Yabusame, in the usual telling, is archery from horseback: a rider at full gallop loosing arrows at wooden targets, and a crowd that knows instantly whether he has hit. At the foot of Mount Fuji, at Omuro Sengen Shrine in Fujiyoshida, the arrows are the least important part.

What matters is the ground. After each run, the crowd looks not at the targets but at the track, where the horse's hooves have left marks in the sand. A man called the urabito, the reader, walks the course and interprets them. His family has done this for generations. From the shape of the prints he determines whether the coming year will bring conflict, or fire, or neither.

The riders prepare by withdrawing from ordinary life for a week beforehand, keeping a purification that begins in early September with a first assembly of the horses. The shrine keeps its own animals; you can visit them on any other day of the year.

On the 18th there is an evening festival, with a portable shrine built from Fuji's own lava carried through the streets. The main rite falls on the 19th.

The record holds that this has not been missed since the late Heian period. It is a strange thing to stand in a crowd waiting, not for a shot, but for someone to finish reading the sand.