The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913, 1895-09-02
STOLE A HAND OF BUDDHA.
One Chinese Who Will Have
Phenomenal Luck for a
Year to Come.
Chinatown Celebrating the Seventh
Month Festival of Feeding
the Dead.

There is one happy Monaghan in China
tow n to-day, in fact great many of them
are happy, but one is supremely so. 1t is
All Lung Wat. The reason for his great
Joy is due to the fact that he was success
full in pilfering from under the very noses
of watchful guards token which accord
ing to heather belief will bring him sue
cess in all his undertakings for a year to
come.
This is the seventh month of the Chinese
year and the annual seventh month fes-
tival has been in progress for three days.
1t begins the 7th and continues until the
middle of the Chinese month. According
to the popular superstition, all the Chinese
who die from natural causes go to hell
reigned over by Kwai Wong, the king of
devils. All those who are removed from
the earth by murder or any other unnat-
ural cause remain to roam the earth in
spirit. These are supposed to be but
poorly fed and clad.
The seventh-month festival is, therefore,
given and the spirits of all the departed
heather come forth and feast and procure
new raiment, for if they were not toasted
and clothed once year the spirits would
destroy the Chinaman's crop, would an
noy his wife, and his children would be
deformed; his business would suffer and
various other calamities would beset him.
kwai Wong also sallies forth from his
palace in hell at this time and visits the
temple. He must also be appeased. To
deliver themselves from the wrath of Kwai
Wong and from the torment of the spirits
the temple OF the common people prepares
a feast which is set before the god or god
dess of the temple, as the case may be,
there being numerous gods and goddesses
who reign and are worshiped in the vari-
Gus temples or joss houses. Paper clothing
and money in abundance are burned
at the same time to provide the raiment
The relatives or friends of a deceased Chi
naman also prepare feast and set it out
for the departed one.
Thus the king of devils is satisfied, and
after three days he returns to his abode in
the internal regions, the spirits go their
way III peace and the heather is restored
to his peace of mind for another year.
The most important part of the festival
is the feasting of Kwai Wong, his satanic
majesty. For this an extraordinary repast
is prepared the principal feature of which
is an imm ense pyramid cake, on the top of
which is a hand, made of choicest con-
fectionery, which is supposed to represent
the hand of Buddha, upon which rests all
the blessings which are the result of the
rlIeS perIOrueu curing Tue festival.
The Chinaman who at the close of the
feast can purloin this hand from the cake
without being detected in the act will re-
ceive all these blessings for year and his
good luck will be something phenomenal.
1t is the successful mplishment of this
feat that has filled All Lung Wat with such
ioyfulness that he is spending money in
celebrating the event to the utter aston
ishment of his Monaghan friends, so Law
ish is he in putting his savings into circu-
lation.
For the past three Gays the great cake
has rested on a pedestal, in front of Ting
Fow, the Goddess of Heaven, the idol wor-
shipped by the Chinese at the Ting Tow
Mu Temple in Waverly place. The period
during which Kwai Wong was supposed to
finger in the temple was up last evening,
and special guard was placed around
the sacred hand. but All Lung Wat
watched his opportunity and made way
with the token at a moment when the
guards had relaxed their vigilance. He is
truck farmer with a patch OF land near
the City, and now he expects TO raise such
vegetables as were never before seen or
heard of. All Lung Wat was fortunate in
more WAYS than one, for a severe,cudgeling
is the penalty of detection in the act.
The feasting of the spirits will continue
until the middle of the month.