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Updated: May 23, 2025
You will find in a Japanese dictionary the word 'bakeru' translated by such terms as 'to be transformed, 'to be metamorphosed, 'to be changed, etc.; but the belief about these trees is very singular, and cannot be explained by any such rendering of the verb 'bakeru. The tree itself does not change form or place, but a spectre called Ki-no o-bake disengages itself from the tree and walks about in various guises. Most often the shape assumed by the phantom is that of a beautiful woman.
Everybody seems to be asleep when we first land: the only living creature visible is a cat, sitting on the stern of a boat; and even that cat, according to Japanese beliefs, might not be a real cat, but an o-bake or a nekomata in short, a goblin-cat, for it has a long tail.
And the seamen speak euphemistically of the O-'bake, the honourable ghosts, and fear them with a great fear. Wherefore cats are kept on board! A cat, they aver, has power to keep the O-bake away. How or why, I have not yet found any to tell me. I know only that cats are deemed to have power over the dead. If a cat be left alone with a corpse, will not the corpse arise and dance?
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