Roku Jizo--'The Six Jizo'--these images are called in the speech of
the people; and such groups may be seen in many a Japanese cemetery.
They are representations of the most beautiful and tender figure in
Japanese popular faith, that charming divinity who cares for the souls
of little children, and consoles them in the place of unrest, and saves
them from the demons. 'But why are those little stones piled about the
statues?' I ask.

Well, it is because some say the child-ghosts must build little towers
of stones for penance in the Sai-no-Kawara, which is the place to which
all children after death must go. And the Oni, who are demons, come to
throw down the little stone-piles as fast as the children build; and
these demons frighten the children, and torment them. But the little
souls run to Jizo, who hides them in his great sleeves, and comforts
them, and makes the demons go away. And every stone one lays upon the
knees or at the feet of Jizo, with a prayer from the heart, helps some
child-soul in the Sai-no-Kawara to perform its long penance. [2]

'All little children,' says the young Buddhist student who tells all
this, with a smile as gentle as Jizo's own, 'must go to the Sai-no-
Kawara when they die. And there they play with Jizo. The Sai-no-Kawara
is beneath us, below the ground. [3]

'And Jizo has long sleeves to his robe; and they pull him by the sleeves
in their play; and they pile up little stones before him to amuse
themselves. And those stones you see heaped about the statues are put
there by people for the sake of the little ones, most often by mothers
of dead children who pray to Jizo. But grown people do not go to the
Sai-no-Kawara when they die.' [4]