The people regard
the flame as the forge of a spectral smith who here carried on his
business after death had removed him from his old smithy in the village.
Once a year all the household fires in Kahma are extinguished and then
lighted afresh from the ghostly flame.[341]
[The new fire in China and Japan.]
In China every year, about the beginning of April, certain officials,
called _Sz'hueen_, used of old to go about the country armed with wooden
clappers. Their business was to summon the people and command them to
put out every fire. This was the beginning of a season called
_Han-shih-tsieh_, or "eating cold food." For three days all household
fires remained extinct as a preparation for the solemn renewal of the
fire, which took place on the fifth or sixth day of April, being the
hundred and fifth day after the winter solstice. The ceremony was
performed with great pomp by the same officials, who procured the new
fire from heaven by reflecting the sun's rays either from a metal mirror
or from a crystal on dry moss. Fire thus obtained is called by the
Chinese heavenly fire, and its use is enjoined in sacrifices; whereas
fire elicited by the friction of wood is termed by them earthly fire,
and its use is prescribed for cooking and other domestic purposes. When
once the new fire had thus been drawn from the sun, all the people were
free to rekindle their domestic hearths; and, as a Chinese distich has
it--
"_At the festival of the cold food there are a thousand white stalks
among the flowers;
On the day Tsing-ming, at sunrise, you may see the smoke of ten
thousand houses_.
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