honor the trees as the abode of the kami, or as evidence of their faith
in the renown accredited in the past.

In common with most human beings the Japanese consider the serpent an
object of mystery and awe, but most of them go further and pay the
ophidian a reverence and awe which is worship. Their oldest literature
shows how large a part the serpent played in the so-called divine age,
how it acted as progenitress of the Mikado's ancestry, and how it
afforded means of incarnation for the kami or gods. Ten species of
ophidia are known in the Japanese islands, but in the larger number of
more or less imaginary varieties which figure in the ancient books we
shall find plenty of material for fetich-worship. In perusing the
"Kojiki" one scarcely knows, when he begins a story, whether the
character which to all appearance is a man or woman is to end as a
snake, or whether the mother after delivering her child will or will not
glide into the marsh or slide away into the sea, leaving behind a trail
of slime. A dragon is three-fourths serpent, and both the dragon and the
serpent are prominent figures, perhaps the most prominent of the kami or
gods in human or animal form in the "Kojiki" and other early legends of
the gods, though the crocodile, crow, deer, dog, and other animals are
kami.[24] It is therefore no wonder that serpents have been and are
still worshipped by the people, that some of their gods and goddesses
are liable at any time to slip away in scaly form, that famous temples
are built on sites noted as being the abode or visible place of the
actual water or land snake of natural history, and that the spot where a
serpent is seen to-day is usually marked with a sacred emblem or a
shrine.[25] We shall see how this snake-worship became not only a part
of Shint[=o] but even a notable feature in corrupt Buddhism.