ed Ch'ih Ti,
'the Red Emperor.' He reigned for more than two hundred years, and
became an Immortal, His capital was the ancient city of Kuei, thirty
_li_ north-east of Hsin-cheng Hsien, in the Prefecture of K'ai-feng
Fu, Honan. His tomb is on the southern slope of Heng Shan. The peak
is known as Chu Jung Peak. His descendants, who went to live in the
south, were the ancestors of the Directors of Fire.

Hui Lu

The most popular God of Fire, however, is Hui Lu, a celebrated
magician who, according to the _Shen hsien t'ung chien_, lived some
time before the reign of Ti K'u (2436-2366 B.C.), the father of Yao
the Great, and had a mysterious bird named Pi Fang and a hundred other
fire-birds shut up in a gourd. He had only to let them out to set up
a conflagration which would extend over the whole country.

Huang Ti ordered Chu Jung to fight Hui Lu and also to subdue the
rebel Chih Yu. Chu Jung had a large bracelet of pure gold--a most
wonderful and effective weapon. He hurled it into the air, and it
fell on Hui Lu's neck, throwing him to the ground and rendering him
incapable of moving. Finding resistance impossible, he asked mercy
from his victor and promised to be his follower in the spiritual
contests. Subsequently he always called himself Huo-shih Chih T'u,
'the Disciple of the Master of Fire.'

The Fire-emperor

Shen Nung, the God of Agriculture, also adds to his other functions
those appertaining to the God of Fire, the reason being that when
he succeeded the Emperor Fu Hsi on the throne he adopted fire as
the emblem of his government, just as Huang Ti adopted the symbol
of Earth. Thus he came to be called Huo Ti, the 'Fire-emperor.' He
taught his subjects the use of fire for smelting metals and making
implements and weapons, and the use of oil in lamps, etc. All the
divisions of his official hierarchy were connected in some way with
this element; thus, there were the Ministers of Fire generally, the
officers of Fire of the North, South, etc. Becoming thus doubly the
patron of fire, a second fire symbol (_huo_) was added to his name,
changing it from Huo Ti, 'Fire-emperor,' to Yen Ti, 'Blazing Emperor,'

CHAPTER IX

Myths of Epidemics, Medicine, Exorcism, Etc.

The Ministry of Epidemics

The gods of epidemics, etc., belong to the sixth, ninth, second,
and third celestial Ministries. The composition of the Ministry of
Epidemics is arranged differently in different works as Epidemics
(regarded as e