The Chinese are
convinced that when human bodies remain unburied, the souls of their
late owners feel the discomfort of rain, just as living men would do
if they were exposed without shelter to the inclemency of the
weather. These wretched souls, therefore, do all in their power to
prevent the rain from falling, and often their efforts are only too
successful. Then drought ensues, the most dreaded of all calamities
in China, because bad harvests, dearth, and famine follow in its
train. Hence it has been a common practice of the Chinese
authorities in time of drought to inter the dry bones of the
unburied dead for the purpose of putting an end to the scourge and
conjuring down the rain.
Animals, again, often play an important part in these
weather-charms. The Anula tribe of Northern Australia associate the
dollar-bird with rain, and call it the rain-bird. A man who has the
bird for his totem can make rain at a certain pool. He catches a
snake, puts it alive into the pool, and after holding it under water
for a time takes it out, kills it, and lays it down by the side of
the creek.
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