to whom he owed a grudge, by destroying his cow secretly, and if possible when in the shape of a wolf himself. After much persuasion the supposed wer-wolf undertook to carry out the suggested plan. The next morning the cow in question was found to be fearfully mangled, but the strange part of the story is this, that although witnesses were set to watch the man in his cell, they swore unanimously that he had never left it and had passed the whole of the night in deep sleep, only at one time making slight movements of his head, his hands and his feet.[44]

Just as the man who thinks he changes into a wolf suffers from lycanthropy, so the one who believes he changes into a dog is suffering from kynanthropy, and those who change into kine from boanthropy. Every part of the world chooses a special animal as being the most suitable for disguise, and naturally enough the animal is one which is common to the district. Thus we find the tiger chosen for India and Asia, the bear for Northern Europe, the lion, leopard, and hyæna for Africa, the jaguar for South America, and so forth.

Many superstitions surround the tiger. Besides being the abode of the soul of a dead man it may be the temporary or even the permanent form of a living human being. In India it is said that a certain root brings about the metamorphosis and that another root is used for the antidote. In Central Java powers of transformation are believed to be hereditary, no shame is attached to it, and the wer-tiger is looked upon as a friendly animal, and if his friends call upon him by name he behaves like a domestic pet and is believed to guard the fields. In the Malay Peninsula faith in the genuine wer-tiger persists, and it is thought there also that the soul of a dead wizard enters the animal's body. During the process of transformation the corpse is laid in the forest, and beside it a supply of rice and water is placed, sufficient for seven days, in which time transmigration, resulting from a compact made by the pawang's ancestors, is complete. A ceremony is also gone through by the son of a pawang who wishes to succeed his father in tiger's form.

A wer-tiger belief exists in India, and the Garrows think the mania is produced by a special drug which is laid on the forehead. First the wer-tiger pulls the earrings out of his ears and then wanders forth alone, shunning the company of his fellow-man. The disease lasts about fourteen days, and patients are said to have glaring red eyes, their hair dishevelled and bristled, and a peculiar convulsive manner of moving the head. When taken by fits of this kind they are believed to go forth in the night to ride on the backs of tigers.

Another form of the belief is the wizard in the shape of a tiger, and the Thana tradition is that mediums are possessed by a tiger spirit. The Binuas of Johore think that every pawang has an immortal tiger spirit.

The belief that lion form is assumed by wizards is found near the Luapula and on the Zambezi, where a certain drink is supposed to effect the transformation. Among the Tumbukas people smear themselves with white clay, which gives them a certain power of metempsychosis. Not only can men take lions' shape but lions can change into men.

CHAPTER X

LION- AND TIGER-MEN

The rooted idea in the savage mind that animals may be invested by human souls, and that men may at will transform themselves into animals, has been largely strengthened throughout the ages by the teachings of the "Medicine men" or wizards, who have no doubt found it profitable and conducive to their own acquisition of power to work on the superstitions and foster the weaknesses of the people to whom they minister.

Stories about lion- and tiger-men, hyæna-women, and other strange monsters gifted with human qualities are found in the Books of Travel in every part of the world.

The way the sorcerer sets to work on the imagination of primitive people has often been described. Firstly he declares that he is about to change himself into a tiger and tear the people to pieces, and he no sooner begins to roar than the frightened natives, acting under the spell of suggestion, take to their heels, but they dare not go beyond the reach of those terrible sounds. "Look," cry the fear-stricken women, who cannot really see what is going on, "his body is covered with spots like a tiger! Horrible! his nails are turning into claws."

All the time the sorcerer is hidden in his tent, carrying on a kind of magical performance which inspires the people with a dread of the unknown, so that they fall a prey to the imagination and almost lose their reason. When asked to explain this unholy dread, they declare that it arises from being unable to see and to kill the fearsome tiger-image which threatens them.

Africa is vastly rich in stories of wer-lions, wer-leopards, and wer-hyænas, and the language of Bornu has a word "bultungin," which means "I change myself into a hyæna." It is even said that in the village of Kabutiloa every native possesses the faculty of transformation.

The wizards of Abyssinia are said to be able to become hyænas at will, and in "The Life of Nathaniel Pearce"[45] the story is told of a man called Coffin who was asked by a servant for leave of absence. No sooner had he granted the request than one of the other servants called out, "Look, look, he has turned himself into a hyæna!" Coffin gazed in the direction in which the first servant had disappeared, and there he saw a large hyæna bounding across the open plain. The next morning the servant returned, and when asked about the matter asserted that such a transformation had actually taken place. Coffin brought himself to believe in these native stories, and quoted in evidence of their truth that he had often seen a certain kind of earring in the ears of hyænas shot, trapped and speared by himself or his friends, identical with those which were commonly worn by the native servants. A natural explanation has been sought in the suggestion that the sorcerers themselves adorned the hyænas with the gems in order to encourage a superstition which they found profitable for their own purposes, but no proof of any such thing has been discovered. Abyssinia is a hotbed of strange happenings of this character, some of which are quite beyond understanding.

The trade of blacksmith is hereditary there and is regarded with more or less suspicion, from the fact that blacksmiths are, with few exceptions, believed to be sorcerers and are opprobriously given the name of Bouda. They are said to have the power of turning themselves into various kinds of animals. "I remember," says Mansfield Parkyns in "Life in Abyssinia,"[46] "a story of some little girls, who, having been out in the forest to gather sticks, came running back breathless with fright; and on being asked what was the cause, they answered that a blacksmith of the neighbourhood had met them, and entering into conversation with him, they at length began to joke about whether, as had been asserted, he could turn himself into a hyæna. The man, they declared, made no reply, but taking some ashes, which he had with him tied up in the corner of his cloth, sprinkled them over his shoulders, and to their horror and alarm they began almost immediately to perceive that the metamorphosis was actually taking place, and that the blacksmith's skin was assuming the hair and colour of the animal in question. When the change was complete he grinned and laughed at them, and then retired into the neighbouring thickets. They stood rooted to the spot from sheer fright; but the moment the hideous creature withdrew, they made the best of their way home."

Parkyns tells another Bouda story[47] which is fully credited by the natives. In the neighbourhood of Adoua there was said to be a woman who had one human foot and in the place of the other the hoof of a donkey. Several persons assured Parkyns that they had seen this human monstrosity, and others firmly believed the following account of the affair:

The woman was said to have died, and was buried with ceremony in the churchyard. The following day a man came to one of the priests and offered him a sum of money for the body, pledging himself to strict secrecy. The bargain was concluded and the unscrupulous priest allowed the stranger, who was a blacksmith, to disinter and carry off the corpse. On the way to the market the blacksmith passed the house where the deceased lady's family lived, and he usually rode or drove a remarkably fine donkey which, strangely enough, on passing the house, or any of the old woman's children, brayed loudly and endeavoured to run towards them.

At first no notice was taken of this odd behaviour on the part of an ass, but at last one of the sons grew suspicious and exclaimed, "I am sure that ass is my mother!"

Accordingly Bouda, ass and all were seized and brought to the hut, much to the apparent satisfaction of the animal, which rubbed its nose against the young men and was even said to shed tears of joy on the occasion.

On being charged with the offence of sorcery the Bouda tried to make light of it and denied the accusation, but at last by dint of threats and promises he was induced to confess that he had turned the old woman into a donkey, she having been not really dead but in a trance, into which he had purposely thrown her. His power, he asserted, was sufficient to change the external appearance, but not to alter the mind of his victim. Hence it was that the old woman, or rather donkey, possessed human feelings, which she had displayed in her endeavours to enter her former habitation and in her recognition of her children. The Bouda, moreover, agreed to restore her human appearance, and began his exorcism. As he proceeded she by degrees assumed her natural form, and the change was almost complete, when one of the sons, blinded by his rage, forgot the promises of pardon which the Bouda had exacted, and drove his spear through his heart. The incantation not being entirely finished, one foot remained in the shape of the hoof of an ass and continued so until her death, which was not till many years afterwards.

Still another story belonging to the same class concerns two brothers who lived in Gojam. One of them having transformed himself into a horse, ass or cow, was sold in the market and driven out of town by his purchaser. Directly night had closed the eyes of his new master in sleep the Bouda took on human form again and walked quietly home. The brothers were known to sell cattle in the market so frequently that people became suspicious, because they did not know where their stock was kept, and they often had no beasts in their yard even the very day before the sales. Besides, it soon leaked out that every animal sold make its escape the same night and was never heard of again. Then a purchaser who had been twice taken in by the brothers, determined to discover how the fraud was carried out. One market day he bought a fine horse from one of the brothers and rode off upon it, but no sooner had he left the market town behind him than he dismounted and drove a knife through the animal's heart. Then he walked back to the market-place and meeting the vendor told him that he had killed the beautiful animal he had just bought in a fit of passion. The Bouda gave a start, but managed to conceal his grief till he entered his house, when he burst forth into lamentations and rubbed the skin off his forehead, as the custom is when a near relative dies. To his inquisitive neighbours he declared that his favourite brother had been robbed and murdered in the Galla country, whither he had travelled in order to purchase horses. It was said, however, that he afterwards sent no more animals to the market-place for sale.

According to Livingstone's account[48] the Makololo also believe that certain people can transform themselves into animals, and they call such persons "Pondoro." Livingstone came across a Pondoro in the Kebrasa hills, and heard that this gentleman was in the habit of assuming the shape of a lion which he retained for days and sometimes even for a month, during which time he wandered in the woods where his wife had built a den for him and took care that he was provided with food and drink. No one was allowed into the den except the Pondoro and his wife, and no strangers were permitted even to lay a gun against any of the trees in the neighbourhood of the den, or against any shanty owned by the Pondoro. The wer-lion used his gift to go hunting in the village. After a few days had passed his faithful spouse scented her returning husband and provided him with a certain kind of medicine or ointment by which it became possible for him to change into a man again. But she had to hurry over this duty, so that the lion might not catch sight of her and, falling upon her, devour even her.

After the Pondoro was once more human he returned to the village and asked the inhabitants to help him carry home his prey. One of the odd things about this wer-lion was that he always trembled if he smelt gunpowder, and he sometimes overacted his part. Livingstone asked the natives to make him show off while he was watching, offering a reward for the performance, but they refused, saying, "If we ask him to do so, he may change while we are asleep and kill us." It was owing to his distaste for the smell of gunpowder that it was made punishable to rest muskets against his den.

In the same district the belief is also current that the souls of departed chiefs enter into lions "and render them sacred." Thus when a hungry lion prowled round the camp where a freshly killed buffalo lay, a native servant harangued him loudly in between his roars, saying, "What sort of a chief do you call yourself, sneaking round here in the dark trying to steal our buffalo meat? You're a pretty chief, you are! You've no more courage than a scavenger beetle. Why don't you kill your own dinner?" The Pondoro took no notice except to roar the louder, so a second native took the matter up and expostulated in more dignified terms as to the impropriety of the conduct of "a great chief like him" prowling round in the dark, "trying like a hyæna to steal the food of strangers."

A piece of meat dipped in strychnine brought the lion-chief to his senses and he took his departure. It is not to be wondered at that such things occur in a country where the natives regard their chiefs as almighty and infallible. The extent of their faith in him appears from the story of one Chief Chibisa, who placed a powerful "medicine" in the river and told his people they might safely enter the water as it was a protection against the bite of crocodiles. Thereupon the people bathed there without fear of these dangerous reptiles.

Du Chaillu, in "Ashango Land,"[49] tells the story of a young lad, Akosho, who declared that he had been turned into a leopard, and feeling a craving for blood had gone forth into the forest where he had killed two men. After each murder he said he had taken on human shape. His chief Akondogo could not believe the story, but Akosho led him to the scene where lay the mangled bodies of the victims. It appears that the boy suffered from lycanthropia, and he was burnt to death in full view of the tribe.

Theophilus Waldmeier mentions a similar case of possession in which the patient thought herself to be a hyæna.[50] One evening when he was in his house at Gaffat a woman began to cry fearfully and run up and down the road on her hands and feet like a wild beast, quite unconscious of what she was doing. The natives said to him, "This is the Bouda, and if it is not driven out of her she will die." A crowd gathered round and everything possible was done to relieve her condition, but without avail. She howled and roared in an unnatural manner and most powerful voice. At last a blacksmith, who was said to have secret connection with the evil one, was called in to see what he could do. The woman obeyed his orders at once. He took hold of her hand and dropped the juice of a white onion or garlic into her nostril, and then he questioned the evil spirit, by whom she was supposed to be possessed, as follows:

"Why did you possess this poor woman?"

"I was allowed to do so," came the answer through her lips.

"What is your name?"

"Gebroo."

"And your country?"

"Godjam."

"How many people have you already taken possession of?"

"Forty people—men and women."

"You must now leave this woman's body."

"I will do so on one condition."

"What is it?"

"I want to eat the flesh of a donkey."

The long cross-examination being concluded the evil spirit was granted his strange request. A donkey was brought and the possessed woman ran hastily upon the animal and bit the flesh out of the creature's back, and though the donkey kicked and started off, she clung to it as though fastened by leather thongs.

After the performance had continued for some time the man recalled the woman, and a jar of prepared liquid with which much filth had been mixed was set down in a hidden spot where she could not see it. When, however, the exorcist exclaimed, "Go and look for your drink," she started off on all fours to the place where the jar stood and drank the whole of its contents.

When she returned, the blacksmith said, "Take up this stone." Although the stone in question was too large for her to move under natural conditions, she placed it on her head with ease and began spinning round, until the stone flew off on one side and she fell on to the ground. Then the exorcist said to the people round, "Take her away to bed, the Bouda has left her."

In a similar case the woman's symptoms began in a sort of fainting-fit; her fingers were clenched in the palms of her hands, the eyes were glazed, the nostrils distended and the whole body stiff and inflexible. Suddenly a hideous laugh, like that of a hyæna, burst from her and she began running about on all fours. The cure was brought about in much the same way as in the preceding case.

Mr. Parkyns also tells the tale of a servant who was said to have been bewitched by a blacksmith-hyæna. He evidently attempted to lure her into the forest with the intention of devouring her.

One evening the howls and laughter of a hyæna were clearly heard from the hut in which the sick woman lay bound and closely guarded. Her master happened to be present, when he saw to his astonishment that she rose "like a Davenport brother" freed from her bonds, and made an effort to escape from the hut in answer to the call of the wild animal without.

That such proceedings were sometimes carried out for vicious ends not unconnected with the slaying of human victims is proved by the existence of the mysterious Human Leopard Society which Mr. T. J. Alldridge writes about in "The Sherbro and Its Hinterland." The society was founded for the purpose of obtaining the human fat used in the preparation of a certain "medicine" mixed with Borfinor, the resulting material being regarded as an all-powerful fetish.

Victims at first were relatives of the members of the society selected at committee meetings, who were afterwards waylaid and slaughtered by a man in the guise of a leopard. He plunged a three-pronged knife into the unfortunate person's neck from behind, separated the vertebræ and caused instant death. More victims were required, outsiders were made to join the society by the expedient of giving them a dish in which, without their knowledge, human flesh was cooked. Afterwards, on being informed of the unpleasant fact, they were persuaded to join the society and told they must furnish a victim as part of the initiation ceremony.

The members of the society rapidly increased in number but great secrecy was observed, and it was impossible to bring the criminals to justice. When questioned the victims declared that they had seen nothing. The leopard sprang from the bush, and it merely seemed as though a great wind had rushed by.[51]

Before seizing their victims the human leopards cover themselves with the skin of the animal and imitate its roars. In the paws of the leopard skin are fixed sharp-pointed knives shaped like a leopard's claws, which are intended to inflict similar wounds, the better to avoid unpleasant disclosure.

Many of the Indians in Guiana believe that "Kanaima" tigers are possessed by human spirits who, as men, devote themselves to deeds of cannibalism. Taking the shape of the jaguar they approach the lonely sleeping-places, or waylay Indians in the forests. No superstition causes more terror.

A legend exists among the natives about an old man who lurked in the forest in the shape of a Kanaima tiger. His son, who was hunting, shot the tiger down. His arrow, which was one of the old-fashioned sort, tipped with bone, entered the animal's jaw. The tiger raised its paw, broke off the weapon and vanished into the forest. The young huntsman picked up the splintered arrow-head and returned home. Next day his guilty father came back groaning, and cried out that his mouth was "all on fire." The son drew from his cheek a bone which, oddly enough, fitted into his splintered arrow-head. Then the son was very sorrowful and said to his father that he must leave him and take his young wife away too, for neither of them would be safe from the dread Kanaima charm. This is a specimen of the "repercussion" stories, in which the wound inflicted on the wer-animal appears in the human form.

CHAPTER XI

WER-FOX AND WER-VIXEN

Even more elaborate in detail and richness of lore than the lion-, tiger- and hyæna-transformations, are those of the wer-fox; and a curious point to be noted is that it is quite as easy for the animal to become human as for a man or woman to become a fox. In Japanese folklore the fox is regarded as more skilful than any other animal in taking human shape.

In China the belief exists that foxes and wolves attain to an age of eight hundred years, and "when more than five hundred years old they are able to metamorphose themselves into beings shaped liked men."[52]

De Groot tells several stories about wer-foxes.[53] A man runs away from home and is found in an empty grave. His shape is quite that of a fox, and does not in any respect correspond to the human form. The only sound he utters is O-tsze (meaning red) which is the name for foxes. For ten days this wer-fox remains in a state of semi-consciousness, and then he awakens and gives the following account of himself: "When the fox came to me for the first time it assumed the shape of a lovely woman standing in a fowl-house in a hidden corner of my dwelling. She called me to her and told me she bore the name of O-tsze.[54] When she had called me many times I followed her and she became my wife. At night I frequently accompanied her to her dwelling, and we met without being perceived by the dogs."

No human animal is as seductive as the wer-vixen. Numerous stories occur in Eastern folklore of women in the shape of foxes and foxes in the shape of women leading men on through passion to their doom. Even male foxes take the shape of women to seduce men, but other harm than this they do not do them.[55]

Ono, an inhabitant of Mino (says an ancient Japanese legend of A.D. 545), spent the seasons longing for his ideal of female beauty. He met her one evening on a vast moor and married her. Simultaneously with the birth of their son, Ono's dog was delivered of a pup which as it grew up became more and more hostile to the lady of the moors. She begged her husband to kill it, but he refused. At last one day the dog attacked her so furiously that she lost courage, resumed vulpine shape, leaped over a fence and fled.

"You may be a fox," Ono called after her, "but you are the mother of my son and I love you. Come back when you please; you will always be welcome."

So every evening she stole back and slept in his arms.[56]

The wer-fox has a strange manner of bringing about transformation. Roaming over a grassy plain, the animal picks up a skull, puts it on his head and, facing towards the north star, worships silently. At first he performs his religious genuflections and obeisances slowly and circumspectly, but by and by his motions become convulsively rapid and his leaps wondrously active. Yet, however high he jumps towards the star, he endeavours to keep his skull-crown immovable, and if after a hundred acts of worship he succeeds, he becomes capable of transforming himself into a human being. But if he desires to assume the shape of a beautiful maiden he must live in the vicinity of a graveyard.[57]

A monk who passed a moonlight night in a graveyard saw a fox placing withered bones and a skull upon its head, and as soon as the animal succeeded in moving its head without dropping its burden, it covered its body with grass and leaves, and changed into a beautiful woman. She sat by the roadside, and presently a man came riding by to whom she told a pitiable story about herself. Charmed with her appearance and sympathising with her forlorn condition, he was about to ask her to mount his horse with him, when the monk appeared from behind a gravestone and warned him that the woman was not what she appeared to be. Making the sign of the cross and uttering an incantation, the holy man caused the woman to fall down, and she turned into an old vixen and expired. Nothing remained but the dry bones with the skull, and the grass and the leaves on the dead body of the fox.

De Groot quotes the old Chinese saying that the wild fox bears the name of Tsze (Red). At night he strikes fire out of his tail. When he desires to appear as a spook he puts on a human skull and salutes the Great Bear constellation, and the transformation is brought about as soon as the skull ceases to fall.

One of the commonest stories of the fox, found in China and Japan, is that the fox as usual assumes the form of a lovely maiden, and weds a man. She dies and all that remains is the dead body of the fox. No more is heard of the woman.

The Eskimos have a similar story.

A bachelor coming home in the evening finds his hut tidied. One day, returning prematurely, he sees a woman at work straightening his things. He falls in love with her and marries her, only to discover that she is a fox in disguise, and when his jealous cousin mentions the tabooed subject of the smell of a fox, she runs away, never to return.

Under the T'ang dynasty the belief in wer-vixens, who changed into fascinating women to tempt men, was prevalent.

"When a fox is fifty years old, it can transform itself into a woman; when a hundred years old, it becomes a beautiful female or sorceress termed wu. Such enchanted beings possess a knowledge of what is happening more than a thousand miles away. They can poison men by sorcery or possess and bewilder them so that they lose their memory or even their reason. When a fox reaches the age of a thousand it goes to paradise and becomes a celestial creature."[58]

The wer-vixen in the next story had not attained to this privilege, she belonged to a far different region.

A captain in the Imperial Guard met a beautiful lady in the moonlight and began to talk to her. While she was speaking to him she kept her face hidden behind a fan. As they came to the palace the man remembered that wer-vixens were dangerous beings to deal with and he wanted to find out whether the woman was genuine or an animal in human shape, so he drew his sword, seized her by the hair, pushed her against one of the pillars in front of the palace and threatened to kill her. She struggled and jumped about violently, sending forth so pungent an odour that he could not hold her, and as he let her go she turned into a fox and ran off shrieking "ko, ko!" The captain did not in the least regret the rough handling he had given the supposed beautiful lady; he only wished he had killed her on the spot.

Fox demons are said to cause disease and madness, and sometimes they act in a spirit of revenge, more often from unprovoked malice. The "Huen Chung ki" mentions that foxes sometimes take the shape of Buddhas or Bodhisattvas. Another mystic idea about wer-foxes is that they are believed to possess a mysterious pearl which represents their soul. They hold this pearl in their mouths and any man who gets possession of it becomes a favourite throughout the world. In Japan some people think that foxes have a luminous pearl in their tail. Whether this is connected with the soul or whether it is a talisman of power it is difficult to say.

Wer-foxes in the shape of human beings can be made to resume their animal forms by wounding or slaying them or by setting dogs upon them. Incantations, argument if they appear in the shape of scholars, poisonous food, written charms, or cutting off the caudal appendage if they show signs of one, are also effective means of making them declare themselves in their true colours.

If a person is possessed by a wer-fox he can have the evil spirit transferred to a woman in a similar manner to that practised by the Boudas of Abyssinia in the case of those possessed by hyænas. In one instance the evil spirit spoke from the scape-woman's mouth as follows:—

"I am a fox. I have not come to do evil, but only to have a look round, because I thought there was plenty of food at a place like this. Then I found that I (the patient) was kept indoors." Thus speaking, she took from her bosom a white gem, the size of a small orange. Throwing this into the air, she caught it again, and those who saw it said, "What a strange gem; she keeps it in her pocket for the purpose of deluding people." A young man cleverly caught the gem as the woman threw it up and put it in his pocket. The demon fox begged him to give it back to her but he refused. She then burst into tears and said, "My gem is of no value to you for you do not know how to use it. If you do not give it back to me I will be your enemy for ever, but if you do, I will be your friend and protect you like a god." At these words the young man returned the gem.

When the sorcerer had exorcised the fox spirit it was discovered that the gem had disappeared, which was taken as a proof that it belonged to the wer-fox, and was connected with some mysterious power.

The fox kept its promise, for when the young man was going home late one night in the dark, he became suddenly very frightened and called the fox to help him. The animal appeared and led him by a narrow footpath instead of by the usual road. Afterwards he discovered that highwaymen were hidden in ambush near the road, and if he had passed that way he would surely have been killed.

The cunning of the fox turns to learning in a man, for intellectuality appears to be regarded as a fox-like trait by the Japanese, and many tales tell of scholars becoming animals and vice-versa.

A learned old man called Hu suddenly disappeared from the college in which he held a professorship, and was found by his students in the shape of a fox explaining logic out of an old book to a pack of foxes who were drawn up in ranks before him in an empty grave.

Two foxes, in another story, were over a thousand years old and lived in the tomb of a king. They transformed themselves into students, giving proof of extraordinary learning, and having fine personalities and handsome, open countenances. Mounted on horseback they rode to the house of a talented minister to argue with him on theological questions connected with the spirit of the glorification tree which stood before a tomb. The minister could not get the better of them in discussion, and after three days he became suspicious and set his dogs loose upon them, but they showed not the slightest fear. "To be sure," he exclaimed, "they are spectres of the true sort. If a hundred years old, they must change their shape at the sight of hounds; if they are spooks of a thousand years, they must change when they see the glow of fire produced from a tree of the same age." Reasoning thus, the minister sent some servants to the tomb in order to fell the glorification tree. The spirit of the tree was a young child dressed in blue garments, and he was sitting in a cleft in the side of the tree. When the child was told of the matter he wept, and lamented the ignorance of the old foxes and his own fate. Then he vanished. When the servants felled the tree, blood gushed forth from it. They took the wood home and set fire to it, and as soon as it was kindled the foxes resumed their original shape. Then the minister had them captured and cooked.

The power possessed by the fox of bewitching men is clearly shown in the following story quoted by Dr. Visser in "The Fox and Badger in Japanese Folklore."[59]

In the eighth year of the Kwambei era (896) a man called Kaya Yoshifuji resigned the post of a high official in the Bizen province and went to live in Hongo Ashimori. His wife ran away to the capital and he kept house quite alone. One day he went out of his mind and began to recite love poems to an imaginary woman. After a month passed in this manner he disappeared and his relatives searched high and low but could find no trace of him, so they concluded that he had committed suicide, and vowed they would make an image of the eleven-faced Kwannon if they found the unhappy man's corpse. They cut down an oak tree and began to carve the life-size image of Yoshifuji, bowing before the unfinished statue to repeat the vow they had taken. This went on for about a fortnight, when to their intense surprise Yoshifuji crept from under his go-down as thin and pale as though he had passed through a serious illness. The floor of the go-down was only half a dozen inches from the ground, so that it was held to be impossible that a man could have been beneath it. When he had recovered his senses sufficiently to give an account of his adventures, he said that a beautiful girl had come to him, bringing love letters and poems from a princess, and that he had replied to them in the same vein in which they were written.

"At last," he continued, "the girl came with a magnificent carriage and four postilions to take me to the princess.

"After a drive of about ten miles we arrived at a splendid palace, where an exquisite meal and a very hearty reception from the princess soon made me feel quite at ease. There I lived with her as inseparably as two branches growing together on the same tree. She gave birth to a son, a very intelligent and beautiful child, whom I loved so much that I thought of degrading my son Jadasada and putting this child in his place as son of my principal wife—this in view of the high rank of the princess. But after three years a Buddhist priest suddenly entered the room of Her Highness, carrying a stick in his hand. The effect of his appearance was astonishing. Chamberlains and Court ladies all fled left and right and even the princess hid herself somewhere. The priest pushed me from behind with his stick and made me go out of the house through a very narrow passage. When I looked back I discovered that I had just crept from under my own go-down!"

The curious point of this story is that those who listened to it rushed to the go-down and demolished it without delay. As they did so, twenty or thirty foxes came from beneath it and scattered in all directions, hastening to the mountains. Yoshifuji, bewitched by these wizard-foxes, had been lying under the go-down for a fortnight, believing in his trance that he was spending three years in a palace. The priest who broke the spell was a metamorphosis of Kwannon.

That the wer-vixen superstition is deeply engrained in the minds of travellers is proved by the story of a bishop who once passed the night in a house which was so desolate in appearance that his companions begged him to read a sutra for the purpose of driving away evil influences. Two of them went to a wood close to the house, where they saw a mysterious phantom, large and white, which they took to be a wer-vixen. They rushed in to tell the bishop, who, greatly excited, cried, "I have often heard of foxes haunting people, but I have never set eyes on a ghost of this kind," and he hastened to the spot, full of eagerness, only to discover a harmless, ordinary girl—or so he said!

Another wer-vixen attempted to steal a child. The nurse was out in the grounds with her charge of two years old when her master, the father of the infant, heard her crying for help. Seizing his sword he ran to the spot, when to his astonishment he found that two nurses exactly alike were pulling at his son and heir, one on one side and one on the other. He could not say which was the genuine nurse, and in great terror brandished his sword, making feints at both. Thereupon one of the nurses vanished and the other swooned, the child still in her arms. A priest was sent for and by means of incantations brought the nurse to her senses. She then said that her double had appeared and laying hold of the babe had claimed it as her own. Nobody knew whether the phantom was a fox or a spirit.[60]

Here is a story of a vindictive wer-fox, taken from the "Uji shui monogatari":—

"A samurai was on his way home one evening when he met a fox. Pursuing the animal, he sent an arrow into its loin. The fox howled loudly and limped quickly away through the grass towards the samurai's house. When the man saw the animal was breathing fire he hastened to overtake him, but was too late. The fox, on arriving at the house, assumed human shape and set fire to the building. Then the samurai pursued the culprit, whom he took to be a real man, but, resuming vulpine form, the animal disappeared into the thicket."

A number of fox legends, which have been rendered into English by Dr. Visser, are found in the "Kokon chomonshu."

The house of a Dainagon was haunted by a number of foxes, and was so impossible to live in that the owner decided to hold a battue. The very night he gave orders to this effect he saw a vision of a grey-haired old man, with the figure of a tall boy, wearing a green hunting dress, and seated under an orange tree in the garden. The owner asked the apparition's name, and he replied, "I have lived in your house for two generations and have a great number of children and grandchildren. I have always tried to keep them out of mischief but they never would listen. Now I am sorry because they have made you angry. If you will forgive the things my family have done, I will protect you and let you know whenever good luck is coming your way."

Then the owner of the house awoke from his strange dream, rose and opened the door of the verandah. There he discovered in the dim morning light an old hairless fox, shyly trying to hide himself behind a bamboo bench.

The tanuki, or badger, shares with the fox the reputation for powers of transformation. This animal appeared in Japanese folklore later than the fox, but is often coupled with it in stories of animal sorcery. An old mountain lake was frequented by many water birds, but it was well known that whoever tried to shoot them was drowned in the lake. At last a man, who had more courage than the others, decided that this mysterious matter must be looked into. He went alone in the dark, armed with bow, arrows, and a sword, and when he reached the lake he sat down under a pine tree, bent his bow and waited. Suddenly the surface of the lake was disturbed, waves dashed on the shore and he saw a faint light in the centre. The ball of light moved about, coming closer and closer, and circling round him. He was about to shoot at it when it flew back over the lake. Presently it came close to him again, and in the centre he saw a grinning old hag, upon whom he seized. She tried to pull him into the lake, but could not manage to do so, for he stood like a rock and, having thrown down his bow, stabbed at her with his sword. She grew weaker and weaker and the light disappeared. Then she died, and he took home the animal shape which was left on his hands, and which proved to be an old tanuki.

Another story of the tanuki is more like a ghost story than that of a wer-animal, and concerns a captain of the guards called Sukeyasu. When he was hunting in the province of Tamba he passed the night in an old chapel which the villagers warned him was haunted by a monster. As a snowstorm was raging he preferred to face the strange risk inside the chapel to a certain wetting in the open.

He was half asleep when he heard a noise outside the chapel and peeping through a chink in the sliding door he saw a pitch-black priest, so tall that his head appeared to reach the eaves. The priest stretched a thin hairy arm through the chink in the door and stroked Sukeyasu's forehead, afterwards withdrawing his hand. The captain was too frightened to move, but when the same thing was repeated he plucked up courage to grasp the hairy hand and hold it firmly. Then ensued a struggle and the door gave way. Sukeyasu came down on the top of the priest and as he pressed upon him with all his might he found his opponent growing smaller and smaller, and his arms thinner and thinner. The captain called his servants to his assistance and when a light was obtained it was found that the huge spook was in reality a tanuki. Next day the animal's head was shown to the villagers, and from that time the chapel was no longer haunted.

An unsuccessful transformation into animal shape is the subject of another wer-fox story. A man left his house one evening in order to do some business in a neighbouring city, but to his wife's surprise he came back accompanied by a servant long before he was due, saying that he had accomplished his business satisfactorily. He was very tired and went to bed at once, but an old woman-servant in the house warned her mistress, saying that she had noticed something odd about the returned traveller, who was blind in the left eye, while her master was blind in the right eye. The wife then called to the sleeping man, saying she was ill, and asking him to get her some medicine. He did so, grumbling, and to the wife's astonishment, she saw that what the old woman said was true. Then when he lay down to sleep again she stabbed him to death, and he cried out like a fox, "kon, kon, kwai—kwai." Then they beat to death the servant the wer-fox had brought with him, and found he was also a fox. The one who had taken the shape of the master had not trained himself carefully enough in the art of transformation.