"'Hearken! all of you to this fulfilling of praises as the morning sun rises in glory.'
"He says: 'More especially would I enjoin on the kannushi and hafuri with all due ceremony to receive, take up, and present the offerings purely provided by the Imbe, hanging stout straps on weak shoulders.'"
A special embassy was sent to Ise, consisting of one Prince, one Nakatomi, one Imbe, and one Urabe.
In the third decade of the tenth month the Mikado went in state to a river-bank near Kioto and performed a ceremonial ablution (misogi).
For one month before the Ohonihe lesser abstinence (ara-imi) was enjoined, and for three days greater abstinence (ma-imi). Buddhist ceremonies, and the eating of impure food, were interdicted throughout the five home provinces. Purity of language[225] was also necessary. During the three days of ma-imi, no official was allowed to do any work except that connected with the ceremony.
Special buildings were erected for the Ohonihe at Kitano, a suburb of Kiōto. After a purification ceremony, a site 480 feet square was marked out by twigs of sakaki hung with tree-fibre. On the arrival of the yuki and suki rice from the provinces, this site was propitiated. The Brewer-maidens then with a pure mattock turned the first sod and dug the holes for the four corner posts. The Urabe went to the mountain where the timber was to be cut, and worshipped the God of the mountain. The Brewer-maiden struck the first blow with a pure axe, and wood-cutters completed the work. Similar formalities were practised in cutting the grass for thatch and in digging wells.
The sacred enclosure (yu-niha) was divided into two sections, an inner and an outer, and contained numerous buildings, such as shrines to the eight Gods already mentioned, storehouses for the rice and other necessaries, lodgings for the Brewer-maidens and their assistants, kitchens, &c.
The site of the principal building, or Ohonihe no Miya, measured 214 feet by 150 feet. It was erected after the others and was in duplicate, one being for the yuki, the other for the suki. Each was forty feet long by sixteen feet wide. The roof-tree ran north and south. Undressed wood was used for the erection, which was covered by a roof of thatch. The floor was strewn with bundles of grass over which bamboo mats were placed. In the centre of the sleeping-chamber (the sanctum) several white tatami (thick mats) were laid down and upon them the Saka-makura, which was a cushion three feet broad by four feet long, for the use of the God or Gods.[226] This was called the "Deity seat." The Mikado's seat was placed to the south of it.
The preparation of the sake for the ceremony was preceded by worship of the Well-God, the Furnace-God, and the Sake-God. The first fire was produced by a fire-drill. The Brewer-maiden began to turn it and the Rice-fruit-lord continued the work. A third official blew the fire and the attendants then kindled a torch with it. All the utensils had been provided by the Imbe with great care, performing harahi and worship at every step.
The Mikado himself practised lesser abstinence for a month and greater abstinence for three days before the ceremony. The procedure at the Ohonihe is too elaborate to describe in detail. It included the recitation before the Mikado of "old words" (myths and legends?) by the Kataribe, or corporation of reciters, and songs by the women who pounded the rice for the offerings, wishing him long life and prosperity. The rice was presented to him by the Nukiho no tsukahi, with the words, "We bring a thousand and five hundred auspicious ears which we offer as divine food of a million loads." Old-fashioned music was performed and the regalia were delivered to him by the Urabe.