DigiCat Publishing presents to you this special edition of "Gleanings in Buddha-Fields: Studies of Hand and Soul in the Far East" by Lafcadio Hearn. DigiCat Publishing considers every written word to be a legacy of humankind. Every DigiCat book has been carefully reproduced for republishing in a new modern format. The books are available in print, as well as ebooks. DigiCat hopes you will treat this work with the acknowledgment and passion it deserves as a classic of world literature.

Excerpt from Gleanings in Buddha-Fields, Studies of Hand and Soul, in the Far East Of whatever dimension, the temples or shrines of pure Shinto are all built in the same archaic style. The typical shrine is a windowless oblong building of unpainted timber, with a very steep overhanging roof; the front is the gable end; and the upper part of the perpetually closed doors is wooden lattice-work, - usually a grating of bars closely set and crossing each other at right angles. In most cases the structure is raised slightly above the ground on wooden pillars; and the queer peaked façade, with its visor-like apertures and the fantastic projections of beam-work above its gable-angle, might remind the European traveler of certain old Gothic forms of dormer. There is no artificial color. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

This classic text about Buddhism in Japan by Lafcadio Hearn--on of the first Westerns to write about Japan--will be of great interests to scholars and Japanophiles alike. Lafcadio Hearn's books continue to charm and captivate readers, as the exotic subjects about which he wrote charmed and captivated him. Gleanings In Buddha-Fields presents more Hearn magic as he enters into the spirit of Buddhism as though he were born into it. Hearn says that if he were a god, dwelling in some old Izumo shrine on the summit of a hill, then "as air to the bird, as water to the fish, so would all substance be permeable to the essence of me. I should pass at will into the walls of my dwelling to swim in the long gold bath of a sunbeam, to thrill in the heart of a flower, to ride on the neck of a dragonfly." He writes of a trip to Kyoto, telling of hazy autumn rice fields, with dragonflies darting over the drooping grain; maples crimsoning above a tremendous gorge; ranges of peaks steeped in morning mist; and a peasant's cottage perched on the verge of some dizzy mountain road.

"This is a wonderful collection of Lafcadio Hearn's essays on Buddhism, Japan, and Japanese folklore." -- J.B. Hare