olybius_, i. 35).

V. THE TOAD IN THE MOON.

We owe an immense debt of gratitude and honour to the many
enterprising and cultivated men who have gone into all parts of the
earth and among all peoples to investigate human history and habit,
mythology and religion, and thus enrich the stores of our national
literature. With such a host of travellers gathering up the fragments,
nothing of value is likely to be lost. We have to thank intelligent
explorers for all we know of the mythical frog or toad in the moon:
an addition to our information which is not unworthy of thoughtful
notice.

The Selish race of North-west American Indians, who inhabit the
country between the Cascade and Rocky Mountains, have a
tradition, which Captain Wilson relates as follows: "The expression
of 'a toad in the moon,' equivalent to our 'man in the moon,' is
explained by a very pretty story relating how the little wolf, being
desperately in love with the toad, went a-wooing one night and
prayed that the moon might shine brightly on his adventure; his
prayer was granted, and by the clear light of a full moon he was
pursuing the toad, and had nearly caught her, when, as a last chance
of escape, she made a desperate spring on to the face of the moon,
where she remains to this day." [91] Another writer says that "the
Cowichan tribes think that the moon has a frog in it." [92]

From the Great Western we turn to the Great Eastern world, and in
China find the frog in the moon. "The famous astronomer Chang
Heng was avowedly a disciple of Indian teachers. The statement
given by Chang Heng is to the effect that 'How I, the fabled inventor
of arrows in the days of Yao and Shun,[*] obtained the drug of
immortality from Si Wang Mu (the fairy 'Royal Mother' of the
West); and Chang Ngo (his wife) having stolen it, fled to the moon,
and became the frog--_Chang-chu_--which is seen there.' The lady
_Chang-ngo_ is still pointed out among the shadows in the surface
of the Moon." [93] Dr. Wells Williams also tells us that in China
"the sun is symbolized by the figure of a raven in a circle, and the
moon by a rabbit on his hind legs pounding rice in a mortar, or by a
three-legged toad. The last refers to the legend of an ancient beauty,
Chang-ngo, who drank the liquor of immortality, and straightway
ascended to the moon, where she was transformed into a toad, still
to be traced in its face. It is a special object of worship in autumn,
and moon cakes dedicated