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 Purchased by the Hammill Missionary Fund. 
 
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Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2015 
 
 https://archive.org/details/jinrikishadaysinOOscid 
 
MOUS MI 
 
JiNRiKiSHA Days in Japan 
 
 BY 
 
 ELIZA RUHAMAH SCIDMORE 
 
 “ \V'a"n kuni no Yaniato shima no ni idzuru hi \va; 
 Morokoshi hiio mo, awoga zarameya.” 
 
 “ In tlie ancient Yamato inland, my native land, the sun rises; 
 Must not even the Western foreigner reverence?” 
 
 Aucieut yafinnesi Poem. 
 
 “ I cannot cease from praising these Japanese. Tliey 
 are truly the delight of my heart.’* 
 
 St. Francis Xavirr. 
 
 ILLUSTRATED 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 HARPER & RROTHKRS, FRANRMN SQUARE 
 
Copyright, 1891, by Harper & Brothers. 
 
 All rights reserved 
 
PREFACE 
 
 The aim of this small book is to present, in out- 
 line sketches only, something of the Japan of to- 
 day, as it appeared to a tourist who was a foreign 
 resident as well. No one person can see it all, nor 
 comprehend it, as the jinrikisha speeds through 
 city streets and country roads, nor do any two peo- 
 ple enjoy just the same experiences or draw the 
 same conclusions as to this remarkable people. 
 
 The scientists, scholars, and specialists who have 
 written so fully of Japan, have necessarily omitted 
 many of those less important phases of life which 
 yet leave the pleasantest impressions on less seri- 
 ous minds. The books of ten or twenty years ago 
 hardly describe the country that a visitor now 
 finds, and in another decade the present aspect 
 will have greatly changed. Bewildered by its nov- 
 elty and strangeness, too many tourists come and 
 go with little knowledge of the Japan of the Jap- 
 anese, and, beholding only the modernized sea- 
 ports and the capital, miss the unique and distinc- 
 tively national sights and experiences that lie close 
 at hand. 
 
 This unassuming chronicle is the outcome of two 
 
 V 
 
Preface 
 
 visits, covering nearly three years’ stay in the Isl- 
 and Empire, a period during which a continued 
 residence was maintained, by turns, in each of the 
 larger ports, while many weeks were spent in Kioto, 
 Nara, and Nikko. Its object will be attained if it 
 helps the tourist to enjoy more satisfactorily his 
 stay in Japan, or if it gives the stay-at-home reader 
 a greater interest in those fascinating people and 
 their lovely home. Unfortunately, it is impossible 
 in acknowledging the kindness of the many Jap- 
 anese friends and acquaintances who secured to 
 • me so many unusual enjoyments and experiences, 
 to begin to give the long list of their names. Each 
 foreign visitor must feel himself indebted to the 
 whole race for being Japanese, and therefore the 
 most interesting population in the world, and his 
 obligation is to the whole people, as much as to 
 particular individuals. 
 
 To Mr. John Brisben Walker, of The Cosmopolitan, 
 thanks are extended for permission to reprint the 
 chapter entitled “The Japanese Theatre,” which 
 first appeared in the pages of that magazine. 
 
 E. R. S. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 CHAP. PAGE 
 
 I. THE NORTH PACIFIC AND YOKOHAMA ... I 
 
 II. YOKOHAMA lO 
 
 III. YOKOHAMA — CONTINUED 20 
 
 IV. THE ENVIRONS OF YOKOHAMA 28 
 
 V. KAMAKURA AND ENOSHIMA 38 
 
 VI. TOKIO 43 
 
 VII. TOKIO— CONTINUED 53 
 
 VIII. TOKIO FLOWER FESTIVALS 65 
 
 IX. JAPANESE HOSPITALITIES 86 
 
 X. THE JAPANESE THEATRE 96 
 
 XI. THE I.MPERIAL FAMILY Ill 
 
 XII. TOKIO PALACES AND COURT 1 25 
 
 XIII. THE SUBURBS OF TOKIO 1 34 
 
 XIV. A TRIP TO NIKKO 140 
 
 XV. NIKKO 147 
 
 XVI. CHIUZENJI AND YUMOTO 162 
 
 XVII. THE ASCENT OF FUJIYAMA 175 
 
 XVIII. THE DESCENT OF FUJIYAMA 183 
 
 XIX. THE TOKAIDO — I 189 
 
 XX. THE TOKAIDO — II I97 
 
 XXI. NAGOYA 206 
 
 XXII. LAKE imVA AND KIOTO 2l6 
 
 XXIII. KIOTO TEMPLES 226 
 
 XXIV. THE MONTO TEMPLES AND THE DAI.MONJI . 236 
 
 XXV. THE PALACES AND CASTLE 244 
 
 XXVI. KIOTO SILK INDUSTRY 255 
 
 XXVII. E.MBROIDERIES AND CURIOS 267 
 
 vii 
 
Contents 
 
 CHAP. 
 
 XXVIII. 
 
 XXIX. 
 
 XXX. 
 
 XXXI. 
 
 XXXII. 
 
 XXXIII. 
 
 XXXIV. 
 
 XXXV. 
 
 XXXVI. 
 
 XXXVII. 
 
 PACE 
 
 POTTERIES AND PAPER WARES 
 
 GOLDEN DAYS 285 
 
 SENKfi AND THE MERCHANTS’ DINNER . . 296 
 
 THROUGH UJI TO NARA 304. 
 
 NARA 320 
 
 OSAKA 331 
 
 KOBE AND ARIMA . . ' 340 
 
 THE TEA TRADE 350 
 
 THE INLAND SEA AND NAGASAKI .... 358 
 
 IN THE END 368 
 
 index 377 
 
ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 MO us MI Frontispiece 
 
 FUJIYAMA 5 
 
 JAPANESE CHILDREN 17 
 
 AT KAWAWA 3° 
 
 THE semi’s cage 55 
 
 AT A FLOWER SHOW 67 
 
 A UY^NO TEA-HOUSE 7 1 
 
 IN A florist’s garden 75 
 
 WISTARIA-VINE AT KASUKABE 79 
 
 IN DANGO-ZAKA STREET 82 
 
 THE FLORAL KWANNON 83 
 
 SLAYING THE DEMON 85 
 
 CHOPSTICKS — FIGS. I AND 2 88 
 
 CHOPSTICKS — FIG. 3 .89 
 
 THE NESANS AT THE HOISHIGAOKA 93 
 
 MATSUDA. THE MASTER OF CHA NO YU 94 
 
 SCENE FROM THE PLAY OF THE “FORTY-SEVEN RO- 
 
 NINS” '07 
 
 IN THE PALACE GARDENS I '5 
 
 IN THE PALACE GARDENS 117 
 
 IN THE PALACE GARDENS I2I 
 
 PLAN OF emperor’s PRIVATE APARTMENTS . ... \2J 
 
 IMPERIAL SAKE-CUP 129 
 
 INTERIOR OF THE lYEMITSU TEMPLE I 51 
 
 GATE-WAY OF THE lYEYASU TEMPLE 1 55 
 
 FARM LABORERS AND PACK-HORSE 163 
 
 PUBLIC BATH-HOUSE AT YUMOTO 17 1 
 
 ix 
 
Illustrations 
 
 PAGE 
 
 THE SHOJO 213 
 
 THE GREAT PINE-TREE AT KARASAKI . . . . . 219 
 
 THE TRUE-LOVER’S SHRINE AT KIOMIDZU . . . .231 
 
 THE THRONE OF 1S68 248 
 
 KABE HABUTAI 262 
 
 CHIRIMEN 263 
 
 EBISU CHIRIMEN 264 
 
 KINU CHIRIMEN 265 
 
 FUKJJSA 270 
 
 MANJI 272 
 
 MITSU TOMOYE 273 
 
 IN nammikawa’s work-room 288 
 
 PICKING TEA 305 
 
 IN THE KASTJGA TEMPLE GROUNDS 317 
 
 IN THE TEA-HOUSE . . 324 
 
 FARM LABORERS 347 
 
 X 
 
JINRIKISHA DAYS IN JAPAN 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 THE NORTH PACIFIC AND YOKOHAMA 
 
 All the Orient is a surprise to the Occidental. Every- 
 thing is strange, with a certain unreality that makes one 
 doubt half his sensations. To appreciate Japan one 
 should come to it from the main-land of Asia. From 
 Suez to Nagasaki the .Asiatic sits dumb and contented 
 in his dirt, rags, ignorance, and wretchedness. After 
 the muddy rivers, dreary Hats, and brown hills of China, 
 after the desolate shores of Korea, with their unlovely 
 and unwashed peoples, Japan is a dream of Paradise, 
 beautiful from the first green island off the coast to the 
 last picturesque hill-top. The houses seem toys, their 
 inhabitants dolls, whose manner of life is clean, pretty, 
 artistic, and distinctive. 
 
 There is a greater difference between the people of 
 these idyllic islands and of the two countries to west- 
 ward, than between the physical characteristics of the 
 three kingdoms; and one recognizes the Japanese as 
 the fine flower of the Orient, the most polite, refined, 
 and aesthetic of races, happy, light-hearted, friendly, and 
 attractive. 
 
 The bold and irregular coast is rich in color, the per- 
 ennial green of the hill-side is deep and soft, and the 
 perfect cone of Fujiyama against the sky completes the 
 landscape, grown so familiar on fan, lantern, box, and 
 
yinrikiska Days in Japa?i 
 
 plate. Every-day life looks too theatrical, too full of 
 artistic and decorative effects, to be actual and serious, 
 and streets and shops seem set with deliberately studied 
 scenes and carefully posed groups. Half consciously 
 the spectator waits for the bell to ring and the curtain 
 to drop. 
 
 The voyage across the North Pacific is lonely and 
 monotonous. Between San Francisco and Yokohama 
 hardly a passing sail is seen. When the Pacific Mail 
 Steamship Company established the China line their 
 steamers sailed on prescribed routes, and outward and 
 homeward-bound ships met regularly in mid-ocean. 
 Now, when not obliged to touch at Honolulu, the cap- 
 tains choose their route for each voyage, either sailing 
 straight across from San Francisco, in 37° 47', to Yoko- 
 hama, in 35° 26' N., or, following one of the great cir- 
 cles farther north, thus lessen time and distance. On 
 these northern meridians the weather is always cold, 
 threatening, or stormy, and the sea rough ; but the stead- 
 iness of the winds favors this course, and persuades the 
 ship’s officers to encounter wet decks, torn sails, de- 
 structive seas, and the grumbling of passengers. Dwell- 
 ers in hot climates suffer by the sudden transition to 
 polar waters, and all voyagers dislike it. Fortunately, 
 icebergs cannot float down the shallow reaches of Behr- 
 ing Strait, but fierce winds blow through the gaps and 
 passes in the Aleutian Islands. 
 
 Canadian Pacific steamers, starting on the 49th par- 
 allel, often pass near the shores of Attu, the last little 
 fragment of earth swinging at the end of the great Aleu- 
 tian chain. The shelter which those capable navigators, 
 Mrs. Leeks and Mrs. Aleshine, had the luck to find in 
 iheir memorable journey, mariners declare to be Mid- 
 way Island, a circular dot of land in the great waste, 
 with a long, narrow, outlying sand-bar, where schooners 
 have been wrecked, and castaways rescued after months 
 
The North Pacific and Yokohama 
 
 of imprisonment. The steamer's course from San Fran- 
 cisco to Yokohama varies from 4500 to 4800 miles, and 
 the journey takes from twelve to sixteen days. From 
 Vancouver to Yokohama it is seventy hours shorter. 
 
 When the ship's course turns perceptibly southward 
 the mild weather of the Japan Stream is felt. In winter 
 the first sign of land is a distant silver dot on the hori- 
 zon, which in summer turns to blue or violet, and grad- 
 ually enlarges into the tapering cone of Fuji, sloping up- 
 ward in faultless lines from the water’s edge. One may 
 approach land many times and never see Fuji, and dur- 
 ing my first six months in Japan the matchless mountain 
 refused to show herself from any point of view. Cape 
 King, terminating the long peninsula that shelters Yeddo 
 J 5 ay, shows first a line of purple cliffs, and then a front 
 of terraced hills, green with rice and wheat, or golden 
 with grain or stubble. Fleets of square-sailed fishing- 
 boats drift by, their crews, in the loose. Happing gowns 
 and universal blue cotton head towels of the Japanese 
 coolies, easily working the broad oar at the stern. At 
 night Cape King's welcome beacon is succeeded by Ka- 
 nonsaki’s lantern across the Bay, Sagami's bright light, 
 then the myriad flashes of the Yokosuka navy-yard, and 
 last the red ball of the light-ship, marking the edge of 
 the shoal a mile outside the Bund, or sea-wall, of Yoko- 
 hama. When this craft runs up its signal-flag a United 
 States man-of-war, if there be one in port, fires two 
 guns, as a signal that the American mail has arrived. 
 
 Daylight reveals a succession of terraced hills, cleft 
 by narrow green valleys and narrower ravines ; little vil- 
 lages, their clusters of thatched roofs shaded by pine, 
 palm, or bamboo ; fishing-boats always in the foreground, 
 and sometimes Fuji clear-cut against the sky, its base 
 lost now and then behind the overlapping hills. In 
 summer Fuji’s purple cone shows only ribbon stripes of 
 white near its apex. For the rest of the year it is a 
 
 3 
 
Jinrikiska Days in Japan 
 
 silvery, shining vision, rivalled only by Mount Rainier, 
 which, pale with eternal snows, rises from tbe dense 
 forests of Puget Sound to glass itself in those green wa- 
 ters. 
 
 Yokohama disappoints the traveller, after the splen- 
 did panorama of the Bay. The Bund, or sea-road, with 
 its club-houses, hotels, and residences fronting the wa- 
 ter, is not Oriental enough to be very picturesque. It 
 is too European to be Japanese, and too Japanese to be 
 European. 'Phe water front, which suffers by compari- 
 son with the massive stone buildings of Chinese ports, 
 is, however, a creditable contrast to our untidy Ameri- 
 can docks and quays, notwithstanding the low -tiled 
 roofs, blank fences, and hedges. The water life is vivid 
 and spectacular. The fleet of black merchant steamers 
 and white men-of-wnr, the ugly pink and red canal-steam- 
 ers, and the crowding brigs and barks, are far outnum- 
 bered by the fleet of sampans that instantly surround 
 the arriving mail. Steam-launches, serving as mail-wag- 
 on and hotel omnibus, snort, puff, and whistle at the 
 gang-ways before the buoy is reached ; and voluble boat- 
 men keep up a steady bzz, hzz, sckizz, whizz, to the strokes 
 of their crooked, wobbling oars as they scull in and out. 
 Four or five thousand people live on the shipping in the 
 harbor, and in ferrying this population to and fro and 
 purveying to it the boatmen make their livelihood. Strict 
 police regulations keep them safe and peaceable, and the 
 harbor impositions of other countries are unknown. On 
 many of these sampans the whole family abides, the 
 women cooking over a handful of charcoal in a small 
 box or bowl, the children playing in corners not occu- 
 pied by passengers or freight. On gala days, when the 
 shipping is decorated, the harbor is a beautiful sight; or 
 when the salutes of the foreign fleets assembled at Yoko- 
 i’.ama are returned by the guns of the fort on Kanagawa 
 Heights, and the air tingles with excitement. Only three 
 
FUJIYAMA 
 
The North Pacific and Yokohama 
 
 of the large mail steamers, with a lone man-of-war or a 
 sporadic sailing-ship, ever fly the Stars and Stripes 
 among a forest of masts fluttering with the flags of all 
 nations. The American navy is conspicuous by its ab- 
 sence, unless a venerable wooden side-wheeler represents 
 the might of the world’s 'most boastful country. A fleet 
 of otter schooners flies the American flag, and enjoys 
 seal-hunting in the Northern Ocean without disturbing 
 international relations. 
 
 A mole and protected harbor with stone docks is be- 
 ing built with the money only lately returned to Japan 
 by the United States, after being shamefully withheld 
 for a quarter of a century, as our share of the Shiinono- 
 seki Indemnity Fund. The present basin lies so open 
 to the prevailing south-east winds that loading and un- 
 loading is often delayed for days, and landing by launch- 
 es or sampans is a wet process. 'I’he Eay is so shallow 
 that a stiff wind quickly sends its waves breaking over 
 the sea-wall, to subside again in a few hours into a mir- 
 ror-like calm. The harbor has had its great typhoons, 
 but does not lie in the centre of those dreaded circular 
 storms that whirl up from the China seas. Deflected to 
 eastward, the typhoon sends its syphoon, or wet end, to 
 fill the air with vapor and drizzle, and a smothering, mil- 
 dewy, e.xhausting atmosphere. A film of mist covers 
 everything, wall -paper loosens, glued things fall apart, 
 and humanity wilts. 
 
 Yokohama has its divisions — the Settlement, the Bluff, 
 and Japanese Town — each of which is a considerable 
 place by itself. The Settlement, or region originally set 
 apart by the Japanese in 1858 for foreign merchants, 
 was made by filling in a swampy valley opening to the 
 Bay. This Settlement, at first separated from the To- 
 kaido and the Japanese town of KanagawM, has become 
 the centre of a surrounding Japanese population of over 
 eighty thousand. It is built up continuously to Kana- 
 
 7 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 gawa Bridge, two miles farther north, on the edge of a 
 bold bluff, where the Tokaido — the East Sea Road — 
 leading up from Kioto, reaches the Bay. In diplomatic 
 papers Kanagawa is still recognized as the name of the 
 great port on Yeddo Bay, although the consulates, banks, 
 hotels, clubs, and business streets are miles away. 
 
 At the hatoba, or landing-place, the traveller is confront- 
 ed by the jinrikisha, that big, two-wheeled baby-carriage 
 of the country, which, invented by an American, has been 
 adopted all over the East. The jinrikisha (or kuritma, 
 as the linguist and the upper class more politely call it) 
 ranges in price from seventeen to forty dollars, twenty 
 being the average cost of those on the public stands. 
 Some thrifty coolies own their vehicles, but the greater 
 number either rent them from, or work for, companies, 
 and each jinrikisha pays a small annual tax to the Gov- 
 ernment. An unwritten rule of the road compels these 
 carriages to follow one another in regulated single file. 
 The oldest or most honored person rides at the head of 
 the line, and only a boor would attempt to change the 
 order of arrangement. Spinning down the Bund, at the 
 rate of ten cents a single trip to hotel or station, ten cents 
 an hour, or seventy-five cents a day, one finds the jin- 
 rikisha to be a comfortable, flying arm-chair-- a little pri- 
 vate, portable throne. The coolie wears a loose coat 
 and waistcoat, and tights of dark-blue cotton, with straw 
 sandals on his bare feet, and an inverted washbowl of 
 straw covered with cotton on his head. When it rains 
 he is converted into a prickly porcupine by his straw 
 rain-coat, or he dons a queer apron and cloak of oiled 
 paper, and, pulling up the hood of the little carriage, 
 ties a second apron of oiled paper across the knees of 
 his fare. At night the shafts are ornamented with a pa- 
 per lantern bearing his name and his license number; 
 and these glowworm lights, flitting through the streets 
 and country roads in the darkness, seem only another 
 
The North Pacific and Yokohama 
 
 expression of the Japanese love of the picturesque. In 
 the country, after dark, they call warnings of ruts, holes, 
 breaks in the road, or coining crossways; and their cries, 
 running from one to another down the line, are not un- 
 musical. To this smiling, polite, and amiable little pony 
 one says Hayaku for Abunayo I for “ take care,” 
 
 Sukoshimate ! for “stop a little,” and Soro! for “slowly.” 
 The last command is often needed when the coolie, lean- 
 ing back at an acute angle to the shaft, dashes down- 
 hill at a rapid gait. Jinrikisha coolies are said even to 
 have asked extra pay for walking slowly through the fas- 
 cinating streets of open shops. If you experiment with 
 the jinrikisha on a level road, you find that it is only tlie 
 first pull that is hard ; once started, the little carriage 
 seems to rup by itself. The gait of the man in the shafts, 
 and his height, determine the comfort of the ride. A 
 tall coolie holds the shafts too high, and tilts one at an 
 uncomfortable angle ; a very short man makes the best 
 runner, and, with big toe curling upward, will trot along 
 as regularly as a horse. As one looks down upon the 
 bobbing creature below a hat and two feet seem to con- 
 stitute the whole motor. 
 
 The ivaraji, or sandals, worn by these coolies are 
 woven of rice straw, and cost less than half a cent a 
 pair. In the good old days they were much cheaper. 
 Every village and farm house make them, and every shop 
 sells them. In their manufacture the bijr toe is a creat 
 assistance, as this highly trained member catches and 
 holds the strings while the hands weave. On country 
 roads wrecks of old waraji lie scattered where the wear- 
 er stepped out of them and ran on, while ruts and mud- 
 holes are filled with them. For long tramps the for- 
 eigner finds the waraji and the/ir/v, or digitated stocking, 
 much better than his own clumsy boots, and he ties them 
 on as overshoes when he has rocky paths to climb. Coo- 
 lies often dispense with waraji and wear heavy tabi, with 
 
 9 
 
Jtnrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 a strip of the almost indestructible hechima fibre for the 
 soles. The hechima is the gourd which furnishes the 
 vegetable washrag, or looffa sponge of commerce. 'I'he 
 snow-white cotton tabis of the better classes are made an 
 important part of their costume. 
 
 Those coolies who pull and push heavily loaded carts 
 or drays keep up a hoarse chant, which corresponds to 
 the chorus of sailors when hauling ropes. '‘‘Hilda! 
 Hoida!" they seem to be crying, as they brace their feet 
 for a hard pull, and the very sound of it exhausts the lis- 
 tener. In the old days people were nearly deafened with 
 these street choruses, but their use is another of the he- 
 reditary customs that is fast dying out. In mountain 
 districts one’s chair - bearers wheeze out "Hi rikisha I 
 Ho rikisha!” or "Ito sha! lio sha!” as they climb the 
 steepest paths, and they cannot keep step nor work vig- 
 orously without their chant. 
 
 CHAPTER II 
 YOKOHAMA 
 
 The Settlement is bounded by the creek, from whose 
 opposite side many steep hill-roads wind up to the Bluff, 
 where most of the foreigners have their houses. These 
 bluff- roads pass between the hedges surrounding trim 
 villas with their beautifully set gardens, the irregular 
 numbering of whose gates soon catches the stranger’s 
 eye. The first one built being number one, the others 
 were numbered in the order of their erection, so that 
 high and low numerals are often side by side. To coo- 
 lies, servants, peddlers, and puiA^eyors, foreign residents 
 are best known by their street-door numeration, and 
 ‘ Number four Gentleman ” and “Number five Lady” 
 
Yokohama 
 
 are recurrent and adequate descriptions. So well used 
 are the subjects of it to this convict system of identifica- 
 tion that they recognize their friends by their alias as 
 readily as the natives do. 
 
 Upon the Bluff stand a public hall, United States and 
 British marine hospitals, a French and a German hos- 
 pital, several missionary establishments, and the houses 
 of the large American missionary community. At the ex- 
 treme west end a colony of Japanese florists has planted 
 toy-gardens filled with vegetable miracles; burlesques 
 and fantasies of horticulture; dwarf-trees, a hundred 
 years old, that could be put in the pocket; huge single 
 flowers, and marvellous masses of smaller blossoms ; 
 cherry-trees that bear no cherries ; plum-trees that bloom 
 in midwinter, but have neither leaves nor fruit; and roses 
 — that favorite flower which the foreigner brought with 
 him — flowering in Californian profusion. A large busi- 
 ness is done in the exportation of Japanese plants and 
 bulbs, encased in a thick coating of mud, which makes 
 an air-tight case to protect them during the sea-voyage. 
 Ingenious fern pieces are preserved in the same way. 
 'I'hese grotesque things are produced by wrapping in 
 moist earth the long, woody roots of a fine-leafed variety 
 of fern. They are made to imitate dragons, junks, tem- 
 ples, boats, lanterns, pagodas, bells, balls, circles, and 
 every familiar object. When bought they look dead. If 
 hung for a few days in the warm sun, and occasionally 
 dipped in water, they change into feathery, green objects 
 that grow more and more beautiful, and are far more 
 artistic than our one conventional hanging-basket. The 
 dwarf- trees do not stand transportation well, as they 
 either die or begin to grow rapidly. 
 
 'I'he Japanese are the foremost landscape gardeners 
 in the world, as we Occidentals, who are still in that 
 barbaric period where carpet gardening seems beautiful 
 and desirable, shall in time discover. Their genius has 
 
’Jinrikisha Days in Japa)i 
 
 equal plaj' in an area of a yard or a thousand feet, and 
 a Japanese gardener will doubtless come to be consid- 
 ered as necessary a part of a great American establish- 
 ment as a French maid or an English coachman. From 
 generations of nature-loving and flower worshipping an- 
 cestors these gentle followers of Adam’s profession have 
 inherited an intimacy with growing things, and a power 
 over them that we cannot even understand. Their very 
 farming is artistic gardening, and their gardening half 
 necromancy. 
 
 On high ground, beyond the Bluff proper, stretches 
 the race-course, where spring and fall there are running 
 races by short-legged, shock-headed ponies, brought from 
 the Flokkaido, the northern island, or from China. Gen- 
 tlemen jockeys frequently ride their own horses in flat 
 races, hurdle-races, or steeple-chases. The banks close, 
 a general holiday reigns throughout the town, and often 
 the Emperor comes down from Tokio. This race-course 
 affords one of the best views of Fuji, and from it curves 
 the road made in early days for the sole use of foreign- 
 ers to keep them off the Tokaido, where they had more 
 than once come in conflict with trains of travelling no- 
 bles. This road leads down to the water's edge, and, 
 following the shore of Mississippi Bay, where Commo- 
 dore Perry’s ships anchored in 1858, strikes across a rice 
 valley and climbs to the Bluff again. 
 
 The farm-houses it passes are so picturesque that one 
 cannot believe them to have a utilitarian purpose. They 
 seem more like stage pictures about to be rolled away 
 than like actual dwellings. The new thatches are bright- 
 ly yellow, and the old thatches are toned and mellowed, 
 set with weeds, and dotted with little gray-green bunches 
 of “hen and chickens,” while along the ridge-poles is a 
 bed of growing lilies. There is an old wife's tale to the 
 effect that the women’s face-powder was formerly made 
 of lily-root, and that a ruler who wished to stamp out 
 
Yokohama 
 
 such vanities, decreed that the plant should not be grown 
 on the face of the earth, whereupon the people promptly 
 dug it up from their gardens and planted it in boxes on 
 the roof. 
 
 The Japanese section of Yokohama is naturally less 
 Japanese than places more remote from foreign influ- 
 ence, but the stranger discovers much that is odd, unique, 
 and Oriental. That delight of the shopper, Honchodori, 
 with its fine curio and silk shops, is almost without a 
 shop-window, the entire front of the cheaper shops being 
 open to tlie streets. But the old lacquer and bronzes, 
 ivory, porcelains, enamels, silver, and silks of Chojiro, 
 Matsuishiya, Musashiya, Shieno, Shobey, and Kinuya are 
 concealed by high wooden screens and walls. The silk 
 shops are filled with goods distracting to the foreign 
 buyer, among which are the wadded silk wrappers, made 
 and sold by the hundreds, which, being the contrivance 
 of some ingenious missionary, were long known as mis- 
 sionary coats. 
 
 Ben ten Dori, the bargain -hunter’s Paradise, is a de- 
 lightful quarter of a mile of open-fronted shops. In the 
 silk shops, crapes woven in every variety of cockle and 
 wrinkle and rippling surface, as thin as gauze, or as thick 
 and heavy as brocade, painted in endless, exquisite de- 
 signs, are brought you by the basketful. Each length is 
 rolled on a stick, and finally wrapped in a bit of the 
 coarse yellow cotton cloth that envelopes every choice 
 thing in Japan, though for what reason, no native or for- 
 eigner, dealer or connoisseur can tell. 
 
 Xozawaya has a godown or fire-proof storehouse full 
 of cotton crapes, those charmingly artistic fabrics that 
 the Western world has just begun to appreciate. The 
 pock-marked and agile proprietor will keep his small 
 boys running for half an hour to bring in basketfuls of 
 cotton crape rolls, each roll measuring a little over eleven 
 yards, which will make one straight, narrow kimono with 
 
 >3 
 
yinrikisha Days in yapan 
 
 a pair of big sleeves. 'I'hese goods are woven in the 
 usual thirteen-inch Japanese width, although occasionally 
 made wider for the foreign market. A Japanese kimono 
 is a simple thing, and one may put on the finished gar- 
 ment an hour after choosing the cloth to make it. The 
 cut never varies, and it is still sewn with basters’ stitches, 
 although the use of foreign flat-irons obviates the neces- 
 sity of ripping the kimono apart to wash and iron it. 
 The Japanese flat-iron is a copper bowl filled with burn- 
 ing charcoal, which, with its long handle, is really a small 
 warming-pan. Besides this contrivance, there is a flat 
 arrow point of iron with a shorter handle, whicn does 
 smaller and quite as ineffectual service. 
 
 To an American, nothing is simpler than Japanese 
 money. The yen corresponds to our dollar, and is made 
 up of one hundred sen, while ten rin make one sen. The 
 yen is about equal in value to the Mexican dollar, and is 
 roughly reckoned at seventy-five cents United States 
 money. One says dollars or yens indiscriminately, al- 
 ways meaning the Mexican, which is fire current coin of 
 the East. The old copper coins, the rin and the oval 
 tempo, each with a hole in the middle, are disappearing 
 from circulation, and at the Osaka mint they are melted 
 and made into round sens. Old gold and silver coins 
 may be bought in the curio shops. If they have not little 
 oblong silver bu, or a long oval gold ko ban, the silversmith 
 will offer to make some, which will answer every purpose ! 
 
 When you ask for your bill, a merchant takes up his 
 frame of sliding buttons — the soroban, or abacus — and 
 plays a clattering measure before he can tell its amount. 
 The soroban is infallible, though slow, and in the head of 
 the educated Japanese, crowded with thousands of arbi- 
 trary characters and words, there is no room for mental 
 arithmetic. You buy two toys at ten cents apiece. Clat- 
 ter, clatter goes the soroban, and the calculator asks you 
 for twenty cents. Depending entirely on the soroban. 
 
Yokohama 
 
 they seem unable to reckon the smallest sums without 
 it, and any peddler who forgets to bring his frame may 
 be puzzled. The dealer in old embroideries will twist 
 and work his face, scratch his head, and move his fingers 
 in the air upon an imaginary soroban over the simplest 
 addition, division, and subtraction. At the bank, the 
 shroff \\2i% a soroban a yard long; and merchants say 
 that in book-keeping the soroban is invaluable, as by its 
 use whole columns of figures can be added and proved 
 in less time than by our mental methods. 
 
 By an iron bridge, the broad street at the top of Ben- 
 ten Dori crosses one of the many canals e.xtending from 
 the creek in every direction, and forming a net work of 
 water passages from Mississippi Bay to Kanagawa. Be- 
 yond the bridge is Isezakicho, a half mile of theatres, 
 side-shows, merry-go rounds, catchpenny games, candy 
 shops, restaurants, second - hand clothes bazaars, laby- 
 rinths of curio, toy, china, and wooden - ware shops. 
 Hundreds of perambulating restaurateurs trundle their 
 little kitchens along, or swing them on a pole over their 
 shoulders. Dealers in ice-cream, so called, abound, who 
 will shave you a glass of ice, sprinkle it with sugar, and 
 furnish a minute teaspoon with which to eat it. There 
 are men who sell soba, a native vermicelli, eaten with 
 pungent soy ; and men who, for a penny, heat a big grid- 
 iron, and give a small boy a cup of batter and a cup of 
 soy, with which he may cook and eat his own griddle 
 cakes. There the people, the middle and lower classes, 
 present themselves for study and admiration, and the 
 spectator never wearies of the outside dramas and pano- 
 ramas to be seen in this merry fair. 
 
 Pretty as she is on a pictured fan, the living Japanese 
 woman is far more satisfying to the esthetic soul as she 
 patters along on her wooden clogs or straw sandals- 
 The very poorest, in her single cheap cotton gown, oi 
 
 «s 
 
yinrikisha Days zn Japan 
 
 kimono, is as picturesque as her richer sister in silk and 
 crape. With heads elaborately dressed, and folds of gay 
 crape, or a glittering hair-pin thrust in the smooth loops 
 of blue-black hair, they seem always in gala arrays and, 
 rain or shine, never protect those elaborate coiffures with 
 anything less ornamental than a paper umbrella, except 
 in winter, when the zzzkin, a yard of dark crape lined 
 with a contrasting color, is thrown over the head, con- 
 cealing the whole face save the eyes. A single hair-pin 
 of tortoise-shell, sometimes tipped with coral or gold, is 
 all that respectable women of any class wear at one time. 
 The heavily hair-pinned women on cheap fans are not 
 members of good society, and only children and dancing- 
 girls are seen in the fantastic flowers and trifles sold at 
 a hundred shops and booths in this and every street. 
 
 The little children are the most characteristically Jap- 
 anese of all Japanese sights. Babies are carried about 
 tied to the mothers’ back, or to that of their small sisters. 
 They sleep with their heads rolling helplessly round, 
 watch all that goes on with their black beads of eyes, and 
 never cry. Their shaven crov.ns and gay little kimonos, 
 their wise, serene countenances, make them look like 
 cabinet curios. As soon as she can walk, the Japanese 
 girl has her doll tied on her back, until she learns to 
 carry it steadily and carefully; after that the baby broth- 
 er or sister succeeds the doll, and flocks of these comical 
 little people, with lesser people on their backs, wander 
 late at night in the streets with their parents, and their 
 funny double set of eyes shine in eveiy audience along 
 Isezakicho. 
 
 These out-of-door attractions are constantly changing. 
 Native inventions and adaptations of foreign ideas con- 
 tinually appear. “ Pigs in clover ” and pot-hook puzzles 
 followed only a few weeks behind their New York sea- 
 son, and street fakirs offer perpetual novelties. Of jug- 
 glers the line is endless, their performances filling inter- 
 
 i6 
 
JAl'ANKbE CIIU.DKl.N 
 
Yokohama 
 
 ludes at theatres, coming between the courses of great 
 dinners, and supplying entertainment to any garden par- 
 ty or flower fete in the homes of rich hosts. More cun- 
 ning than these gorgeously clad jugglers is an old man, 
 who roams the vicinity of Yokohama, wearing poor cot- 
 ton garments, and carrying two baskets of properties by 
 a pole across his shoulders. On a street corner, a lawn, 
 a piazza, or a ship’s deck, he sets up his baskets for a 
 table, and performs amazing feats with the audience en- 
 tirely encircling him. A hatful of coppers sufficiently re- 
 wards him, and he swallows fire, spits out eggs, needles, 
 lanterns, and yards of paper-ribbon, which he twirls into 
 a bowl, converts into actual soba, and eats, and by a 
 magic sentence changes the remaining vermicelli into 
 the lance-like leaves of the iris plant. This magician 
 has a shrewd, foxy old face, whose grimaces, as well as 
 his pantomime, his capers, and poses, are tricks in them- 
 selves. His chuckling, rippling stream of talk keeps his 
 Japanese auditors convulsed. Sword walkers and knife 
 swallowers are plenty as blackberries, and the phono- 
 graph is conspicuous in Isezakicho’s tents and booths. 
 The sceptic and investigator wastes his time in the effort 
 to penetrate the Japanese jugglers’ mysteries. Once, at 
 a dinner given by Governor Tateno at Osaka, the foreign 
 guest of honor determined to be cheated by no optical 
 delusions. He hardly winked, so close was his scrutiny, 
 and the juggler played directly to him. An immense 
 porcelain vase having been brought in and set in the 
 middle of the room, the juggler, crawling up, let himself 
 down into it slowly. For half an hour the sceptic did 
 not raise his eyes from the vase, that he had first proved 
 to be sound and empty, and to stand on no trap-door. 
 After this prolonged watch the rest of the company as- 
 sailed him with laughter and jeers, and pointed to his 
 side, where the old juggler had been seated for some 
 minutes fanning himself. 
 
 •9 
 
Jinriktska Days in Japan 
 
 CHAPTER Iir 
 
 <- YOKOHAMA — CONTINUED 
 
 In the Settlement, back of the main street, the Chi- 
 nese have an ill-smelling corner to themselves. Their 
 greasy walls and dirty floors affront the dainty doll dwell- 
 ings across the creek, and the airy little box of a tea- 
 house, whose lanterns swing at the top of the perpen- 
 dicular bluff behind them. Vermilion paper, baggy 
 clothes, pigtails, harsh voices, and vile odors reign in 
 this Chinatown. The names on the signs are curiosities 
 in themselves, and Cock Eye, tailor. Ah Nie and Wong 
 Fai, ladies’ tailors, are the Poole, Worth, and Felix of the 
 foreign community. Only one Japanese has a great rep- 
 utation as dress-maker, but the whole guild is moderately 
 successful, and prices are so low that the British and 
 French houses of Yokohama cannot compete with them. 
 
 There is a large joss-house near the Chinese consulate, 
 and at their midsummer, autumn, and New-year’s festi- 
 vals the Celestials hold a carnival of lanterns, fire-crackers, 
 incense, paper-flowers, varnished pigs, and cakes. The 
 Japanese do not love these canny neighbors, and half 
 the strictures of the passport laws are designed to lim- 
 it their hold on the business of the country. The Chi- 
 nese are the stronger and more aggressive people, the 
 hard-headed financiers of the East, handling all the 
 money that circulates this side of India. In ever}’ bank 
 Chinese shroffs, or experts, test the coins and make the 
 actual payments over the counters. The money-changers 
 are Chinese, and every business house has its Chinese 
 
 20 
 
Yokohama 
 
 compradorc or superintendent, through whom all con- 
 tracts and payments are made. The Chinaman has the 
 methodical, systematic brain, and no convulsion of nat- 
 ure or commerce makes him lose his head, as the charm- 
 ingly erratic, artistic, and polite Japanese does. In many 
 foreign households in Japan a Chinese butler, or head 
 boy, rules the establishment ; but while his silent, unvary- 
 ing. clock-like service leaves nothing undone, the attend- 
 ance of the bright-faced, amiable, and exuberant little 
 natives with their smiles, their matchless courtesy, and 
 their graceful and everlasting bowing is far more agree- 
 able. 
 
 Homura temple, whose stone embankments and soaring 
 roof rise just across the creek, is generally the first Budd- 
 hist sanctuary seen by the tourist coming from American 
 shores. Everv month it has its matsuri, or festival, but 
 sparrows are always twittering in the eaves, children play- 
 ing about the steps, and devout ones tossing their coppers 
 in on the mats, clapping their hands and pressing their 
 palms together while they pray. One of the most impress- 
 ive scenes ever witnessed there was the funeral of its high- 
 priest, when more than a hundred bonzes, or priests, came 
 from neighboring temples to assist in the long ceremonies, 
 and sat rigid in their precious brocade vestments, chant- 
 ing the ritual and the sacred verse. The son, who suc- 
 ceeded to the father’s office by inheritance, had prepared 
 for the rites by days of fasting, and, pale, hollow-eyed, 
 but ecstatic, burned incense, chanted, and in the white 
 robes of a mourner bore the mortuary tablets from the 
 temple to the tomb. Homura’s commercial hum was 
 silenced when the train of priests in glittering robes, 
 shaded by enormous red umbrellas, wound down the 
 long terrace steps and out between the rows of tiny 
 shops to the distant graveyard. Yet after it the crowd 
 closed in, barter and sale went on, jinrikishas whirled 
 up and down, and pattering women and toddling children 
 
 21 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 I fell into their places in the tableaux which turn Homu- 
 ra’s chief street into one endless panorama of Japanese 
 lower-class life. 
 
 Half-way up one of the steep roads, climbing from 
 Homura to the Bluff, is the famous silk store of Tenabe 
 Gengoro, with its dependent tea-house of Segiyama, best 
 known of all tea-houses in Japan, and rendezvous for the 
 wardroom officers of the fleets of all nations, since Te- 
 nabe’s uncle gave official welcome to Commodore Perry'. 
 ^Vhen a war-ship is in port, the airy little lantern-hung 
 houses continuously' send out the music of the ^o/a and 
 the samiscn, the banjo, bones, and zither, choruses of 
 song and laughter, and the measured hand-clapp;ng that 
 proclaims good cheer in Japan. Tenabe herself has now 
 lost the perfect bloom and beauty of her younger days, 
 but with her low, silver-sweet voice and fascinating man- 
 ner. she remains the most charming woman in all Japan. 
 In these days Tenabe presides over the silk store only, 
 leaving her sisters to manage the fortunes of the tea- 
 house. Tenabe speaks English, French, and Russian; 
 never forgets a face, a name, or an incident ; and if you 
 enter, after an absence of many y'ears, she will surely 
 recognize y'ou, serve you sweets and thimble-cups of pale 
 yellow tea. and say dozo, dozo, “please, please,” with grace 
 incomparable and in accents unapproachable. 
 
 Both living and travelling are delightfully easy in 
 Japan, and no hardships are encountered in the ports 
 or on the great routes of travel. Yokohama has excel- 
 lent hotels ; the home of the foreign resident may be 
 Queen Anne, or Colonial, if he like, and the markets 
 abound in meats, fish, game, fruits, and vegetables at 
 very' low prices. Imported supplies are dear because of 
 the cost of transportation. Besides the fruits of our cli- 
 mates, there are the Inwa, or loquat, and the delicious kake, 
 or Japanese persimmon. Natural ice is brought from 
 Hakodate ; artificial ice is made in all the ports, the 
 
Yokohama 
 
 Japanese being as fond of iced drinks as Americans. 
 Three daily English newspapers, weekly mails to Lon- 
 don and New York, three great cable routes, electric 
 lights, breweries, gas, and water -works add utilitarian 
 comfort to ideal picturesqueness. The summers are hot, 
 but instead of our eccentric variations of temperature, 
 the mercury stands at 8o°, 85°, and 90° from July to Sep- 
 tember. With the fresh monsoon blowing steadily, that 
 heat is endurable, however, and the nights are comfort- 
 able. June and September are the two nyubai, or rainy 
 seasons, when everything is damp, clammy, sticky, and 
 miserable. In May, heavy clothing is put away in sealed 
 receptacles, even gloves being placed in air-tight glass 
 or tin, to preserve them from the ruinous mildew. While 
 earthquakes are frequent, Japan enjoys the same immu- 
 nity from thunder-storms as our Pacific Coast. 
 
 There is no servant problem, and house keeping is a 
 delight. lioth Chinese and Japanese, though unfamiliar 
 with western ways, can be trained to surpass the best 
 European domestics. Service so swift, noiseless, and 
 perfect is elsewhere unknown. Indeed, cooks as well as 
 butlers are adjusted to so grand a scale of living that 
 their employers are served with almost too much formal- 
 ity and elaboration. The art of foreign cookery has 
 been handed down from those exiled chefs who came 
 out with the first envoys, to insure them the one attain- 
 able solace of existence before the days of cables and 
 regular steamships. There is a native cuisine of great 
 excellence, and each legation or club chef has pupils, who 
 pay for the privilege of studying under him, while the 
 ordinary kitchener of the treaty ports is a more skilful 
 functionary than the professional cook of American cit- 
 ies. Such cooks do their own marketing, furnish without 
 complaint elaborate menus three times a day, serve a 
 dinner party every night, and out of their monthly pay, 
 ranging from ten to twenty Mexican dollars, supply their 
 
 23 
 
Jinrikisha Days in 'Japan 
 
 own board and lodging. The brotherhood of cooks help 
 each other in emergencies, and if suddenly called upon 
 to feed twice the expected number of guests, any one of 
 them will work miracles. He runs to one fellow-crafts- 
 man to borrow an extra fish, to another to beg an entree, 
 a salad, or a sweet, and helps himself to table ware as 
 well. A bachelor host is often amazed at the fine linen, 
 the array of silver, and the many courses set before him 
 on the shortest notice, and learns afterwards that ever)'- 
 thing was gathered in from neighboring establishments. 
 Elsewhere he may meet his own monogram or crest at 
 the table. Bachelors keep house and entertain with less 
 trouble and more comfort than anywhere else in the 
 world. To these sybarites, the “boy,” with his rustling 
 kimono, is more than a second self, and the soft-voiced 
 amahs, or maids, are the delight of woman’s existence. 
 The musical language contributes not a little to the 
 charm of these people, and the chattering servants seem 
 often to be speaking Italian. 
 
 After the Restoration many samurai, or warriors, were 
 obliged to adopt household service. One of these at my 
 hotel had the face of a Roman senator, with a Roman 
 dignity of manner quite out of keeping with his broom 
 and dust-pan, or livery of dark-blue tights, smooth vest, 
 and short blouse worn by all his class in Yokohama. 
 When a card for an imperial garden party arrived, I 
 asked Tatsu, my imperial Roman, to read it for me. He 
 took it, bowed low, sucked in his breath many times, and, 
 muttering the lines to himself, thus translated them : “ Mi- 
 kado want to see Missy, Tuesday, three o’clock.” When a 
 curio-dealer left a piece of porcelain, Tatsu, always crit- 
 ical of purchases, went about his duties slowly, waiting 
 for the favorable moment to give me, in his broken Eng- 
 lish, a dissertation on the old wares, their marks and 
 qualities, and his opinion of that particular specimen 
 of blue and white. He knew embroideries, understood 
 
Yokohama 
 
 pictures, and was a living dictionary of Japanese phrase 
 and fable. A pair of Korean shoes procured me a lect- 
 ure on the ancient relations between Japan and Korea, 
 and an epitome of their contemporary historj". 
 
 Social life in these foreign ports presents a delightful 
 fusion of English, continental, and Oriental customs. 
 The infallible Briton, representing the largest foreign 
 contingency, has transferred his household order un- 
 changed from the home island, yielding as little as pos- 
 sible to the exigencies of climate and environment. 'I'he 
 etiquette and hours of society are those of England, and 
 most of the American residents are more English in 
 these matters than the English. John Bull takes his 
 beef and beer with him to the tropics or the poles indif- 
 ferently, and in his presence Jonathan abjures his pie, 
 and outlaws the words “guess,” “cracker,” “trunk,” 
 “baggage,” “car,” and “canned.” His East Indian ex- 
 periences of a century have taught the Briton the best 
 system of living and care-taking in hot or malarial coun- 
 tries, and he thrives in Japan. 
 
 In the small foreign communities at Yokohama, Kobe, 
 and Nagasaki the contents of the mail -bags, social 
 events, and the perfection of physical comfort comprise 
 the interests of most of the residents. The friction of a 
 large community, with its daily excitements and affairs, the 
 delights of western art, music, and the drama, are absent, 
 and society naturally narrows into cliques, sets, rivalries, 
 and small aims. If most residents did not affect indif- 
 ference to things Japanese, life would be much more in- 
 teresting. As it is, the old settler listens with an air of 
 superiority, amusement, and fatigue to the enthusiasm 
 of the new-comer. Not every foreign resident is famil- 
 iar with the art of Japan, nor with its history, religion, 
 or political conditions. If the missionaries, of whom 
 hundreds reside in Yokohama and Tokio, mingled more 
 with the foreign residents, each class would benefit ; but 
 
Jinrikisha Days iti "Japan 
 
 the two sets seldom touch, the missionaries keep to 
 themselves, and the lives of the other extra-territorial 
 people continually shock and offend them. Each set 
 holds extreme, unfair, and prejudiced views of the other, 
 and affords the natives arguments against both. 
 
 Socially, Tokio and Yokohama are one community, 
 and the eighteen miles of railroad between the two do 
 not hinder the exchange of visits or acceptance of invi- 
 tations. When the Ministers of State give balls in To- 
 kio, special midnight trains carry the Yokohama guests 
 home, as they do when the clubs or the naval officers 
 entertain at the seaport town. With the coming and go- 
 ing of the fleets of all nations great activity and variety 
 pervades the social life. In the increasing swarm of 
 tourists some prince, duke, or celebrity is ever arriving, 
 visitors of lesser note are countless, and the European 
 dwellers in all Asiatic ports east of Singapore make 
 Japan their pleasure-ground, summer resort, and sanita- 
 rium. That order of tourist known as the “globe-trotter,” 
 is not a welcome apparition to the permanent foreign 
 resident. His generous and refined hospitality has been 
 so often abused, and its recipients so often show a half- 
 contemptuous condescension to their remote and uncom- 
 prehended hosts, that letters of introduction are looked 
 upon with dread. Now that it has become common for 
 parents to send dissipated young sons around the “ Horn ” 
 and out to Japan on sailing vessels, that they may reform 
 on the voyage, a new-comer must prove himself an in- 
 valid, if he would not be avoided after he confesses hav- 
 ing come by brig or bark. Balls, with the music of naval 
 bands, and decorations of bamboo and bunting, are as 
 beautiful as balls can be ; picnics and country excursions 
 enliven the whole year; and there are perennial dinners 
 and dances on board the men-of-war. 
 
 Those East-Indian contrivances, the chit and the cJiit- 
 book, furnish a partial check on native servants. The 
 
 26 
 
Yokohatna 
 
 average resident carries little ready money, but writes a 
 memorandum of whatever he buys, and hands it to the 
 seller instead of cash. These chits are presented month- 
 ly ; but the system tempts people to sign more chits than 
 they can pay. This kind of account-keeping is more gen- 
 eral in Chinese ports, where one may well object to re- 
 ceive the leaden-looking Mexicans and ragged and dirty 
 notes of the local banks. When one sends a note to an 
 acquaintance he enters it in his chit-book, where the per- 
 son addressed adds his initials as a receipt, or even 
 writes his answer. The whole social machinery is regu- 
 lated by the chit-book, which may be a source of discord 
 when its incautious entries and answers lie open to any 
 Paul Pry. 
 
 Summer does not greatly disturb the life of society. 
 Tennis, riding, boating, and bathing are in form, while 
 balls and small dances occur even in July and .August. 
 At many places in the mountains and along the coast 
 one may find a cooler air, with good hotels and tea- 
 houses. Some families rent country temples near Yo- 
 kohama for summer occupation, and enjoy something 
 between the habitual Japanese life and Adirondack camp- 
 ing. The sacred emblems and temple accessories are 
 put in the central shrine room, screens are drawn, and 
 the sanctuary becomes a spacious house, open to the air 
 on all sides, and capable of being divided into as many 
 separate rooms as the family may require. Often the 
 priests set the images and altar-pieces on a high shelf 
 concealed by a curtain, and give up the whole place to 
 the heretical tenants. In one instance the broad altar- 
 shelf became a recessed sideboard, whereon the gilded 
 Buddhas and Kwannons were succeeded by bottles, de- 
 canters, and glasses. At another temple it was stipu- 
 lated that the tenants should give up the room in front 
 of the altar on a certain anniversary day, to allow the 
 worshippers to come and pray. 
 
 27 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 THE ENVIRONS OF YOKOHAMA 
 
 The environs of Yokohama are more interesting and 
 beautiful than those of any other foreign settlement, af- 
 fording an inexhaustible variety of tramps, rides, drives, 
 railroad excursions, and sampan trips. 
 
 At Kanagawa proper the Tokaido comes to the bay’s 
 edge, which it follows for some distance through double 
 rows of houses and splendid old shade-trees. Back of 
 Kanagawa’s bluff lie the old and half-deserted Bukenji 
 temples, crowded on rare fete days with worshippers, 
 merrymakers, and keepers of booths, and at quieter times 
 serving as favorite picnic grounds for foreigners. 
 
 On the Tokaido, just beyond Kanagawa, is the grave 
 of Richardson, who was killed by the train of the Prince 
 of Satsuma, September 14, 1862. Although foreigners 
 had been warned to keep off the Tokaido on that day, 
 the foolhardy Briton and his friends deliberately rode 
 into the daimio's train, an affront for which they were 
 attacked by his retainers and severely wounded, Rich- 
 ardson himself being left for dead on the road-side, while 
 the rest escaped. Y'hen the train had passed by, a 
 young girl ran out from one of the houses and covered 
 the body with a piece of matting, moving it in the night 
 to her house, and keeping it concealed until his friends 
 claimed it. A memorial stone, inscribed with Japanese 
 characters, marks the spot where Richardson fell. Since 
 that time the kindly black-eyed Susan’s tea-house has 
 been the favorite resort for foreigners on their afternoon 
 rides and drives. Susan is a tall woman, with round 
 
 28 
 
I he Environs of Yokohama 
 
 eyes, aquiline nose, and a Roman countenance — quite 
 fit for a heroine. Riders call at her tea-house for tea, 
 rice, and eels, prawns, clams, pea-nuts, sponge-cake, or 
 beer, and insist upon seeing her. This Richardson affair 
 cost the Japanese the bombardment of Kagoshima, and 
 an indemnity of ^125,000; but Susan did not share in 
 the division of that sum. 
 
 According to one version Susan’s strand is the spot 
 where Taro of Urashima, the Rip Van Winkle of Japan, 
 left his boat and nets, and, mounting a tortoise, rode 
 away to the home of the sea-king, returning by the same 
 tortoise to the same spot. On its sands he opened the 
 box the sea-king had given him, and found himself veiled 
 in a thin smoke, out of which he stepped an old, old man, 
 whose parents had been dead a hundred years. The 
 fishermen listened to his strange tale, and carried him 
 to their daimio, and on fans, boxes, plates, vases, and 
 fukusas Taro sits relating his wonderful tale to this 
 day. 
 
 Ten miles inland from Bukenji’s temples is the little 
 village of Kawawa, whose headman has a famous col- 
 lection of chrysanthemums, the goal of many autumnal 
 pilgrimages. This Kawawa collection has enjoyed its 
 fame for many years, the owner devoting himself to it 
 heart and soul, and knowing no cooling of ardor nor 
 change of fancy. His great thatched house in a court- 
 yard is reached through a black gate-way at the top of a 
 little hill, and the group of buildings within his black 
 walls gives the place quite a feudal air. Facing the front 
 of the house are rows of mat sheds, covering the precious 
 flowers that stand in files as evenly as soldiers, the tops 
 soft masses of great frowsy, curly-petalled, wide-spread 
 ing blooms, shading to every tint of lilac, pink, rose, rus- 
 set, brown, gold, orange, pale yellow, and snow white. It 
 was there that we ate a salad made of yellow chrysanthe- 
 mum petals, most aesthetic of dishes. The trays of golden 
 
 29 
 
’Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 leaves in the kitchen of the house indicated that the 
 master enjo}"ed this ambrosial feast habitually, and per- 
 haps dropped the yellow shreds in his sake cup to pro- 
 long his life and avert calamities, as they are warranted 
 
 AT KAWAWA 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 to do. Beyond Kawawa lies a rich silk district, and all 
 the region is marked by thrift and comfort, signs of the 
 prosperity that attends silk-raising communities. 
 
 From Negishi, where Yokohama's creek debouches 
 30 
 
The Environs of Yokohama 
 
 into Mississippi Bay, one looks across to Sugita, a fish- 
 ing village with an ancient temple set in the midst of 
 plum-trees and cherry-trees that make it a place of fetes 
 in February and April, when those two great flower fes- 
 tivals of the empire, the blossoming of the plum and the 
 cherry, are observed. From the bluff above Sugita, at 
 the end of the watery cresent, is a superb view of the 
 Bay and its countless sharp, green headlands. Wherever 
 the view is fine some Japanese family has encamped in 
 a tateba, the least little mat shed of a house, furnished 
 with a charcoal brazier, half a dozen tea-pots and cups, 
 and a few low benches covered with the all-pervading 
 red blanket. Their national passion for landscape and 
 scenery draws the Japanese to places having fine pros- 
 pects, and a thrifty woman, with her family of children, 
 turns many a penny by means of her comfortable seat 
 and good cheer for the wayfarer. Japan is the picnicker's 
 own country, whether he be native or foreign. Every- 
 where, climbing the mountain-tops, or crouching in the 
 valleys, hidden in the innermost folds of the hills, or 
 perched on the narrowest and remotest ledges overhang- 
 ing the water, one finds the tea-house, or its summer com- 
 panion, the tateba, with its open sides and simmering 
 kettle. Everywhere hot water, tea, rice, fruits, eggs, cups, 
 plates, glasses, and corkscrews may be had. These 
 things become so much a matter of course after a time, 
 that the tourist must banish himself to China, to value, 
 as they deserve, the clean Japanese tea-house, and the 
 view-commanding tateba with its simple comforts. 
 
 Sugita's plum-trees bud in January, and blossom as 
 mild days and warm suns encourage, so that the last 
 week of February finds the dead-looking branches clothed 
 with clouds of starry white flowers. I'he blossoming 
 plum-tree is often seen when snow is on the ground, and 
 the hawthorn pattern of old porcelains is only a conven- 
 tional representation of pale blooms fallen on the seamed 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 ice of ponds or garden lakelets. The plum is the poet’s 
 tree, and symbolic of long life, the snowy blossoms upon 
 the gnarled, mossy, and unresponsive branches showing 
 that a vital current still animates it, and the heart lives. 
 At New-years a dwarf-plum is the ornament of every 
 home, and to give one is to wish your friend length of 
 days. Ume, the plum blossom, has a fresh, delicate, elu- 
 sive, and peculiar fragrance, which in the warm sun and 
 open air is almost intoxicating, but in a closed room be- 
 comes heavy and cloying. The blossoming of the plum- 
 tree is the first harbinger of spring, and to Sugita regu- 
 larly every year go the Empress Dowager, many princes, 
 and great officials to see those billows of bloom that lie 
 under the Bluff, and the pink and crimson clouds of trees 
 before the old temple. 
 
 During the rest of the year little heed is paid to Sugi- 
 ta’s existence, and the small fishing village in the curve 
 of the Bay, with its green wall of bluffs, is as quiet as in 
 the days when Commodore Perry’s fleet anchored off it 
 and Treaty Point acquired its name. With the blossoms 
 Sugita puts on its holiday air, tea-houses open, tateba 
 spring from the earth, and scores of low, red-blanketed 
 benches are scattered through the grove, signals of tea 
 and good cheer, equivalent to the iron tables and chairs 
 of Parisian boulevards. Strings of sampans float in to 
 shore, lines of jinrikishas file over the hills, zealous pil- 
 grims come on foot, and horsemen trot down the long, 
 hard beach. The tiny hamlet often has a thousand vis- 
 itors in a day, and the pretty little nesans, or tea-house 
 maids, patter busily about with their trays of tea and solid 
 food, welcoming and speeding the guests, and looking 
 — quaint, odd, and charming maidens that they are — 
 like so many tableaux vivants with their scant kimonos, 
 voluminous sleeves, ornate coiffures, and pigeon-toes. 
 
 Notwithstanding the crowds, everything is decorous, 
 quiet, and orderly, and no more refined pleasure exists 
 
The Environs of Yokohama 
 
 than this Japanese beatitude of sitting lost in revery and 
 rapturous contemplation of a blossoming tree, or inditing 
 a verse to ume 710 ha/ia, and fastening the bit of paper to 
 the branches. In this Utopia the spring poem is never 
 rejected, nor made the subject of cruel jokes. The winds 
 fan it gently, it hangs conspicuous, it is read by him who 
 runs, but it is not immortal, and the first heavy rain 
 leaves it a wet and withered wreck, soon to fall to the 
 ground and disappear. 
 
 Just outside the temple-door is a plum-tree whose age 
 is lost in legend. Its bent and crooked limbs and propped- 
 up branches sustain a thick-massed pyramid of pale rose- 
 pink. The outer boughs droop like a weeping-willow, 
 and their flowers seem to be slipping down them like 
 rosy rain-drops. Poets and peers, dreamers and plod- 
 dens, coolies, fishermen, and the unspiritual foreigner, all 
 admire this lovely tree, and its wide arms flutter with 
 poems in its praise. All around the thatched roof of the 
 old temple stand plum-trees covered with fragant blos- 
 soms — snow white, palest yellow, rose, or deep carna- 
 tion-red. The sheltering hill back of the temple is crowd- 
 ed with gravestones, tombs, tablets, and mossy Buddhas, 
 sitting calm and impassive in tangles of grasses and 
 vines under the shadow of ancient trees. A wide-spread- 
 ing pine on the crest of the hill is a famous landmark, 
 whence one looks down on the flower-wreathed village, 
 the golden bow of the beach curving from headland to 
 headland, and the blue bay flashing with hundreds of 
 square white sails. It is a place for poesy and day- 
 dreams, but the foreign visitor dedicates it to luncheon, 
 table-talk, and material satisfactions, and, perhaps, the 
 warm sun and air, and the mild fragrance of the plum- 
 blossoms aid and abet the insatiable picnic appetite. 
 
 All this part of Japan is old, and rich in temples, 
 shrines, and picturesque villages, with a net-work of nar- 
 row roads and shady by-paths leading through perpetual 
 
yinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 scenes of sylvan beauty. Thatched roofs, whose ridge 
 poles are beds of lilies, shaded by glorified green plumes 
 of bamboo-trees, tall, red-barked cryptomerias, crooked 
 pines, and gnarled camphor-trees, everywhere charm the 
 eye. Little red temples, approached through a line of 
 picturesque iorii — that skeleton gate-way that makes a 
 part of every Japanese view or picture — red shrines no 
 larger than marten boxes ; stone Buddhas, sitting cross- 
 legged, chipped, broken-nosed, headless, and moss-grown ; 
 odd stone tablets and lanterns crowd the hedges and 
 banks of the road-side, snuggle at the edges of groves, 
 or stand in the corners of rice fields. 
 
 Fair as the spring days are, when the universal green 
 mantle of the earth is adorned with airy drifts of plum 
 and cherry-blossoms, the warm, mellow sunshine, glori- 
 ous tints and clear bright air of autumn are even fairer. 
 One may forget and forgive the Japanese summer for 
 the sake of the weeks that follow, an Indian summer 
 which often lasts without break for four months after 
 the equinoctial storm. E.xcept that Fujiyama gleams 
 whiter and whiter, there is no suggestion of winter’s ter- 
 rors, and only a pleasant crispness in the bracing and 
 intoxicating air. When the maple leaves begin to turn, 
 and a second rose-blossoming surpasses that of June in 
 color, prodigality, and fragrance, autumnal Japan is the 
 typical earthly Paradise. Every valley is a floor of gold- 
 en rice stubble, every hill-side a tangle of gorgeous foli- 
 age. The persimmon-trees hang full of big golden kake, 
 sea and sky wear their intensest blue, and Fujiyama’s 
 loveliness shines out against the western sky. In among 
 the yellowing stubble move blue-clad farmers with white 
 mushroom hats. Before the farm-houses men and wom- 
 en swing their flails, beating the grain spread out on 
 straw matting. The rice straw, whether bunched in 
 pretty sheaves, tied across poles, like a New-year’s fringe, 
 or stacked in collars around the tree-trunks, is always 
 
 34 
 
The Environs of Yokohama 
 
 decorative. Meditative oxen, drawing a primitive plough 
 made of a pointed stick, loosen the soil for the new plant- 
 ing, and tiny green wheat-shoots, first of the three regu- 
 lar crops of the year, wait for the warm winter sun that 
 opens the plum-blossoms. 
 
 Above and beyond Sugita is Mine, a temple on a 
 mountain-top, with a background of dense pine forest, 
 a foreground of bamboos, and an old priest, whose suc- 
 cessful use of the moxa brings sufferers from long dis- 
 tances for treatment. A bridle-path follows for several 
 miles the knife-edge of a ridge commanding noble views 
 of sea and shore, of the blue Hakone range, its great 
 sentinel Oyama, and Fuji beyond. The high ridge of 
 Mine is the backbone of a great promontory running 
 out into the sea, the llay of Yeddo on one side and 
 Odawara Hay on the other. Square sails of unnum- 
 bered fishing-boats fleck the blue horizon, and the view 
 seaward is unbroken. Over an old race -course and 
 archery - range of feudal days the path leads, till at a 
 sudden turn it strikes into a pine forest, where the 
 horses’ hoofs fall noiseless on thick carpets of dry pine- 
 needles, and the cave -like twilight, coolness, and still- 
 ness seem as solemn as in that wood where Virgil and 
 Dante walked, before they visited the circles of the other 
 world. 
 
 A steep plunge down a slippery, clayey trail takes the 
 rider from the melancholy darkness to a solitary forest 
 clearing, with low temple buildings on one side. Here, 
 massed against feathery fronds of giant bamboos, blaze 
 boughs of fine -leafed maples, all vivid ciimson to the 
 tips. While the priests bring sake tubs, and the aniado, 
 or outside shutters of their house, to make a table, and 
 improvise benches with various temple and domestic 
 properties, visitors may wander through the forest to 
 open spaces, whence all the coasts of the two bays and 
 every valley of the province lie visible, and a column of 
 
 35 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japati 
 
 smoke proclaims the living volcano on Oshima’s island, 
 far down the coast. 
 
 Groups of cheery pilgrims come chattering down from 
 the forest, untie their sandals, wash their feet, and dis- 
 appear within the temple ; where the old priest writes 
 sacred characters on their bared backs to indicate where 
 his attendant shall place the lumps of sticky moxa dough. 
 Another attendant goes down the line of victims and 
 touches a light to these cones, which burn with a slow, 
 red glow, and hiss and smoke upon the flesh for agoniz- 
 ing seconds. The priest reads pious books and casts up 
 accounts, while the patients endure without a groan tor- 
 tures compared with which the searing with the white- 
 hot irons of Parisian moxa treatment is comfortable. 
 The Mine priest has some secret of composition for his 
 moxa dough which has kept it in favor for many j’ears, 
 and almost the only revenue of the temple is derived 
 from this source. Rheumatism, lumbago, and paralysis 
 yield to the moxa treatment, and the Japanese resort to 
 it for all their aches and ills, the coolies’ backs and legs 
 being often finely patterned with its scars. 
 
 The prospect from Mine’s promontory is rivalled by 
 that at Kanozau, directly across the Bay, one of the 
 highest points on the long tongue of separating land. 
 Here are splendid old temples, almost un visited by for- 
 eigners, but the glory of the place is the view of the 
 ninety-nine valleys, of Yeddo Bay, the ocean, and the 
 ever- dominant Fujiyama. Every Japanese knows the 
 famous landscapes of his country, and the mention of 
 these ninety-nine valleys and the thousand pine -clad 
 islands of Matsuyama brings a light to his eyes. 
 
 At Yokosuka, fifteen miles below Yokohama, are the 
 Government arsenal, navy - yard, and dry docks, with 
 their fleets of war-ships that put to shame the American 
 squadron in Asiatic waters. The Japanese Government 
 has both constructed and bought a navy; some vessels 
 
 36 
 
The Environs of Yokohama 
 
 coming from Glasgow yards, and others having been 
 built at these docks. 
 
 Uraga, reached from Yokosuka by a winding, Cornice- 
 like road along the coast, is doubly notable as being the 
 port off which Commodore Perry’s ships first anchored, 
 and the place where midzu atne, or millet honey, is made. 
 The whole picturesque, clean little town is given up to 
 the production of the amber sweet, and there are certain 
 families whose midzu ame has not varied in excellence 
 for more than three hundred years. The rice, or millet, 
 is soaked, steamed, mixed with warm water and barley 
 malt, and left to stand a few hours, when a clear yellow 
 liquid is drawn off and boiled down to a thick syrup or 
 paste, or cooked until it can be moulded into hard balls. 
 Unaffected by weather, it is the best of Japanese sweets, 
 and in its semiliquid stage is twisted out on chopsticks 
 at all seasons of the year. The older and browner the 
 midzu ame is, the better. It may be called the apotheo- 
 sis of butter-scotch, a glorified Oriental taffy, constantly 
 urged upon one for one’s osvn good, and conceded by for- 
 eign physicians in Japan to be of great value for dyspep- 
 tics and consumptives. Though prepared all over the 
 empire, this curative sweet is the specialty of Uraga; 
 and the secrets and formulas held in the old families 
 make for Uraga midzu ame, as compared with other pro- 
 ductions, a reputation akin to that of the Grande Char- 
 treuse, or Schloss Johann isberger, among other cordials 
 or wines. Street artists mould midzu ame paste, and 
 blow it with a pipe into myriad fantastic shapes for their 
 small patrons; while at the greatest banquets, and even 
 on the Emperor’s table, it appears in the fanciful flowers 
 that decorate every feast. 
 
 37 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 KAMAKURA AND ENOSHIMA 
 
 The contemporary Yankee might anticipate the sage 
 reflections of the future New Zealander on London 
 Bridge were there left enough ruins of the once great 
 city of Kamakura to sit upon ; but the military capital 
 of the Middle Ages has melted away into rice fields and 
 millet patches. One must wrestle seriously with the 
 polysyllabic guide-book stories of the shoguns, regents, 
 and heroes who made the glory of Kamakura, and at- 
 tracted to it a population of five hundred thousand, to 
 repeople these lonely tracts with the splendid military 
 pageants of which they were the scene. 
 
 The plain of Kamakura is a semicircle, bounded by 
 hills and facing the open Pacific, the surf pounding on 
 its long yellow beach between two noble promontories. 
 The Dai Butsu, the great bronze image of Buddha, 
 which has kept Kamakura from sinking entirely into 
 obscurity during the centuries of its decay, stands in a 
 tiny valley a half-mile back from the shore. The Light 
 of Asia is seated on the lotus flower, his head bent for- 
 ward in meditation, his thumbs joined, and his face wear- 
 ing an expression of the most benignant calm. This is 
 one of the few great show-pieces in Japan that is badly 
 placed and lacks a proper approach. Seen, like the tem- 
 ple gate-ways and pagodas of Nikko, at the end of a long 
 avenue of trees, or on some height silhouetted against 
 the sky, Dai Butsu (Great Buddha) would be far more 
 imposing. Within the image is a temple forty-nine feet 
 
 3S 
 
Kamakura and Enoshima 
 
 in height; and through an atmosphere thick with incense 
 may be read the chalked names of ambitious tourists, 
 who have evaded the priests and left their signatures 
 on the irregular bronze walls. An alloy of tin and a lit- 
 tle gold is mingled with the copper, and on the joined 
 thumbs and hands, over which visitors climb to sit for 
 their photographs, the bronze is polished enough to show 
 its fine dark tint. The rest of the statue is dull and 
 weather-stained, its rich incrustation disclosing the seams 
 where the huge sections were welded together. 
 
 A pretty landscape-garden, banks of blossoming plum- 
 trees, and the usual leper at the gate-way furnish the ac- 
 customed temple accessories, and Buddha broods and 
 meditates serene in his quiet sanctuary. The photo- 
 graphic skill of the priest brings a good revenue to the 
 temple, and a fund is being slowly raised for building a 
 huge pavilion above the great deity, like that which stood 
 there three hundred years ago. During his six centuries 
 of holy contemplation at Kamakura, Dai Butsu has en- 
 dured many disasters. Earthquakes have made him nod 
 and sway on the lotus pedestal, and tidal waves have 
 twice swept over and destroyed the sheltering temple, 
 the great weight and thickness of the bronze keeping the 
 statue itself unharmed. 
 
 Kamakura is historic ground, and each shrine has its 
 legends. The great temple of Hachiman, the God of 
 War, remains but as a fragment of its former self, the 
 buildings standing at the head of a high stone-embanked 
 terrace, from which a broad avenue of trees runs straight 
 to the sea, a mile and a half away. Mere are the tomb 
 of Yoritomo and the cave tombs of his faithful Satsuma 
 and Chosen Daimios; and the priests guard sacredly the 
 sword of Yoritomo, that of Hachiman himself, the hel- 
 met of lyeyasu, and the bow of lyemitsu. 
 
 In the spring, Kamakura is a delightful resort, on 
 whose dazzling beach climate and weather are altogether 
 
 39 
 
Jinri/cis/ta Days in Japan 
 
 different from those of Yokohama or Tokio. In summer- 
 time, the steady south wind, or monsoon, blows straight 
 from the ocean, and the pine grove between the hotel 
 and shore is musical all day long with the pensive sough 
 of its branches. In winter it is open and sunny, and tlie 
 hot sea-water baths, the charming walks and sails, the 
 old temples and odd little villages, attract hosts of vis- 
 itors. 
 
 On bright spring mornings men, women, and children 
 gather sea-weed and spread it to dry on the sand, after 
 which it is converted into food as delicate as our Iceland 
 moss. Both farmers and fishermen glean this salty har- 
 vest, and after a storm, whole families collect the flotsam 
 and jetsam of kelp and sea-fronds. Barelegged fisher- 
 maidens, with blue cotton kerchiefs tied over their heads, 
 and baskets on their backs, roam along the shore ; chil- 
 dren dash in and out of the frothing waves, and babies 
 roll contentedly in the sand ; men and boys wade knee- 
 deep in the water, and are drenched by the breakers all 
 day long, with the mercury below 50°, in spite of the 
 warm, bright sun. Women separate the heaps of sea- 
 weed, and at intervals regale their dripping lords with 
 cups of hot tea, bowls of rice, and shredded fish. It is 
 all so gay and beautiful, every one is so merry and hap- 
 py, that Kamakura life seems made up of rejoicing and 
 abundance, with no darker side. 
 
 The poor in Japan are very poor, getting comparative 
 comfort out of smaller means than any other civilized 
 people in the world. .V few cotton garments serve for 
 all seasons alike. The cold winds of winter nip their 
 bare limbs and pierce their few thicknesses of cloth, and 
 the fierce heat of summer torments them ; but they en- 
 dure these extremes with stoical good-nature, and enjoy 
 their lovely spring and autumn the more. A thatched 
 roof, a straw mat, and a few cotton wadded futons, or 
 comforters, afford the Japanese laborer shelter, furniture, 
 
 40 
 
Kamakura and Enoshitna 
 
 and bedding, while rice, millet, fish, and sea-weed consti- 
 tute his food. \\’ith three crops a year growing in his 
 fields, the poor fanner supports his family on a patch of 
 land forty feet square ; and with three hundred and sixty 
 varieties of food fish swimming in Japanese waters, the 
 fisherman need not starve. Perfect cleanliness of person 
 and surroundings is as much an accompaniment of pov- 
 erty as of riches. 
 
 Beyond Kamakura's golden bow lies another beach — 
 the strand of Katase, at the end of which rises Enoshi- 
 ma, the Mont St. Michel of the Japanese coast. Eno- 
 shima is an island at high tide, rising precipitously from 
 the sea on all sides save to the landward, where the preci- 
 pice front is cleft with a deep wooded ravine, that runs 
 out into the long tongue of sand connecting with the 
 shore at low tide. 
 
 Like every other island of legendary fame, Enoshima 
 rose from the sea in a single night. Its tutelary genius 
 is the goddess Benten, one of the seven household dei- 
 ties of good-fortune. She is worshipped in temples and 
 shrines all over the woody summit of tlie island, and in 
 a deep cave opening from the sea. Shady paths, moss- 
 grown terraces, and staircases abound, and little tea- 
 houses and tateba offer seats, cheering cups of tea, and 
 enchanting views. 'I'he near shores, the limitless waters 
 of the Pacific, and the grand sweep of Odawara Bay afford 
 the finest setting for Eujiyama anvwhere to be enjoyed. 
 
 Enoshima’s crest is a very Eorest of Arden, an en- 
 chanted place of lovely shade. The sloping ravine which 
 gives access to it holcls only the one street, or foot-path, 
 lined with tea-houses and shell-shops, all a-flutter with 
 pilgrim flags and banners. The shells are cut into whis- 
 tles, spoons, toys, ornaments, and hair-pins; and tiny 
 pink ones of a certain variety form the petals of most 
 perfect cherry blossoms, which are fastened to natural 
 branches and twigs. 
 
'Jmrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 The fish dinners of Enoshima are famous, and the 
 Japanese, who have the genius of cookery, provide more 
 delicious fish dishes than can be named. At the many 
 tateba set up in temple yards or balanced on the edges 
 of precipices, conch-shells, filled with a black stew like 
 terrapin, simmer over charcoal fires. This concoction 
 has a tempting smell, and the pilgrims, who pick at the 
 inky morsels with their chopsticks, seem to enjoy it ; but 
 in the estimation of the foreigner it adds one more to 
 the list of glutinous, insipid preparations with which the 
 Japanese cuisine abounds. The great marine curiosity 
 of Enoshima is the giant crab, with its body as large as 
 a turtle, and claws measuring ten, and even twelve, feet 
 from tip to tip. These crustaceans are said to prom- 
 enade the beach at night, and glare with phosphorescent 
 eyes. Another interesting Japanese crab, the Doryppe 
 Japonica, comes more often from the Inland Sea. A 
 man's face is distinctly marked on the back of the shell, 
 and, as the legend avers, these creatures incarnate the 
 souls of the faithful samurai, who, following the fortunes 
 of the Tairo clan, were driven into the sea by the victo- 
 rious Minamoto. At certain anniversarj' seasons, well 
 known to true believers, the spirits of these dead war- 
 riors come up from the sea by thousands and meet to- 
 gether on a moonlit beach. 
 
 In time Enoshima will be the great summer resort of 
 the cities north of it, the Nahant or Marblehead of the 
 far East, though a thousand times more picturesque than 
 they. When typhoons rage or storms sweep in from the 
 ocean, billows ring the island round with foam, spray 
 dashes up to the drooping foliage on the summit, the air 
 is full of the wild breath and wilder roar of the breakers, 
 while the very ground seems to tremble. The under- 
 ground shrine of Benten is then closed to worshippers, 
 and looking down the sheer two hundred feet of rock, 
 one sees only the whirl and rage of waters that hide the 
 
Tokio 
 
 entrance. When these storms rage, \asitors are some- 
 times imprisoned for days upon the island. At low tide 
 and in ordinary seas Benten’s shrine is easily entered by 
 a ledge of rocks, the hard thing being the climb up the 
 long stone stair-ways to the top of the island again. 
 Guides are numerous, and an old man or a small boy 
 generally attaches himself to a company of strangers, 
 and is so friendly, polite, and amiable, that, after escort- 
 ing it unbidden round the island, he generally wins his 
 cause, and is bidden to tnani marii (go sight-seeing) as 
 escort and interpreter. 
 
 CH.^PTER VI 
 TOKIO 
 
 The first view of Tokio, like the first view of Yoko- 
 hama, disappoints the traveller. The Ginza, or main 
 business street, starting from the bridge opposite the 
 station, goes straight to Nihombashi, the northern end 
 of the Tokaido, and the recognized centre of the city, 
 from which all distances are measured. Most of the 
 roadway is lined with conventional houses of foreign 
 pattern, with their curb-stones and shade-trees, while the 
 tooting tram-car and the rattling basha, or light omnibus, 
 emphasize the incongruities of the scene. This is not 
 the Veddo of one's dreams, nor yet is it an Occidental 
 city. Its stucco walls, wooden columns, glaring shop- 
 windows, and general air of tawdry imitation fairly de- 
 press one. In so large a city there are many corners, 
 however, which the march of improvement has not reach- 
 ed, odd, unexpected, and Japanese enough to atone for 
 the rest. 
 
 43 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 Through the heart of Tokio winds a broad spiral moat, 
 encircling the palace in its innermost ring, and reaching, 
 by canal branches, to the river on its outer lines. In 
 feudal days the Shogun’s castle occupied the inner ring, 
 and within the outer rings were the yashikis, or spread- 
 out houses, of his daimios. Each gate-way and angle of 
 the moat was defended by towers, and the whole region 
 was an impregnable camp. Every daimio in the empire 
 had his yashiki in Tokio, where he was obliged to spend 
 six months of each year, and in case of war to send his 
 family as pledges of his loyalty to the Shogun. The 
 Tokaido and the other great highways of the empire 
 were always alive with the trains of these nobles, and 
 from this migratory habit was developed the passion for 
 travel and excursion that animates every class of the 
 Japanese people. When the Emperor came up from 
 Kioto and made Tokio his capital, the Shogun’s palace be- 
 came his home, and all the Shogun’s property reverted to 
 the crown, the yashikis of the daimios being confiscated 
 for government use. In the old days the barrack build- 
 ings surrounding the great rectangle of the yashiki were 
 the outer walls, protected by a small moat, and furnished 
 with ponderous, gable -roofed gate-ways, drawbridges, 
 sally-ports, and projecting windows for outlooks. These 
 barracks accommodated the samurai, or soldiers, attached 
 to each daimio, and within their lines were the parade 
 ground and archery range, the residence of the noble 
 family, and the homes of the artisans in his employ. 
 With the new occupation many yashiki buildings were 
 razed to the ground, and imposing edifices in foreign 
 style erected for government offices. A few of the old 
 yashiki remain as barracks, and their white walls, resting 
 on black foundations, suggest the monotonous street 
 views of feudal days. Other yashiki have fallen to baser 
 uses, and sign-boards swing from their walls. 
 
 Modern sanitary science has plucked up the miles of 
 
 44 
 
Tokio 
 
 lotus beds that hid the triple moats in midsummer. 
 From the bridges the lounger used to overlook acres of 
 pink and white blossoms rising above the solid floors of 
 bluish-green leav'es ; but the Philistines could not uproot 
 the moats, which remain the one perfect feudal relic of 
 Japanese Yeddo. The maay-angled gate-ways, the mass- 
 ive stone walls, and escarpments, all moss and lichen- 
 grown, and sloping from the water with an inward curv'e, 
 are noble monuments of the past. Every wall and em- 
 bankment is crowned with crooked, twisted, creeping, 
 century-old pines, that fling their gaunt arms wildly out, 
 or seem to grope along the stones. Here and there on 
 the innermost rings of the moat still rise picturesque, 
 many -gabled towers, with white walls and black roofs, 
 survivors from that earlier day when they guarded the 
 shiro, or citadel, and home of the Shogun. 
 
 The army is always in evidence in Tokio, and the lit- 
 tle soldiers in winter dress of dark-blue cloth, or sum- 
 mer suits of white duck, swarm in the neighborhood of 
 the moats. In their splendid uniforms, the dazzling offi- 
 cers, rising well in the saddle, trot by on showy horses. 
 On pleasant mornings, shining companies of cavalry file 
 down, the line of the inner moat and through the deep 
 bays of the now dismantled Cherry-Tree gate to the Hi- 
 biya parade-ground, where they charge and manoeuvre. 
 When it rains, the files of mounted men look like so many 
 cowled monks, with the peaked hoods of their great 
 coats drawn over their heads, and they charge, gallop, 
 and countermarch through mud and drizzle, as if in a 
 real campaign. Taking the best of the German, French, 
 Italian, and British military systems, with instructors of 
 all these nationalities, th? Japanese army stands well 
 among modern fighting forces. There is a military gen- 
 ius in the people, and tlie spirit of the old samurai has 
 leavened the nation, making the natty soldiers of to-day 
 worthy the traditions of the past. 
 
 4S 
 
Jinrzkis/ia Days in Japa7i 
 
 A large foreign colony is resident in Tokio, the diplo- 
 matic corps, the great numbers of missionaries, and 
 those employed by the Government in the university, 
 schools, and departments constituting a large commu- 
 nity. The missionary settlement now holds the Tsukiji 
 district near the railway station ; that piece of made 
 ground along the shore first ceded for the exclusive oc- 
 cupation of foreigners. Besides being malarial, Tsukiji 
 was formerly the rag-pickers’ district, and its selection 
 was not complimentary to the great powers, all of whose 
 legations have now left it. To reside outside of Tsukiji 
 is permitted to non-officials only when in Japanese em- 
 ploy. Rich art collectors, scientists, and enthusiasts, who 
 choose to live in Tokio, must be claimed as employes or 
 teachers by some kindly Japanese friend, who becomes 
 responsible for the stranger’s conduct. These limita- 
 tions pertain to the treaty regulations, which permit no 
 foreigners to go more than twenty-five miles beyond a 
 treaty port without a passport, which may be obtained 
 through a legation, and which names the places to be vis- 
 ited. The police register the arrival of all strangers, and 
 keep a record of their movements. The United States 
 Legation issues as a passport only a page of thick mul- 
 berry paper covered with the essential writings in Japan- 
 ese characters. The British Legation encloses a similar 
 passport in a small pamphlet of instructions, wherein the 
 holder is minutely admonished as to his behavior, warned 
 not to quarrel, not to deface monuments, not to destroy 
 shrubs or trees, nor break windows. At Kobe, any Amer- 
 ican citizen may, if he likes, procure a passport for Kio- 
 to from the Kenc/io, or governor’s office, without applying 
 to his consul. Travellers of all other nationalities must 
 proceed through their consuls, and this recognition of 
 the freedom and independence of the American citizen 
 is a tribute to the individual sovereignty of his nation, 
 concerning which a Japanese poet writes : 
 
 46 
 
Tokio 
 
 “ What are those strangely-clad beings 
 Who move quickly from one spot of interest to another 
 Like butterflies flitting from flower to flower ? 
 
 These are Americans, 
 
 They are as restless as the ocean, 
 
 In one day they will learn more of a city 
 Than an inhabitant will in a year. 
 
 Are they not extraordinary persons?” 
 
 All the legations are now on the high ground in the 
 western part of the city near the castle moats. All lega- 
 tion buildings are owned and kept up by their respective 
 governments, except that of the United States, which 
 still uses rented property, although the Japanese Gov- 
 ernment has offered the land as a gift, if the United 
 States will erect a permanent edifice. 
 
 The English possess a whole colony of buildings in 
 the midst of a large walled park, affording offices and 
 residences for all the staff. Germany, Russia, France, 
 and the Netherlands own handsome houses with grounds. 
 The Chinese legation occupies part of an old yashiki, in- 
 side whose bright vermilion and pea-green gate-way the 
 Chinese gate keepers lounge, and over which the trian- 
 gular yellow dragon flag flies. 
 
 The show places of Tokio are the many government 
 museums at Uyeno Park, the many mortuary temples of 
 the Tokugawa Shoguns at Shiba and Uyeno, the popular 
 temple of Asakusa, and the Shinto temple at the Kudan, 
 with its race-course and view of the city; but the Kanda, 
 the Kameido, the Hachiman temples, many by -streets 
 and queer corners, the out door fairs, the peddlers, and 
 shops give the explorer a better understanding of the 
 life of the people than do the great monuments. Here 
 and there he comes upon queer old nameless temples 
 with ancient trees, stones, lanterns, tanks, and urns that 
 recall a forgotten day of religious influence, when they 
 possessed priests, revenues, and costly altars. 
 
 47 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 An army of jinrikisha coolies waits for passengers at 
 the station, and among them is that Japanese Mercur)", 
 the v/inged-heeled Sanjiro, he of the shaven crown and 
 gun-hammer topknot of samurai days. His biography 
 includes a tour of Europe as the servant of a Japanese 
 official. On returning to Tokio he took up the shafts of 
 his kuruma again, and is the fountain-head of local news 
 and gossip. He knows what stranger arrived yesterday, 
 who gave dinner parties, in which tea-house the “man-of- 
 war gentlemen” had a geisha dinner, where your friends 
 paid visits, even what they bought, and for whom court 
 or legation carriages were sent. He tells you whose 
 house you are passing, what great man is in view, where 
 the ne.\t matsuri will be, when the cherrv blossoms will 
 unfold, and what plays are coming out at the Shintomiza. 
 Sanjiro is cyclopajdic at the theatre, and as a temple 
 guide he exhales ecclesiastical lore. To take a passen- 
 ger on a round of official calls, to and from state balls or 
 a palace garden party, he finds bliss unalloyed, and his 
 e.xplanations pluck out the heart of the mystery of Tokio. 
 “ Mikado’s mamma,” prattles Sanjiro in his baby- Eng- 
 lish, as he trots past the green hedge and quiet gate of 
 the Empress Dowager’s palace, and “ Tenno San," he 
 murmurs, in awed tones, as the lancers and outriders of 
 the Emperor appear. 
 
 First, he carries the tourist to Shiba, the old monas- 
 tery grounds that are now a public park. Under the 
 shadow of century-old pines and cryptomeria stand the 
 mortuary temples of the later Shoguns, superb edifices 
 ablaze with red and gold lacquer, and set with panels of 
 carved wood, splendid in color and gilding, the gold tre- 
 foil of the Tokugawas shining on every ridge-pole and 
 gable. These temples and tombs are lesser copies of 
 the magnificent shrines at Nikko. and but for those orig- 
 inals would be unique. On a rainy day, the green shad- 
 ow and gloom, the cawing of the ravens that live in the 
 
 48 
 
Tokio 
 
 old pine-trees, and their slow flight, are solemn as death 
 itself; and the solitude of the dripping avenues and court- 
 yards, broken only by the droning priests at prayer, and 
 the musical vibrations of some bell or sweet-voiced gong, 
 invite a gentle melancholy. On such a day, the priests, 
 interrupted in their statuesque repose, or their pensive 
 occupation of sipping tea and whiffing tiny pipes in silent 
 groups around a brazier, display to visitors the altars and 
 ceilings and jewelled walls with painstaking minuteness, 
 glad of one ripple of e.vcitement and one legitimate fee. 
 Led by a lean, one-toothed priest, you follow, stocking- 
 footed, over lacquer floors to behold gold and bronze, 
 lacquer and inlaying, carving and color, golden images 
 sitting in golden shadows, enshrined among golden lotus 
 flowers, and sacred emblems. In one temple the clear, 
 soft tones of the bronze gong, a bowl eighteen inches in 
 diameter and a little less in depth, vibrate on the air for 
 three full minutes before they die away. 
 
 Up mossy stair-ways, between massive embankments, 
 and through a shady grove, the priest’s clogs scrape 
 noisily to the he.vagonal temple, where the ashes of 
 Hidetada, the Xi Dai Shogun, lyeyasu’s son, lie in a 
 great gold lacquer cylinder, the finest e.xisting specimen 
 of the lacquer of that great art age. The quiet of Shiba, 
 the solemn background of giant trees, the deep shadows 
 and green twilight of the groves, the hundreds of stone 
 lanterns, the ponds of sacred lotus, the succession of 
 dragon-guarded gate-ways, and carved and gorgeously- 
 colored walls, crowd the memory with lovely pictures. 
 Near a hill-top pagoda commanding views of the Bay and 
 of Fuji, stands the tateba of a cheerful family, who bring 
 the visitor a telescope and cups of cherry-blossom tea. 
 
 A colony of florists show gardens full of wonderful 
 plants and dwarf-trees, and then Sanjiro minces, “I think 
 more better we go see more temples and we go, spin- 
 ning past the giant Shiba gate and up the road to Atago 
 
 O 49 
 
’Jinrikisha Days in 'Japan 
 
 Yania, a tiny temple on the edge of a precipitous hill- 
 top, approached by men’s stairs, an air-line flight of broad 
 steps, and women’s stairs, curving by broken flights of 
 easier slope. A leper, with scaly, white skin and hideous 
 ulcers, extends his miserable hand for alms, and pict- 
 uresque, white-clad pilgrims, with staff and bell, go up 
 and down those breathless flights. The tateba, with their 
 rows of lanterns, where the nesans offer tea of salted 
 cherry blossoms, that unfold again into perfect flowers 
 in the bottom of the cup, overhang the precipice wall, 
 and look down upon the Shiba quarter as upon a relief 
 map. 
 
 A breathless rush of two miles or more straight across 
 the city, past flying shops, beside the tooting tram-way 
 and over bridges, and Sanjiro runs into Uyeno Park, with 
 its wide avenues, enormous trees, and half- hidden tem- 
 ple roofs. The ground slopes away steeply at the left, 
 and at the foot of the hill lies a lotus lake of many acres 
 that is a pool of blossoms in midsummer. A temple and 
 a tiny tea - house are on an island in the centre, and 
 around the lake the race-course is overarched with cher- 
 ry-trees. Great torii mark the paths and stairs leading 
 from the shore to the temples above. 
 
 At Uye'no are more tombs and more sanctuaries, av- 
 enues of lanterns, bells, and drinking - fountains, and a 
 black, bullet-marked gate-way, where the Veddo troops 
 made their last stand before the Restoration. Near this 
 gate way is the sturdy young tree planted by General 
 Grant. Far back in the park stand the mortuary tem- 
 ples, splendid monuments of Tokugawa riches and pow- 
 er, though the most splendid, here as at Shiba, have been 
 destroyed by fire. 
 
 When the Tokio Fine Arts Club holds one of its loan 
 exhibitions in its Uye'no Park house, Sanjiro is ine.xora- 
 ble, deposits his fare at the door-way, shows the way to 
 the ticket - office, and insists upon his seeing the best 
 
Tokio 
 
 work of the great artists. The noble club men contrib- 
 ute specimens from their collections of lacquer, porcelain, 
 ivories, bronzes, and kakemonos. Behind glass doors 
 hang kakemonos by the great artists, and Japanese visit- 
 ors gaze with’ reverence on the masterpieces of the Kano 
 and Tosa schools. The great art treasures of the empire 
 are sequestrated in private houses and godowns, and to 
 acquire familiarity with them, to undertake an art educa- 
 tion in semiannual instalments by grace of the Fine Arts 
 Club, is a discouraging endeavor. It would be more 
 hopeful to seek the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, the 
 British Museum, or Mr. Walters's Baltimore galleries, 
 which contain an epitome of all Japanese art. At the 
 Tokio Club, however, works of Sosen and Hokusai, the 
 two masters of the last century, are often e.xhibited. 
 Sosen painted inimitable monkeys, and connoisseurs of 
 to-day award him the tardy fame which his contempora- 
 ries failed to give. .\s a rule, foreigners prefer Hokusai 
 to all other masters, and they search old book-shops in 
 the hope of stumbling upon one of the innumerable 
 books illustrated and sometimes engraved by this pro- 
 lific genius. His genius never lacked recognition, and a 
 century ago all feudal Veddo went wild over his Xew- 
 year's cards, each one a characteristic and unique bit of 
 landscape, caricature, or fantasy. His fourteen volumes 
 of Mangsva. or rough sketches, and his One Hundred 
 Views of Fuji are most celebrated ; but wonderfully clev- 
 er are his jokes, his giants, dwarfs, demons, goblins, and 
 ghosts ; and when he died, at the age of ninety, he sighed 
 that he could not live long enough to paint something 
 which he should himself esteem. After the visit to the 
 club Sanjiro takes his patron to the tomb of Hokusai, in 
 a near-by temple yard, and shows the brushes hung up 
 by despairing and prayerful artists, who would follow his 
 immortal methods. 
 
 East of Uyeno stands the great Asakusa temple, shrine 
 
 5 ‘ 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japa?i 
 
 of one of the most famous of the thirty -three famous 
 Kwannons of the empire, the great place of worship for 
 the masses, and the centre of a Vanity Fair unequalled 
 elsewhere. Every street leading to the temple grounds 
 is a bazaar and merry fair, and theatres’, side shows, 
 booths, and tents, and all the devices to entrap the idle 
 and the pleasure-seeking, beset the pilgrim on his way 
 to the sanctuary. In florists’ gardens are shown marvels 
 of floriculture, in their ponds swim gold-fish with won- 
 derfully fluted tails, and in tall bamboo cages perch 
 Tosa chickens with tail feathers ten and twelve feet 
 long. Menageries draw the wondering rustics, and they 
 pay their coppers for the privilege of toiling up a wood, 
 canvas, and pasteboard Fujiyama to view the vast plain 
 of the city lying all around it, and on timbered slopes 
 enjoy tobogganing in midsummer. Penetrating to the 
 real gate way, it is found guarded by giant Nio, whose 
 gratings are spotted with the paper prayers that the wor- 
 shipful have chewed into balls and reverently thrown 
 there. If the paper wad sticks to the grating, it is a fa- 
 vorable omen, and the believer may then turn the vener- 
 able old prayer-wheel, and farther on put his shoulder 
 to the bar, and by one full turn of the revolving library 
 of Buddhist scriptures endow himself with all its intel- 
 lectual treasure. 
 
 The soaring roof of the great temple is fitly shadowed 
 by camphor-trees and cryptomeria that look their centu- 
 ries of age, and up the broad flagging there passes the 
 ceaseless train of believers. One buys corn and feeds 
 the hundreds of pigeons, messengers of the gods, who 
 live secure and petted by all the crowds in the great en- 
 closure, or pays his penny to secure the release of a cap- 
 tive swallow, that flies back every night to its owner. 
 At the foot of the steps the pilgrim begins to pray, and, 
 ascending, mumbles his way to the altar. The colossal 
 money-box, which is said to gather in over a thousand 
 
 52 
 
Tokio 
 
 dollars on great holidays, rings and echoes ^vell to the 
 fall of the smallest coin. The sides of the temple are 
 open to the air, and the visitor may retain shoes and 
 clogs, so that the clatter of these wooden soles, the pil- 
 grims’ clapping and mumbling, mingle in one distracting 
 roar. 
 
 Tame pigeons fly in and out through the open walls, 
 and children chase each other across the floor ; but be- 
 hind the grating candles burn, bells tinkle, priests chant, 
 and rows of absorbed worshippers clap, toss their cop- 
 pers, and pray, oblivious of all their surroundings. 
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 TOKIO — CONTINUED 
 
 There are no such holiday-makers as the Japanese. 
 The whole twelvemonth is fete - time, and the old year 
 held three hundred and sixty-five festivals and anniver- 
 saries. All the great days of the Chinese calendar are 
 observed, and the death-day of past sovereigns, instead 
 of the birthday; while each religion, each sect, each tem- 
 ple, and each neighborhood has its own fete or matsuri, 
 religious in its origin. Every night different temple 
 grounds and different streets glow with lanterns and 
 torches, an out-door fair is in full progress, and happy, 
 laughing, chattering men, women, and children enjoy it 
 all. The evening flower-fairs are as characteristic and 
 picturesque as anything in Japan. The smoke of blazing 
 flambeaux, the smell of the women’s camellia seed hair- 
 oil, and the mingled odors from booths and portable 
 restaurants, are not enticing on a hot night, but at least 
 they offend in an “ artless Japanese way.” 
 
 The booths along the whole length of the Ginza offer 
 
 - 53 
 
yinrikisha Days in yapan 
 
 innumerable odd notions, queer toys, pretty hair-pins, 
 curios, and indescribable trifles, every night in the year. 
 The Japanese hair-pin, by-the-bye, is a dangerous vanity, 
 the babies often twisting themselves into the range of its 
 point, and the mothers impaling them on it in shaking 
 them up higher on their backs and tightening the bands 
 that hold them. The comic and ingenious toys, em- 
 bodying the simplest principles of mechanics, and by the 
 aid of a little running water, or the heat of a candle, per- 
 forming wonderful feats, are such trifles of bamboo, thin 
 pine, paper, or straw, as American children would destroy 
 at a touch. Yet the more truly civilized Japanese little 
 people play with them for weeks ; and they toddle home 
 with minute wicker cages of sctni, or cicada, on one finger, 
 content to hang them up and listen peaceabh’ to the 
 strident captives’ chirping mi-mi-mi all day long. 
 
 The first week of March is gala time for the small 
 girls of Japan, when their Hina Alatsuri, or Feast of Dolls, 
 is celebrated. Then do toy shops and doll shops double 
 in number and take on dazzling features, while children 
 in gay holiday clothes animate the streets. Little girls 
 with hair elaborately dressed, tied with gold cords and 
 bright crape, and gowns and girdles of the brightest 
 colors, look like walking dolls themselves. The tiniest 
 toddler is a quaint and comical figure in the same long 
 gown and long sleeves as its mother, the gay-patterned 
 kimono, the bright inner garments showing their edges 
 here and there, and obis shot with gold threads, mak- 
 ing them irresistible. Nothing could be gentler or sweet- 
 er than these Japanese children, and no place a more 
 charming play-ground for them. In the houses of the 
 rich the Dolls’ Festival is second only to the New Year 
 in its importance. The family don their richest clothing, 
 and keep open house for the week. The choicest pict- 
 ures and art treasures are displayed, and with these the 
 hina or images that have been preserved from grand- 
 
 54 
 
Tokio 
 
 THE semi's cage 
 
 mothers’ and great-grandmothers’ time, handed down 
 and added to with the arrival of each baby daughter. 
 'I'hese dolls, representing tlie Emperor, Empress, nobles, 
 and ladies of the old Kioto court, are sometimes num- 
 bered by dozens, and are dressed in correct and expen- 
 sive clothing. During the holiday the dolls are ranged 
 
Jtnrikiska Days in Japan 
 
 in a row on a shelf like an altar or dais, and food and 
 gifts are placed before them. The tiny lacquer tables, 
 with their rice -bowls, teapots, cups, plates, and trays, 
 are miniature and exquisite likenesses of the family fur- 
 nishings. Each doll has at lea.st its own table and dish- 
 es, and often a full set of tableware, with which to enter- 
 tain other dolls, and amazing prices have been paid for 
 sets of gold and carved red lacquer dishes, or these 
 Lilliputian sets in wonderful metal-work. After the fes- 
 tival is over, the host of dolls and their belongings are 
 put away until the next ISIarch , and when the beautiful 
 images emerge from the storehouses after their long hid- 
 ing they are as enchanting as if new. Nothing better 
 illustrates inherent Japanese ideas of life and enjoyment, 
 and gentleness of manners, than this bringing out of all 
 the dolls for one long fete week in the year, and the 
 handing them down from generation to generation. 
 
 On the fifth day of the fifth month comes the boys’ 
 holiday. The outward sign is a tall pole surmounted 
 with a ball of open basket-work, from which hang the 
 most natural-looking fish made of cloth or paper. Such 
 a pole is set before every house in which a boy has been 
 born during the year, or where there are young boys, 
 and some patriarchal households display a group of poles 
 and a school of carp flying in the air. 'I'hese nobori, as 
 the paper carp are called, are of course symbolic, the 
 carp being one of the strongest fish, stemming currents, 
 mounting water-falls, and attaining a great age. Many 
 of these nobori are four or five feet in length, and a hoop 
 holding the mouth open lets them fill and float with as 
 life-like a motion as if they were flapping their fins in 
 their own element. In-doors, images and toys are set out 
 in state array —miniature warriors and wrestlers, spears, 
 banners, and pennants, and all the decorative parapher- 
 nalia that once enriched a warrior’s train. In all classes 
 children's parties and picnics prevail. The schools are 
 
Tokio 
 
 given up to out-door exercises, and every sunny morning 
 processions of youngsters file by, with banners and col- 
 ored caps to distinguish them, and go to some park or 
 parade-ground for exercises, drills, and athletic games. 
 
 Besides the public schools maintained by Government, 
 there are scores of private schools and mission schools. 
 With its higher institutions reaching up to the Imperial 
 University, with its special schools of law, medicine, en- 
 gineering, science, and the arts, 'I’okio offers the best 
 education to the youth of Japan. "I'lie public-school sys- 
 tem is the equal of that of the United States, and the 
 Government employs foreign teachers in even the re- 
 motest provincial schools. At a kindergarten the aris- 
 tocratic pupils, with a repose of manner inherited from 
 generations of courtly and dignified ancestors, trot in, in 
 their little long-sleeved kimonos, like a Mikado opera 
 company seen through the wrong end of an opera-glass, 
 sit down demurely around low tables, and fold their 
 hands like so many old men and women of the kingdom 
 of Lilliput. There is no tittering, no embarrassment, nor 
 self-consciousness ; and these grave and serious mites 
 will take the blocks from the teachers with sl reverent 
 bow and present them to other children with another 
 formal salute, quite as their grandfathers might have 
 done at court.. In some of the girls’ schools the old 
 Japanese methods are followed, and they are taught the 
 traditional etiquette and the c/ta tio yu, to embroider, to 
 write poems, to arrange flowers, and to play the samisen. 
 The koto, once almost obsolete, is restored to favor, and 
 girls delight to touch this sweet-toned, horizontal harp. 
 
 The great summer festival is the opening of the river. 
 This is the beginning of the nightly water fetes on the 
 Sumidagawa, and in the innumerable tea-houses that 
 line its banks. This fete, appointed for the last week of 
 June, is often postponed to the more settled season of 
 July. Flat-bottomed house-boats, with open sides, awn- 
 
 57 
 
'Jinrtkisha Days in yapan 
 
 ings hung round with lanterns, and sturdy boatmen at 
 either end of the craft, go up the river by hundreds and 
 thousands at sunset, gliding out from the creeks and ca- 
 nals that everywhere intersect the city. The glittering 
 fleet gathers in the broad stretch of stream lying between 
 the Asakusa bashi and the Ryogoku bashi, and these two 
 bridges are black with spectators. The rows of tea- 
 houses lining both shores spread red blankets over the 
 balcony railings, and hang row upon row of lanterns 
 along balustrades and eaves. With their rooms thrown 
 wide open to the water, they themselves look like great 
 lanterns. Every room of every house has its dinner par- 
 ty, the tea-house of the Thousand Mats being engaged 
 months before hand, and every maiko and geisha bespo- 
 ken. Boats command double prices, and nearly every 
 boat has its family group ; little children in holiday dress, 
 their elders in fresh silk, crape, gauze, or cotton kimonos, 
 sitting on the red floor-cloth, each with a tray of dolls’ 
 dishes, filled with the morsels of dainty things that make 
 up a Japanese feast, and sake bottles circulating freely. 
 The lines of lanterns shed a rose-colored light over all ; 
 and at one end a pretty maiko goes through her graceful 
 poses, the company keeping time with her in rhythmical 
 hand - clappings. Peddlers of fruit, candies, fireworks, 
 and sake' ; performing jugglers, acrobats, and story-tell- 
 ers ; floating restaurants, theatres, side-shows, and boat- 
 loads of musicians row in and out among the rest. Talk, 
 laughter, and the wailing notes of samisens fill the air 
 with a hum that swells to cheers and roars as the swift 
 rockets fill the air with balls, fountains, sheaves, sprays, 
 jets, and trails of light ; or fiery dragons, wriggling mon- 
 sters, rainbows, and waterfalls shine out on the dark 
 night sky. Although sake flows everywhere, there is no 
 drunkenness or disorder to degrade these gentle, cheer- 
 ful merry-makers. 
 
 Fires are among the thrilling but picturesque experi- 
 58 
 
Tokio 
 
 ences of city life, confined chiefly to the winter months. 
 The annual losses of Japan through conflagrations are 
 ver}’ great, and Tokio has been destroyed many times. 
 The flimsy little straw-matted, wooden houses are always 
 ready to blaze ; and if a lamp explodes, a brazier upsets, 
 or a spark flies, the whole place is in flames, which leap 
 from roof to roof until the quarter is kindled. Each time 
 a burned district is rebuilt the streets are widened, a 
 measure which preserves property but ruins piciuresque- 
 ness, for the broad thoroughfares, lined with low, un- 
 painted buildings, make the modern Japanese city mo- 
 notonous and uninteresting. 
 
 The diminutive Japanese dwellings, of toy-like con- 
 struction, rest on corner posts set on large rocks, and 
 made stable by their heavy roofs of mud and tiles. P'ires 
 are stemmed only by tearing down all buildings in the 
 path of the flames, which is done as easily as a house of 
 cards is overturned. A rope, fastened to one of the up- 
 right corner posts, brings the structure down with a crash, 
 while the hea\y roof covers it like an extinguisher. 'I'he 
 ordinary city house or shop may have twelve feet of 
 frontage, and even a second story seldom raises the roof 
 more than fifteen feet from the ground. To hear of a 
 thousand houses being burned in a night is appalling, 
 but a thousand of these Lilliputian dwellings and their 
 microscopic landscape gardens would not cover more 
 area than two or three blocks of a foreign city. 
 
 Each section or ward has a high tower or ladder, with 
 a long bell, and from this lookout the watchman gives 
 the alarm or the near policeman sounds the fire-bell. 
 Pandemonium follows, for a more e.xcitable being than 
 the Japanese does not exist, and the fire-bell’s clang is 
 suggestive of many sad and terrible e.xperiences. Besides 
 the municipal fire brigade with their ladders and hand- 
 pumps, each ward maintains private watchmen and fire- 
 men. These watchmen roam their beats from dusk to 
 
 59 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 daylight, jingling the loose iron rings on the tops of their 
 long staffs. Throughout the night the watchman’s clink- 
 ing rings are heard at half-hour intervals or oftener. The 
 policemen, on the contrary, go about quietly, lurking in 
 shadow to pounce upon malefactors ; and foreigners, mis- 
 taking the fire-guardian for the constable, have pointed 
 many jokes at his noisy progress. 
 
 When the alarm-bell clangs, friends rush to help 
 friends in saving their effects, and thieves make the 
 most of the opportunity. Blocks away from the fire 
 agitated people gather up mats, screens, bedding, cloth- 
 ing, and cooking utensils, and hurry from the neighbor- 
 hood. Then does the simplicity of Japanese life justify 
 itself. No cumbrous furniture is rolled out, to be broken 
 in the transit ; no tables, chairs, or clumsy beds are 
 ruined in the saving. One small hand-cart holds the 
 roll of wadded comforters and gowns that compose the 
 bedding of the family, their clothing, and their few other 
 effects. The sliding paper-screens are slipped from their 
 grooves, the thick straw-mats are taken from the floor, 
 and the household departs, leaving but the roof, corner 
 posts, and rough floor behind them. Processions of these 
 refugees stream away from the burning quarter, and the 
 heart of the spectator goes out to the poor people, who, 
 with so little, live so cheerfully and suffer so bravely. 
 
 The emblems or rallying banners always carried by 
 native fire-companies astonish foreign eyes. Glorified 
 drum -majors’ sticks, gigantic clubs, spades, hearts, dia- 
 monds, balls, crescents, stars, or puzzles, are borne aloft 
 by the color-bearer of the detachment, who stands in the 
 midst of smoke, sparks, and the thickest of the hurly- 
 burly, to show where his company is at work. Thrilling 
 tales are told of these Casabiancas remaining on roofs 
 or among flames until engulfed in the blazing ruins. 
 
 Sometimes carpenters begin to build new habitations 
 on the still smoking ground, stepping gingerly among 
 
 6o 
 
Tokio 
 
 hot stones and tiles. The amazing quickness with which 
 Japanese houses rise from their ashes defies comparison. 
 In twelve hours after a conflagration the little shop- 
 keepers will resume business at the old stand. Fire in- 
 surance is not suited to this country of wood and straw 
 dwellings ; but thatched roofs are giving way to tiles in 
 the cities, and brick is more and more used for walls. 
 Stone is too expensive, and, in this earthquake country, 
 open to greater objections than brick. The stone walls 
 sometimes seen aie a sham, the stones being thin slabs 
 nailed on the wooden framework of a house, like tiles or 
 shingles, to rattle down in a harmless shower when the 
 earth heaves and rocks. Steam fire - engines are un- 
 known, and hand-grenades are inevitably forgotten in 
 the excitement of a conflagration. 
 
 Earthquakes, though frequent, are fortunately not se- 
 vere, and no alarming catastrophe has been suffered since 
 the convulsions of 1854 and 1855, which the malcontents 
 attributed to the wrath of the gods at the spectacle of 
 foreign barbarians entering the country. The old myth, 
 that the earth — meaning the islands of Japan — rests 
 upon the back of a huge fish, whose writhings cause 
 these disturbances, places the head of the leviathan be- 
 neath Vezo, its tail under the southern island, and its 
 vital and active body below Yokohama and Tokio. Now 
 the Government has a seismologist on its university 
 staff, and each tremor or palpitation is accurately record- 
 ed, the average number reaching four hundred annually. 
 Kobe and Kioto seldom experience even the slightest 
 motion, but in the vicinity of the capital one becomes 
 fairly accustomed to the unpleasant visitation. A slight 
 disturbance sets lamps and chandeliers vibrating; with 
 a heavier rock all bric-Ybrac not wired fast to cabinets, 
 mantels, or tables, slides to the floor; and a harder shock 
 loosens tiles, wrenches timbers, and sends brick chim- 
 neys, not boxed in wood or sheet-iron, crashing through 
 
'Jinrtkisha Days in 'Japan 
 
 the roofs. A small house rattles as if the earthquake 
 fish had come out of the sea and seized it as a terrier 
 does a rat. Pebbles grate in garden paths, tall ever- 
 greens snap their tops like switches, bells ring, clocks 
 stop, and people rush frantically to open spaces or 
 streets. 
 
 The Japanese seldom drink water, although they 
 splash, dabble, or soak in it half the time ; yet men 
 who are working m moats or lotus-ponds, grubbing out 
 the old roots or stalks, and dripping wet to their waists 
 and shoulders, will quit work on rainy days. In Yoko- 
 hama harbor, coolies who load and unload lighters, and 
 are in and out of water continually, often refuse to work 
 when a shower begins ; but a wet day brings a new as- 
 pect to the streets, and fair weather has no monopoly of 
 picturesqueness. I'he unoccupied women with babies 
 tied on their backs, an apparently large leisure class, are 
 always gadding about the town with the aimless uncon- 
 cern of hens, taking no account of the weather, and en- 
 joying the open air regardless of the barometer. Children 
 are equally indifferent, and jinrikisha coolies, although 
 they draw the hoods and tie their passengers in snug and 
 dry with oil-paper or rubber aprons, trot along cheerfully, 
 with their too scanty cotton garments more abbreviated 
 than ever. They substitute for an umbrella a huge flat 
 straw plate of a hat, and instead of putting on galoches, 
 they take o.ff even their straw sandals and run barefoot- 
 ed, tying up the big tee with a bit of rag or wisp of straw, 
 apparently by way of decoration. Those pedestrians who 
 wish to be stately and dry-shod thrust their bare feet 
 into a half -slipper arrangement of wood and oil-paper, 
 perched on two wooden rests three inches high, adding 
 this cubit to their stature. 
 
 \Vhen the rain-drops patter the shops are a delight, 
 and the great silk bazaars of Echigoya and Dai Maru, 
 the Louvre and Bon Marche of Tokio, are as entertain- 
 
 62 
 
Tokio 
 
 ing as a theatre. Both occupy corners on great thor- 
 oughfares, and have waving curtains of black cloth, with 
 crest and name in white, as the only wall or screen from 
 the street. The one vast open room of the first story 
 is rev'ealed at a glance. The floor proper of this great 
 apartment, raised a foot and a half from the stone walk 
 surrounding it, is covered with the usual straw - mats, 
 the uniform glistening surface extending more than sixty 
 feet either way. Here and there salesmen and account- 
 ants, the book-keepers being also cashiers, sit at low 
 desks, where they keep their sorobans, money, and cu- 
 rious ledgers. There are no shelves nor counters, and 
 in groups on the mats sit women with beautifully-dressed 
 hair, and men in sober silk garments, inspecting the 
 heaps of rainbow fabrics strewn about them. Small 
 boys bring out arm loads and baskets of silks from the 
 godowns, for no stock is ever in sight until the purchaser 
 asks for it. It is etiquette for these small boys to hail 
 and cheer the arriving and departing customer, and they 
 drone out some nasal cliorus. We once lifted the street 
 curtain at Dai Maru’s on a rainy day to find the whole 
 matted area deserted of customers. Immediately the 
 battalion of small boys sprang to their feet, and, deafen- 
 ing us with a chanted canticle, hurried to the corner 
 where a steaming bronze urn, various tea-caddies, and a 
 shelved box full of tea-sets provide patrons with cups of 
 amber-tinted nectar. For an hour these myrmidons ran 
 to and fro, baskets were carried back and forth, and gold 
 brocades supplied sunlight and rainbows for a gloomy 
 day. All these precious brocades come in lengths of four 
 and a half yards for the broad obis or sashes that are 
 one secret of her looks in the toilet of a Japanese woman. 
 Those woven of silk alone are as thick as leather and 
 soft as crape, and the massed gold threads, while glis- 
 tening like plates of chased metal, give stiffness but not 
 nardness to the fabrics. When the woof threads are left 
 
Jtnrz/cisha Days in Japan 
 
 in thick, shaggy loops on the under side, not cut away 
 in any economical fashion, these are yesso nis/iikis, the 
 choicest of all Japanese stuffs, and valued from sixty to 
 one hundred and twenty dollars for the single obi length. 
 
 The Nakadori is a half-mile-long street of curio and 
 second-hand shops, which just before the New Year con- 
 tain their best bargains, and no one can hold to the safe- 
 ty of his jinrikisha through that straight and narrow path, 
 beset by every temptation of old porcelains, lacquer, and 
 embroideries. Peddlers will gather from these shops and 
 carry packs twice their own size, to spread their con- 
 tents out in the room of a customer. Their wares are so 
 tempting and cheap that the beholder cannot resist them, 
 after a reformation of prices, and that peddler who comes 
 twice has marked his victim for his own. On certain 
 days of the week a rag fair is held on the Vanagiwara. 
 Vendors in rows half a mile long sit under the willow- 
 trees on the canal bank, with neat piles of old clothing, 
 scraps of cloth, and ornaments for sale. Between Shiba 
 and the railway station is a rag alley, a Petticoat Lane of 
 old clothing, but most of it is foreign and unpicturesque, 
 even in the flying glimpses to be caught from a jinrikisha. 
 
 In curio-hunting the experienced buyer invariably re- 
 plies takai, “too much,” to whatever price the dealer 
 names. If intent on the bargain he may add takusan 
 takai, “altogether too much.” Osoros/ii takai, or to/io- 
 moni takai, “inexpressibly, unspeakably dear,” some- 
 times serves to abate the price by reason of the dealer’s 
 amazement at hearing those classic and grandiloquent 
 words brought down to common usage. 
 
 Once I visited the most charming of old-clothes shops, 
 one where theatrical wardro’oes were kept ; but Sanjiro 
 could not, or would not remember it, and I never re- 
 turned. The shopmen were sober and serious automata, 
 whose countenances were stolid and imperturbable, and 
 one might as well have bargained with the high-priest 
 
 64 
 
Tokio Flower Festivals 
 
 for the veil of the temple, as have offered them less 
 than they asked. They sat, smoked, and cast indifferent 
 glances at us while baskets of gorgeous raiment were 
 borne in, and affected to look up the prices in a book of 
 records. After baiting me long enough, and bringing 
 me to raise my offer, the trio of partners would sudden- 
 ly clap their hands, say something in concert, and de- 
 liver me the article. It was all as precisely ordered and 
 acted as a set scene on the stage, and I longed io vain 
 to assist at other acts in the unique drama. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 TOKIO FLOWER FESTIVALS 
 
 With all its foreign sophistications, flower worship 
 has not died out in the Japanese capital. The calendar 
 is divided into the time of the camellia, the plum, the 
 cherry, the wistaria, the lotus, the chrysanthemum, and 
 the maple. Orange blossoms and tea blossoms alone 
 are omitted among the special flower festivals, and the 
 Japanese as naturally refer to the time of the cherry 
 blooming or of maple-leaves, as we to spring or autumn. 
 They infuse into these festivals a sentiment and feeling, 
 a spirit and gayety, inherited from generations of flower- 
 loving ancestors, who made their sesthetic pilgrimages 
 year after year to see the acres of wonderful flowers in 
 the different suburbs of each city. By the old calendar, 
 the first unfolding of the plum-trees, the true awakening 
 of the seasons, marked the new year. In the cliange 
 from the Chinese method of reckoning to the Gregorian, 
 the Japanese January fell to a churlish mood of nature, 
 when only late chrysanthemums, camellias, and in-door 
 dwarf -trees can bloom. But every door -way is then 
 
 B 65 
 
jinrzktsha Days in Japan 
 
 arched with evergreens and flowers ; pine and bamboo, 
 bound with braided straw ropes, are set before the 
 house ; tassels of rice straw are festooned across the 
 eaves, and lanterns hang in rows. The emblematic rice- 
 cake, prawn, orange, and fern -leaf are fastened above 
 the lintel, the handsomest screen is brought forward, 
 and more emblems and a large bowl for cards are set 
 out at the entrance. This is the season when all debts 
 are paid, while general visiting and feasting occupy three 
 days. Everybody says to everybody else, Shinen oms 
 ilefo, “I wish you a happy New -year;” or, Man zai 
 rakii, “ Good - luck for ten thousand years.” • Every- 
 body sends his friend a present — a basket of fruit, or 
 a dumpling of red beans or rice dough, wrapped in cer- 
 emonial paper. The streets of Tokio, crowded with 
 merrymakers and lighted at night by thousands of lan- 
 terns and torches, hold out-of-door fairs without number, 
 and from palace to hovel run sounds of rejoicing; yet 
 this joyous homage to the spirit of life is paid in mid- 
 winter, when snow-flakes may shroud the blooming ca- 
 mellia-trees, though the clear, bright Indian - summer 
 weather often lasts until after the new year. A\dnter, a 
 long calamity elsewhere in the same latitude, is only the 
 disagreeable incident of a few weeks in Central Japan. 
 A fortnight, a month, of melting snows, cold rains, and 
 dull skies, and lo ! the branches of the withered, old 
 black plum-trees are starred with fragrant white flow- 
 ers. For a few days a hazy calm hushes the air, sounds 
 are veiled, light is softened, and spring has really come, 
 no matter how many sullen relapses it may suffer before 
 the glorious April cloud-burst of cherry blossoms decks 
 the empire in wreaths of white and pink, and fills the 
 people with joy. And this linked sweetness long drawn 
 out, this gentle season of delight, lasts from the bursting 
 of the plum blossoms in February to the end of the 
 nyubai, or rainy season of June. 
 
 66 
 
AI A ILoWLk SHOW 
 
Tokio Flower Festivals 
 
 Beyond Kameido's wistaria-bordered lake are ancient 
 plum groves, whose trees — old, gnarled, twisted, black, 
 and lichen-covered, propped with poles and stone posts — 
 writhe and twist over the ground in contortions which 
 explain their name — the Gwariobai, or the couchant 
 dragon-trees. This Ume Yashiki was once the villa of 
 a Shogun's favorite. Its buildings, fences, and hedges 
 are gray with age, its stone tablets, moss-grown and 
 something in the hoary antiquity of the place subdues 
 one's pulses. The long cry of a hidden boatman in the 
 creek beyond the high camellia hedge is the only sound 
 that breaks the silence. People sit on the red-covered 
 benches, women in soft - toned crapes walk under the 
 strange skeleton shadows like moving figures of a dream, 
 and children flash among the black trunks brilliant in 
 their gay garb. Often one sees visionary old men sit- 
 ting lost in reverie, and murmuring to themselves of 
 nme no /tana the, plum blossom. They sip tea, they rap 
 out the ashes from tiny pipes, and slipping a writing-case 
 from the girdle, unroll a scroll of paper and indite an ode 
 or sonnet. 'I'hen, with radiant face and cheerful mutter- 
 ing, the ancient poet will slip his toes into his clogs and 
 tie the little slip to the branches of the most charming 
 tree. The well - bred spectators do not push upon the 
 fluttering scroll, as my impetuous fellow - countrymen 
 would do, but with a decent dignity read and criticise 
 the praises of the blossoms and the solemn stillness of 
 the old yashiki. 
 
 The veriest Gradgrind could not be indifferent to the 
 poetic charm of the Japanese spring-time, wherein the 
 setting of the buds, their swelling, and the gradual un- 
 folding of saknra, the cherry blossoms, are matters of 
 great public concern, the native newspapers daily print- 
 ing advance despatches from the trees. Even more beau- 
 tiful than the plum-tree festival is the Tokio celebration 
 of the blossoming of the cherry, and gayer than the brill- 
 
 69 
 
‘Jinrikisha Days in 'Japan 
 
 iant throngs are the marvellous trees. From the wild, 
 indigenous dwarf seedling of the mountains have been 
 developed countless varieties, culminating in that which 
 bears the pink-tinged double blossoms as large as a hun- 
 dred-leafed rose, covering every branch and twig with 
 thick rosettes. A faint fragrance arises from these sheets 
 of bloom, but the strange glare of pinkish light from their 
 fair canopy dazzles and dizzies the beholder. The cher- 
 ry-blossom Sunday of Uyeno Park is a holiday of the 
 upper middle class. One week later, the double avenue 
 of blossoming trees, lining the Mukojima for a mile along 
 the river bank, invites the lower classes to a very differ- 
 ent celebration from that of the decorous, well-dressed 
 throng driving, walking, picnicking, and tea drinking un- 
 der the famous trees. No warning to keep off the grass 
 forbids their wandering at will over the great park, every 
 foot of whose ground is historic, whose trees are ancient, 
 whose avenues are broad and winding, and whose woods 
 are as dark as the forest primeval. Temple bells softly 
 boom, ravens croak, and happy voices fill the air. 
 
 Not the Bois, the Cascine, or the Thier Garten can 
 vie with Uyeno on this blossom Sunday. Down every 
 path and avenue are vistas of flowery trees, lofty and 
 wide-spreading as vast oaks and elms, and through their 
 snowy branches shine thousands of other snowy branch- 
 es, or countless solitary trees gleaming against green 
 backgrounds. The wide lotus lake below Uyeno reflects 
 the white wonder that encircles the race course, and the 
 temple roofs on the tiny islands are smothered in pink 
 branches. Under the great grove of cherry-trees tea- 
 house benches are set close, and there the people lunch 
 and dine and sup ; and though sake' flows freely, the 
 most confirmed drinker is only a little redder, a little 
 happier, a little more loquacious than the rest. Czars 
 and kaisers may well envy this Oriental ruler, whose 
 subjects gather by thousands, not to throw bombs and 
 
 7 ° 
 
as.i()ii-v:i.i. o\:iA.i v 
 
Tokio Flower Festivals 
 
 riot for bread or the division of property, but to fall in 
 love with cherry-trees, and write poems in their praise. 
 At the cherry-blossom season especially his inborn pas- 
 sion for flowers and landscapes shows itself in prince, 
 poet, peasant, merchant, and coolie. Tattered beggars 
 gaze entranced at the fairy trees, and princes and min- 
 isters of state go to visit the famous groves. Bulletins 
 announce, quite as a matter of course, that Prince Sanjo 
 or Count Ito has gone to Xara or Kioto, a three days' 
 journey, to see the blossoming trees ; which is as if Bis- 
 marck or Gladstone should interrupt his cares of state 
 to undertake a pilgrimage to a distant rose show. 
 
 Later in the season the carefully tended trees in the 
 palace grounds put forth their blossoms, and sovereign 
 and courtiers hang poems on their branches, while the 
 spring garden party gathers the whole court circle under 
 the aisles of bloom in the palace grounds of Hama Rikiu. 
 Every citizen who has a garden gives an out-door fete, 
 and flower-bordered cards invite guests to see the native 
 sakura, or the cerisiers of the diplomatic set. 
 
 The celebration of the Mukojima, an avenue along 
 the east bank of the Sumidagawa, lined for more than 
 two miles with double rows of cherry-trees, belongs to 
 the lower ten thousand. On Sunday, which is officially 
 a day-of rest, the water is dotted with hundreds of boats, 
 and solemn little policemen keep the holiday-makers 
 moving along the shore. Friends recognize each other 
 in the crowd by some distinctive article of clothing. 
 One procession of jinrikishas will land a group with 
 heads tied up in gayly-figured towels all alike, or bits of 
 figured cotton folded as collars around the necks of their 
 kimonos. Boat-loads of men, partly disguised by their 
 queer head-dresses, are sculled and poled along the 
 banks, shouting and singing, clapping and strumming 
 the samisen, with an entire abandon that is the wonder 
 and envy of the Anglo-Saxon. Every reveller has his 
 
Jinrikisha Days m Japan 
 
 sake gourd, or tiny tub slung over his shoulder, which he 
 empties and refills, as long as his money and conscious- 
 ness last. Every man offers friend, neighbor, and stran- 
 ger a cup of the cheering spirit. One booth in three is 
 a sake stand, and pyramids of straw-covered sake' tubs 
 stand before every tea house. 'I'his sake, or rice brandy, 
 tastes and looks like the weakest sherry, although it 
 scents the air with alcoholic fumes. Made everywhere 
 in Japan, the sakd distilled from the rice of the broad 
 Osaka plain is most esteemed by connoisseurs for a pe- 
 culiarly delicate flavor. As it is the one liquor that does 
 not improve with age, the newest is the best, and is kept 
 in wooden tubs closed with spigots, and drawn off into 
 open-mouthed porcelain bottles, which are set in hot wa- 
 ter if warm sake is desired. 'Ehe Japanese drink it from 
 little shallow porcelain or lacquer cups that hold barely a 
 tablespoonful, but by repetition they imbibe pints. Its 
 first effect is to loosen the tongue and limber the joints ; 
 its second to turn the whole body a flaming red. 
 
 Mukojima’s carnival rivals the saturnalia of the an- 
 cients. This spring revel affords another resemblance 
 between this aesthetic people and the old Romans, and 
 one half expects to find a flower-crowned statue of Bac- 
 chus in some lovely little landscape garden beside the 
 Mukojima. Men dance like satyrs, cup and gourd in 
 hand, or, e.xtending a hand, make orations to the crowd — 
 natural actors, orators, and pantomimists every one of 
 them. But, with all this intoxication, only glee and affec- 
 tion manifest themselves. No fighting, no rowdyism, no 
 rough words accompany the spring saturnalia ; and the 
 laughter is so infectious, the antics and figures so com- 
 ical, that even sober people seem to have tasted of the 
 insane cup. At night lanterns swing from all the rows 
 of tea-houses, booths, and fairy branches, and intermina- 
 ble Japanese dinners are eaten, with beautiful maiko and 
 geisha posing and gliding, twanging the samisen and 
 
 74 
 
M ORIS I ’s c Aunr.N 
 
Tokio Flower Festivals 
 
 tsnziimi drums, their kimonos embroidered with cherry 
 blossoms, hair-pins, and coronals of blossoms set in the 
 butterfly loops of blue-black hair. Then the rain comes, 
 the petals fall, and those snow storms not from the skies 
 whiten the ground. 
 
 For a week in June, jinrikishas spin up this leafy tun- 
 nel to the iris fetes at Hori Kiri, where in ponds and 
 trenches grow acres of such fleur-de-lis as no Bourbon 
 ever knew. Compared with the cherry-blossom carnival, 
 this festival is a quiet and decorous garden party, where 
 summer-houses, hills, lakes, armies of royal flowers, and 
 groups of visitors seem to be consciously arranging them- 
 selves for decorative effects. 
 
 After the season opens, flower festivals crowd one an- 
 other, and the miracles of Japanese floriculture present- 
 ly e.xhaust the capacity of wonder. One of the most 
 superb of their productions is the botan, or tree peony, 
 whose fringed and silken flowers, as large as dinner- 
 plates, show all delicate rose and lilac shades, a red that 
 is almost black, and cream, pale yellow, straw' color, 
 and salmon hues of marvellous beauty. At the Ikegami 
 temples, the Nichiren priests display with pride their 
 botan, now three hundred years old, whose solid trunk 
 and wrinkled bark uphold a multitude of stately blos- 
 soms. Azaleas, fire- red, snow-white, salmon -pink, and 
 lilac, crowd every garden, and the mountains and wild 
 river-banks are all ablaze with them in May. 
 
 Then, also, the wistaria, the fuji, is in bloom, and at 
 the Kameido temple makes an eighth w'onder of the 
 world. Every householder has his wistaria trellis, gen- 
 erally reachiirg out as a canopy over some inlet, or, as 
 at Kameido, forming the roofs of the open air tea-houses 
 edging the lake. The mat of leaves and blossoms over- 
 head casts thick, cool shadows, and the long, pendent 
 purple and white flow'ers are reflected in the water. 
 Blossoms tw'o and even three feet long are common, and 
 
 77 
 
"Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 only a great swaying tassel four feet in length draws a 
 ‘‘‘ jVanihoilo!” (wonderful) from the connoisseurs. Whole 
 families come to spend the day on the borders of the 
 little lake, sipping amber tea, tossing mochi to the lazy 
 goldfish, or sitting in picturesque groups on the low 
 platforms under the canopies of flowers fluttering with 
 poems and lanterns. The temple is ancient, and the 
 grounds are full of tiny shrines, stone lanterns, tablets, 
 and images, and dwarfed and curiously trained pine trees, 
 with a high, hump-backed little bridge, over which, in the 
 old days, only priests and grandees might walk. Golden 
 carp, venerable old fellows, three or four feet in length, 
 show an orange nose now and then above the surface of 
 the pond. The people call these pets by clapping their 
 hands, and the golden gourmands swim from one horn 
 of plenty, filled with mochi, or rice-cakes, with which they 
 are fed, to another. At Kasukabe, on the Oshukaido, 
 north-east of Tokio, is the most famous wistaria in the 
 empire. Tlie vine is five hundred years old, with pen- 
 dent blossoms over fifty inches long, and trellises cov- 
 ering a space of four thousand feet, and thither poets 
 and pilgrims reverently go. 
 
 In August occurs the one great lotus show now seen 
 in Tokio, when the lake below Uyeno Park shows acres 
 of bluish -green plates of leaves starred with pink and 
 white blossoms, and the enchanted beholder looks down 
 from the bridges and tea-houses of the little islands 
 straight into the heart of the great flowers. The castle 
 moats no longer show their acres of lotus, and the mimic 
 salutes no longer ring around the citadel, as when those 
 myriad blossoms of Buddha opened with a gentle noise 
 under the first warm rays of the sun. There is a lovely 
 lotus-pond back of the Shiba pagoda, just seen as the 
 jinrikisha whirls along the shady avenue skirting it, but 
 the lotus of the moats was the summer glory of Tokio. 
 The flower was not alone to blame for malarial exlia- 
 
 7S 
 
WISTARIA-VINE AT KASUKABE 
 
Tokio Flower Festivals 
 
 lations, as the contest still rages between the two sides 
 of the city, as to whether the vapors from the moats, or 
 those from the exposed mud flats and made ground of 
 the Tsukiji section, are most pernicious. 
 
 The festival of the kiku, or chrysanthemum, in autumn, 
 decks the whole empire with red, white, and yellow flow- 
 ers. 'I'he sixteen-petalled chrysanthemum is the imperial 
 or government crest ; and the Emperor’s birthday, the 
 third of November, coming in the height of the season, 
 is made a gala-day in every province, and the occasion 
 of gorgeous flower shows. The Western mind is filled 
 with envy to discover that the wide -spreading, spicy 
 flowers selling here for a few coppers each, cost as many 
 dollars under new names across the water. Dango-zaka, 
 dismissed with a line in the guide-book, is more pictu- 
 resquely Japanese in autumn than any other suburb of 
 'I’okio. A community of florists tend, prune, dwarf, and 
 cultivate their chrysanthemum plants in obscurity until 
 the blossoming time makes Dango-zaka a gay fair. The 
 unique productions of their gardens are set pieces of 
 flowers on a gigantic scale. Under matted sheds, which 
 are so many temporary stages without footlights, groups 
 with life-sized figures are arranged, whose faces and hands 
 are of wax or composition, but whose clothes, the ac- 
 cessories, and scenery are made of living flowers, trained 
 so closely over a framework that the mechanism is not 
 even suspected. The plants forming the flower-pieces 
 are taken up with all their roots, wrapped in straw and 
 cloths, propped up inside the skeleton framework, and 
 watered every day. The flowers, drawn to the outside 
 and woven into place, produce a solid surface of color, 
 and are shaded with the most natural effects. The 
 tableaux represent scenes from history and legend, and 
 from the latest plays, or even illustrate the last emo- 
 tional crime of the day. Here are seen whole mountain- 
 sides of flowers, with water -falls of white blossoms 
 
 F 8l 
 
Jinrikisha Days m Japan 
 
 IN DANGO-ZAKA STREET 
 
 spreading into floral streams ; 
 and chrysanthemum women 
 leading chrysanthemum 
 horses, ridden by chrysanthemum men across chrysan- 
 themum bridges. Gigantic flowers, microscopic flowers, 
 plants of a single blossom, and single plants of two hun- 
 dred blossoms, have bamboo tents to themselves. Tout- 
 ers invite one to enter, proprietors chant the stor}- of 
 their pictures, and the side-show, the juggler, the fakir, 
 and the peddler make the bannered and lanterned lanes 
 a gay and innocent Babel. All classes visit Dango-zaka, 
 
 
 82 
 
THE FLORAL KWANNON 
 
Tokio Floivcr Festivals 
 
 and wander together up and down its one steep street, 
 and in and out of the maze of gardens, paying a copper 
 or two at each gate-way. Giants and saintly images forty 
 and fifty feet high are enshrined in mat pavilions as lofty 
 as temples, and to these marvellous chrysanthemum creat- 
 ures the phonograph has lately added its wonders. The 
 coolie, who draws the visitor's jinrikisha, is as voluble 
 
 SL.VYI.VG THE DEMON 
 SS 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 over the flowers as any of his patrons, and quite as dis- 
 criminating an admirer. Instead of stopping to rest 
 after his long pull to that hilly suburb, he follows his 
 passenger, pointing out beauties and marvels, approving 
 and exclaiming with contagious enthusiasm. 
 
 In November, with the brilliant maple-leaves, the floral 
 year ends. The coquette sends her lover a leaf or branch 
 of maple to signify that, like it, her love has changed. 
 Both the tea-plant and camellia are in bloom, but there 
 is no rejoicing in their honor, and flower -worshippers 
 count the weeks until the plum shall bloom again. 
 
 CH.APTER IX 
 
 J.VPANESE HOSPITALITIES 
 
 Among Japanese virtues stands hospitality, but, until 
 the adoption of foreign dress and customs by the court 
 nobles, no Japanese allowed his wife to receive general 
 visitors, or entertain mixed companies. The Japanese 
 is, consequently, a born club-man, and makes the club- 
 house a home. The Rokumeikwan, or Tokio Nobles' 
 Club, is the most distinguished of these corporations. 
 Its president is an imperial prince, and its members 
 are diplomats, nobles, officials, rich citizens, and resi- 
 dent foreigners. The exquisite houses and gardens of 
 the smaller, purely Japanese clubs, are perfect specimens 
 of nativ'e architecture, decoration, and landscape garden- 
 ing. By an arrangement of sliding screens, the houses 
 themselves may afford one large room or be divided 
 into many small ones, besides the tiny boxes in which 
 are celebrated the rites of cha no yu, or ceremonial tea. 
 
 Their elaborate dinners, lasting for hours, with jug- 
 86 
 
'Japanese Hospitalities 
 
 glers, dancers, and musicians between the courses, are 
 very costly. Rich men display a Russian prodigality in 
 entertaining, which was even greater in feudal times. 
 A day or two after arriving in Japan it was my good- 
 fortune to be a guest at one of these unique entertain- 
 ments, given at the Koyokwan, or Maple Leaf Club- 
 house, on the hill-side above the Shiba temples. We 
 arrived at three o’clock, and were met at the door by a 
 group of pretty nesans, or maids of the house, who, tak- 
 ing off our hats and shoes, led us, stocking-footed, down 
 a shining corridor and up-stairs to a long, low room, 
 usually divided into three by screens of dull gold paper. 
 One whole side of this beautiful apartment was open to 
 the garden beyond a railed balcony of polished cedar, 
 and the view, across the maple-trees and dense groves 
 of Shiba, to the waters of the Bay was enchanting. The 
 decorations of the club-house repeat the maples that fill 
 the grounds. The wall screens are painted with deli- 
 cate branches, the ramnia, or panels above the screens, 
 are carved with them, and in the outer wall and balcony- 
 rail are leaf-shaped openings. I'he dresses of the pret- 
 ty nesans, the crape cushions on the floor, the porcelain 
 and lacquer dishes, the sake bottles and their carved 
 stands, the fans and bon-bons, all display the maple-leaf. 
 In the tokonoma, or raised recess where the flow'er-vase 
 and kakemono, or scroll picture, are displayed, and that 
 small dais upon which the Emperor would sit if he ever 
 came to the house, hung a shadow')- painting, with a sin- 
 gle flower in a bronze vase. 
 
 Before each guest were set the tabako bon, a tray hold- 
 ing a tiny with live coals lying in a cone of ashes, 
 and a section of bamboo stem for an ash-receiver. Then 
 came the tea and sw-eetmeats, inevitable prelude to all 
 good cheer. Next the nesans set in front of each guest 
 an ozen, or table, not four inches in height, on which 
 stood a covered lacquered bowl containing the first 
 
 87 
 
Jinrikisha Days in "Japan 
 
 course, a tiny cup of soy, or piquant bean sauce, in 
 which to dip morsels of food, and a long envelope con- 
 taining a pair of white pine chopsticks. The master of 
 
 the feast broke apart his chopsticks, which were whittled 
 in one piece and split apart for only half their length, to 
 show that they were unused, and began a nimble play 
 with them. In his fingers they were enchanted wands, 
 and did his bidding promptly; in ours they wobbled, 
 made x’s in the air, and deposited morsels in our laps 
 
 and upon the mats alternately. The nesans giggled, and 
 the host almost forgot his Japanese decorum, but the 
 company patiently taught us how to brace one chop- 
 
 88 
 
Japanese Hospitalities 
 
 stick firmly in the angle of the thumb and against the 
 third finger. That stick is immovable, and the other, 
 held like a pen with the thumb and first and second fin- 
 gers, plays upon it, holding and letting go with a sure- 
 ness and lightness hardly attained with any other im- 
 plements. The supreme test of one’s skill is to lift and 
 hold an egg, the round surface making a perfect balance 
 and firm hold necessary, while too much force applied 
 would cause disasters. 
 
 Innumerable courses of dainty dishes followed, accom- 
 panied by cups of hot sak^. which our host taught us to 
 drink as healths, offered by each one of the company to 
 the others in turn, rinsing, offering, filling, and raising 
 the cup to the forehead in salutation, and emptying it 
 in three prescribed sips. Custom even requires one to 
 offer a health to the nesans, which they receive with a 
 modest and charming grace. 
 
 Midway in the feast three charming girls in dark 
 crape kimonos, strewn with bright maple-leaves, slipped 
 the screens aside and knelt on the mats with the koto, 
 samisen, and tsuzumi drum, on which they played a pre- 
 lude of sad, slow airs. Then the gilded panels disclosed 
 a troop of dazzling maiko in soft blue kimonos brocaded 
 
 89 
 
yinrikisha Days in yapart 
 
 with brilliant maple-leaves and broad obis of gold bro- 
 cade, the loops of their blue -black hair thrust full of 
 golden flowers, and waving gold fans painted with gay 
 maples. To the melancholy accompaniment of the geisha, 
 they danced the song of the maple-leaf in measures that 
 were only a slow gliding and changing from one perfect 
 pose to another. Watching these radiant creatures in 
 their graceful movements, we were even deaf to the soft 
 booming of the temple bells at the sunset hour, and the 
 answering croak of the mighty ravens. 
 
 These maikd and geisha, professional dancers and 
 singers, are necessary to any entertainment, and are 
 trained to amuse and charm the guests with their ac- 
 complishments, their wit, and sparkling conversation ; 
 lending that attraction, brightness, and charm to social 
 life, which wives and daughters are permitted to do in 
 the Occident. The maiko dances as soon as she is old 
 enough to be taught the figures and to chant the poems 
 which explain them ; and when she begins to fade, she 
 dons the soberer attire of the geisha, and, sitting on the 
 mats, plays the accompaniments for her successors and 
 pupils. Until this modern era, the geisha were the most 
 highly educated of Japanese women, and many of them 
 made brilliant marriages. 
 
 Long before the beautiful band had finished their 
 poem and dance of the four seasons, twilight had fallen. 
 Andons, or saucers of oil, burning on high stands inside 
 square paper lantern frames, made Rembrandtesque ef- 
 fects. Everything was lost in shadow but the figures of 
 the maiko moving over the shining mats. One tiny girl 
 of thirteen, belonging to the house, slipped in and out 
 with a bronze box and snuffers, and, kneeling before the 
 andons, opened the paper doors to nip off bits of the 
 wicks. The child, a miniature beauty, was grace itself, 
 gentle and shy as a kitten, blushing and quaintly bowing 
 when addressed. 
 
 90 
 
Japanese Hospitalities 
 
 It was six hours after the entrance of the tabako bons 
 before the guests rose to depart. All the troop of maid- 
 ens escorted us to the door, and after endless bows and 
 farewells, sat on the mats In matchless tableaux, their 
 sweet sayonaras ringing after us as our jinrikishas whirl- 
 ed us down the dark avenues of Shiba. 
 
 Cha no yu might well be a religious rite, from the rev- 
 erence with which it is regarded by the Japanese, and a 
 knowledge of its forms is part of the education of a 
 member of the highest classes. Masters teach its mi- 
 nute and tedious forms, and schools of cha no yu, like 
 the sects of a great faith, divide and differ. The cha no 
 yu ceremony is hedged round with the most awesome, 
 elaborate, and exalted etiquette of any custom in polite 
 Japanese life. Weddings or funerals are simple affairs 
 by comoarison. The cha no yu is a complication of all 
 social usages, and was perfected in the sixteenth centu- 
 ry, wlien itwas given its vogue by the Shogun Hideyoshi. 
 Before that it had been the diversion of imperial abbots, 
 monarchs retired from business, and other idle and se- 
 cluded occupants of the charming villas and monasteries 
 around Kioto. Hideyoshi, the Taiko, saw in its precise 
 forms, endless rules, minutiae, and stilted conventionali- 
 ties a means of keeping his daimios from conspiracies 
 and quarrels when they came together. It was an age 
 of buckram and behavior,_when solemnity constituted 
 the first rule of politeness. Tea drinking was no trivial 
 incident, and time evidently had no value. The daimios 
 soon invested the ceremony with so much luxury and 
 extravagance that Hideyoshi issued sumptuary laws, and 
 the greatest simplicity in accessories was enjoined. The 
 bowls in which the tea was made had to be of the plain- 
 est earthen-ware, but the votaries evaded the edict by 
 seeking out the oldest Chinese or Korean bowls, or those 
 made by some celebrated potter. Tea-rooms were re- 
 
 9 ‘ 
 
Jinrikzsha Days in Japan 
 
 stricted to a certain size — six feet square ; the entrance 
 became a mere trap not three feet high ; no servants 
 were permitted to assist the host, and only four guests 
 might take part in the six-hour or all-day-long ceremony. 
 The places of the guests on the mats, with relation to the 
 host, the door, and the tokonoma, or recess, were strictly 
 defined. Even the conversation was ordered, the objects 
 in the tokonoma were to be asked about at certain times, 
 and at certain other times the tea -bowl and its accom- 
 paniments were gravely discussed. Not to speak of them 
 at all would be as great an evidence of ill -breeding as 
 to refer to them at the wrong time. 
 
 The masters of cha no yu were revered above scholars 
 and poets. They became the friends and intimates of 
 Emperors and Shoguns, were enriched and ennobled, and 
 their descendants receive honors to this day. Of the 
 great schools and methods those of Senke, Yabunouchi, 
 and Musanokoji adhere most closely to the original 
 forms. Their first great difference is in the use of the 
 inward or the outward sweep of the hand in touching or 
 lifting the utensils. Upon this distinction the dilettanti 
 separated, and the variations of the many schools of to- 
 day arose from the original disagreement. To get some 
 insight into a curious phase of Japanese social life, I took 
 lessons in qha no yu of Matsuda, an eminent master of 
 the art, presiding over the ceremonial tea rooms of the 
 Hoishigaoka club-house in Tokio. 
 
 There could be no more charming place in which to 
 study the etiquette of tea drinking, and the master was 
 one of those mellow, gentle, gracious men of old Japan, 
 who are the perfect flower of generations of culture and 
 refinement in that most cesthetic country of the world. 
 In the afternoon and evening the Hoishigaoka, on the 
 apex of Sanno hill, is the resort of the nobles, scholars, 
 and literary men, who compose its membership, but in 
 the morning hours, it is all dappled shadow and quiet. 
 
 52 
 
Japanese Hospitalities 
 
 THE NESANS AT THE HOISHtGAOKA 
 
 The master was much pleased at having four foreign pu- 
 pils. and all the hill side took an interest in our visits. 
 We’ followed the etiquette .strictly, first taking oft' our 
 shoes — for one would as soon think of walking hob- 
 nailed across a piano -top, as of marring the polished 
 woods of T^ip^'isse corridors, or the fine, soft mats of 
 their rooms with heel-marks— and sitting on our heels, 
 as long as our unaccustomed and protesting muscles 
 and tendons permitted. 
 
 First, bringing in the basket of selected charcoal, with 
 its prettv twigs of charred azalea coated with lime, Mat- 
 
 93 
 
Jinrikisha Days hi 'Japan 
 
 suda replenished the fire in the square hearth in the 
 fioor, dusted the edges with an eagle’s feather, and 
 dropped incense on the coals. Then he placed the iron 
 kettle, filled with fresh water from a porcelain jar, over 
 the coals, and showed us how to fold the square of pur- 
 ple silk and wipe each article of the tea-service, how to 
 scald the bowl, and to rinse the bamboo whisk. For 
 cha no yu, tea-leaves are pounded to a fine powder, one, 
 two, or three spoonfuls of this green flour being put in 
 the bowl, as the guests may prefer a weak or a strong 
 
 MATSUD-V, THE MASTER OF CH.V XO YU 
 94 
 
'Japanese Hospitalities 
 
 decoction. Boiling water is poured on the powder, and 
 the mixture beaten to a froth with the bamboo whisk. 
 This thick, green gruel, a real puree of tea, is drank as a 
 loving-cup in the usu cha ceremony, each one taking 
 three sips, wiping the edge of the bowl, and passing it 
 to his neighbor. The measures and sips are so exact 
 that the last one drains the bowl. Made from the finest 
 leaves, this beverage is so strong that a prolonged course- 
 of it would shatter any but Japanese nerves. 
 
 It is in the precise management of each implement, in 
 each position of the fingers, in the deliberation and cer- 
 tainty of each movement, that the art of cha no yu lies, 
 and its practice must be kept up throughout the lifetime 
 of a devotee. Even with all the foreign fashions, the old 
 ceremonial rites are as much in vogue with the upper 
 classes as ever, and the youth of both sexes are carefully 
 trained in their forms. 
 
 Much less pretentious and formal are the eel dinners 
 with which Japanese hosts sometimes delight their for- 
 eign friends, as well as those of their own nationality. 
 Even Sir Edwin Arnold has celebrated the delights of 
 eels and rice at the Golden Koi, and there are other 
 houses where the delicious dish may be enjoyed. When 
 one enters such a tea-house, he is led to a tank of squirm- 
 ing fresh-water eels, and in all seriousness bidden to 
 point out the object of his preference. Uncertain as 
 the lottery seems, the cook, who stands by with a long 
 knife in hand, quickly understands the choice made, and 
 seizing the wriggling victim, carries it oft' to some sacri- 
 ficial block in the kitchen. An eel dinner begins with 
 eel-soup, and black eels and white eels succeed one an- 
 other in as many relays as one may demand. The fish 
 are cut in short sections, split and flattened, and broiled 
 over charcoal fires. Black eels, so called, are a rich 
 dark brown in reality, and the color is given them by 
 
 95 
 
J/nrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 dipping them in soy before broiling ; and white eels are 
 the bits broiled without sauces. Laid across bowls of 
 snowy rice, the eels make as pretty a dish as can be 
 served one, and many foreigners besides the appreciative 
 English poet have paid tribute to their excellence. An 
 eel dinner in a river-bank tea-house, with a juggler or a 
 fow maiko to enliven the waits between the courses, is 
 most delightful of Tokio feasts. 
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 THE JAPANESE THEATRE 
 
 “ Saturated with the refinements of an old civiliza- 
 tion,” as Dr. Dresser says, and possessing all other arts 
 in perfection, it is not surprising that the Japanese 
 drama should be so well worthy of its people. The 
 theatre has reached its present development slowly and 
 with difficulty. Caste distinctions hindered its rise, 
 actors ranking next the eta, or outcast class in feudal 
 days, and the play-houses of such degraded beings lying 
 under ban. Only the middle and lower classes patron- 
 ized them, nobles never attending any public exhibitions, 
 and all women being excluded. 
 
 In the golden age of the Tokugawas the drama began 
 to win recognition ; theatres were built by the Shogun ; 
 the marionette shows, the first departure from the No 
 Kagura, gave way to living actors and realism succeeded. 
 In the great social upheaval and rearrangement of classes 
 following the Restoration, actors rose a little in social 
 esteem and gained some rights of citizenship. But an- 
 other quarter of a century will hardly rank the dramatic 
 with the other arts and honor its interpreters. Noble- 
 men now attend the theatre, but actors never receive 
 an invitation to their clubs. A few years since, Tokio 
 
 96 
 
The 'Japanese Theatre 
 
 founded an association for the improvement of the the- 
 atre, and the development of the histrionic art of the 
 country in its own distinctive way. Viscount Hijikata 
 and Viscount Kawawa were elected president and vice^ 
 president of this Engei Kyokai, but little is known of its 
 actual work. 
 
 Instead of farce or recitative prologue preceding the 
 play, come one or two acts of classic pantomime or char- 
 acter dance, or an interlude of this kind in the middle 
 of the drama. These classic pantomimes resemble the 
 No Kagura simplified. 
 
 This No dance, or lyric drama, is the dramatic form cur- 
 rent before the seventeenth century. Bordering on the 
 religious, it suggests the Greek drama, and the passion 
 and miracle plays of medimval Europe. Originally, the 
 No was the pantomime festival dance of the Shinto tem- 
 ples, fabled to have been first performed by Suzume be- 
 fore the cave of the Sun Goddess. The sacred dance is 
 still a temple ceremonial, and the dances of the Shinto 
 priestesses at Nikko and Nara are famous. In time the 
 No became the entertainment of honor in the yashikis 
 of the great, and princes and nobles took part in the 
 solemn measures when greater princes were their guests. 
 To the slow and stately movements of the dancers, and 
 their play with fan and bells, dialogue was added, and an 
 e.xaggeration of detail and etiquette. 
 
 The No is wholly artificial, the movements of the act- 
 ors being as stiff, stilted, and measured as the classic 
 idiom in which the dialogue is spoken, and the ancient 
 and obsolete ideographs which set forth the synopsis of 
 the action. Confined to the yashikis and monasteries, 
 the No was the entertainment of the upper classes, who 
 alone could understand its involved and lofty diction 
 and intricate syfnbolism. While the bare arguments of 
 plays and dances are as familiar as fairy tales or folk- 
 lore, only scholars of great attainments can read their 
 
 G 97 
 
Jinrikisha Days in yapati 
 
 actual lines, and the full translation of a No programme 
 for the Duke of Edinburgh, on his visit to Japan, busied 
 the interpreters of the British Legation for days, with 
 the aid of all the old native poets and scholars in Tokio. 
 
 The No is a trilogy, occupying four or five hours of 
 three successive days. The first set of scenes is to pro- 
 pitiate the gods ; the second to terrify evil spirits and 
 punish the wicked ; and the third to glorify the good, 
 beautiful, and pleasant. The dramatis persona gods, 
 goddesses, demons, priests, warriors, and heroes of ear- 
 ly legend and history, and much of the action is alle- 
 gorical. By a long gallery at the left the actors ap- 
 proach the elevated pavilion or platform of the stage, 
 which is without curtain or scenery, and almost without 
 properties. The audience sits upon the matted area 
 surrounding the three sides of the stage. Flute, drum, 
 and pipes play continuously, and a row of men in old 
 ceremonial dress sit statuesque at one side of the stage, 
 chanting and wailing the explanatory chorus throughout 
 the performance. In the great scenes the actors wear 
 masks of thin lacquered or gilded wood, and valuable 
 collections of such ancient dance masks are preserved 
 in temples and yashikis. The costuming is superb, the 
 old brocade and cloth - of - gold garments showing the 
 court costumes of centuries ago, and the great families 
 and monasteries hold their ancient No costumes as chief- 
 est treasures. 
 
 The actors enter at a gait that out-struts the most 
 exaggerated stage stride ever seen, the body held rigid 
 as a statue, and the foot, never wholly lifted, sliding slow- 
 ly along the polished floor. These buckram figures, mov- 
 ing with the solemnity of condemned men, utter their 
 lines like automata, not a muscle nor an eyelash moving, 
 nor a flicker of expression crossing the unmasked coun- 
 tenance. Their tones are unspeakably distressing, nasal, 
 high-pitched, falsetto sounds, and many performers have 
 
 98 
 
The Japanese Theatre 
 
 ruined and lost their voices, and even burst blood-ves- 
 sels, in the long-continued, unnatural strain of their reci- 
 tatives. The children who take part equal the oldest 
 members in their gravity and woodenness. In some 
 delightful scenes the demons, with hideous masks and 
 abundant wigs of long, red-silk hair, spread deliberate and 
 conventional terror among the buckram grandees, and, 
 stamping the stage wildly, leaping and whirling, relieve 
 the long-drawn seriousness of the trilogy. It is only 
 when the performers are without masks that the scene 
 is recognized as intentionally a light and amusing farce, 
 while the roars of the audience are elicited by stately, 
 ponderous, and time-honored puns, and plays upon words 
 that a foreigner cannot appreciate. 
 
 Fine representations of the No may be seen at the 
 Koyokwan club-house in 'I'okio, and in the audiences 
 one beholds all the bureaucracy, the court circles, and a 
 gathering of aristocratic families not elsewhere to be en- 
 countered. 
 
 The e.visting theatre and the legitimate drama are not 
 yet three centuries old, and the name shibai, meaning 
 turf places, or grass plot, implies the same evolution 
 from out-door representations that the occidental drama 
 liad. There is no Shakespeare, nor Corneille, nor, in- 
 deed, any famous dramatist, whose works survive from 
 an earlier day, to align the stage with literature and 
 make its history. Authorship is rarely connected with 
 the plays, and authors’ royalties are unknown. Many 
 of the novels of Baku have been dramatized, but most 
 often anonymously. Plays are usually written in the 
 simpler hirakana, or running characters, in which light 
 romances and books for women are written, and this fact 
 alone shows the esteem in which dramatic literature 
 is held. Incidents in history, lives of warriors, heroes, 
 and saints furnish themes for the drama, and all the 
 common legends and fairy tales are put upon the stage. 
 
 99 
 
'Jtnrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 That great classic, the affecting history of the “ Forty- 
 seven Ronins,” is always popular, and the crack-brained 
 heroisms of the days of chivalry fire the Japanese heart 
 notwithstanding its passion for the foreign and modern. 
 The trials, tortures, and miracles of the early days of 
 Buddhism, and the warlike histories of the great feudal 
 houses, furnish tragedies and sensational and spectacu- 
 lar plays without end. There are, also, romantic melo- 
 dramas, emotional dramas, and comedies of delicious hu- 
 mor and satire. 
 
 New plays, while rare, are not theatrical events, and 
 first nights by no means indicate success or failure. 
 The play is tried on the audience, changed, cut, and al- 
 tered as actors, manager, scene-painter, carpenter, and 
 patrons desire, without consideration of the author’s 
 rights or feelings. 
 
 I once asked a great star who had written his play. 
 
 “ I do not understand,” said the tragedian ; and a by- 
 stander explained that the manager had cut reports of a 
 theft, a murder, and a shipwreck from a newspaper, and, 
 discussing them with the star, evolved the outlines of a 
 connected play and decided on the principal scenes and 
 effects. A hack writer was then called in, who, under 
 dictation, shaped the plot and divided it into scenes. 
 The managerial council elaborated it further, allotting 
 the parts, and the star then composed his lines to suit 
 himself. In rehearsal the play was rounded, the diction 
 altered, and each actor directed to write out his own 
 part, after which a full transcript was made for the 
 prompter. 
 
 As to the authorship of the play of the “ Forty-seven 
 Ronins,” he said: “'I'hat is our country’s history. We 
 all know the story of their lives and glorious deaths, and 
 many novelists and poets have written of them.” 
 
 “ But who made it into a drama ?” 
 
 “Oh, every theatre has its own way of representing 
 
 100 
 
The Japanese Theatre 
 
 the different scenes, although the great facts are histori- 
 cal and cannot be misrepresented, now that the Toku- 
 gawa’s ban against the play is removed. Danjiro pla\’S 
 it in one way, and other actors have their versions, but 
 none of them play it the same at every engagement, nor 
 repeat just the same acts on every day of an engage- 
 ment.” 
 
 With dramatic authorship so vague and uncertain, the 
 origin or author of any play is far to seek. Revivals 
 and rotations of the old favorites constitute a manager's 
 idea of attractions, a new scene or two, a novel feature, 
 and some local picture or allusion being enough to sat- 
 isfy the most blase patron. No accurate libretto nor 
 printed book of the play can thus e.xist, but the illus- 
 trated programmes give a pictorial outline of it — a veri- 
 table impressionist sketch, noting its salient features, 
 and leaving all details to time and imagination. There 
 are no dramatic unities, no three-act or five-act limita- 
 tions, and no hampering laws of verse and rhythm. An 
 orchestra and half - concealed chorus e.xplains, heralds, 
 and lauds the action, a survival of the No gradually dis- 
 appearing with other things before the demand for 
 shorter hours and briefer plays. 
 
 Women do not appear on the Japanese stage, female 
 parts being played by men, who often make these roles 
 their specialty, cultivating and using their voices always 
 in a thin, high falsetto. The make-up, the voices, gait, 
 action, and manner of some of these actors are wonder- 
 ful, and Genoske, the greatest impersonator of female 
 characters, when dressed for the part of some noble her- 
 oine, is an ideal beauty of the delicate, aristocratic type. 
 Outside the great theatres, in plays and side-show enter- 
 tainments, that may be compared with our dime muse- 
 ums, a woman is occasionally found on the stage ; and, a 
 few years ago, a Tokio manager amazed the town with 
 the performances of a company made up entirely of 
 
 lOZ 
 
Jittrik/s/ia Days in 'Japan 
 
 women. In the interludes, where jugglers and acrobats 
 entertain the audience, women are sometimes seen, and, 
 in time, plays will be cast for both sexes, and female stars 
 will shine. The infant prodigy is known to the Japan- 
 ese stage, and in some wonderfully pretty and affecting 
 scenes in the “ Ronins ’’ little children utter their lines 
 and go through their parts with great naturalness. 
 
 The great theatre of Tokio is the Shintoiniza, a long, 
 gabled building, ornamented above the row of entrance 
 doors by pictures of scenes from the play. The street 
 is lined with tea-houses, or restaurants, for a play is not 
 a hap hazard two-hour after-dinner incident. A man 
 goes for the day, carefully making up his theatre party 
 beforehand, the plays generally beginning at eleven 
 o’clock in the morning, and ending at eight or nine in 
 the evening. After a short run the hours during which 
 the great actors appear and the great stage effects are 
 made become known, and the spectator may time his 
 visit accordingly. It is bad form for a Japanese of posi- 
 tion to go to the theatre door, pay for a box. and enter 
 it. He must send a servant, at least a day beforehand, 
 to one of the tea-houses near the theatre to engage its 
 attentions for the day. and through its agency secure a 
 box. The tea-house people are the ticket speculators in 
 league with the box-office. .At the proper hour, the party 
 assemble at the tea-house, and give orders for the lunch, 
 dinner, and frequent teas to be served during the day. 
 The tea-house attendants conduct them to their box. and 
 at each intermission come to see what is wanted, bring- 
 ing in at the dinner-hour the large lacquer chmo boxes 
 with their courses of viands, that their patrons may dine 
 comfortably where they sit. Everybody smokes, and 
 each box has its little tabako bon. with its cone of glow- 
 ing coals to light the tiny pipes, the rat-tat of the pipes, 
 as the ashes are knocked out, often making a chorus to 
 the action. 
 
 102 
 
The Japanese Theatre 
 
 Theatre buildings are light and flimsy wooden struct- 
 ures, with straw -mats and matting everywhere. They 
 are all alike — a square auditorium with a sloping floor, 
 a single low gallery, and a stage the full width of the 
 house. The floor space is divided into so-called boxes 
 by low railings, that serve as bridges for the occupants 
 to pass in and out. Visitors always sit on the floor, each 
 box being six feet square and designed for four people. 
 'I’he gallery has one row of boxes at either side, several 
 rows facing the stage, and behind them a pen, where the 
 multitude stand and listen, paying one or two coppers 
 for each act. This gallery of the gods is called the ‘‘deaf 
 seat,” but the deaf hear well enough to be vociferous. 
 The theatre-goer takes a check for his shoes, and racks 
 hanging full of wooden clogs are the ornaments of the 
 foyer. Within the building are booths for the sale of 
 fruits, tea, sweets, tobacco, toys, hair-pins, photographs 
 of the stars, and other notions, so that a bo.x-party need 
 not leave the house in pursuit of any creature comforts. 
 The ventilation is too good, and the light and open con- 
 struction invites wintry draughts. 
 
 Charges are made in detail, and the following is one 
 bill presented for a party of seven at a Yokohama the- 
 atre. No charge was made for the two family servants, 
 who came and went at will. 
 
 .Admission (seven persons) g8 
 
 Box I 6o 
 
 Carpeting, chairs, etc 50 
 
 Messenger hire 10 
 
 Tea and confectionery 30 
 
 Persimmons, figs, and grapes 30 
 
 Eels and rice, etc. (seven persons) 3 50 
 
 Tea house i 00 
 
 Presents to servants 30 
 
 ^8 58 
 
 Received payment. 
 
 103 
 
 Fukkuya. 
 
Jinriktsha Days in yapa7t 
 
 There is always a drop-curtain, generally ornamented 
 with a gigantic character or solitary symbol, and often 
 nowadays covered with picturesque advertisements. For- 
 merly, so much of the play was given by day that no foot- 
 lights and few lamps were used. In those good old days 
 a black-shrouded mute hovered about each actor after 
 dark, holding out a candle at the end of a long stick to 
 illuminate his features, that the audience might see the 
 fine play of expression. With the adoption of kerosene 
 the stage was sufficiently lighted, and the Shintomiza 
 has a full row of footlights, while the use of electricity 
 will soon be general. The black mutes act as “ supers ” 
 throughout all plays where changes are made or proper- 
 ties manoeuvred while the curtain is up. 
 
 The actors enter the stage by two long, raised walks 
 through the auditorium, so that they seem to come from 
 without. These raised walks, on a level with the stage 
 and the heads of the spectators in the floor boxes, are 
 called the hana michi, or flower-walks, and as a popular 
 actor advances his way is strewn with flowers. The exits 
 are sometimes by the hana michi and sometimes by the 
 wings, according to the scene. 
 
 The miniature scale of things Japanese makes it pos- 
 sible to fill a real scene with life-like details. The stage 
 is always large enough for three or four actual houses to 
 be set as a front. The hana michi is sufficiently broad 
 for jinrikishas, kagos, and pack-horses, and with the il- 
 lumination of daylight the unreality of the picture van- 
 ishes, and the spectator seems to be looking from some 
 tea-house balcony on an everj'-day street scene. Garden, 
 forest, and landscape effects are made by using potted 
 trees, and shrubs uprooted for transplanting. The ever- 
 ready bamboo is at hand and the tall dragon-grass, and 
 the scene-painters produce extraordinary illusions in the 
 backgrounds and wings. Some of the finest stage pict- 
 ures I have seen were in Japan, and its stage ghosts, 
 
 104 
 
The Japatiese Theatre 
 
 demons, and goblins would be impossible elsewhere. In 
 the play of “ Honest Sebi ” there was a murder scene 
 in a bamboo grove in a rainy twilight that neither Henry 
 Irving nor Jules Claretie could have surpassed; and in 
 “The Vampire Cat of the Nabeshima,” or “The En- 
 chanted Cat of the Tokaido,” a beautiful young woman 
 changed, before the eyes of the audience, to a hideous 
 monster, with a celerity more ghastly than that which 
 transforms Dr. Jekyll into Mr. Hyde. 
 
 Japanese theatres use the revolving stage, which has 
 been their original and unique possession for two centu- 
 ries. A section of the stage flooring, twenty or thirty 
 feet in diameter, revolves like a railway turn-table, on 
 lignum-vitte wheels, moved by coolies below stairs, who 
 put their shoulders to projecting bars, as with the silk- 
 press. The wings come to the edge of this circle, and 
 at a signal a whole house whirls around and shows its 
 other rooms or its garden. Sometimes the coolies turn 
 too quickly, and the actors are rolled out of sight gestic- 
 ulating and shouting. The scenery is painted on wings 
 that draw aside, or on flies hoisted overhead. Curiously 
 enough, the signal for opening the curtain is the same as 
 that used at the Come'die Frangaise— three blows on the 
 floor with a big stick. 
 
 The Japanese theatre of to d.ay is given over to real- 
 ism and the natural school, and Jefferson and Coquelin 
 are not more quietly, easily, and entirely the characters 
 they assume than Danjiro, their Japanese fellow-Thes- 
 pian. The play is a transcript of actual life, and ev- 
 erything moves in an every-day way, though Japanese 
 manners and customs often seem stilted, artificial, and 
 unnatural to the brusque Occidental, with his direct and 
 brutally practical etiquette. Pathos is always deep and 
 long drawn out, and the last tear is e.xtracted from the 
 eyes of audiences quick to respond to emotional appeals. 
 Tragedies are very tragic and murders very sanguinary. 
 
 105 
 
yinrtkisha Days in yapan 
 
 Death is generally accomplished by edged tools, and the 
 antics of the fencers, the wonderful endurance of the 
 hacked victims, and the streams of red paint and red silk 
 ravellings that ooze forth delight the audiences, who 
 shout and shriek their “ Yal Ya!” and “ Yeh! Yeh!" 
 The swordsmen are often acrobats and jugglers in dis- 
 guise, who enliven the extended slaughters with thrilling 
 tours de force. Seppuku the honorable death, or hara-kiri 
 as it is most commonly known, is always received with 
 breathless interest and wild applause, and the self-dis- 
 embowelling of the hero, with a long last oration, still 
 seems to the Japanese something fine and heroic and 
 the most complete revenge upon an insulting foe. 
 
 The detail and minuteness with which everything is 
 explained, and the endless etiquette and circumlocution, 
 are thoroughly Japanese. Little is left to the imagina- 
 tion in their dramatic art, and an ordinary play has more 
 sub-plots and characters than one of Dickens’s novels. 
 With the rapid adoption of new customs, the theatre is 
 becoming the only conserver of the old life and manners. 
 
 If the Japanese stage has its blood-and-thunder and 
 its tank drama, it has also its millinery play. The cos- 
 tumes alone are often worth going to see, and the man- 
 agers announce the appearance of historic brocades and 
 armor worthy of museums. Danjiro owns and wears a 
 sacred coat of mail that belonged to one of the Ronins, 
 and his appearance in it is the signal for the maddest 
 applause. Such treasures of costume and of armor are 
 bequeathed from father to son, and from retiring star to 
 favorite pupil. As tokens of high approval rich and no- 
 ble patrons send to actors rare costumes, swords, pipes, 
 and articles of personal use. E.xcited spectators even 
 throw such tributes upon the stage. One approving for- 
 eigner, seeing the rain of hats, coats, obis, and tobacco- 
 pouches, once tossed his hat down. Later the manager 
 and the actor's valet returned the hat and asked for ten 
 
SCENIC FROM IMF. Fl.AV OF THE “ F( IR I Y-sl.VEN KONINS. 
 
The 'Japanese Theatre 
 
 dollars, as those seeming gifts from the audience were 
 merely pledges or forfeits, to be afterwards redeemed by 
 money under the star’s regular schedule of prices. As 
 protests availed nothing, and the whole house only roar- 
 ed in derision when he said that he had wished Danjiro 
 to keep the battered derby as a souvenir, the enthusiast 
 paid his forfeit. 
 
 The audience is as interesting a study as the players, 
 each little square bo.x being another stage, whereon the 
 picturesque drama of Japanese life is enacted. Trays 
 of tea and sweetmeats and single teapots are constant- 
 ly supplied to the spectators by attendants, who tread 
 the narrow partition rails between the bo.xes like acro- 
 bats. Whenever the curtain closes there is a swift scur- 
 rying of these Ganymedes to the bo.xes, while the chil- 
 dren climb upon the partition rails and the hana michi, 
 or run about the theatre, even romping upon the stage 
 itself, and peeping under the curtain to see what the 
 carpenters are hammering ; all with perfect ease and 
 unconsciousness. 
 
 Visiting the star in his dressing-room is a simple com- 
 mercial transaction. The actors make a fixed charge 
 for receiving such visits, deriving a regular income from 
 this source. Danjiro’s dressing-room is high up among 
 the flies back of the Shintomiza stage, with a window 
 looking down upon it, so that he needs no call-boy. He 
 often shouts down to the stage himself, and has the ac- 
 tion of the play delayed or hastened, according to his 
 toilet or his humors. Nothing could be more scornful 
 and indifferent than Danjiro’s treatment of the high- 
 priced visitors to his dressing-room. Fulsome flattery, 
 if offered with the florid and elaborate Japanese forms, 
 will mollify him, and the old fellow — eighth idolized 
 Danjiro in succession — will finally offer tea, present a 
 hair-pin to a lady, or write an autograph on a fan in his 
 most captivating stage daimio manner. When making up 
 
 109 
 
Jinri/cis/ia Days in Japan 
 
 for a part, the great actor sits on the mat before a large 
 swinging mirror. Except for a character face little dis- 
 guise is used, as daylight spoils its effect. Three or four 
 meek valets wait upon this spoiled and whimsical old 
 autocrat, and the whole theatre staff attends. The value 
 of his wardrobe, kept in immense covered bamboo bas- 
 kets, is very great, and its care a serious matter. Part of 
 it was once stolen, and when the whole Tokio police force 
 succeeded in restoring it Danjiro announced that he could 
 never again wear what the touch of a thief had defiled. 
 
 Genoske, fourth of his name and line, and Sodanje, a 
 cousin of Danjiro, equally prove the heredity of Japan- 
 ese genius, and are favorites of the Tokio public. Young 
 actors pay the great stars for the privilege of joining 
 their companies, and studying their methods. Danjiro 
 is said to receive three thousand dollars from the Shin- 
 tomiza theatre for the year or season, which lasts from 
 early fall until after the cherry blossoms. His connec- 
 tion with the Shintomiza is like that of a societaire with 
 the Comddie Frangaise. Yet he plays in other Tokio 
 theatres, has filled engagements in other cities, and ev- 
 erywhere receives from perquisites, fees, and gifts more 
 than the amount of his salary. 
 
 The Japanese artist is fully aware of the aid ingenious 
 advertising may lend to genius. Drawing-room engage- 
 ments do not yet contribute a part of the income of a 
 great actor ; but such a one was once brought to drink 
 tea at a foreign house, and obligingly recited from his 
 great roles, and through the interpreter, talked most in- 
 terestingly to us of his art and stage business. In a few 
 I days the native newspapers, the vernacular press, as 
 phe British dailies term it, contained accounts of a great 
 entertainment offered this favorite actor by some foreign 
 residents, and the simple afternoon tea of six people was 
 lost to view in the description of the elaborate banquet 
 and attending crowd. 
 
 IXO 
 
The Imperial Family 
 
 The Government exercises a certain censorship of the 
 stage, as of the press, suppressing an obnoxious play, and 
 arresting manager and company if necessary. No allu- 
 sions to present political events are allowed, and the au- 
 thorities permit the expression of no disturbing ideas. 
 The Tokugawas exercised this censorship towards the 
 play of the “ P'orty-seven Ronins,” because its main ar- 
 gument and many of its scenes reflected too clearly the 
 corrupt practises of the Shogun’s court. Even its name 
 was changed, and, until the Restoration, it was presented 
 as the Chiushingura (Loyal League), and the scenes 
 strayed far from historic fact. Since the new era, mana- 
 gers advertise their representations as most closely fol- 
 lowing the actual records, and every fresh contribution 
 from historian or antiquarian is availed of. 
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 THE l.MPERIAL FAMILY 
 
 European sovereigns and reigning families are par- 
 venus compared to the ruler and the imperial house of 
 Japan, which shows an unbroken line from the accession 
 of Jimmu Tenno, the first Emperor in 660 b.c., down to 
 the present son of Heaven, Mutsu Hito, one hundred 
 and twenty-first Emperor of his line. 
 
 During the feudal period, the Emperors, virtually pris- 
 oners of their vassals, the Shoguns, lived and died within 
 the yellow palace walls of Kioto, knowing nothing of 
 their subjects, and unknown by them. After death, each 
 was deified under a posthumous appellation, and there 
 his history ceased. Too sacred a being to be spoken of 
 by his personal name, at the mention of his title all Jap- 
 anese make an unconscious reverence even now. When 
 
 Jit 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 his patronymic was written, it was purposely left incom- 
 plete by the omission of one stroke of the writing-brush. 
 In the spoken language, the ruler is the Shu jo, the Hei- 
 ka, or the Tenno, while in the written language he is the 
 Tenno, the Kotei, or the Mikado. The Empress is the 
 Kogo in both the spoken and the written language, and 
 the honorific sama follows all of these imperial appella- 
 tions. 
 
 Mutsu Hito, the most significant figure in Japanese 
 history, was born in the Kioto palace, November 3, 1852, 
 and, taught and trained as imperial princes had been be- 
 fore him, succeeded to the throne after the death of his 
 father, February 13, 1867. In the following autumn the 
 Shogun sent in his formal resignation, gave back the su- 
 preme power to the rightful ruler, and retired to Osaka. 
 In February, 1868, the Emperor, not yet sixteen years of 
 age, received the foreign envoys in the Kioto palace with 
 uncovered face; then, defeating the rebellious Shogun at 
 Osaka, removed his capital to Yeddo, and chose the name 
 Meiji (enlightenment), to designate the era of his reign. 
 
 As seen at the rare court functions, at military reviews, 
 and races, the Emperor is easily the central figure. Tall- 
 er than the average of his race, and possessing great dig- 
 nity and majesty, his slow, military step and trailing 
 sword effectually conceal the unequal gait rheumatism 
 sometimes obliges. He wears a trimmed beard, and his 
 features, more decided and strongly marked than is usual 
 with the aristocratic type of Japanese countenance, wear 
 a calm and composure as truly Oriental as imperial. In 
 public he wears the uniform of generalissimo of the army, 
 a heavily-frogged and braided one of dark-blue broad- 
 cloth in winter, and of white duck in summer, with a 
 gold-mounted sword and many decorations. In recog- 
 nition of the honors and orders conferred upon him by 
 other royalties, the Emperor bestows the cordon and 
 jewel of the princely Order of the Chrysanthemum. The 
 
 112 
 
The Imperial Family 
 
 Order of the Rising Sun is given for merit and distin- 
 guished services, and its red button is worn by many for- 
 eigners as well as natives. 
 
 Of late, the Emperor has abandoned his attempts to 
 learn English and German, and relies upon interpreters, 
 but he reads translations of foreign literature with great 
 interest. When he passes through the streets, he is re- 
 ceived with silent reverence, an advance guard of police 
 and a body-guard of lancers escorting him. While his 
 own people never shout or cheer, he accepts very gra- 
 ciously the foreign custom, and bows an acknowledg- 
 ment to the hurrahs that sometimes greet him at Yoko- 
 hama. While the Emperor has been absorbed in the 
 changing affairs of state during the two decades of his 
 reign, he still seems, in comparison with European sov- 
 ereigns, to dwell in absolute quiet and seclusion. Often, 
 for weeks together, he remains within the palace grounds, 
 where he has riding courts, archer)-, and rifle ranges, well- 
 stocked fish-ponds, and every means of amusing himself. 
 Disliking the sea, he has no yacht, a chartered mail- 
 steamer or man-of-war cariy-ing him to naval stations or 
 new fortifications, when the railroad is impracticable. 
 His mountain palaces and remote game preserves he 
 never visits. 
 
 Immediately after establishing his court at Yeddo, 
 the boy- Emperor returned to Kioto to wed Haruko, 
 daughter of Ichijo Takada, a huge, or court noble of the 
 highest rank. The marriage was solemnized by some 
 Shinto ceremony within the temple of the palace, a cer- 
 emony so sacred and private that no Japanese even con- 
 jectures its form. 
 
 The Empress Haruko, born May 29, 1850, was edu- 
 cated in the strictest conventions of old Japan, and 
 taught only the Chinese classics, her own literature and 
 poetic composition, the use of the koto, the forms of 
 cha no yu, needle-work, and the arrangement of flowers 
 
 H 1x3 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 — a broad and most liberal education for a maiden even 
 of high degree. 
 
 Upon her marriage, an extraordinary life opened be- 
 fore the little Empress, demanding a very unusual ac- 
 tivity and study, courage, adaptiveness, and comprehen- 
 sion. She is poetic as well as practical, and her poems 
 are not only traced on imperial screens and kakemono 
 in autograph characters, but several of them have been 
 set to music as well. 
 
 Even now, her Majesty is more delicately pretty than 
 her younger sisters, although for years an invalid. She 
 is short in stature, slender, and small, with the long, oval 
 face and refined features of the ideal aristocratic type of 
 Japanese beauty. At her marriage, she shaved her eye- 
 brows, painted two shadowy suggestions of them high 
 up on her forehead, and blackened her teeth, in accord- 
 ance with Japanese custom ; but after a few years, she 
 ceased to disfigure herself in this way. It was an event, 
 in 1873, when she gave her first audience to the envoys’ 
 wives. It cost the court chamberlains months of study 
 to arrange for the appearance of the Emperor and Em- 
 press together, to reconcile the pretensions of their suites 
 as to rank and precedence, and to harmonize the Occi- 
 dental, chivalrous ideas of deference to women with the 
 unflattering estimate of the Orient. When, on the day 
 of the declaration of the new constitution (February ii, 
 1890), the Emperor and Empress rode side by side in 
 the same state carriage through the streets of Tokio, 
 and when, that night, he offered his arm to lead her to 
 a twin arm-chair in the state dining-hall, a new era was 
 begun in Japanese history. 
 
 The Empress has her secretaries and readers, and 
 gives a part of each day to informal audiences. She 
 visits her schools and hospitals, and makes liberal pur- 
 chases at charity bazaars. She exercises in the saddle 
 within the palace grounds, and drives in a brougham 
 
The Imperial Family 
 
 with half-drawn curtains, her men on the box wearing a 
 dark-blue livery with red cords and facings, silver but- 
 tons, and cocked hats. 
 
 IN THE PALACE GARDENS 
 
 One of the two 
 annual imperial gar- 
 den-parties is given 
 when the chrysan- 
 t h e m urns are in 
 bloom, and the oth- 
 er at the time of 
 the cherry blossoms. 
 
 'I'he etiquette of these is quite simple, although an ap- 
 pearance at one is still equivalent to a presentation at 
 
 \ 
 
Jinrtkisha Days in Japan 
 
 court. A few days before the festivity each guest re- 
 ceives a large chrysanthemum-bordered card : 
 
 November — , . 
 
 By order of their Majesties, the Emperor and Empress, the Min- 
 ister of State for the Household Department presents his compli- 
 ments to , and asks their company at the “ Chry'santhemum 
 
 Party” at the garden of the Imperial Temporary Palace on the 8th 
 inst., at 3 o’clock in the afternoon. 
 
 On an accompanying slip are these instructions : 
 
 Frock-coat required. 
 
 To alight at the “ Kurumayose ” after entering the palace gate.' 
 
 This card to be shown to officers in attendance on arrival. 
 
 No party to be held if the day happens rainy. 
 
 The guests having assembled in the gardens at the 
 hour indicated, the Kimigayo, or national anthem, an- 
 nounces the a; proach of the imperial personages. The 
 Emperor, the Empress, and their suite, passing between 
 the rows of guests and the flower-tents, lead the way to 
 marquees on the lawn, where a collation is served, the 
 Emperor addressing a few remarks to the ministers and 
 envoys as he greets them. Sometimes special presenta- 
 tions are made to him and the Empress, and often the 
 Empress summons an envoy’s wife or a peeress to her, 
 while she sits at table. After another tour of the flower- 
 tents, the company, following the imperial lead, desert 
 the gardens. Calls of ceremony must be made upon the 
 wife of the premier within one week after these parties. 
 
 When the Empress and her ladies wore the old dress 
 the garden-parties at the palace were wonderfully pictu- 
 resque and distinctly Japanese. It was my good fortune 
 to attend the chrysantheinum fete of 1885, when the 
 Empress and her suite made their last appearance in 
 the red hakama and loose brocade kimonos of the old 
 regime. The day was warm, with the brilliant autumnal 
 tints peculiar to Japan, clear and sunny. There were 
 rows of chrysanthemum beds in the Asakasa gardens, 
 
. *T 
 
 
 
 j. 
 
 
 
 \ > 
 
 i 
 
 - >'■ 
 ; t 
 
 !>■■ 
 
 \ 
 
The Itnperial Family 
 
 shielded from sun and wind by matted awnings, screens, 
 and silk hangings, and all the myriad flowers were at one 
 even and perfect period of unfolding. Under silk tents 
 by themselves stood single plants bearing from two hun- 
 dred to four hundred blossoms each, every blossom full 
 and symmetrical. 
 
 The peeresses waiting in that sunny garden were 
 most brilliant figures, rivalling the glow of the flowers 
 in their splendid old brocade robes. At last came the 
 Empress and the whole gorgeous train of her attend- 
 ants, following the shore of the mirror -like lake, past 
 camellia hedges to the esplanade of the upper garden of 
 the great Asakasa park. As the Emperor was housed 
 by illness, the Empress, for the first time, conducted a 
 general court ceremony alone. Her costume consisted 
 of the loose hakama, or divided skirt, of the heaviest 
 scarlet silk, under a long loose kimono of dull helio- 
 trope, brocaded with conventional wistarias and the 
 imperial crests in white. No outer obi, or sash, was 
 worn, and the neck was closed high with surplice folds 
 of rainbow-tinted silks. Many under-kimonos of fine 
 white and scarlet silk showed beneath the long, square 
 sleeves of the heavy brocade kimono. 'I'he imperial 
 hair was stiffened into a thin halo behind the face, fall- 
 ing thence to the waist, but tied here and there with bits 
 of silky white rice-paper, like that of a Shinto priestess. 
 .Above her forehead shone a little golden ornament in 
 the shape of the ho-o, or phcenix, and she carried a para- 
 sol and an old court fan of painted sticks of wood, wound 
 with long cords of many-colored silks. The dignity and 
 majesty of the little woman were most impressive. Every 
 head bowed low, and when she had passed eyes were 
 lifted to her reverently and admiringly. All the princess- 
 es and peeresses following her wore a similar costume, 
 many of their brocade kimonos being stiffened with em- 
 broidery and gold thread, and making dazzling effects 
 
‘Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 of color. When, in the brilliant sunset flush, the impe- 
 rial train retraced its steps, its kaleidoscopic flashes of 
 white and gold and color reflected in the still lake, and 
 showing vividly as the ladies formed in a semicircle on 
 the lawn, while the Empress withdrew to her apart- 
 ments, there ended a series of pictures so beautiful that 
 they seemed an illusion of the imagination. 
 
 Before the following April Paris fashions had set in 
 with great rigor, and all the soft, pink reflections from 
 the clouds of cherry blossoms in the Hama Rikiu palace 
 garden could not give the groups of little women in 
 dark, ugly, close-fitting gowns any likeness to the beau- 
 tiful assemblages of other years. Gone were poetrj^ and 
 picturesqueness. Progress and Philistia were come. 
 E.xcept for the costumes of the Chinese and Korean 
 legations, and that of the Chinese Minister's wife, with 
 its cap-like ornaments of filigree and pearls, and tiny 
 jewelled slippers, nothing Oriental or Asiatic in aspect 
 remained to that court gathering. 
 
 The Empress ordained and defended this change of 
 dress in a famous court circular, whose chief argument 
 seemed to be that the alteration from the sitting and 
 kneeling etiquette of the Orient to the standing eti- 
 quette of the Occident required western fashions for 
 women as well as men. Every lover of the picturesque 
 protested, but it was suspected that this manifesto was 
 a shrewd political move of Count Ito’s to convince the 
 treaty powers that the Japanese do not differ from other 
 civilized people. Should the sacrifice of the old life 
 and the beautiful national dress help to secure for 
 Japan a revision of the shameful and unjust treaties 
 forced upon her from 1854 to 1858, and promote the 
 political liberty and commercial prosperity of the coun- 
 try, the Empress’s patriotic iconoclasm may be justified. 
 
 The sacredness of the imperial person long postponed 
 her Majesty’s change of fashion, as no ignoble dress- 
 
IN THK PALACE CARDENS 
 

The Imperial Family 
 
 maker could be allowed to touch her. Countess Ito, the 
 clever wife of the premier, and leader of foreign fashions 
 at court, was finally chosen as lay figure, to be fitted un- 
 til a model could be made. The Empress now wears 
 European dress altogether, conduct little short of heroic 
 for one accustomed only to the loose, simple, and com- 
 fortable garments of her country. Her gowns are made 
 of Japanese fabrics, and a lace school under her patron- 
 age supplies her with flounces and trimmings. At in- 
 door state ceremonies, low bodices and court trains are 
 prescribed, and the Empress wears a tiara, riviere, and 
 innumerable ornaments of diamonds. The court ladies, 
 who formerly wore no ornaments but the single long 
 hair-pin and the gold balls and trifles on the obi cord, 
 have been seized by a truly American craze for diamonds, 
 and greatly covet the new Order with cordon and jew- 
 elled star lately established by the Empress. 
 
 In adopting the e.xpensive foreign dress court ladies 
 ruthlessly sacrificed irreplaceable lieirlooms of rich old 
 brocades and embroideries. For a long time their coun- 
 tenances and mien betrayed the discomfort of the new 
 dress, but they soon acquired ease with familiarity, and 
 no Japanese woman, in her first Parisian gown, was ever 
 such a burlesque and caricature as are the foreign visit- 
 ors who essay the kimono, and, blind to the ridiculous, 
 are photographed with its folds and fulness all awry. 
 Only two foreign women have I ever seen who could 
 wear Japanese dress gracefully in the Japanese way, with 
 full regard to the meaning which each color, fold, pucker, 
 and cord implies. 
 
 AsahiUo, the Empress Dowager, one of the Kujo fam- 
 ily of kuges, and of Fujiwara descent, has her separate 
 palace and court, where old customs are followed. Boin 
 in 1834, she lives by the traditional code, and the use of 
 a landau with liveried and cockaded men on the bo.v is 
 almost her only concession to the new order. She never 
 
 ■23 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 appears at any of the state functions at the palace, though 
 the ladies of her suite are sometimes seen in the impe- 
 rial loges at a Koyokwan No performance, when given 
 for the benefit of her pet charities. 
 
 The Empress Dowager has nominal charge of the im- 
 perial nurseries in the Nakayama Yashiki, where the chil- 
 dren of the Emperor and his inferior wives remain until 
 their fourth or fifth years. 'I’hese wives are all of kuge 
 birth, and have establishments within the palace enclos- 
 ure. They are an Oriental survival, of which little is said 
 or definitely known, although they still have a fixed rank. 
 
 The Empress Haruko has no children, and Prince 
 Haru, the Crown Prince, is the son of the Emperor and 
 Madame Yanagiwara. One little imperial princess is liv- 
 ing, but ten imperial children have died. Prince Haru 
 was born September 6, 1879, proclaimed heir apparent 
 August 31, 1887, and elected Crown Prince November 3, 
 1889, dispossessing as heir to the throne Prince Arisu- 
 gawa Takehito, a young cousin, who had been adopted 
 by the Emperor in the absence of any direct heirs. 
 Prince Haru attends the Nobles’ school, reciting in 
 classes with other boys, and enjoying a more democratic 
 life than any other crown prince of this era. He is 
 quick, energetic, and ambitious, inclined to foreign ways, 
 and is altogether the most emancipated and untram- 
 melled little man in Tokio. When he is older Prince 
 Haru will be sent around the world to see other coun- 
 tries and courts, and it is prophesied that this energet- 
 ic young man will make great changes in the already 
 changed order of things. To Emperor, Empress, and 
 Empress Dowager he is a marvel, but to him these au- 
 gust personages are but ordinary mortals. Yet the 
 princeling can be a stickler for etiquette, and boy com- 
 panions venturing too far, or becoming too democratic, 
 have been sharply brought to task by Jimmu Tenno's 
 latest descendant. 
 
 124 
 
Tokio Palaces and Court 
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 
 TOKIO PALACES AND COURT 
 
 Thirty different places have been the capital and 
 home of the Emperors of Japan, and Omi, Settsu, and 
 Yamashiro were imperial provinces before the Tokuga- 
 wa’s city of Yeddo (bay’s gate) became Tokio, the east- 
 ern capital and seat of imperial power. The Shogun’s 
 old castle, the Honmaru, or the Shiro, was the imperial 
 palace until destroyed by fire in May, 1873, and its in- 
 terior is said to have been far more splendid than the 
 Nijo castle in Kioto. The yashiki of the Tokugawa 
 daimio of Kiushiu, on the high ground of the Akasaka 
 quarter, ne.xt sheltered the imperial household, though 
 ill adapted to its changing and growing needs. 
 
 At the end of 1888 the Emperor took possession of 
 the new imperial palace, which had been six years in 
 building, and which stands upon the ruins of the Sho- 
 gun’s castle, protected by all the rings of moats. 'I'wo 
 drawbridges and two ponderous old towered gate ways 
 defend the entrance to the front wing of the building, a 
 long yellow brick edifice, with the conical towers and 
 steep roof of a French chateau. The offices of the Impe- 
 rial Household Department are assigned to this foreign 
 wing, except for which the new structure is such a laby- 
 rinthine collection of temple-like buildings, as the old 
 palace at Kioto. Built on sloping and uneven ground, 
 there is a constant change of level in the innumerable 
 roofs and floors. Before it was completed a tour of the 
 palace occupied a full hour, and attendants and work- 
 men were often lost in the maze. Combining Japanese 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 and European architecture, decorations, furnishings, and 
 ideas, the palace is a jumble of unsatisfactory incongru- 
 ities, nobody being found to admire thatched roofs and 
 electric lights, partition walls of sliding paper screens 
 and steam-heating apparatus, a modern ball-room, and a 
 No dance pavilion all side by side. 
 
 Each lofty state apartment is a building by itself, the 
 outer galleries on the four sides being the corridors that 
 touch other corridors at their angles. Plate-glass doors 
 in maroon lacquer frames, with superb metal mountings, 
 take the place of the usual paper shoji ■, but with the low 
 eaves and the light entering from the level of the floor, 
 the rooms need all their Edison lamps. Unfortunately, 
 the best examples of national decorative art are not pre- 
 served in this national palace. Only the richly panelled 
 ceilings are at all Japanese or worthy their place. The 
 famous embroidered ceiling and embroidered wainscot- 
 ing in the great drawing-room, and some makimonos in 
 the private rooms, exhibit the best Kioto needle-work. 
 This wonderful ceiling, costing ten thousand dollars, is 
 panelled with yard-squares of gold-thread tapestry, upon 
 which are embroidered crest-like circles of various flow- 
 ers. The wainscoting is green damask wrought with 
 fruits, and the walls of the drawing-room are hung with 
 a neutral-tinted damask. 
 
 The beautiful Japanese w'oods and the marvellous 
 Japanese carvers were set aside, that the steam factories 
 of Hamburg might supply the cheap and ugly oak furni- 
 ture of the banquet-hall. The state table, seating one 
 hundred people, surrounds three sides of a square. The 
 imperial arm-chairs are at the middle of the board, 
 facing elaborate buffets, framing painted tapestry-panels 
 of the most tawdry German design. The ball-room has 
 a costly inlaid floor, and is decorated in white and gold. 
 The throne-room has nothing Japanese but the crests in 
 the panelled ceiling. A large gilded arm-chair stands 
 
 126 
 
Tokto Palaces and Court 
 
 on a red-carpeted dais, with canopy and curtains of red 
 plush, the sacred sword and seal resting on lacquer ta- 
 bles beside it. At court functions the Empress stands 
 on a dais below and to the right of the throne, with the 
 imperial princes and princesses grouped about her. The 
 members of the diplomatic corps are placed at the Em- 
 peror's left, the ministers and higher officials fill the 
 space facing the throne, and the imperial guard line the 
 gallery corridors that surround the throne-room. 
 
 In the private apartments of the Emperor and Em- 
 press moquette carpets, plush furniture, and easy-chairs 
 confess foreign influence and etiquette. The old rules 
 of the simplicity of a Shinto shrine in the sovereign’s 
 dwelling are observed in leaving all the wood-work un- 
 painted, while wax-candles and open grates replace the 
 electric bulbs and gilded radiators of the official parts of 
 the palace. Some of the private rooms display exquisite 
 panelled and coffered ceilings of pure white pine, or tlie 
 beautiful gray bog-wood. Each suite has one room in 
 pure Japanese style, and a tiny box for celebrating the 
 rites of cha no yu with a 
 favored four. The Em- 
 peror's sleeping-room is 
 the same unlighted, un- 
 ventilated dark closet 
 which his ancestors used. 
 
 'I'his sleeping-room is E 
 in the accompanying di- 
 agram, surrounded by 
 rooms occupied at night 
 by his attendants and 
 guards. 
 
 Above this floor is a 
 suite of studies, libraries, 
 and secretaries’ rooms, all finished in the same exquisite 
 woods, that show their natural grain and color. There 
 
 127 
 
‘Jtnrikisha Days in 'Japan 
 
 is a separate suite of rooms for the Emperor’s toilet and 
 wardrobe, a robing and disrobing room, and an exquisite 
 Japanese bath-room with inlaid floor and walls. The 
 sovereign uses the regular oval wooden tub of his peo- 
 ple, which is filled from a well in the adjoining court by 
 means of the primitive bucket and rope. The screens 
 in these private rooms are undecorated, or at the most 
 only flecked with gold-leaf. From time to time, by spe- 
 cial command, artists will decorate these, and squares of 
 colored paper put here and there upon them invite the 
 autograph poems of the tea-drinking improvisators. 
 
 Somewhere in the recesses of the palace is a chapel 
 or Shinto shrine, but the officials are very reticent con- 
 cerning it. It is known that the mortuary tablets of the 
 Emperor’s ancestors are there, simple ihai, or pieces of 
 pine wood, upon which are written the posthumous 
 names of the deceased rulers. Official bulletins often 
 announce that a newly appointed minister of the cabinet, 
 or a diplomatic officer about departing for his post is 
 “ ordered to worship the cenotaphs in the imperial chap- 
 el,” before an audience with the Emperor. Presumably, 
 such devotions are a form equivalent to the oath of alle- 
 giance in other countries. Upon the anniversaries of 
 the death of certain of his ancestors, on the days of the 
 spring and autumn festival, when the first rice is sown 
 and harvested, as well as before any great ceremonial, 
 it is announced that the Emperor will worship in the im- 
 perial chapel. The aged Prince Kuni Asahiko is con- 
 ductor of divine services to the imperial family; but 
 everything about that simple, formal state religion is 
 baffling and incomprehensible, and no one knows what 
 form the Shinto services in the palace assume. 
 
 The Emperor used to give a Japanese banquet on the 
 morning of his birthday to princes, ministers, and en- 
 voys. Chopsticks were used, and the imperial health 
 was drunk from sake'-cups of fine egg-shell porcelain, 
 
 128 
 
Tokio Palaces and Court 
 
 decorated with chrysanthemums and broken diaper pat- 
 terns in gold, which the guests carried away with them 
 as souvenirs. That celebration and the New-year break- 
 fast are now state banquets, 
 served in foreign fashion, with 
 sovereign and consort seated at 
 the head of the room. Indeed, 
 the entire service of the palace 
 and of the Emperor’s table is 
 European; silver, porcelain, and 
 glass being marked with the im- 
 perial crest of the si.xteen-petal- 
 led chrysanthemum, and the kiri 
 7non of the Faulownia itnperialis appearing in the deco- 
 rative design woven in the white silk napery^ and traced 
 on the delicate porcelain service. The palace lackeys 
 are uniformed in dress-coats with many cords and aiguil- 
 lettes, striped vests, knee-breeches, white silk stockings, 
 and buckled shoes. Their costume resembles that of 
 the Vienna palace, colored sketches of which Prince Ko- 
 matsu sent home during his winter stay on the Danube. 
 The palace tiring-women wear the garb of Kioto days, 
 purple hakama and russet silk kimonos, and are the 
 most fascinating and almost the only Japanese specta- 
 cle in the imperial precincts. In all modifications the 
 usages of the Berlin court have been followed, and no 
 Prussian military martinet or court chamberlain could 
 be more punctilious in matters of etiquette than the Jap- 
 anese court officials. 
 
 Of the Empress Dowager’s palace only its gate-way is 
 known. The Hama Rikiu palace is a sea-shore villa, 
 owing its beautiful garden to the Shoguns, but it is occu- 
 pied only when the ministers of state give balls, or for- 
 eign guests of the Emperor are domiciled there, as was 
 General Grant. An imperial garden-party is held in its 
 confines each spring, and, with the Fukiage gardens ad- 
 
 * 129 
 
’Jinrikisha Days in 'Japa7i 
 
 joining the new palace, it is visited upon presentation of 
 special cards of admission issued by the legations. 
 
 For the support of these palaces and the expenses 
 of the imperial family the Imperial Household Depart- 
 ment’s expenditures were 3,000,000 yens in 1889. 
 
 Tokio court circles have, of course, their factions and 
 cliques, their wars and triumphs, and the favor of the 
 sovereign is the object of perpetual scheming and in- 
 triguing. 
 
 'I’he peerage of Japan numbers ten princes, twenty-five 
 marquises, eighty counts, three hundred and fifty-two 
 viscounts, and ninety-eight barons. All the old kuge 
 families are enrolled in this new peerage, and such dai- 
 mios of the Shogun’s court as gave aid and allegiance to 
 the Emperor, or made honorable surrender in the con- 
 flict of 1868. Rank and title were conferred upon many 
 of the samurai also, the leaders in the work of the Res- 
 toration, and the statesmen, who have advised and led 
 in the wonderful progress of these last twenty years; 
 but the old kuge's have never brought themselves to 
 accept the pardoned daimios and ennobled samurai of 
 other days. It is the Oriental version of the relations 
 between the Faubourg St. Germain, the aristocracy of 
 the empire, and the bureaucracy of the present French 
 republic. 
 
 The imperial princes of the blood, all nearly related 
 to the Emperor, rank above the ten created princes, who 
 head the list of the nobility. Five of these ten princely 
 houses are the old Gosekke, the first five of the one 
 hundred and fifty-five kuge families comprising the old 
 Kioto court. With the Gosekke, which includes the 
 Ichijo, Kujo, Takatsukasa, Nijo, and Konoye families, 
 rank, since 1883, the houses of Sanjo, Iwakura, Shimad- 
 zu, Mori, and Tokugawa, sharing with them the privilege 
 of offering the bride to the heir-apparent. 
 
 The Emperor visits personally at the houses of these 
 133 
 
Tokto Palaces and Court 
 
 ten princes, and recently the Tokugawas entertained 
 him with a fencing-match and a No dance in old style, 
 the costumes and masks for which had been used at 
 Tokugawa fetes for centuries. In accordance with other 
 old customs, a sword by a famous maker was presented 
 to the guest of honor, and a commemorative poem of- 
 fered in a gold lacquer box. Yet the head of the Toku- 
 gawa house is a grandson of the Shogun who first re- 
 fused to treat with Commodore Perry, and son of Keiki, 
 the arch rebel and last of the Shoguns, who for so ‘long 
 lived forgotten as a private citizen on a small estate 
 near Shidzuoka, keeping alive no faction, awaking no 
 interest— attaining, in fact, a political Nirvana. 
 
 Under new titles the old fiefs are lost sight of and 
 old associations broken up. The marquises, counts, and 
 barons of to-day are slender, dapper little men, wearing 
 the smartest and most irreproachable London clothes, 
 able to converse in one or two foreign languages on the 
 subjects that interest cosmopolitans of their *iank in 
 other empires, and are with difficulty identified with 
 their feudal titles. The Daimio of Kaga has become 
 the Marquis Maeda, his sister married the Emperor’s 
 cousin, and the great yashiki of their ancestors has 
 given way to the buildings of the Imperial University. 
 The Daimio of Satsuma is now Prince Shimadzu. It is 
 not easy to associate these modern men-about-town, who 
 dance at state balls, who play billiards and read the files 
 of foreign newspapers at the Rokumeikwan, who pay 
 afternoon calls, attend teas, garden-parties, dinners, con- 
 certs, and races ; who have taken up poker and tennis 
 with equal ardor, and are victimized at charity fairs and 
 bazaars, with their pompous, stately, two-sworded, bro- 
 cade and buckram bound ancestors. 
 
 There are great beauties, favorites, and social leaders 
 among the ladies of the court circle, and the change in 
 their social position and personal importance is incred- 
 
Jinriits/ta Days in 'Japan 
 
 ible. Japanese matrons, ^Yho, a few years ago, led the 
 most quiet and secluded existence, now preside with 
 ease and grace over large establishments, built and 
 maintained like the official residences of London or 
 Berlin. Their struggles with the difficulties of a new 
 language, dress, and etiquette were heroic. Mothers 
 and daughters studied together with the same English 
 governess, and princesses and diplomats’ wives, return- 
 ing from abroad, gave new ideas to their friends at 
 home. Two Japanese ladies, now' foremost at court, 
 are graduates of Vassar College, and many high officials 
 are happily married to foreign wives ; American, Eng- 
 lish, and German women having assumed Japanese 
 names with their wedding vows. The court has its 
 reigning beauty in the wife of the grand master of cere- 
 monies, the richest peer of his day, and representative 
 of that family which gave its name to the finest porce- 
 lain known to the ceramic art of the empire. 
 
 Tokio society delights in dancing, and ever}' one at 
 court dances well. Leaders of fashion go through the 
 quadrille d'honneur, with which state balls open, and 
 follow' the changes of the lancers with the exactness of 
 soldiers on drill, every step and movement as precise 
 and finished as the bending of the fingers in cha no yu. 
 The careless foreigner who attempts to dance an unfa- 
 miliar figure repents him of his folly. Japanese polite- 
 ness is incomparable, but the sedateness, the precision, 
 and exactness of the other dancers in the set will re- 
 proach the blunderer until he feels himself a criminal. 
 The ball is the more usual form of state entertainments. 
 The prime-minister gives a ball on the night of the 
 Emperor’s birthday, and the governor of Tokio gives a 
 ball each winter. From time to time the imperial princes 
 and the ministers of state offer similar entertainments, 
 and every legation has its ball-room. The members of 
 the diplomatic corps are as much in social unison with 
 
 >32 
 
Tokio Palaces and Court 
 
 the higher Japanese circles as it is possible to be with 
 such subjects at any capital, and the round of tiffins, 
 dinners, garden-parties, and small dances makes Tokio 
 very gay during the greater part of the year. 
 
 The first formal visiting of the season begins in Oc- 
 tober, and by May social life is at an end until hot 
 weather is over. Lent makes little break in the social 
 chain. Great seriousness and exactness in social usage 
 is inherent in this high-bred people. Visits of ceremony 
 are scrupulously paid within the* allotted time, and a 
 newly-arrived official in Tokio finds no diminution of 
 the card-leaving and visiting which awaits him in any 
 other capital. At the houses of the imperial princes 
 cards are not left, the visitor inscribing his name in a 
 book in the hall. After each state ball, a guest must 
 call at once upon the princess, or minister’s wife, who pre- 
 sided, and any remissness strikes his name from her list. 
 
 Garden-parties are the favorite expression of Tokio 
 hospitality. All official residences in the city have fine 
 grounds, and many ministers of state own suburban 
 villas. A few of the legations are able to entertain in 
 the same way, and many military officers make the gar- 
 den of the old Mito yashiki, now the Arsenal grounds, 
 the scene of their courtesies. 
 
 There is a stately court journal, which is the official 
 bulletin, but 'I'okio has not yet set up a paper of society 
 gossip and scandal for the rigorous censorship of the 
 Japanese press to expunge; nor are there books of 
 court memoirs. Yet what memoirs could be more inter- 
 esting than those that might be written by the men and 
 women who were born in feudal times, who have lived 
 through the exciting days of the Restoration, and have 
 watched the birth and growth of New Japan. 
 
 «33 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 CHAPTER XIII 
 THE SUBURBS OF TOKIO 
 
 The suburbs of Tokio are full of holiday resorts for 
 the people and the beautiful villas of nobles. To the 
 north-east, in Oji, are the Government chemical works 
 and paper mills, where rough bits of mulberry-wood are 
 turned into papers of a dozen kinds, the silkiest tissue- 
 paper, smooth, creamy writing-paper, thick parchment, 
 bristol-board, and the thin paper for artists and etchers. 
 On a sheet of the heaviest parchment paper I once stood 
 and was lifted from the floor, the fabric showing no mark 
 of rent or strain, and it is wellnigh impossible to tear 
 even a transparent Oji letter sheet. The Oji tea-house 
 has a famous garden, and in autumn Oji’s hill-sides blaze 
 with colored maples, and then the holiday makers mark 
 the place for their own. 
 
 Waseda, the northern suburb, contains an old temple, 
 a vast, gloomy bamboo-grove, and the villa of Countess 
 Okuma, to whose genius for landscape-gardening is also 
 due the French Legation’s paradise of a garden, in the 
 heart of the city, that place having been Count Okuma’s 
 town residence before he sold it to the French Govern- 
 ment. From Waseda’s rice fields a greater marvel grew. 
 
 Meguro, south of Tokio, is a place of sentimental pil- 
 grimage to the lovers of Gompachi and Komurasaki, the 
 Abelard and Heloise of the East, around whose tomb the 
 trees flutter with paper poems, and prayers. In the tem- 
 ple grounds are falling streams of water, beneath which, 
 summer and winter, praying pilgrims stand, to be thus 
 pumped on for their sins. Similar penitents may be seen 
 
 *34 
 
The Suburbs of Tokio 
 
 at a little temple niched in the bluff of Mississippi Bay. 
 Meguro has an annual azalea fete and a celebration of 
 the maple-leaf, and its resident nobles, among whom is 
 General Saigo,give feasts in honor of the season’s blooms. 
 
 The Sengakuji temple, near Shinagawa, is a sacred 
 spot and shrine of chivalry, the burial-place of the Forty- 
 seven Ronins ; and here come pious pilgrims to say a 
 prayer and leave a stick of burning incense, and view the 
 images and relics in the little temple. 
 
 Near Omori, half-way between Yokohama and Tokio, 
 Professor Morse discovered the shell-heaps of prehis- 
 toric man. The neighborhood is made beautiful by old 
 groves, old temples and shrines, tiny villages, picturescpie 
 farm-houses, and hedge-lined roads, while Ikegami’s tem- 
 ples shine upon the hill that stands an evergreen island 
 in the lake of greener rice fields or golden stubble. Here 
 died Nichiren, founder of the Buddhist sect bearing his 
 name. For si.x centuries these splendid temples have 
 resounded with the chantings of his priesthood, who still 
 e.xpound his teachings to the letter. The Nichiren sect 
 is the largest, richest, most influential, and aggressive in 
 Japan. They are the Protestants and Presbyterians of 
 the Buddhist religion ; firm, hard, and unrelenting in 
 their faith, rejecting all other creeds as false, and zeal- 
 ously proselyting. Nichiren was a great scholar, who, 
 poring over Chinese and Sanscrit sutras, believed him- 
 self to have discovered the true and hidden meaning of 
 the sacred books. His labors were colossal, and though 
 e.xiled, imprisoned, tortured, and condemned to death, 
 he lived to see his followers increasing to a great body 
 of true believers, and himself established as high-priest 
 over the temples of Ikegami. In the popular play “ Ni- 
 chiren,” one has thrilling evidence of what the pious 
 founder and his disciples endured. 
 
 On the twelfth and thirteenth of each October special 
 services are held in memory of Nichiren, which thou- 
 
 ‘35 
 
Jinrikis/ia Days in ^apan 
 
 sands of people attend. On the first day of this matsuri 
 the railway is crowded with passengers. Bonfires and 
 strings of lanterns mark the Omori station by night, and 
 by day the neighboring matsuri is announced by tall 
 bamboo poles, from which spring whorls of reeds covered 
 with huge paper flowers. These giant flower-stalks are 
 the conventional sign for festivities, and when a row of 
 them is planted by the road-side, or paraded up and 
 down with an accompaniment of gongs, the holiday spirit 
 responds at once. The quiet country road is blockaded 
 with hundreds of jinrikishas going to and returning from 
 Ikegami’s terraced gate-ways. Men, women, and chil- 
 dren, priests, beggars, and peddlers pack the highway. 
 The crowd is amazing — as though these thousands of 
 people had been suddenly conjured from the ground, or 
 grown from some magician’s powder — for nothing could 
 be quieter than Omori lanes on all the other days of the 
 year. 
 
 Along the foot-paths of the fields women in tightly- 
 wrapped kimonos with big umbrellas over their beauti- 
 fully-dressed heads ; young girls with the scarlet petti- 
 coats and gay hair-pins indicative of maidenhood ; little 
 girls and boys with smaller brothers and sisters strapped 
 on their backs, trudge along in single files, high above 
 the stubble patches, to the great matsuri. In farm-house 
 yards persimmon-trees hang full of mellow, golden fruit, 
 and the road is literally lined with these apples of the 
 Hesperides. Peddlers sit on their heels behind their 
 heaped persimmons and busily tie straw to the short 
 stems of the fruit, that the buyer may carry his purchase 
 like a bunch of giant golden grapes. Fries, stews, bakes, 
 and grills scent the air with savors, and all sorts of little 
 balls and cubes, pats and cakes, lumps and rolls of eat- 
 ables are set out along the country road. A queer sort 
 of sea-weed scales, stained bright red, is the chewing- 
 gum of the East, and finds a ready market. 
 
The Suburbs of Tokio 
 
 On the days of the matsuri the village street is impas- 
 sable, and the whole broad walk of the temple grounds 
 leading from the pagoda is lined with booths, jugglers, 
 acrobats, side shows, and catch-penny tricksters. The 
 “ sand-man,” with bags of different colored sands, makes 
 beautiful pictures on a cleared space of ground, rattling 
 and gabbling without cessation while he works. First 
 he dredges the surface with a sieve full of clean white 
 sand, and then sifts a little thin stream of black or red 
 sand through his closed hand, painting warriors, maid- 
 ens, dragons, flowers, and landscapes in the swiftest, 
 easiest way. It is a fine e.xample of the trained hand 
 and eye, and of excellent free-hand drawing. A juggler 
 tosses rings, balls, and knives in the air, and spins plates 
 on top of a twenty-foot pole. His colleague balances 
 a big bamboo on one shoulder, and a small boy climbs 
 it and goes through wonderful feats on the cross-piece 
 at the top. A ring of gaping admirers surrounds a mas- 
 ter of the black art, who swallows a lighted pipe, drinks, 
 whistles, produces the pipe for a puff or two, swallows it 
 again, and complacently emits fanciful rings and wreaths 
 of smoke. Hair-pins, rosaries, toys, and sweets are 
 everywhere for sale. 
 
 •\ huge, towering, heavy-roofed red gate-way admits 
 streams of people to the great court-yard, surrounded 
 on three sides by temples large and small, where the 
 priests chant and pound and the faithful pray, rubbing 
 their rosaries and tossing in their coins. At one shrine 
 greasy locks of hair tied to the lattices are votive offer- 
 ings from those who have appealed to the deity within. 
 There is a little temple to the North Star, where seamen 
 and fisher-folk pray, and one to Daikoku, the god of 
 riches and abundance, the latter a fat little man sitting 
 on bags of rice, and alwa}'S beset by applicants. 
 
 In the great temple pyramids of candles burn, incense 
 rises, bells sound, and money rains into the big cash-box 
 
 ■37 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 at the head of the steps. The splendid interior is a 
 mass of lacquer, gilding, and color, the panelled ceiling 
 has an immense filigree brass baldaquin hanging like a 
 frosted canopy over the heads of the priests, and a su- 
 perb altar, all images, lotus - leaves, lights, and gilded 
 doors, dazzles the eye. Under the baldaquin sits the 
 high-priest of the temple, who is a bishop of the largest 
 diocese in Japan, while at either side of him more than 
 two hundred celebrants face each other in rows. The 
 priestly heads are shaven, the smooth faces wear the ec- 
 static, exalted expression of devotees purified by vigil 
 and fasting, and over their white or yellow gauze kimo- 
 nos are tied kcsas, or cloaks of rich brocade. The 
 lesser hierarchy appear in subdued colors — gray, pur- 
 ple, russet— but the head priest is arrayed in gorgeous 
 scarlet and gold, and sits before a reading-desk, whose 
 books are covered with squares of similar brocade. He 
 leads the chanted service from a parchment roll spread 
 before him, at certain places touching a silver -toned 
 gong, when all the priests bow low and chant a response, 
 sitting for hours immovable upon the mats, intoning and 
 reading from the sacred books in concert. At intervals 
 each raps the low lacquer table before him and bends 
 low, while the big temple drum sounds, the high-priest 
 touches his gong, and slowly, behind the lights and in- 
 cense clouds of the altar, the gilded doors of the shrine 
 swing open to disclose the precious image of sainted 
 Nichiren. On all sides stand the faithful, extending 
 their rosary- wrapped hands and muttering the Nichi- 
 rene’s special form of prayer ; “ Namu iiiio ho ren ge 
 kio ” (Glory to the salvation-bringing book, the blossom 
 of doctrine). 
 
 After seven hours of worship a last litany is uttered, 
 and the procession of priests files through the grounds 
 to the monastery, stopping to select from the two hun- 
 dred and odd pairs of wooden clogs, waiting at the edge 
 
 liS 
 
The Suburbs of Tokio 
 
 of the temple mats, each his proper pair. The high- 
 priest walks near the middle of the line underneath an 
 immense red umbrella. He carries an elaborate red lacq- 
 uer staff, not unlike a crozier, and even his clogs are 
 of red lacquered wood. The service in the temple sug- 
 gests the forms of the Roman Church, and this Buddhist 
 cardinal, in his red robes and umbrella, is much like his 
 fellow-dignitary of the West. 
 
 To citizens of the United States Ikegami has a pecul- 
 iar interest. When the American man-of-war Oneida was 
 run down and sunk with her officers and crew by tlie 
 P. and 0 . steamer Bombay, near the mouth of Yeddo 
 Bay, January 23, 1870, our Government made no effort 
 to raise the wreck or search it, and finally sold it to a 
 Japanese wrecking company for fifteen hundred dollars. 
 The wreckers found many bones of the lost men among 
 the ship’s timbers, and when the work was entirely com- 
 pleted, with their voluntary contributions they erected a 
 tablet in the Ikegami grounds to the. memory of the dead, 
 and celebrated there the impressive Buddhist segaki 
 (feast of hungry souls), in May, 1889. The great tem- 
 ple was in ceremonial array; seventy -five priests in 
 their richest robes assisted at the mass, and among 
 the congregation were the American admiral and his 
 officers, one hundred men from the fleet, and one sur- 
 vivor of the solitary boat’s crew that escaped from the 
 Oneida. 
 
 The Scriptures were read, a service was chanted, the 
 Sutra repeated, incense burned, the symbolic lotus-leaves 
 cast before the altar, and after an address in English by 
 Mr. Amenomori e.xplaining the segaki, the procession 
 of priests walked to the tablet in the grounds to chant 
 prayers and burn incense again. 
 
 No other country, no other religion, offers a parallel to 
 this e.xperience ; and Americans may well take to heart 
 
 >39 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 the example of piety, charity, magnanimity, and liberal- 
 ity that this company of hard-working Japanese fisher- 
 men and wreckers have set them. 
 
 CHAPTER XIV 
 A TRIP TO NIKKO 
 
 The Nikko mountains, one hundred miles north of 
 'I'okio, are the favorite summer resort of foreign resi- 
 dents and Tokio officials. The railway goes to Utso- 
 nomiya, and the remaining twenty-five miles of the 
 journey are made in jinrikisha over the most beautiful 
 highway, leading through an unbroken avenue of over- 
 arching trees to the village of Hachi-ishi, or Nikko. 
 
 On the very hottest day of the hottest week of Au- 
 gust we packed our koris, the telescope baskets which 
 constitute the Japanese trunk, and fled to the hills. 
 Smoke and dust poured in at the car windows, the roof 
 crackled in the sun, the green groves and luxuriant 
 fields that we whirled through quivered with heat, and 
 a chorus of grasshoppers and scissors-grinders deafened 
 us at every halt. At Utsonomiya it was a felicity to sit 
 in the upper room of a tea-house and dip our faces and 
 hold our hands in basins of cool spring-water, held for 
 us by the sympathetic nesans. They looked perfectly 
 cool, fresh, and unruffled in their clean blue-and-white cot- 
 ton kimonos, for the Japanese, like the creoles, appear 
 never to feel the heat of summer, and, indeed, to be 
 wholly indifferent to any weather. The same placid 
 Utsonomiya babies, whose little shaved heads bobbed 
 around helplessly in the blaze of that midsummer sun. 
 I have seen equally serene with their bare skulls red- 
 dening, uncovered, on the frostiest winter mornings. 
 
A Trip to Nikko 
 
 Once out of the streets of this little provincial capital, 
 the way to Nikko leads up a straight broad avenue, 
 lined.on both sides for twenty-seven miles with tall and 
 ancient cryptomerias, whose branches meet in a Gothic 
 arch overhead. The blue outlines of the Nikko mount- 
 '' ains showed in the distance as we entered the grand 
 avenue. The road is a fine piece of engineering, with 
 its ascent so slow and even as to seem level ; but at 
 times the highway, with its superb walls of crjptomeria, 
 is above the level of the fields, then even with them, and 
 then below them, as it follows its appointed lines. Before 
 the railway reached Utsonomiya, travellers from Tokio 
 had a boat journey, and then a jinrikisha ride of seventy 
 miles through the shaded avenue. This road was made 
 two centuries ago, when the Shoguns chose Nikko as 
 their burial place, and these venerable trees have shaded 
 the magnificent funeral trains of the old warriors, and the 
 splendid processions of their successors, who made pil- 
 grimages to the tombs of lyeyasu and lyemitsu. In our 
 day, alas, instead of mighty daimios and men-at-arms in 
 coats of mail, or brocaded grandees in gilded palanquins, 
 telegraph-poles, slim, ugly, and utilitarian, impertinently 
 thrust themselves forward before the grand old tree- 
 trunks, and the jinrikisha and the rattle-trap basha take 
 their plebeian way. 
 
 The cryptomeria has the reddish bark and long, 
 smooth bole of the California sequoia, and through the 
 mat of leaves and branches, high overhead, the light 
 filters down in a soft twilight that casts a spell over the 
 place. After sunset the silence and stillness of the 
 shaded avenue were solemn, and its coolness and the 
 fragrance of moist earth most grateful. Two men ran 
 tandem with each jinrikisha, and they went racing up 
 the avenue for ten miles, halting only once for a sip of 
 cold water before they stopped at the hamlet of Osawa. 
 The villages, a row of low houses on either side of the 
 
yinrikisha Days in Japaii 
 
 way, make the only break in the long avenue. With its 
 dividing screens drawn back, the Osawa tea-house was 
 one long room, with only side walls and a roof, the front 
 open to the street, and the back facing a garden where 
 a stream dashed through a liliputian landscape, fell in a 
 liliputian fall, and ran under liliputian bridges. At the 
 street end was a square fireplace, sunk in the floor, with 
 a big teakettle swinging by an iron chain from a beam 
 of the roof, teapots sitting in the warm ashes, and bits 
 of fowl and fish skewered on chopsticks and set up in 
 the ashes to broil before the coals. The coolies, sitting 
 around this kitchen, fortified their muscle and brawn 
 with thimble cups of green tea, bowls of rice, and a few 
 shreds of pickled fish. We, as their masters and supe- 
 riors, were placed as far as possible from them, and pic- 
 nicked at a table in the pretty garden. After. the severe 
 exertion of sitting still and letting the coolies draw us, 
 we restored our wasting tissues by rich soup, meats, and 
 all the stimulating food that might be thought more 
 necessary to the laboring jinrikisha men. 
 
 When we started again, with all the tea-house staff 
 singing sweet sayonaras, a glow in the east foretold the 
 rising moon, and a huge stone torii at the end of the vil- 
 lage loomed ghostly against the blackness of the forest. 
 The glancing moonlight shot strange shadows across the 
 path, and we went whirling through this lattice of light 
 and darkness in stillness and solitude. The moon rose 
 higher and was hidden in the leafy arch overhead, and 
 before we realized that its faint light was fading, came 
 flashes of lightning, the rumble of approaching thunder, 
 and a sudden crash, as the flood of rain struck the tree- 
 tops and poured through. The hoods of the jinrikishas 
 were drawn up, the oil-papers fastened across us, and 
 through pitch darkness the coolies raced along. Vivid 
 flashes of lightning showed the thick, Avhite sheet of rain, 
 which gusts of wind blew into our faces, while insidious 
 
A Trip to Nikko 
 
 streams slipped down our shoulders and glided into our 
 laps. Putting their heads down, the coolies beat their way 
 against the rain for two more soaking miles to Imaichi, 
 the last village on the road, only five miles from Nikko. 
 The tea-house into which we turned for shelter was 
 crowded with belated and storm-bound pilgrims coming 
 down from the sacred places of Nikko and Chiuzenji. 
 All Japanese are talkative, the lower in staticn the more 
 loquacious, and the whole coolie company v.'as chatter- 
 ing at once. As the place was too comfortless to stay in, 
 we turned out again in the rain, and the coolies splashed 
 away at a walk, through a darkness so dense as to be felt. 
 At midnight our seven jinrikishas rattling into the hotel 
 court, and fourteen coolies shouting to one another as 
 they unharnessed and unpacked, roused the house and 
 the whole neighborhood of Nikko. Awakened sleepers 
 up-stairs looked out at us and banged the screens angri- 
 ly, but no sounds can be deadened in a tea-house. 
 
 To the traveller the tea-house presents many phases 
 of comfort, interest, and amusement altogether wanting 
 in the conventional hotel, which is, unfortunately, becom- 
 ing common on the great routes of travel. The dimen- 
 sions of every house in the empire conform to certain 
 unvarying rules. The verandas, or outer galleries of the 
 house, are always e.xactly three feet wide. foreigner, 
 who insisted on a nine-feet-wide veranda, entailed upon 
 his Nikko carpenter many days of painful thought, pipe- 
 smoking, and conference with his fellows. These me- 
 chanics were utterly upset in their calculations. They 
 sawed the boards and beams too long or too short, and 
 finally produced a very bad, un-Japanese piece of work. 
 The floors of these galleries are polished to a wonderful 
 smoothness and surface. They are not varnished, nor 
 oiled, nor wa.xed, but every morning rubbed with a cloth 
 wrung out of hot bath-water which contains oily matter 
 enough to give, in time, this peculiar lustre. Three years 
 
 '43 
 
Jinrzkisha Days in "Japan 
 
 of daily rubbing with a hot cloth are required to give a 
 satisfactory result, and every subsequent year adds to 
 the richness of tone and polish, until old tea-houses and 
 temples disclose floors of common pine looking like rose- 
 wood, or six-century-old oak. 
 
 The area of every room is some multiple of three . 
 feet, because the soft tatanii, or floor-mats, measure 
 six feet in length by three in width. These are woven 
 of common straw and rushes, faced with a closely- 
 wrought mat of rice-straw. It is to save these tatami 
 and the polished floors that shoes are left outside the 
 house. 
 
 The thick screens, ornamented with sketches or poems, 
 that separate one room from another, are the fusuma; 
 the screens shutting off the veranda, pretty lattice frames 
 covered with rice-paper that admit a peculiarly soft light 
 to the rooms, are the shoji, and in their management is 
 involved an elaborate etiquette. In opening or closing 
 them, well-bred persons and trained servants kneel and 
 use each thumb and finger with ordered precision, while 
 it is possible to convey slight, contempt, and mortal in- 
 sult in the manner of handling these sliding doors. The 
 outer veranda is closed at night and in bad weather by 
 amados, solid wooden screens or shutters, that rumble 
 and bang their way back and forth in their grooves. 
 These amados are without windows or air-holes, and the 
 servants will not willingly leave a gap for ventilation. 
 “But thieves may get in, or the kappa!" they cry, the 
 kappa being a mythical animal always ready to fly away 
 with them. In every room is placed an andon, or night- 
 lamp. If one clap his hands at any hour of the twenty- 
 four, he hears a chorus of answering Hei ! hei ! hei's ! and 
 the thump of the nesans bare feet, as they run to attend 
 him. While he talks to them, they keep ducking and 
 saying Heh ! Jieh ! which politely signifies that they are 
 giving their whole attention. 
 
A Trip to Nikko 
 
 The Japanese bed is the floor, with a wooden box un- 
 der the neck for a pillow and a futon for a covering. To 
 the foreigner the Japanese landlord allows five or six 
 futons, or cotton-wadded comforters, and they make a 
 tolerable mattress, although not springy, and rather apt 
 to be damp and musty. The traveller carries his own 
 sheets, woolen blankets, feather or air pillows, and flea- 
 powder, the latter the most necessary provision of all. 
 The straw mats and the futons swarm with fleas, and 
 without a liberal powdering, or, better, an anointing with 
 oil of pennyroyal, it is impossible to sleep. These sleep- 
 ing arrangements are not really comfortable, and, after 
 the fatigue of walking and mountain - climbing, stiffen 
 the joints. By day the futons are placed in closets out 
 of sight, or hung over the balconies to air, coming back 
 damper than ev'er, if the servants forget to bring them in 
 before sunset. The bedroom walls are the sliding pa- 
 per screens ; and if one’s next neighbor be curious, he 
 may slip the screen a little or poke a hole through the 
 paper. A whisper or a pin-drop travels from room to 
 room, and an Anglo-Saxon snorer w'ould rock the whole 
 structure. 
 
 At ordinary Japanese inns the charge for a day’s ac- 
 commodation ranges from forty cents to one dollar. A 
 Japanese can get his lodgings and all his meals for about 
 thirty cents, but foreigners are so clumsy, untidy, and 
 destructive, and they demand so many unusual things, 
 that they are charged the highest price, which includes 
 lodging, bedding, and all the tea, rice, and hot water 
 they may wish. All other things are extra. In the beat- 
 en tracks bread and fresh beef may always be found, and 
 each year there is less need of carrying the supplies for- 
 merly so essential. Chairs and tables, cots, knives and 
 forks, and corkscrews have gradually penetrated to the 
 remotest mountain hamlets. At the so-called foreigm 
 hotels at Nikko and other resorts, charges are usually 
 
 K 145 
 
Jinriktsha Days in Japan 
 
 made at a fixed price for each day, with everything in- 
 cluded, as at an American hotel. 
 
 Foreigners travelling away from the ports take with 
 them a guide, who acts as courier, cooks and serves the 
 meals, and asks one dollar a day and his expenses. 
 'I'hus accompanied everything goes smoothly and easily; 
 rooms are found ready, meals are served promptly, show- 
 places open their doors, the best conveyances await the 
 traveller’s wisli, and an encyclopaedic interpreter is al- 
 ways at his elbow. Without a guide or an experienced 
 servant, even a resident who speaks the language fares 
 hardly. Like all Orientals, the Japanese are impressed 
 by a retinue and the appearances of wealth. They wear 
 their best clothes when travelling, make a great show, 
 and give liberal tips. The foreigner who goes to the 
 Nakasendo or to remote provinces alone, trusting to the 
 phrase-book, finds but little consideration or comfort. 
 He ranks with the class of pilgrims, and the guest-room 
 and the choicest dishes are not for him. The guide may 
 swindle his master a little, but the comforts and advan- 
 tages he secures are well worth the cost. All the guides 
 are well-to-do men with tidy fortunes. They exact com- 
 missions wherever they bring custom, and can make or 
 break landlords or merchants if they choose to combine. 
 Some travellers, who, thinking it sharp to deprive the 
 guides of these percentages, have been left by them in 
 distant provinces and forced to make their way alone, 
 have found the rest of the journey a succession of impo- 
 sitions, difficulties, and even of real hardships. After 
 engaging a guide and handing him the passport, the 
 traveller has only to enjoy Japan and pay his bill 
 at the end of the journey. The guides know more 
 than the guide-book; and with Ito, made famous by 
 Miss Bird, Nikko and Kioto yielded to us many pleas- 
 ures which we should otherwise have missed. An ac- 
 quaintance with Miyashta and his sweet -potato hash 
 
 146 
 
Nikko 
 
 made the Tokaido a straight and pleasant way; and 
 Moto’s judicial countenance caused Nikko, Chiuzenji, 
 and Yumoto to disclose unimagined beauties and lux- 
 uries. 
 
 CHAPTER XV 
 NIKKO 
 
 Of all J.npan’s sacred places, Nikko, or Sun’s Bright- 
 ness, is dearest to the Japanese heart. Art, architecture, 
 and landscape gardening add to Nature's opulence, his- 
 tory and legend people it with ancient splendors, and all 
 the land is full of memories. “ He who has not seen 
 Nikko cannot say Kekko !" (beautiful, splendid, superb), 
 runs the Japanese saying. 
 
 With its forest shades, its vast groves, and lofty ave- 
 nues, its hush, its calm religious air, Nikko is an ideal 
 and dream-like place, where rulers and prelates may well 
 long to be buried, and where priests, poets, scholars, ar- 
 tists, and pilgrims love to abide. Each day of a whole 
 summer has new charms, and Nikko’s strange fascina- 
 tion but deepens with acquaintance. 
 
 The one long street of Hachi-ishi, or lower Nikko vil- 
 lage, ends at the banks of the Dayagawa, a roaring 
 stream that courses down a narrow valley, walled at its 
 upper end by the bold, blue bar of Nantaisan, the sacred 
 mountain. Legend has peopled this valley of the Daya- 
 gawa with impossible beings — giants, fairies, demons, 
 and monsters. Most of the national fairy stories begin 
 with, “Once upon a time in the Nikko mountains,” and 
 one half expects to meet imp or fay in the green shad- 
 ows. Mound builder and prehistoric man had lived their 
 squalid lives here ; the crudest and earliest forms of re- 
 ligion had been observed in these forest sanctuaries long 
 
 •47 
 
Jtnriktska Days in Japan 
 
 before Kobo Daishi induced the Shinto priests to believe 
 that their god of the mountain was but a manifestation 
 of Buddha. Everything proclaims a hoary past — trees, 
 moss-grown stones, battered images, crumbling tombs, 
 overgrown and forgotten graveyards. 
 
 Each summer half the Tokio legations move bodily to 
 Nikko, and temples, monastery wings, priests’ houses, 
 and the homes of the dwellers in the upper village are 
 rented to foreigners in ever-increasing numbers. Nikko 
 habitations do not yet bring the prices of Newport cot- 
 tages, but the extravagant rate of three and even five 
 hundred yens for a season of three months is a Japan- 
 ese equivalent. Besides the foreigners, there are many 
 Japanese residents and tourists — little men in hot, un- 
 comfortable foreign clothes, with field-glasses strapped 
 across one shoulder, and the freshest and tightest of 
 gloves. The white-clad pilgrims throng hither by thou- 
 sands during July and early August, march picturesque- 
 ly to the jingle of their staffs and bells round the great 
 temples, and trudge on to the sanctuary on Chiuzenji's 
 shores within the shadow of holy Nantaisan. 
 
 Two bridges cross the DaiyagaAva, and lead to the 
 groves and temples that make Nikko’s fame. One bridge 
 is an every-day affair of plain, unpainted timbers, across 
 which jinrikishas rumble noisily, and figures pass and re- 
 pass. The other is the sacred bridge, over which only 
 the Emperor may pass, in lieu of the Shoguns of old, for 
 whom it was reserved. It is built of wood, covered with 
 red lacquer, with many brass plates and tips, and rests 
 on foundation piles of Titanic stone columns, joined by 
 cross-pieces of stone, carefully fitted and mortised in. 
 Tradition maintains that the gods sent down this rain- 
 bow bridge from the clouds in answer to saintly prayer. 
 Its sanctity is so carefully preserved, that Avhen the Em- 
 peror wished to pay the highest conceivable honor to 
 General Grant, he ordered the barrier to the bridge to 
 
 J4S 
 
Xikko 
 
 be opened that his guest might walk across. Greatly to 
 his credit, that modest soldier refused to accept this 
 honor, lest it should seem a desecration to the humble 
 believers in the sanctity of the red bridge. 
 
 Shaded avenues, broad staircases, and climbing slopes 
 lead to the gate-ways of the two great sanctuaries — the 
 mortuary temples and tombs of the Shogun lyeyasu and 
 his worthy grandson, the Shogun lyemitsu. The hill- 
 side is shaded by magnificent old cryptomerias ; and 
 these sacred groves, with the soft cathedral light under 
 the high canopy of leaves, are as wonderful as the sacred 
 buildings, iiach splendid gate-way, as well as the soar- 
 ing pagoda, can be seen in fine perspective at the end of 
 long avenues of trees, and bronze or stone torii form 
 lofty portals to the holy places. The torii is a distinct- 
 ively national structure, and these grand skeleton gates 
 of two columns and an upward curving cross-piece are 
 impressive and characteristic features of every Japanese 
 landscape, standing before even the tiniest shrines in the 
 Liliputian gardens of Japanese homes, as well as forming 
 the approach to every temple. The stone torii and the 
 rows of stone lanterns are mossy and lichen-covered, and 
 every foot of terrace or embankment is spread with fine 
 velvety moss of the freshest green. Although two hun- 
 dred years old, the temples themselves are in as perfect 
 condition and color as when built ; and nothing is finer, 
 perhaps, than the five- storied pagoda with its red lac- 
 quered walls, the brass trimmings of roofs and rails, the 
 discolored bells pendent from every angle, and a queer, 
 corkscrew spiral atop, the whole showing like a great 
 piece of jeweller’s work in a deep, green grove. 
 
 lyeyasu, founder of Veddo, successor of the Taiko, and 
 military ruler in the golden age of the arts in Japan, was 
 the first Shogun buried on Xikko’s sacred hill-side, and 
 It was intended to make the mortuary temple before his 
 tomb as splendid as the crafts of the day permitted. 
 
 M9 
 
yinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 His grandson, lyeniitsu, was the next and only other 
 Shogun interred at Nikko, and his temple fairly rivals 
 that of his ancestor. 
 
 At each shrine rise broad stone steps leading to the 
 first and outer court-yards, where stand the magnificent 
 gates, exquisitely carved, set with superb metal plates, 
 and all ablaze with color and gilding. The eye is con- 
 fused in the infinite detail of structure and ornament, 
 and the intricacy of beams and brackets upholding the 
 heavy roofs of these gate- ways. Walls of red lacquer 
 and gold, with carved and colored panels topped with 
 black tiles, surround each enclosure, and through inner 
 and outer courts and gate -ways, growing ever more 
 and more splendid, the visitor approaches the temples 
 proper, their soaring roofs, curved gables, and ridge-poles 
 set with the Tokugawa crest in gold, sharp cut against 
 the forest background. At the lowest step his shoes 
 are taken off, and he is permitted to wander slowly 
 through the magnificent buildings on the soft, silk-bor- 
 dered mats. Richly panelled ceilings, lacquered pillars, 
 carved walls, and curtains of the finest split bamboo be- 
 long to both alike, and in the gloom of inner rooms are 
 marvels of carving and decoration, only half visible. 
 
 Both temples were once splendid with all the em- 
 blems and trappings of Buddhism, redolent with in- 
 cense, musical with bells and gongs, and resounding all 
 day with chanted services. But after the Restoration, 
 when the Shinto became the state religion and the Em- 
 peror made a pilgrimage to Xikko, lyeyasu’s temple was 
 stripped of its splendid altar ornaments, banners, and 
 symbols, and the simple mirror and bits of paper of the 
 empty Shinto creed were substituted. In the dark chapel 
 behind the first room there remains a large gong, whose 
 dark bowl rests on a silken pad, and when softly struck 
 fills the place with rising and falling, recurring and wav- 
 ering, tones of sweetness for five whole minutes, while 
 
IN'IF.RIOR OK THK lYKMITSr TKMri.K 
 
/ ■ • v’ i.-'. IT., ■: . 
 
■^Nikko 
 
 Ito stands with open watch and warning finger, and the 
 priest bends low and drinks in the music with ecstatic 
 countenance. lyemitsu’s temple was spared, and there 
 stand the rows of superb lacquered boxes containing 
 the sacred writings, dhere, too, are the gilded images, 
 golden lotus-leaves, massive candlesticks, drums, gongs, 
 banners and pendent ornaments, besides the giant ko- 
 ros, breathing forth pale clouds of incense, that accom- 
 panied the rites of the grand old Buddhist faith. 
 
 Each temple has a fine water-tank in its outer court; 
 an open pavilion, with solid corner posts supporting the 
 heavy and ornate roof above the granite trough. Each 
 basin is a single, huge block of stone, hollowed out and 
 cut with such exactness that the water, welling up from 
 the bottom, pours over the smooth edges so evenly as 
 to give it the look of a cube of polished glass. The 
 fountain at the lyemitsu temple was the gift of the 
 princes of Nabeshima, and its eaves flutter with the 
 myriad flags left there by pilgrims who come to pray at 
 the great shrine. All about the temple grounds is heard 
 the noise of rushing water, and the music and gurgle of 
 these tiny streams, the rustle of the high branches, and 
 the cawing of huge solitary rooks are the only sounds 
 that break the stillness of the enchanted groves between 
 the soft boomings of the morning and evening bells. 
 'I'he noise of voices is lost in the great leafy spaces, and 
 the sacredness of the place subdues even the unbeliev- 
 ing foreigner, while native tourists and pilgrims move 
 silently, or speak only in undertones, and make no sound, 
 save as their clogs clatter on stones and gravel. 
 
 It is impossible to carry away more than a general and 
 bewildered impression of the splendid walled and lan- 
 terned courts, the superb gate -ways, and the temples 
 themselves, but certain details, upon which the guides in- 
 sist, remain strangely clear in memory. Over the doors 
 of the stable where the sacred white pony is kept are 
 
 K— 153 
 
Jinrikiska Days in yapan 
 
 colored carvings representing groups of monkeys with 
 eyes, or ears, or mouth covered with their paws — the sig- 
 nification being that one should neither see, hear, nor 
 speak any evil. In one superbly -carved gate-way is a 
 little medallion of two tigers, so cunningly studied and 
 worked out that the curving grain and knots of the wood 
 give all the softly-shaded stripes of their velvet coats and 
 an effect of thick fur. One section of a car\-ed column 
 in this gate is purposely placed upsidedown, the builder 
 fearing to complete so perfect and marvellous a piece of 
 workmanship. Above another gate-way curls a comfort- 
 able sleeping cat, which is declared to wink when rain is 
 coming, and this white cat has as great a fame as any- 
 thing along the Daiyagawa. 
 
 The strangest hierophant in Xikko is the priestess 
 who dances at the temple of lyeyasu. She looks her three- 
 score years of age, and is allowed a small temple to her- 
 self, where she sits, posed like an altar image, with a big 
 money-box on the sacred red steps before her, into which 
 the pious and the curious toss their offerings. Then the 
 priestess rises and solemnly walks a few steps this way, 
 a few steps that way, poses before each change, shakes 
 an elaborate sort of baby’s rattle with the right-hand, and 
 gesticulates with an open fan in the left-hand. The se- 
 date walk to and fro, the movements of the rattle and 
 fan constitute the dance, after which this aged Miriam 
 sits down, bows her head to the mats, and resumes her 
 statuesque pose. She wears a nun-like head-dress of 
 white muslin, and a loose white garment, like a stole, 
 over a red petticoat, the regular costume of the Shinto 
 priestesses. She seems always amiable and ready to 
 respond to a conciliatory coin, but the visitor wonders 
 that the cool and shaded sanctuarj' in which she sits, 
 with nearly the whole front wall making an open door, 
 does not stiffen her aged joints with rheumatism and end 
 her dancing days. 
 
 154 
 
;aik-\vay <)!• nil; iykvasu tlmi’LK 
 
Nikko 
 
 A green and mossy staircase, a greener and mossier 
 balustraded walk, leads up and along the crest of the hill 
 to the final knoll, atop of which stands the simple bronze 
 urn containing the great Shogun’s body. A more still 
 and solemn, a more peaceful and beautiful resting-place 
 could not be imagined, and the peculiar green twilight 
 reigning under the closely-set cryptomerias, with those 
 long stretches of stone balustrades and embankments, 
 which the forest has claimed for its own and clothed in a 
 concealing mantle of the greenest moss, subdue the most 
 frivolous beholder to silence and seriousness. 
 
 On that velvety-green stair-way leading to lyeyasu's 
 tomb I met, one day, a scholar of fine taste and great 
 culture, a man of distinction in his native West. “ I am 
 overwhelmed with the beauty and magnificence of all 
 this,” he said. “ I must concede the greatness of any 
 religion that could provide and preserve this, and teach 
 its followers to appreciate it.” 
 
 Afterwards, almost on the same step, a dear mission- 
 ary friend stopped me, with eyes full of tears. “Oh!” 
 she sighed, “this fills me with sadness and sorrow. 
 These emblems and monuments of heathenism ! I see 
 nothing beautiful or admirable in those wicked temples. 
 'I'hey show me how hard it will be to uproot such hea- 
 then creeds. I wish I had not come.” 
 
 A woodland path leads around the foot of the great 
 hill on which the Shoguns’ tombs are built, a path laid 
 with large flat stones and set with a rough curbing of 
 loose rocks and bowlders, covered — by the drip and damp 
 and shade of centuries — with a thick green moss. 'I'his 
 silent footway leads past many small temples, stone- 
 fenced enclosures, moss-covered tombs and tablets, tiny 
 shrines behind tiny torii, and battered, broken-nosed, 
 and headless Buddhas. Half- hidden tracks, in that 
 gloomy and silent cryptomeria forest, rough-set stair- 
 cases, roads plunging into the deep shadow of the woods 
 
 '57 
 
yinrikisha Days in yapan 
 
 entice the explorer to ever-new surprises. At deserted 
 and silent shrines heaps of pebbles, bits of paper, oi 
 strips of wood painted with a sacred character attest 
 the presence of prayerful pilgrims, who have sought 
 them out to register a vow or petition, 'l iny red shrines 
 gleam jewel-like in the far shadows, and fallen cryptome- 
 rias make mounds and ridges of entangled vines among 
 the red-barked giants still standing. Above a water-fall, 
 all thin ribbons and jets of foam, are more old temples, 
 where pilgrims come to pray and tourists to admire, but 
 where no one ever despoils the unguarded sanctuaries. 
 In one of these buildings are life-size images of the 
 gods of thunder and the winds. Raiden, the thunder- 
 god, is a bright-red divinity with a circle of drums 
 surrounding his head like a halo, a fierce countenance, 
 and two goaty horns on his forehead. Futen, the god of 
 winds, has a grass-green skin, two horny toes to each 
 foot, and a big bag over his shoulders. A fine heavy- 
 roofed red gate-way and bell-tower distinguish another 
 cluster of temples in this still forest nook, their altars 
 covered with gilded images. One open shrine, which 
 should be the resort of jinrikisha men, is dedicated to a 
 muscular red deity, to whom votaries offer up a pair of 
 sandals, beseeching him for vigorous legs. The whole 
 place is hung over with wooden, straw, and tin sandals, 
 minute or colossal. Then down through the wood, past 
 a hoary graveyard, where abbots and monks of Nikko 
 monasteries were buried for centuries before the Sho- 
 guns came, one returns to the Futa-ara temple and lye- 
 mitsu’s first gale-way. 
 
 In our wanderings we once happened upon an old 
 and crowded graveyard, with splendid trees shading the 
 mossy tombs and monuments, 'fhe stone lanterns, 
 Buddhas, and images were past counting, and one gran- 
 ite deity, under a big sun-hat, had a kerchief of red cot- 
 ton tied under his chin. His benevolent face and 
 
 15S 
 
Nikko 
 
 flaming robes were stuck all over with tiny bits of 
 paper, on which the faithful had written their petitions, 
 and the lanterns beside him were heaped with prayer- 
 stones. A Hindoo -looking deity near by sat with up- 
 lifted knee, on which he rested one arm and supported 
 his bent and thoughtful head. 
 
 A hundred stone representatives of Buddha sit in 
 mossy meditation under the shadow of the river bank, 
 long branches trailing over them and vines clambering 
 about their ancient brows. Time has rolled some from 
 their lotus pedestals, beheaded others, and covered 
 them all with white lichens and green moss, and Gam- 
 man, as this row of Buddhas is named, is the strangest 
 sight among the many strange sights of the river bank. 
 Custom ordains that one should count them, and no two 
 persons are believed to have ever recorded the same 
 number of images between the bridge and Kobo Daishi’s 
 open shrine. 
 
 There is an eta village just below Nikko, peopled by 
 these outcasts, who follow their despised calling of hand- 
 ling the carcasses of animals and dressing leather and 
 furs. Their degradation seems to result not more from 
 that Buddhist law which forbids the taking of animal 
 life, than from the legendary belief that they are the de- 
 scendants of Korean prisoners, long kept as executioners 
 and purveyors for the imperial falcons. Colonies of etas 
 lived for centuries without part or lot in the lives of their 
 high-caste neighbors. After the Restoration, the power 
 of the great nobles was curtailed, and with the gradual 
 freeing of the lower classes from the tyranny of caste 
 the eta became a citizen, protected by law. Prejudice 
 still confines him to his own villages, but when he leaves 
 them salt is no longer sprinkled on the spot where he 
 stands to purify it. 
 
 The most harrowing situation of the old romances 
 was the falling in love of a noble with a beautiful eta 
 
 •59 
 
‘jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 girl. Now the eta children attend the Government 
 schools on the same terms as their betters. But this 
 liberality was of slow growth, and in one province, where 
 the stiff-necked parents withdrew their children because 
 of the presence of these pariahs, the governor entered 
 himself as a pupil, sitting side by side with the little out- 
 casts in the same classes, after which august demonstra- 
 tion of theoretical equality caste distinctions were al- 
 lowed to fade. 
 
 Nikko becomes a great curio mart each summer, the 
 curios having, naturally, a religious cast ; and bells, 
 drums, gongs, incense-burners, images, banners, brocade 
 draperies, and priestly fans make a part of every ped- 
 dler’s pack, each thing, of course, being certified to have 
 come from the sacred treasuries near by. The souve- 
 nirs, which the most hardened tourist cannot resist buy- 
 ing, are the Nikko specialties of trays, cups, boxes, and 
 teapots of carved and lacquered wood, and of curious 
 roots, decorated with chrysanthemums or incised sketches 
 of the Sacred Bridge. The Japanese eye sees possibili- 
 ties in the most unpromising knot, and the Japanese 
 hand hollows it into a casket, or fits it with the spout 
 and handle that turn it into a teapot. All the village 
 street is lined with these wooden-ware shops, alternating 
 with photograph and curio marts. 
 
 Visitors to Nikko always buy its yuoki, a cand\’ made 
 of chestnuts and barley-sugar, which comes in slabs an 
 inch square and six inches long, wrapped in a dried bam- 
 boo sheath, and put in the dainty little wooden boxes 
 which make Japanese purchases so attractive. It is like 
 a dark-brown fig-paste, and has a flavor of marrons 
 glaces and of maple-sugar. Flocks of children, with ba- 
 bies on their backs, hover about the yuoki shop in upper 
 Nikko, and if the tourist bestows a box on them, their 
 comical bobs and courtesies, their funny way of touch- 
 ing the forehead with the gift during all the bowing, and 
 
 160 
 
Nikko 
 
 the rapture with which they attack the bar of sweets 
 express most eloquent thanks. 
 
 When rain or fatigue prevented our making any out- 
 door excursions, the village street furnished us with an 
 all-day occupation. A mossy and abandoned rice-mill 
 faced us across the road, with a tiny cascade dripping 
 down from the leafy hill behind it, feeding its overshot 
 wheel, and dropping by dwarf water-falls to the side of 
 the road, whence it ran down the slope to add its sing- 
 ing to the water chorus that makes all Nikko musical. 
 Pack-horses, farmers, pilgrims, and villagers went pict- 
 uresquely by, each pedestrian tucking his kimono in his 
 belt to shorten it, and holding a vast golden halo over 
 his head in the shape of a flat, oil-paper rain umbrella. 
 
 A small garden separated our summer home at Nikko 
 from our landlord’s house, and from early morning, when 
 his amados thundered open, until dark, when they rum- 
 bled shut, the whole conduct of Japanese household life 
 lay before us. Our neighbors came out of doors be- 
 times. .\ bucket of water from a tiny cascade filled the 
 broad, shallow copper wash-basin, in which one by one 
 they washed their faces. Meanwhile the kettle boiled 
 over the charcoal fire, and some child ran down to a pro- 
 vision-shop for a square slab of bean-curd, which, with 
 many cups of tea, a little rice, and shreds of pickled fish, 
 composed their breakfast. Then the futons were hung 
 over poles or lines to sun ; the andons, pillows, and 
 big green tents of musquito-nets put away; the tatami 
 brushed off, and the little shop put in order for the day. 
 
 The women washed and starched their gowns, pasting 
 them down on flat boards to smooth and dry ; sewed and 
 mended, scrubbed and scoured in the narrow alcove of 
 a kitchen all the morning; while the children trotted 
 back and forth with buckets of water to sprinkle the 
 garden, wash the stones, fill the bath-tubs, and supply 
 the kitchen. The rice, after being washed and rubbed 
 
 I i6i 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 ill the cascade, was soaked for an hour and then poured 
 into the furiously boiling rice-pot. The brush fire under 
 the stone frame of the kettle was raked out, and when 
 the steam came only in interrupted puffs from under the 
 cover, this was lifted to show a pot full to the brim of 
 snowy-white grains. A soup had meanwhile been stew- 
 ing, a fish had been broiled over charcoal, and, with tea, 
 the noonday dinner was ready. At some hour of the 
 day offerings of rice and food were mysteriously placed 
 on the steps of the tiny shrine to the fox-god, chief orna- 
 ment of the farther garden. Towards sundown came 
 supper, and then the lighting of the lamps. Shadow- 
 pictures on the shoji repeated the actions and groupings 
 within, the splash of water betrayed the family bath, and 
 when all, from grandfather to baby, had been boiled and 
 scrubbed, the amados banged, and the performance was 
 over until sunrise. 
 
 CHAPTER XVI 
 CHIUZENJI AND YUMOTO 
 
 The Inquisition should have been put in possession 
 of the Japanese kago as a lesser punishment for heretics, 
 so exquisite and insidious are its tortures. This kago is 
 a shallow basket with a high back, slung from a pole car- 
 ried on the shoulders of two men, and in the mountains 
 and remote districts is the only means of travel, except 
 by pack-horses. The Japanese double their knees and 
 sit on their feet with great dignity and apparent comfort; 
 but the greater size of the foreigner, his stiff joints and 
 higher head, prevent his fitting into the kago; nor is he 
 much better off w-hen he gets astride, dangling his long 
 legs over the edges. Moreover, he not only knows that 
 he looks ridiculous, but suffers the pangs of conscience 
 
 162 
 
FARM I.AHOKKRS AND I’ACR-llORsF 
 
Chinzenji and Yumoto 
 
 for imposing his weight on two small coolies no larger 
 than the ten-year-old boys of his own land, d'here are 
 a few arm-chairs on poles, in which one may ride, like 
 the Pope, or an idol in a procession, but tiie long poles, 
 springing with the gait of four bearers, often make the 
 passenger sea-sick. 
 
 'I'he pack-horse, a slow -moving beast, has a keeper 
 who pulls him along by a cord, his extended head and 
 reluctant gait making that seem the only motive power. 
 Morse and leader wear straw shoes, and new pairs are 
 strung around the high saddle for reshoeing the beast 
 every few miles. Iron horseshoes are confined to the 
 capital and the large ports, and the village blacksmith 
 is unknown. Pack-horses wear a thick straw pad and a 
 high saddle fashioned like a saw-horse, on which the 
 rider sits aloft, so well forward that his feet hang over 
 the creature’s neck. This saddle is merely balanced, not 
 girded on, and the animals are so sleepy, slow-footed, and 
 stumbling, with a lurching, swinging gait like a camel’s, 
 that riding one is really a feat. 
 
 From Nikko to Chiuzenji you must travel eight miles 
 by kago, pack-horse, or on foot, the road leading past 
 rich fields of buckwheat, millet, rice, and potatoes, farm- 
 houses with thatched roofs, wayside shrines and tea- 
 houses. The ascent of the two thousand feet to the 
 higher region of the lake is chieHy included in one three- 
 mile stretch, climbing by easy slopes and broad stair- 
 cases to the high pass. At every few feet a stone step 
 was built, or a tree trunk fastened with a forked stick 
 and set with small stones. This stair-building, done ages 
 ago, has become a part of the mountain. At short dis- 
 tances the staircase enters a little clearing with a rustic 
 tea-hou.se, or the usual tateba, built of poles, a few' planks, 
 branches or mats, and affording sufficient shelter for 
 summer pilgrims and travellers. The keepers imme- 
 diately put out cushions for guests on the edge of the 
 
'Jinrikisha Days in ^apan 
 
 platform that constitutes the floor of the one room, and 
 bring the tray with its tiny tea-pot, thimble cups, and dish 
 of barley-sugar candies. For the refreshment one leaves 
 a few coppers on the tray, and in mountain jaunts, where 
 the traveller walks to escape the kago and sprre the coo- 
 lies, these tiny cups of pale yellow tea are very stimu- 
 lating. Each tateba commands some particular view, 
 and even the pilgrim who is tramping the provinces and 
 living on a few cents a day, will be found inditing poems 
 to the different water-falls and gorges he looks down upon. 
 
 The head of the pass affords a magnificent view of the 
 valley two thousand feet below, and presently the wood- 
 land path is following the border of the lake and comes 
 out into the open of Chiuzenji village. Chiuzenji Lake, 
 three miles wide and eight miles long, is surrounded by 
 steep and thickly-wooded mountains, the great Nantaisan 
 grandly soaring nine thousand feet above the sea, taper- 
 ing regularly as a pyramid and forested to the summit. 
 Nantaisan is a sacred mountain, a temple at its foot, 
 shrines all along the ascent, and at the top an altar on 
 which repentant murderers offer up their swords. Each 
 August come hosts of pilgrims in white clothes and huge 
 straw hats, with pieces of straw matting for rain-coats 
 bound across their shoulders — devout souls, who, after 
 purification in the lake, pass under the torii, say a prayer 
 in the temple, and painfully climb to the summit. Only 
 at such fixed seasons may visitors ascend the mountain, 
 each one paying twenty cents for the privilege of toiling 
 up its endless flight of steps. With these fees the priests 
 keep the underbrush trimmed and the path well cleared, 
 and where the holy guardian unbars the gate and mo- 
 tions one upward, begins the flight of stone stairs that 
 extend, with few breaks or zigzags, straight to the top. 
 The whole way is strewn with the cast-off sandals of the 
 season, and great heaps of the waraji of past years lie 
 here and there. 
 
 iC6 
 
Chiiizenji and Yumoto 
 
 The pilgrims sleep in Government barracks in the vil- 
 lage, a few coppers securing a mat on the floor and the 
 use of the common fireplace. Their vow to Nantaisan 
 being accomplished, they make the half-circuit of the 
 lake, to visit the hidden shrines and temples of the forest 
 shores, and then trudge to Yumoto for its hot sulphur 
 baths and scenery, or home to their ripening rice-fields. 
 
 From across the water Chiuzenji village looks a small, 
 yellow patch, lying between the unbroken green slope of 
 N'antaisan and the great lake. Its five tea-houses rise 
 straight from the water’s edge, each with a triple row of 
 outer galleries overlooking it. The way of life at the 
 Tsutaya, Idzumiya, Nakamarya, and the rest is much more 
 Japanese than in the frequented inns of Nikko. Chairs 
 and tables are conceded to foreigners, but everybody 
 must sleep on the floor, wash face and hands in the com- 
 mon wash-basin in the open court, and go about the house 
 stocking-footed, or wear the stiff, heelless, monkey-skin 
 slippers furnished by the inn. To call a servant one 
 claps his palms, and a long-drawn “Hei!” announces 
 that the rosy-cheeked mountain maid has heard, and the 
 gentle swaying of the house proclaims that she is run- 
 ning up the stairs, d'he washing of rice, vegetables, 
 fish, kitchen utensils, and family clothing goes on from 
 the single plank of a pier running from the lowest floor 
 of the house. Each inn has a similar pier, where socia- 
 ble maidens chatter as they stir and wash the rice in 
 bamboo baskets. The servants of the houses take the 
 whole lake for wash-hand basin and tooth-brush cup, 
 and the pier is a small' stage, upon which these local 
 companies play their unstudied parts. 
 
 As the finest country walk in England is agreed to 
 be that from Stratford to Warwick, so is the way from 
 Chiuzenji to Yumoto the finest country walk in Japan, 
 for its eight miles of infinite variety. First, the broad 
 foot-path wanders for two miles along the shores of 
 
 167 
 
Jinrikisha Days in "Japan 
 
 Lake Chiuzenji, which, however, appears only in glimpses 
 of placid blue through the dense forest, all stillness, cool- 
 ness, and enchantment. Then it emerges at the head of 
 the lake in a grove of pine-trees sheltering a rustic tea- 
 house, which overlooks the bit of low beach known as 
 the Iris Strand, and all the grand amphitheatre of mount- 
 ains walling in Chiuzenji. Farther on are Hell's River 
 and the Dragon Head cascade, where a mountain stream 
 slides in many a separate ribbon down mossy ledges. 
 Thence the foot-path climbs to a high plain covered with 
 tall grasses and groves of lofty pines — the famous Red 
 Plain, dyed once with the blood of a conquered army, 
 and tinged with each autumn's frost to the same deep 
 hue again. From the border of this plain rise sombre 
 mountains, Xantaisan a giant among them, with green 
 and purple veils of shadows and a crown of floating clouds. 
 No sign of habitation or cultivation marks the high plain, 
 which, with its loneliness and its scattered pines, is so 
 much like the valleys of the high Sierras. Everywhere 
 else in Japan the country is wooded and shaded and cul- 
 tivated from water's edge to mountain-top ; but in win- 
 ter all the region above X'ikko is deserted, and deep 
 snows in the passes shut it off from the rest of the world. 
 Tea-houses close, the people flee to the valley for warmth, 
 and only the coming of spring and the tourist restores it 
 again. Even those wizards, the Japanese farmers, do 
 not attempt to subdue these solitudes, whose wild beau- 
 ty delights the whole people. 
 
 Beyond this lonely plain the way climbs seven hun- 
 dred feet along the face of a precipitous hill to the level 
 of Yumoto Lake, which there narrows to a few feet and 
 slips down the rocks, a mass of foam, spray, and steam. 
 The lake — small, uneven, walled by perpendicular mount- 
 ain-slopes and forests — is a still mirror of these superb 
 heights, one of which, Shirane-san, is a slumbering vol- 
 cano. Vaporous sulphur springs bubble through the hot 
 
 i6S 
 
Chiuzenjt and Yiemoio 
 
 crust of earth at the end of the lake, and boiling sulphur 
 wells up, even in the bed of the lake itself, and clouds 
 and heats the whole body of water so that no fish can 
 live there. The two miles of winding forest -path, be- 
 tween the fall at one end of Yumoto Lake and the village 
 of the same name at the opposite end, lead through an en- 
 chanted forest— a picturesque tangle of roots and rocks, 
 covered with green moss, wound with vines, shaded with 
 ferns, and overhung with evergreen branches. 
 
 Yumoto has two streets and a dozen tea-houses, whose 
 galleries are hung with red lanterns, as if in perpetual 
 fSte, and an atmosphere nearly all sulphuretted hydro- 
 gen. One of the hot springs bubbles up at the entrance 
 of the village, filling a tank about ten feet square, cov- 
 ered by a roof resting on four corner pillars. The sides 
 are all open to the air, and an Arcadian simplicity of 
 bathing arrangements prevails. Citizens and sojourners 
 stroll hither, because the site commands a view of the 
 thoroughfare, remove and fold up their garments, and 
 sit down in the pool. When sufficiently boiled, they 
 cool off occasionally on the edge of the tank, and then 
 drop into the pool again. If the company prove agree- 
 able, the bath occupies hours. More open-air pavilions 
 are at the end of the village, where more bronze figures 
 boil and cool themselves in the same e.xoteric fashion. 
 The public bath-houses, that alternate with the tea- 
 houses in the village streets, have roofs and sides of 
 solid wood, except the street front, which is open and 
 curtainless, and within which men, women, and children 
 meet in the hot-water tanks, as at the market-place or 
 street-corners in other countries. To a new-comer this 
 extraordinary simplicity is startling, but it he stays long 
 enough, he finds that the childlike innocence and uncon- 
 cern of the people make a new code of the proprieties. 
 
 These infantile views of the Japanese as to bathing 
 make even the great pay little attention to the seclusion 
 
 L — 169 
 
yinrikiska Days in yapan 
 
 and inviolateness of the bath-room. In a high-class 
 Japanese house, or at the best tea-houses, this is an 
 exquisitely artistic nook, with cement walls and floors, 
 inlaid with fantastic stones and bits of porcelain. The 
 oval tubs are of pine, bound with withes, and white with 
 scouring. The doors are generally sliding paper screens 
 without locks, and the wooden wall, or door, if there be 
 one, is full of fantastic holes and tiny windows with no 
 curtain. Often the bath-house is a detached pavilion, 
 to which you are expected to walk in a special bath 
 gown, or ukata, meeting, on the way, household and 
 guests, who are always ready for a friendly chat. Eu- 
 ropeans can hardly make a Japanese servant under- 
 stand that in their order of arrangements, the bath and 
 the bath-room are for the use of one person at a time. 
 The Japanese wooden tub is vastly better than the zinc 
 coffins and marble sarcophagi in which we bathe. The 
 wood keeps the water hotter and is pleasanter to the 
 touch. One kind of tub has a tiny stove with a long 
 pipe in one end, and with a mere handful of charcoal 
 such a tub is filled with boiling water in the briefest 
 time. Many bathers have lost their lives by the carbonic 
 acid gas sent off by this ingenious contrivance. A Jap- 
 anese hot bath is only a point or two from boiling. The 
 natives bear this temperature without wincing, and will 
 step from this scalding caldron out-of-doors, smoking 
 along the highway on a frosty day, like the man whom 
 Dr. Griffis describes. Our grave and statuesque land- 
 lord at Yumoto, who sat like a Buddha behind his low 
 table and held court with his minions, once appeared to 
 us stalking home in the starlight with all his clothes on 
 his arm. His stride was as stagey and majestic as ever, 
 there being no reason, in his consciousness, why he 
 should lay off his dignity with his garments, they repre- 
 senting to him the temporary and accidental, not the 
 real envelope of the pompous old soul. 
 
 170 
 
rrni.ic HATn-nfirsi: \ r Yi’Moro 
 
Chiiizenji a7id Yumoto 
 
 At some of the great mineral springs there are now 
 separate pools for men and women, in deference to for- 
 eign prejudice ; but more than one generation will p^ss 
 before promiscuous bathing is done away with. 
 
 At all medicinal springs the baths are owned and 
 managed by the Government and are free to the people. 
 Here at Yumoto, men, women, and children walk into 
 the one large room containing the pools, undress, lay 
 their clothing in a little heap on the raised bench or 
 platform running around the edge of the room, and step 
 into the water ; and, as has been said, no one sees any 
 impropriety in this custom. Women sit or kneel on the 
 edges of the pool, scouring themselves with bags of rice- 
 bran, and chattering with their friends in or out of the 
 water. People stop at the open doors, or breast-high 
 windows, to talk to the bathers, and conduct is as deco- 
 rous, as reserved, and as modest as in a drawing-room. 
 The approach of a foreigner sends all the grown bathers 
 deep into the water, simply out of respect to his artificial 
 and incomprehensible way of looking at natural things. 
 They know, though they cannot understand, that the 
 European finds something objectionable, and even 
 wrong, in so insignificant a trifie as being seen without 
 clothes. 
 
 .-\t our tea-house in Yumoto our three rooms in the 
 upper story were thrown into one during the daytime, 
 making an apartment open to the gallery on three sides. 
 Hibachis, or braziers, with mounds of glowing charcoal, 
 tempered the morning and evening air, and all day we 
 could sit on piles of futons, and enjoy the superb picture 
 of mountains and lake before us. We were poled over 
 the placid water in a queer ark of a boat, and the mount- 
 ain-paths were always alluring, the roughest trail often 
 passing under torii, or leading past some shrine, just 
 when it seemed that no foot had ever preceded ours. 
 At night, when the chilling air presses the sulphur fumes 
 
 •73 
 
^tnrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 closer to earth, Yumoto streets resound with the wailing 
 whistle of the blind shainpooer, or amah. These amah 
 are found everywhere — in the largest cities and in the 
 smallest mountain villages — and, whether men or women, 
 are never young, or even middle-aged. Theirs is an in- 
 definite, unscientific system of massage, and their ma- 
 nipulations often leave their charges with more lame and 
 aching muscles than before. But the amah are an insti- 
 tution of the country, and Yumoto streets would ring 
 with their dreary music, and our screens would be slipped 
 aside by many an ill-favored crone, as soon as it was 
 time for the usual evening baths to be prepared at the 
 tea-houses. 
 
 Upon another visit to Nikko and Chiuzenji in late 
 October there was a more splendid autumnal pageant 
 than the most gorgeous hill sides of America had ever 
 shown me. Frost had done its most wonderful work, 
 and the air was exhilarating to intoxication. The clear 
 and brilliant weather moved the coolies to frisk, play, 
 and chant like children — even that dignified little man, 
 Ito, relaxing his gravity to frolic like a boy, and to pry 
 bowlders over the edges of precipices to hear them crash 
 and fall far below. Chiuzenji looked a vast, flawless 
 sapphire, and Nantaisan was a mosaic of richest Byzan- 
 tine coloring. Kegon-no-taki, the fall of three hundred 
 feet by which the waters of Chiuzenji drop to the valley 
 in their race to the Daiyagawa, seemed a column of snow 
 in its little amphitheatre hung with autumn vines and 
 branches. But we dared not remain, for already Yumo- 
 to was closed and boarded up for the season, and on 
 any day the first of the blockading snows of winter 
 might shut the door of the one tea-house left open at 
 Chiuzenji, and end the travel from the Ashiwo copper- 
 mines. 
 
 174 
 
The Ascent of Fujiyama 
 
 CHAPTER XVII 
 THE ASCENT OF FUJIYAMA 
 
 It was in the third week of July that we made our 
 long-talked-of ascent of P’ujiyama. There were nine of 
 us, all told, four stalwart men, three valiant women, and 
 two incomparable Japanese boys, or valets. For forty 
 miles we steamed down the old line of the Tokaido, 
 drawing nearer to the sea in its deep indentation of 
 Odawara Bay, and to the blue bar of the Hakone range 
 that fronts the ocean. At Kodzu we took wagonettes 
 and rattled over the plain and up a valley along the To- 
 kaido, children being snatched from under the heels of 
 the horses, and coolies, with poles and baskets over their 
 shoulders, getting entangled with the wheels all the way. 
 A Japanese driver is a most reckless Jehu, and the 
 change to jinrikishas, after the wild ten-mile charge up 
 the valley, was beatific. Ascending a narrow canon, and 
 rounding curve after curve, we saw at last the many 
 lights of Miyanoshita twinkling against the sky. 
 
 Miyanoshita, the great summer resort, is the delight 
 alike of Japanese and foreigner. It has excellent hotels 
 kept in western fashion, clear mountain air, mineral 
 springs and beautiful scenery, and it is the very centre 
 of a most interesting region. All the year round its ho- 
 tels are well patronized, the midwinter climate being a 
 specific for the malarial poison of the ports of southern 
 China. P'amous, too, is the wooden -ware of Miyano- 
 shita, where every house is a shop for the sale of Japan- 
 ese games, household utensils, toys and trifles, all made 
 of the beautifully-grained native woods, polished on a 
 
 >75 
 
Jinriktsha Days in Japa7i 
 
 wheel with vegetable wax. Exquisite mosaics of a hun- 
 dred broken patterns amaze one with their nicety of 
 finish and cheapness, and no one escapes from the vil- 
 lage without buying. 
 
 Guides and coolies had been engaged for us at Miya- 
 noshita, and at six o’clock, on the morning after our arri- 
 val, the three kagos of the ladies were carried out, and 
 the four cavaliers, the two boys, and six baggage coolies 
 followed. The broad path zigzagged upward to the 
 narrow, knife-edge ride of the mountain range known 
 as the O Tomi Toge pass. From its summit we looked 
 back along the checkered green valley to Miyanoshita 
 and Hakone Lake, with the Emperor's island palace. 
 Looking forward across a checkered plain, we saw Fuji- 
 3'ama rise straight before us, its obstinate head still 
 hidden in clouds. Dropping quickly to the level of the 
 plain, we reached Gotemba, and, changing to jinrikishas, 
 were whirled away to Subashiri, six miles distant. 
 
 Trains of descending pilgrims and farmers, perched 
 high on the backs of pack-horses, smiled cheerfully at 
 the procession of foreigners bound for Fuji, and at each 
 rest-house on the way women and children, petrified 
 with astonishment, stood staring at us. Black cinders 
 and blocks of lava announced the nearness of the v’ol- 
 cano, and the road became an inky trail of coal-dust 
 through green fields. Banks of scoriae, like the heaps of 
 coal-dust around collieries, cropped out by the road-side, 
 and the wheels ground noisily through the loose, coarse 
 slag. The whole of Subashiri, crowding the picturesque 
 street of a typical Japanese village, welcomed us. In 
 the stream of running water, on either side of the broad 
 highway danced, whirled, and spouted a legion of me- 
 chanical toys, some for the children's pleasure, and 
 others turning the fly-brushes hung over counters of 
 cakes and sweetmeats. The place looks in perpetual 
 fete, with the hundreds of pilgrim flags and towels flut- 
 es 
 
The Ascent of Fujiyama 
 
 tering from each tea-house, and at the end of the street 
 is a torii, leading to an ancient temple in a grove, where 
 all Fuji pilgrims pray before beginning the ascent of the 
 mountain. In the light of the afternoon, the double 
 row of thatched houses and the street full of bareheaded 
 villagers looked like a well-painted stage scene. Mean- 
 while the sun sank, and in the last crimson glow of its 
 fading the clouds rolled away, and Fuji’s stately cone 
 stood over us, its dark slopes turning to rose and violet 
 in the changing light. 
 
 We rose with the sun at four o’clock, looked at Fuji, 
 all pink and lilac in the exquisite atmosphere of the 
 morning, snatched a hasty breakfast and set off, the 
 women in their kagos and the men on mettlesome steeds 
 that soon took them out of sight along the broad cin- 
 dery avenue leading to the base of the slanting mount- 
 ain. In that clear light Fuji looked twice its twelve 
 thousand feet above the sea, and the thought of toiling 
 on foot up the great slope was depressing. Instead of a 
 fifteen-mile walk, it looked fifty miles at least. All along 
 the forest avenue moss-grown stone posts mark the dis- 
 tance, and at one place are the remains of a stone wall 
 and lantern-guarded gate-way setting the limit of the 
 mountain’s holy ground. From that point the soil is 
 sacred, although horses and kagos are allowed to go a 
 mile farther to a mat-shed station, known as Umagaye- 
 shi (Turn Back Horse). Thence the great Fuji sweeps 
 continuously upward, and a tall torii at the head of the 
 stone staircase marks the beginning of the actual as- 
 cent, the holy ground on which only sandaled feet may 
 tread. 
 
 In the mat-shed the kagos were stored for a two days’ 
 rest, luggage was divided and tied on the backs of the 
 coolies, who were as gayly fringed as Indians on the 
 war-path, with the many pairs of straw sandals tied at 
 their waists and hanging from their packs. The coarse 
 
 M 177 
 
’Jinrikisha Days in ’Japan 
 
 cinders cut through boot-soles so quickly that foreigners 
 tie on these waraji to protect their shoes, allowing eight 
 pairs of the queer galoshes for the ascent and descent 
 of Fuji. From Umagayeshi, the path goes up through 
 woods and stunted underbrush and on over bare cin- 
 der and lava, pursuing the even slope of the mountain 
 without dip or zigzag to break the steady climb. Three 
 small Shinto temples in the woods invite pilgrims to 
 pray, pay tribute, and have their staff and garments 
 marked with a sacred seal. Beyond these temples, ten 
 rest-houses, or stations, stand at even distances along 
 the path, the first, or number one, at the edge of the 
 woods, and the tenth at the summit. Priests and sta- 
 tion-keepers open their season late in June, before the 
 snow is gone, and close in September. In the midsum- 
 mer weeks the whole mountain-side is musical with the 
 tinkling bells and staffs of lines of white-clad pilgrims. 
 Notwithstanding their picturesqueness, these devotees 
 are objectionable companions, as they fill tea-houses 
 and mountain stations, devour everything eatable, like 
 swarms of locusts, and bear about with them certain 
 smaller pilgrims that make life a burden to him who fol- 
 lows after. Nearly thirty thousand pilgrims annually 
 ascend Fujiyama. These pious palmers are chiefly from 
 the agricultural class, and they form mutual pilgrimage 
 associations, paying small annual dues, from the sum of 
 which each member in turn has his expenses defrayed. 
 They travel in groups, each man furnished with his bit 
 of straw matting for bed, rain coat, or shelter. They 
 carry, also^ cotton towels marked with the crest of their 
 pilgrim society, to be hung, after using, at temple water- 
 tanks, or as advertisements of their presence at the tea- 
 houses which they patronize. At each new shrine they 
 visit the priests stamp their white clothing with the red 
 seal of the temple. 
 
 Fujiyama is invested with legends, which these pil- 
 
 178 
 
The Ascent of Fujiyama 
 
 grims unquestioningly accept. It is said to have risen 
 up in a single night two thousand years ago, when a 
 great depression appeared to the southward, which the 
 waters of Lake Biwa immediately filled. For a thousand 
 years pilgrims have toiled up the weary path to pray at 
 the highest shrine and to supplicate the sun at dawn. 
 Fuji-san, the goddess of the mountain, hated, it is said, 
 her own se.x, and stories of devils, who seize women and 
 fly off into the air with them, still deter all but the most 
 emancipated Japanese women from making the ascent. 
 It was after Fuji-san had quarrelled with all the other 
 gods that she set up this lofty mountain of her own, 
 where she might live alone and in peace. No horse’s 
 foot is allowed to fall on the steep approaches to her 
 cloudy throne, and even the sand and cinders are so 
 sacred, that whatever dust is carried down on the pil- 
 grims’ feet by day is miraculously returned by night. 
 Even to dream of the peerless mountain is a promise of 
 good-fortune, and Fuji, with the circling storks and the 
 ascending dragon, symbolizes success in life and tri- 
 umph over obstacles. 
 
 Until the year 1500, Fuji wore a perpetual smoke- 
 wreath, and every century saw a great eruption. The 
 last, in 1707, continued for a month, and threw out the 
 loose cinders, ashes, and lumps of baked red clay that 
 still cover the mountain. Ashes were carried fifty miles, 
 damming a river in their path, covering the plain at its 
 base si.x feet deep with cinders, and forming an excres- 
 cence on the north side, which still mars the perfect 
 symmetry of the cone. 
 
 L'magayeshi, or Turn Back Horse, is four thousand 
 feet above the sea, and the other eight thousand feet 
 are surmounted in a distance of fifteen miles. We de- 
 sired to reach Station Eight by four o’clock ; either to 
 sleep there until three o’clock the next morning, or to 
 push on to the tenth and last station, rest there, and see 
 
 '79 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 the sun rise, from the door-way of that summit rest- 
 house. Our two Colorado mountaineers had faced the 
 slope like chamois, and were leaping the rocks walling 
 the first station, before the female contingent had left 
 the torii. Of the fifteen coolies accompanying us, three 
 were assigned to each woman, with orders to take her to 
 the top if they had to carry her pickaback. After an 
 established Fuji fashion, one coolie went first with a 
 rope fastened around the climber's waist, while another 
 pushed her forward. Aided still further by tall bamboo 
 staffs, we were literally hauled and boosted up the 
 mountain, with only the personal responsibility of lift- 
 ing our feet out of the ashes. 
 
 For the first three or four miles, the path led through 
 a dense, green bower, carpeted with vines, and starred 
 with wild flowers and great patches of wild strawberries. 
 Scaling moss-covered log steps, we passed through tem- 
 ples with gohei, or prayer papers, hanging from the gates 
 and doors, and bare Shinto altars within. At one shrine, 
 the sound of our approaching footsteps was the signal 
 for blasts from a conch-shell horn and thumps on the 
 hanging drum, and the priests, in their purple and white 
 gowns and black pasteboard hats, gave us a cheerful 
 welcome, and many cups of hot barley-tea. At our re- 
 quest, they stamped our clothing with big red charac- 
 ters, the sacred seal or crest of that holy station, and 
 sold us the regulation pilgrim’s staff, branded with the 
 temple mark. The old priest, to dazzle us with his ac- 
 quirements, and to show his familiarity with foreign 
 customs, glibly placed the price of the alpenstock at 
 “ Sen tents.” 
 
 The forest ended as suddenly as if one had stepped 
 from a door-way, and a sloping dump of bare lava and 
 cinders stretched upward endlessly ; the whole cone vis- 
 ible, touched with scudding bits of thin white clouds. 
 Every dike and seam of lava between the forest edge 
 
The Ascent of Fujiyama 
 
 and the summit was clearly seen, and the square blocks 
 of rest-houses, though miles away, stood out on the great 
 ash-heap as if one could touch them. It was apparent 
 that the walk would be merely a matter of persever- 
 ance. There are no dizzy precipices, no dangerous 
 rocks, no hand-over-hand struggles, nor narrow ledges, 
 nor patches of slippery stone — only a steadily ascending 
 cinder path to tread. Above the forest line, nothing in- 
 terrupts the wide views in every direction, and the goal 
 is in plain sight. 
 
 After we had passed the third station, the scudding 
 clouds closed in and hid the summit, and we trudged 
 along, congratulating ourselves on our escape from the 
 glaring sun while we were out on the open lava slope. 
 Station Number Four was closed and its roof in partial 
 ruins, where a rolling stone had craslied in during the 
 winter, but at the next two huts we rested, in company 
 with a sturdy mountaineer, his wife and baby, who were 
 going up to open Station Number Nine for the summer. 
 The baby was strapped on its father’s back, its little 
 bare toes sticking out from its tight swaddling-gown and 
 curling up in comical balls as the wind grew colder. 
 Our two veterans of Pike’s Peak were far ahead, merely 
 white spots on the dark, chocolate-brown slope, but we 
 all intended to overtake them and come in with them at 
 the end of the day. 
 
 Suddenly the drifting clouds swept down, curling along 
 the dark lava, like steam, and wrapping us in a gray 
 mist that blotted out everything. Another gust of wind 
 brought a dash of rain, and hurried us to the lee wall of 
 a closed hut for shelter. The shower came harder and 
 faster, and the baggage - coolies with water - proofs and 
 umbrellas were far in advance, invisible in the mist. We 
 pushed on, and after climbing a hundred yards in loose 
 ashes, found ourselves on the sliding track of the de- 
 scent. We struck away blindly to the right and mounted 
 
yinrikisha Days in yapan 
 
 Straight upward. A seam of hard lava soon gave us 
 secure foothold, but presently became a net-work of tiny 
 cascades. My cheerful little coolie, in his saturated cot- 
 ton suit, tried to encourage me, and passing the rope 
 around a horn of lava at one breathing-stop, pointed up- 
 ward, and assured me that there was clear sunshine 
 above. Glancing along the sloping lava-track, we saw a 
 foaming crest of water descending from those sunny uj> 
 lands, and had barely time to cross its path before the 
 roaring stream came on and cut off retreat. -■ 
 
 After two hours of hard climbing in the blinding rain 
 and driving wind, we reached the shelter of Station Num- 
 ber Eight, chilled and exhausted. This hut, a log-cabin 
 faced with huge lava blocks, its low roof held down by 
 many bowlders, and its walls five feet in thickness, con- 
 sists of one room about twelve by thirty feet in size. 
 Two doors looked sheer down the precipitous mountain- 
 slope, and a deep window, like that of a fortress, was set 
 in the end wall. The square fireplace, sunken in the 
 floor, had its big copper kettle swinging from a crane, 
 and the usual stone frame for the rice-kettle. When the 
 doors were barred and braced with planks against the 
 fury of the storm, the smoke, unable to escape, nearly 
 blinded us. Our dripping garments and the coolies’ 
 wet cotton clothes were hung to dry on the rafters over 
 the fireplace, where they slowly dripped. The master 
 of Number Eight had opened his rest-house only five 
 days before, and with his young son and two servants 
 found himself called on to provide for us with our ret-’ 
 inue of seventeen servants, for four young cadets from 
 the naval college in Tokio, storm -bound on their way 
 down the mountain, and a dozen pilgrims — forty -two 
 people in all. 
 
 M’armed, and comforted with a stray sandwich, we 
 were glad enough to go to bed. Each of us received 
 two futons, one of which made the mattress and the 
 
 1S2 
 
The Descent of Fujiyama 
 
 Other the covering, while basket-lids served for pillows. 
 The floor was cold as well as hard, and the rows of cot- 
 ton towels hung on the walls by preceding pilgrims flut- 
 tered in the draughts from the howling blasts that shook 
 the solid little hut. The shriek and roar and mad rushes 
 of wind were terrifying, and w'e were by no means cer- 
 tain that the little stone box would hold together until 
 morning. One hanging-lamp shed a fantastic light on 
 the rows of heads under the blue futons, and the still- 
 ness of the Seven Sleepers presently befell the lonely 
 shelter. 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII 
 THE DESCENT OF FUJIYAMA 
 
 From Saturday until Tuesday, three endless days and 
 as many nights, the whirling storm kept us prisoners in 
 the dark, smoke-filled rest-house. What had been the 
 amusing incidents of one stormy night became our in- 
 tolerable routine of life. Escape was impossible, even 
 for the hardy mountaineers ;ind pilgrims at the other 
 end of the hut, and to unbar the door for a momentary 
 outlook threatened the demolition of the shelter. A 
 tempest at sea was not more awful in its fury, but our 
 ears became finally accustomed to the roar and hiss of 
 the wind, and the persistent blows it dealt the structure. 
 The grave problem of provisioning the place in time 
 confronted us, and after our one day’s luncheon was 
 exhausted, it became a question how long the master 
 of the station could provide even fish and rice for forty 
 people. 
 
 The two boys, or valets, brought by their sybarite 
 masters, like all Japanese servants out of their grooves, 
 
 183 
 
Jinrikisha Days in ^apaji 
 
 were utterly helpless, and lay supine in their corners, 
 covered, head and all, with futons. The altitude, the cold, 
 or the dilemma paralyzed their usually nimble faculties, 
 and our coolies were far more useful. We could not 
 stand upright under the heavy beams of the roof, and as 
 the floor planks had been taken up here and there to 
 brace the doors with, walking was difficult in that dark 
 abode. While we grew impatient in our cage, the four 
 little naval cadets sat, or laj'^, quietly in their futons, hour 
 after hour, talking as cheerfully as if the sun w’ere shin- 
 ing, their prospects hopeful, and their summer suits of 
 white duck designed for the Eighth Station’s phenome- 
 nal climate. Throughout our incarceration the coolies 
 dozed and waked under their futons, sitting up only long 
 enough to eat, or play some childish game, and dropping 
 back to reckon how much per diem Avould accrue to 
 them without an equivalent of work. When we found 
 that the smoky fireplace offered some warmth, we sat 
 around the sunken box with our feet in the ashes and 
 handkerchiefs to our eyes to keep out the blinding smoke. 
 
 In that intimate circle we learned the cook’s secrets, 
 and watched him shaving off his billets of dried fish with 
 a plane, stewing them with mushrooms and seasoning 
 with soy and sake. This compound we found so good 
 that our flattered landlord brought out hot sake and in- 
 sisted on an exchange of healths. We noticed that in 
 the midst of this hospitality he went and made some of- 
 fering or other at his little household altar, and, writing 
 something in a book, returned more benign and friendly 
 than ever. The preparation of red bean and barley soups, 
 two sweetened messes that only a Japanese could eat, 
 and the boiling of rice seemed never to stop. Twice a 
 day the big copper caldron was set on its stone frame 
 half full of boiling water. When it bubbled most furi- 
 ously over a brushwood fire, a basketful of freshly washed 
 and soaked rice w'as poured in. In a half-hour the cal- 
 
 184 
 
The Descent of Fujiyama 
 
 dron was filled to the top with the full, snowy grains, 
 ready for the chopsticks of the waiting compan3^ 
 
 Each night the master of the hut prophesied clear 
 weather at five o’clock in the morning, and each morn- 
 ing he prophesied clear weather for five o’clock in the 
 afternoon, but the wind howled, the sleet swept by in 
 clouds, and hail rattled noisily on roof and walls. The 
 second afternoon the master of the summit rest-hut ap- 
 peared at the window, and, more dead than alive, was 
 drawn in by the e.xcited coolies, who helped chafe his 
 limbs and pour cups of hot sake between his lips. The 
 story of his battle with the storm on the open, wind- 
 swept cone satisfied us all to wait for the clearing. An 
 empty rice-box had forced him to attempt the journey 
 to revictual his station, and we wondered how soon 
 our landlord would be compelled to the same desperate 
 effort. 
 
 On the third morning the visiting boniface and four 
 wood -choppers decided to attempt the descent, and 
 when the door was unbarred, the pale daylight and a 
 changed wind, that entered the dim cave where we had 
 been imprisoned, foretold a clearing sky. As the clouds 
 lifted, we could see for miles down the wet and glisten- 
 ing mountain to a broad, green plain, sparkling with 
 flashing diamonds of lakes, and gaze down a sheer ten 
 thousand feet to the level of the sea. It was a view 
 worth the three days of waiting. The summit loomed 
 clear and close at hand, and our western mountaineers 
 made two thousand feet of ascent in thirty minutes, the 
 rest of us following in a more deliberate procession, as 
 befitted the altitude. The coolies, in bright yellow oil- 
 paper capes and hats, trooped after us like a flock of 
 canaries, gayly decorating the dark lava paths. At the 
 edge of the summit, on the rim of the crater, we passed 
 under a torii, climbed steep lava steps and entered the 
 last station — a low, dark, wretched, little wind-swept 
 
 iSs 
 
Jinrikisha Days m Japan 
 
 cabin, with one small door and a ten - inch fireplace, 
 where sake was warming for us. 
 
 Hardly had we arrived when the wind rose, the clouds 
 shut down, and again the rain drove in dense and whirl- 
 ing sheets. The adventurous ones, who had pushed on 
 to the edge of the crater to look in, were obliged to 
 creep back to safety on their hands and knees, for fear 
 of being swept over into that cauldron of boiling clouds 
 and mist. It was no time to make the circuit of the cra- 
 ter’s rim with its many shrines, or descend the path-w^ay, 
 guarded by torii, to the crater’s bed. We hurried through 
 the formalities at the temple, where the benumbed priest 
 branded the alpenstocks, stamped our handkerchiefs 
 and clothing, and gave us pictured certificates of our 
 ascent to that point. Then began a wild sliding and 
 plunging down a shoot of loose cinders to Station Num- 
 ber Eight, where the landlord produced a book and read 
 our three-days’ board bill from a record of many pages. 
 Everything was chanted out by items, even to the sake 
 and mushrooms that had been pressed upon us as a 
 courtesy, and it was only after many appeals for the sum 
 total that he instinctively ducked his head and named 
 fifty-eight dollars for the seven of us. Then ensued a 
 deafening attack of remonstrances from men and valets, 
 threats and invectives in Japanese and English, lasting 
 until the inn-keeping Shylock agreed to take thirty dol- 
 lars, received this moiety cheerfully, and bade us adieu 
 with many protestations of esteem. 
 
 Rubber and gossamer rain -cloaks were worse than 
 useless in that whirlwind, and haste w'as our one neces-' 
 sity. Dress skirts were sodden and leaden masses, and 
 mine being hung as an offering to Fuji-san, a red Navajo 1 
 blanket replaced it, and enveloped me completely. A 
 yellow- clad coolie securely fastened his rope, and we 
 slipped, and plunged, and I’olled dow'ii a shoot of loose 
 cinders. Sinking ankle-deep, we travelled as if on run- 
 
 186 
 
The Desce?it of Ficjiyaina 
 
 ners through the wet ashes, sliding down in minutes 
 stretches that it had taken us as many hours to ascend, 
 and stopping only at one or two rest-houses for cups of 
 hot tea, while we staggered and stumbled on through 
 rain that came ever harder and faster. 
 
 At Umagayeshi, where the dripping party waited for 
 more tea, the sun came gayly out and seemed to laugh 
 at our plight. 'I'he sudden warmth, the greenhouse steam 
 and softness, were most grateful to us after our hard- 
 ships in the clouds. At Subashiri we put on the few 
 dry garments we had been fortunate enough to leave be- 
 hind us. The tea-house windows framed vignettes of 
 Fuji, a clear blue and purple cone in a radiant, cloud- 
 dappled sky. With the prospect of a hot day to follow, 
 it was decided to push on to Miyanoshita, travelling all 
 night, the kagos being as comfortable as the flea-infested 
 tea-house, and the men of our party being obliged to 
 walk on until they reached dry boots and clothes. 
 Though the coolies grumbled, stormed, and appealed, 
 they had enjoyed three days of absolute rest and full 
 pay at Number Eight, and the walk of forty-five miles, 
 from the summit to Miyanoshita, is not an unusual jaunt 
 for them to make. 
 
 At Gotemba’s tea-house we found our companions in 
 misfortune — the little midshipmen — whom we joined in 
 feasting on what the house could offer. The old women 
 in attendance, yellow and wrinkled as the crones of ivory 
 netsukcs, were vastly interested in our Fuji e.xperiences 
 and dilapidated costumes, and gave us rice, fish, sponge- 
 cake, tea, and sake. At midnight we roused the coolies 
 from their five-hour rest, and prepared for the fifteen-mile 
 journey over O 'romi I'oge pass. The little midshipmen 
 slid the screens and beckoned us up to the liliputian bal- 
 cony again. “It is the night Fuji" said one of them, 
 softly, pointing to the dark violet cone, striped with 
 its ghostly snow, and illuminated by a shrunken yel- 
 
 .87 
 
Jinrilctsha Days in Japan 
 
 low moon that hung fantastic above O Tomi Toge’s 
 wall. 
 
 With our commander-in-chief perched high on a pack- 
 horse, whose chair-like saddle left his rider’s heels rest- 
 ing on the neck of the animal, and the kago coolies 
 slipping and floundering through the bottomless mud of 
 the roads, we once more started on our way. The whole 
 country was dark, silent, and deserted, and the only au- 
 dible sound was the chatter of our army of coolies, who 
 chirped and frolicked like boys out of school. The night 
 air over the rice-fields was warm and heavy, and seemed 
 to suffocate us, and fire-flies drifted in and out among 
 the rushes and bamboos. Deep, roaring streams filled 
 the channels that had been mere silver threads of wa- 
 ter a few days before. The coolies could barely keep 
 their footing as they waded waist-deep in the rush- 
 ing water, and at every ford we half expected to be 
 drowned. 
 
 At the summit of the pass we dismounted, and the 
 coolies scattered for a long rest. The sacred mountain 
 was clear and exquisite in the pale gray of dawn ; and 
 while we watied to see the sun rise on Fuji, a dirty- 
 brown fog scudded in from the sea, crossed the high 
 moon, and instantly the plain faded from view and we 
 were left, isolated Brocken figures, to eat our four-o’clock 
 breakfast of dry bread and chocolate, and return to the 
 kagos. Everywhere we encountered traces of a heayy 
 storm, the path being gullied and washed into a deep 
 ditch with high banks, whose heavy-topped, white lilies 
 brushed into the kagos as we passed. Half asleep, we 
 ' watched the green panorama unfolding as we descended, 
 and at eight o’clock we were set down in Miyanoshita. 
 Nesans ran hither and thither excitedly, to bring coffee 
 and toast, to prepare baths, produce the luggage we had 
 left behind, and mildly rehearse to the other domestics 
 the astonishing story of our adventures. By noon, when 
 
 i38 
 
The Tokaido 
 
 we came forth arrayed in the garb of civilization, we 
 were heroes. 
 
 For weeks after we returned to the plain, the treach- 
 erous Fujiyama stood unusually clear and near at hand. 
 “ The summer Fuji,” its dark-brown slopes only touched 
 with a fine line or two of snow, is less beautiful than 
 “the winter Fuji,” with its glistening crown; and our 
 Mount Rainier, whose snows are eternal, whose wooded 
 slopes shadow the dark-green waters of Puget Sound, is 
 lovelier still. But though we have the more glorious 
 mountain, the snow, the rocks, the forest, we have not 
 the people instinct with love of poetry and nature ; we 
 have not the race-refinement, and the race-traditions, 
 that would make of it another Fuji, invested with the 
 light of dream and legend, dear and near to every heart. 
 
 CHAPTER XIX 
 THE TOKAIDO — I 
 
 As the kago gave way to the jinrikisha, the jinrikisha 
 disappears before the steam-engine, which reduces a ri to 
 a cJio, and extends the empire of the commonplace. The 
 first railroads, built by English engineers and equipped 
 with English rolling-stock, have been copied by the Jap- 
 anese engineers, who have directed the later works. The 
 Tokaido railway line, built from both ends, put Tokio 
 and Kioto within twenty-four hours of each other. The 
 forty miles of railroad between Yokohama and Kodzu 
 were completed in 1887, bringing Miyanoshita, a long 
 day’s journey distant, within three hours of the great sea- 
 port. The long tunnels and difficult country around Fu- 
 jiyama, and the expensive engineering work at each river 
 
 18.5 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 delayed the opening of the whole line until 1889. Before 
 the iron horse had cleared all picturesqueness from the 
 region three of us made tlie jinrikisha journey down the 
 Tokaido. 
 
 The Tokaido having been the great post-road and 
 highway of the empire for centuries, with daimios and 
 their trains constantly travelling between the two capi- 
 tals, its villages and towns were most important, and each 
 supplied accommodations for every class of travellers. 
 All the world knew the names of the fifty-three post sta- 
 tions on the route, and there is a common game, which 
 consists in quickly repeating them in their order back- 
 ward or forward. As the railroad touched or left them, 
 some of the towns grew, others dwindled, and new places 
 sprang up. Each village used to have its one special oc- 
 cupation, and to ride down the Tokaido was to behold in 
 succession the various industries of the emoire. In one 
 place only silk cords were made, in another the finely- 
 woven straw coverings of sake cups and lacquer bowls; 
 a third produced basket-work of -wistaria fibres, and a 
 fourth shaped ink-stones for writing-boxes. Increased 
 trade and steam communication have interfered with 
 these local monopolies, and one town is fast becoming 
 like another in its industrial displays. 
 
 May is one of the best months for such overland trips 
 in Japan, as the weather is perfect, pilgrims and fleas 
 are not yet on the road, and the rainy season is distant. 
 The whole country is like a garden, with its fresh spring 
 crops, and the long, shaded avenue of trees is everywhere 
 touched with flaming azaleas and banks of snowy black- 
 berry blossoms. The tea-house and the tateba every- 
 where invite one to rest and watch the unique proces- 
 sions of the highway, and away from foreign settlements 
 much of the old Japan is left. Tea is everywhere in evi- 
 dence in May. It is being picked in the fields, carted 
 along the roads, sold, sorted, and packed in every town, 
 
The Tokaido 
 
 while charming nesans with trays of tiny cups fairly line 
 the road. 
 
 P'rom iVIiyanoshita’s comfortable hotel the two foreign 
 women and the Japanese guide started on the first stage 
 of the Tokaido trip in pole-chairs, carried by four coolies 
 each. The danna san, or master of the party, scorning 
 such effeminate devices, strode ahead with an alpen- 
 stock, a pith helmet, and russet shoes, while the provi- 
 sion-box and general luggage, filling a kago, followed 
 after us. We were soon up the hill in a bamboo-shaded 
 lane, and then out over the grassy uplands to the lake of 
 Hakone. The singing coolies strode along, keeping even 
 step on the breathless ascents, past the sulphur baths of 
 Ashinoyu and to the Hakone Buddha — a giant bass-relief 
 of Amida sculptured on the face of a wall of rock niched 
 among the hills. The lonely Buddha occupies a fit place 
 for a contemplative deity — summer suns scorching and 
 winter snows drifting over the stony face unhindered. A 
 heap of pebbles in Buddha’s lap is the register of pil- 
 grims’ prayers. 
 
 At Hakone village, a single street of thatched houses 
 bordering the shore of Hakone lake, the narrow foot- 
 path over the hills joins the true Tokaido, a stone-paved 
 highway shaded by double rows of ancient trees, a for- 
 est aisle recalling, fo*" a brief journey, the avenue to 
 Nikko. 'I'he chrysanthemum-crested gates of the Em- 
 peror’s island palace were fast shut, and Fuji’s cone 
 peeped over the shoulders of encircling mountains, and 
 reflected its image in the almost bottomless lake — an an- 
 cient crater, whose fires are forever extinguished. Here 
 we tied straw sandals over our shoes and tried to walk 
 along the smooth flat stones of the Tokaido, but soon 
 submitted to be carried again up the ascent to Hakone 
 pass, which looks southward over a broad valley to the 
 ocean. Pack-horses, with their clumsy feet tied in straw 
 shoes, were led by blue- bloused peasants, their heads 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 wrapped in the inevitable blue-and-white cotton towel, 
 along the stony road, that has been worn smooth and 
 slippery by the straw-covered feet of generations of men 
 and horses. 
 
 From the Fuji no taira (terrace for viewing Fuji), in 
 tlie village of Yamanaka, we looked sheer down to the 
 plain of Mishima and saw, almost beneath us, the town 
 that would mark the end of our day’s journey. The vil- 
 lages of Sasabara and Mitsuya have each a single row 
 of houses on either side of the road replacing the shade- 
 trees of the Tokaido, and, like all Japanese villages, they 
 overflow with children, to whom Ijin san, the foreigner, 
 is still a marvel. 
 
 Mishima is a busy, prosperous little town, with a gay 
 main street and shops overflowing wflth straw hats, bas- 
 kets, matting, rain-coats, umbrellas, tourist and pilgrim 
 necessities. Shops for the sale of foreign goods are nu- 
 merous, and besides the familiar cases of “ Devoe’s 
 Brilliant Oil for Japan, 150^ test,” American trade is 
 advertised by pictures of the Waterbury watch, and long 
 hanging signs declaring the merits of the American 
 time-keepers sold at three yen apiece. Even the chief 
 of the jinrikisha men, who came to make the bargain 
 for wheeling us down the Tokaido, pulled out such a 
 watch to tell us the time of day. 
 
 Mishima’s best tea-house, where daimios rested in the 
 olden time, is a most perfect specimen of Japanese 
 architecture, full of darkly-shining woods, fantastic win- 
 dows, and tiny courts. In one of our rooms the toko- 
 noma held a kakemono, with a poem written on it in 
 giant characters, and three tall pink peonies springing 
 from an exquisite bronze vase. In another, smiled a 
 -wooden image of old Hokorokojin, one of the household 
 gods of luck, and on a low lacquer table rested a large 
 lacquer box containing a roll of writing-paper, the ink- 
 box, and brushes. These, with the soft mats, a few silk 
 
The Tokaido 
 
 cushions, a tea-tray, and tabako bon, were all that the 
 rooms contained, until our incongruous bags and bun- 
 dles marred their exquisite simplicity. The landlord, 
 with many bows and embarrassed chucklings, greeted us 
 there, and presented a most superb, long stemmed Jacque- 
 minot rose, whose fragrance soon filled the whole place. 
 
 When we went out for a walk all Mishima joined us ; 
 and with a following of two hundred children and half 
 as many elders, we turned into the grounds of an old 
 temple shaded by immense trees and protected by an 
 ancient moat. The brigade clattered after us across the 
 stone bridge of a great lotus pond, where the golden 
 carp are as large and as old as the mossy-backed patri- 
 archs at Fontainebleau and Potsdam, and snapped and 
 fought for the rice-cakes we threw tliem as if it were 
 their first feast. Farther in the temple grounds gor- 
 geously-colored cocks with trailing tails, and pretty pig- 
 eons are kept as messengers of the gods, and a toothless 
 old man makes a slender living by selling popped beans 
 to feed them. Prayers for rain offered up at this tem- 
 ple always prevail, and we had barely returned to the 
 tea-house before a soaking storm set in and restricted 
 us to our inn for entertainment. 
 
 I’he large matted room, or space at the front of the 
 tea-house, was at once office, hall, vestibule, pantry, and 
 store-room. At one side opened a stone-floored kitchen 
 with rows of little stone braziers for charcoal fires, on 
 which something was always steaming and sputtering. 
 Chief - cook, under - cooks, and gay little maids pattered 
 around on their clogs, their sleeves tied up, hoisting wa- 
 ter from the well, and setting out trays with the various 
 dishes of a Japanese dinner. There is no general dining- 
 room, nor any fixed hour for meals in a Japanese inn. At 
 any moment, day or night, the guest may clap his hands 
 and order liis food, which is brought to his room on a 
 tray and set on the floor, or on the ozen, a table about 
 
 K 193 
 
Jinrikisha Days in ‘Japan 
 
 four inches high. Rice is boiled in quantities large 
 enough to last for one, or even two days. It is heated 
 over when w'anted, or hot tea is poured over the cold 
 rice after it is served. Our guide cooked all our food, 
 laid our high table with its proper furnishings, and was 
 assisted by the nesans in carrying things up and down 
 the stairs. In a small room opening from the office two 
 girls were sorting the landlord’s new tea just brought in 
 from the country. They sat before a large table raised 
 only a few inches from the floor, and, from a heap of the 
 fragrant leaves at one end, scattered little handfuls thinly 
 over the lacquer top. With their deft fingers they slid 
 to one side the smallest and finest leaves from the tips 
 of the new shoots of the plant, and to the other side the 
 larger and coarser growth, doing it all so quickly and 
 surely that it was a pleasure to watch them. In another 
 corner of the office two other little maids were putting 
 clean cases on all the pillows of the house. The Japan- 
 ese pillow is a wooden bo.x, with a little padded roll on 
 top, which is covered with a fresh bit of soft, white mul- 
 berry-paper each day. The bath room was as accessible 
 as the kitchen, without a door, but with glass screens, 
 and one large tank in which three or four could sociably 
 dip together. Here were splashing and talking until 
 midnight, and steam issued forth continually, as guests 
 and the household staff took their turn. The landlord 
 requested the masculine head of our party to use a spe- 
 cial tub that stood in an alcove of the office, a folding- 
 screen about three feet high being set up to conceal him 
 from the populous precincts of office, corridor, garden, 
 and main street. A too vigorous sweep of his stalwart 
 arm, however, knocked down his defence, and dropping 
 to his chin in the water, he called for help ; whereupon 
 the two maids, who were sorting tea, ran over and set the 
 barrier up again, as naturally as a foreign servant would 
 place the fire-screen before a grate. 
 
 194 
 
The Tokaido 
 
 In old Tokaido days the home bath-tub was often set 
 beside the door -step, that bathers might lose nothing 
 that was going on. Government regulations and stern 
 policemen have interfered with this primitive innocency, 
 except in the most remote districts, and these Oriental 
 Arcadians are obliged to wear certain prescribed fig- 
 leaves, although they curtail them as much as possible 
 in warm weather, and dispense with them when beating 
 out wheat ears in their own farm-yards, and treading the 
 rice -mill in -doors. Privacy is unknown to the lower 
 classes, and in warm weather their whole life is lived out- 
 of-doors. With their open-fronted houses, they are hard- 
 ly in-doors even when under their own roofs. On pleas- 
 ant mornings women wasli and cook, mend, spin, reel, 
 and set up the tlireads for the loom on the open road- 
 side, and often bring the clumsy wooden loom out-of- 
 doors, throwing tlie bobbins back and fortli, while keep- 
 ing an eye on their neiglibors’ doings and the travelling 
 public. One runs past miles of such groups along the 
 Tokaido, and the human interest is never wanting in any 
 landscape picture. 
 
 From Mishima southward the country is most beauti- 
 ful, Fujiyama standing at the end of the broad valley 
 witli the spurs of its foot-hills running down to the sea. 
 'I'liis Voshiwara plain is one wide wheat-field, golden in 
 May- time with its first crop, and the Tokaido’s line 
 marked with rows of picturescpie pine-trees rising from 
 low embankments brilliant with blooming bushes. In 
 the villages each little thatched house is fenced with 
 braided reeds, enclosing a few peonies, iris -beds, and 
 inevitable chrysanthemum plants. The children, with 
 smaller children on their backs, chase, tumble, and play, 
 cage tire-flies, and braid cylinders and hexagonal puzzles 
 of wheat straws ; and in sunshine or in rain, indifferently 
 stroll along the road in the aimless, uncertain way of 
 chickens. 
 
 '95 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 Beyond the poor, unfragrant town of Yoshiwara, a 
 creaking, springing bridge leaped the torrent of a river 
 fed by Fuji’s snows and clouds. In the good old days, 
 when the traveller sat on a small square platform, car- 
 ried high above the shoulders of four men, to be ferried 
 over, these bearers often stopped in the most dangerous 
 place to e.xtort more pay — which was never refused. 
 .Above the river bank the road climbs a ridge, traverses 
 the tiniest of rice valleys, and then follows the ocean 
 cliffs for hours. This Corniche road, overhanging the 
 sea, presents a succession of pictures framed by the 
 arching branches of ancient pine-trees, and the long Pa- 
 cific rollers, pounding on the beach and rocks, fill the 
 air with their loud song. At sunset we came to the old 
 monastery of Kiomiidera, high on the terraced front of 
 a bold cliff. Climbing to a gate-way and bell tower 
 worthy of a fortress, we roused the priests from their 
 calm meditations. .An active young brother in a white 
 gown fiew to show us the famous garden with its palm- 
 rrees and azaleas reflected in a tiny lake, a small water- 
 fall descending musically from the high mountain wall 
 of foliage behind it. Superbly decorated rooms, where 
 Shoguns and daimios used to rest from their journeys, 
 look out on this green shade. The main temple is a 
 lofty chamber with stone flooring and gorgeous altar, 
 shady, quiet, and cool, and a corner of the temple yard 
 has been filled by pious givers with hundreds upon hun- 
 dreds of stone Buddhas, encrusted with moss and lichens, 
 and pasted bits of paper prayers. 
 
 All through those first provinces around Fuji the gar- 
 den fences, made of bamboo, rushes, twigs, or coarse 
 straw, are braided, interlaced, woven and tied in ingen- 
 ious devices, the fashion and pattern often changing 
 completely in a few hours' ride. This region is the hap- 
 py hunting-ground of the artist and photographer, where 
 everything is so beautiful, so picturesque, and so artis- 
 
 196 
 
T he Tokaido 
 
 tic that even the blades of grass and ears of millet 
 “ compose,” and every pine-tree is a kakemono study. 
 Thatched roofs, and arching, hump-backed bridges made 
 of branches, twigs, and straw seem only to exist for land- 
 scape effects ; but, unhappily, the old bridges, like the 
 lumbering junks with their laced and shirred sails, are 
 disappearing, and, in a generation or two, will be as un- 
 familiar to the natives as they now are to foreigners. 
 
 CHAPTER XX 
 THE TOKAIDO — II 
 
 Gre.at once was Shidzuoka, which now is only a busy 
 commercial town of an agricultural province. The old 
 castle has been razed, its martial quadrangle is a wheat 
 field ; and the massive walls, the creeping and overhang- 
 ing pine-trees and deep moats are the only feudal relics. 
 Keiki, the last of the Tokugawa Shoguns, lived in a 
 black walled enclosure beyond the outer moat, but the 
 modern spirit paid no heed to his existence, and his 
 death, in 18S3, was hardly an incident in the routine of 
 its commercial progress. 
 
 'i’lie great Shinto temple at the edge of the town is 
 famous for the dragons in its ceiling. The old priest 
 welcomed us with smiles, led us in, shoeless, over the 
 mats, and bade us look up, first at the Dragon of the 
 Four Quarters, and then at the Dragon of the Eight 
 Quarters, the eyes of the monster strangely meeting 
 ours, as we changed our various points of view. 
 
 At the archery range behind ihe temple our danna san 
 proved himself a new V.’illiam Tell with the bow and 
 arrows. 'I'he attendant idlers cheered his shots, and a 
 wrinkled old woman brought us dragon candies on a 
 
 •97 
 
Jinrtkis/ia Days in ^apan 
 
 dark-red lacquer tray, under whose transparent surface 
 lay darker shadows of cherry blossoms. The eye of the 
 connoisseur was quick to descry the tray, and when the 
 woman said it had been bought in the town, we took 
 jinrikishas and hurried to the address she gave. The 
 guide explained minutely, the shopkeeper brought out 
 a hundred other kinds and colors of lacquer, and chil- 
 dren ran in from home workshops with hardly dried 
 specimens to show us. All the afternoon we searched 
 through lacquer and curio shops, and finally despatched 
 a coolie to the temple to buy the old w'oman’s property. 
 Hours afterwards he returned with a brand-new', bright 
 red horror, and the message that “ the mistress could not 
 send the honorable foreigner such a poor old tray as that.” 
 The fine Shidzuoka baskets, which are so famed else- 
 w'here, were not to be found in Shidzuoka ; our tea-house 
 was uninteresting, and so we set forth in the rain, unfurl- 
 ing big flat umbrellas of oil paper, and whirling away 
 through a dripping landscape. Rice and wheat alter- 
 nated with dark-green tea-bushes, and cart-loads of tea- 
 chests were bearing the first season’s crop to market. 
 The rain did not obscure the lovely landscape, as the 
 plain we follow’ed turned to a valley, the valley narrowed 
 to a ravine, and we began climbing upward, while a 
 mountain - torrent raced down beside us. One pictu- 
 resque little village in a shady hollow gave us glimpses 
 of silk-worm trays in the houses as we went whirling 
 through it. The road, ■winding by zigzags up Utsono- 
 miya pass, suddenly entered a tunnel six hundred feet 
 in length, where the jinrikisha wheels rumbled noisily. 
 On cloudy days the place is lighted by lamps, but on 
 sunny days by the sun’s reflection from two black lacq- 
 uer boards at the entrances. The device is an old one 
 in Japan, but an American patent has recently been is- 
 sued for the same thing, as a cheap means of lighting 
 ships’ holds while handling cargo. 
 
The Tokaido 
 
 On the other side of Utsonomiya pass the road winds 
 dpwn by steep zigzags to the village of Okabe, noted 
 for its trays and boxes made of the polished brown stem 
 of a coarse fern. We bought our specimens from an 
 oracular woman, who delivered her remarks like the 
 lines of a part, her husband meekly echoing what she said 
 in the same dramatic tones, and the whole scene being 
 as stagey as if it had been well rehearsed beforehand. 
 
 From the mountains the road drops to a rich tea 
 country, where every hill-side is green with the thick-set 
 little bushes. At harvest-time cart-loads of basket-fired, 
 or country- dried, tea fill the road to the ports, to be 
 toasted finally in iron pans, and coated with indigo and 
 gypsum to satisfy the taste of American tea- drinkers. 
 In every town farmers may be seen dickering with the 
 merchants over the tough paper sacks of tea that they 
 bring in, and within the houses groups sitting at low 
 tables sort the leaves into grades with swift fingers. 
 
 At Fujiyeda, where we took refuge from the increas- 
 ing rain, the splashing in the large bath-room of the tea- 
 house was kept up from afternoon to midnight by the 
 guests, and continued by the family and tea-house maids 
 until four o’clock, when the early risers began their ab- 
 lutions. A consumptive priest on the other side of our 
 thin paper walls had a garrulous shampooer about mid- 
 night and a refection later, and we were glad to resume 
 the ride between tea fields at the earliest possible hour. 
 
 At Kanaya, at the foot of Kanaya mountain, the tea- 
 house adjoined a school-house. 'I'he school-room had 
 desks and benches but no walls, the screens being all 
 removed. The teacher called the pupils in by clapping 
 two sticks together, as in a French theatre. Spying the 
 foreigners, the children stared, oblivious of teacher and 
 blackboard, and the teacher, after one good look at the 
 itinerants, bowed a courteous good-morning, and let the 
 offenders go unpunished. 
 
 '99 
 
Jinrikis/ta Days in Japan 
 
 Up over Kanaya pass we toiled slowly, reaching at last 
 a little eyrie of a tea-house, where the landlord pointed 
 with equal pride to the view and to several pairs of muddy 
 shoes belonging, he said, to the honorable gentlemen 
 who were about piercing the mountain under us wdth a 
 railway tunnel. Under a shady arbor is a huge, round 
 bowlder, fenced in carefully and regarded reverently by 
 humble travellers. According to the legend it used to 
 cry at night like a child until Kobo Daishi, the inventor 
 of the Japanese syllabary, wrote an inscription on it and 
 quieted it forever. No less famous than Kobo Daishi’s 
 rock is the midzu ame of this Kanaya tea-house, and the 
 dark browm sw'eet is put in dainty little boxes that are 
 the souvenirs each pilgrim carries away with him. 
 
 Farther along the main road, with its arching shade- 
 trees, the glossy dark tea-bushes gave way to square miles 
 of rice and wheat fields. Here and there a patch of in- 
 tense green verdure showed the young blades of rice al- 
 most ready to be transplanted to the fields, whence the 
 wheat had just been garnered, the rice giving w’ay in turn 
 to some other cereal, all farming land in this fertile re- 
 gion bearing three annual crops. 
 
 few villages show'ed the projecting roofs peculiar to 
 the province of Totomi, and then the pretty tea-house at 
 Hamamatsu quite enchanted us after our experiences 
 with the poor accommodations of some of the provincial 
 towns. A rough curbed well in the court-yard, w’ith a 
 queer parasol of a roof high over the sweep, a pretty 
 garden all cool, green shade, a stair-w’ay, steep and high, 
 and at the top a long, dim corridor, with a floor of shin- 
 ing, dark keyaki wood. This w'as the place that made 
 us w'elcome ; even stocking-footed we half feared to tread 
 on those brilliantly-polished boards. Our balcony over- 
 looked a third charming garden, and each little room had 
 a distinctive beauty of w'ooden ceilings, recesses, screens, 
 and fanciful windows. 
 
 200 
 
The Tokaido 
 
 The most enviable possession of Hamamatsu, howev'er, 
 was O' I’atsu, and on our arrival O'Tatsu helped to carry 
 our traps up-stairs, falling into raptures over our rings, 
 pins, hair-pins, watches, and beaded trimmings. She 
 clapped her hands in ecstasy, her bright eyes sparkled, 
 and her smile displayed the most dazzling teeth. When 
 we ate supper, sitting on the floor around an eight-inch 
 high table, with little O’Tatsu presiding and waiting on 
 us, not only her beauty but her charming frankness, 
 simplicity, quickness, and grace made further conquest of 
 us all. The maiden enjoyed our admiration immensely, 
 arrayed herself in her freshest blue-and-white cotton ki- 
 mono, and submitted her head to the best hair-dresser in 
 town, returning with gorgeous bits of crape and gold cord 
 tied in with the butterfly loops of her blue-black tresses. 
 At her suggestion we sent for a small dancing-girl to enter- 
 tain us, who, with a wand and masks, represented Suzume 
 and other famous characters in legend and melodramas. 
 When we left Hamamatsu, affectionate little O’Tatsu 
 begged me to send her my photograph, and lest I should 
 not have understood her e.xcited flow of Japanese sen- 
 tences, illuminated, however, by her great pleading eyes, 
 she ran off, and, coming back, .slipped up to me and 
 held out a cheap, colored picture of some foreign beauty 
 in the costume of 1865. When at last we rode awaj" 
 from the tea-house, O’Tatsu followed my jinrikisha for a 
 long way, holding my hand, with tears in her lovely eyes, 
 and her last sayonara broke in a sob. 
 
 .V hard shell-road winds down to the shores of Hama- 
 na Lake and across its long viaduct. The jinrikishas 
 run, as if on rubber tires, for nearly three mites over an 
 embankment crossing the middle of the great lake, which 
 at one side admits the curling breakers of the great Pa- 
 cific. Until a few years ago this mountain-walled pool 
 was protected from the ocean by a broad sand ridge, 
 which an earthquake shook down, letting in the salt- 
 
 201 
 
'Jinrikisha Days in Japaii 
 
 waters. The Tokaido railroad crosses the lake on a high 
 embankment, which was sodded and covered with a lat- 
 tice-work of straw bundles, while seed was sown in the 
 crevices more than a year before the road could be used. 
 The whole railroad, as we saw in passing its completed 
 sections, is solidly built with stone foundations and stone 
 ballast, and intended to last for centuries. The Japan- 
 ese seldom hurry the making of public works, and even 
 a railroad does not inspire them with any feverish activ- 
 ity. Not until the last detail and station-house was fin- 
 ished was the line opened for travel, and following so 
 nearly the route of the old Tokaido, through the most 
 fertile and picturesque part of Central Japan, it keeps 
 always in sight Fujiyama or the ocean. 
 
 In the course of the afternoon plantations of mulber- 
 ry-trees came in sight. Loads of mulberry branches and 
 twigs were being hauled into the villages and sold by 
 weight, the rearers of silk-worms buying the leaves and 
 paper-makers the stems for the sake of the inside bark. 
 Climbing to one high plateau, we rested at a little rustic 
 shed of a tea-house, commanding a superb view down a 
 great ragged ravine to the line of foam breaking at its 
 bowlder strewn entrance, and so on to the limitless 
 ocean. One of the jinrikisha coolies preceded us to the 
 benches on the overhanging balcony, and, kindly point- 
 ing out the special beauties of the scene, took off his 
 garments and spread them out on the rail in the matter- 
 of-fact, unconscious way of true Japanese innocence and 
 simplicity of mind. 
 
 The guide-book calls the stretch of country beyond 
 that high-perched tea-house “a waste region,” but noth- 
 ing could be more beautiful than the long ride through 
 
 o o o 
 
 pine forest and belts of scrub-pine on that uncultivated 
 plateau, always overlooking the ocean. At one point 
 a temple to the goddess Kwannon is niched among tow- 
 ering rocks at the base of a narrow cliff, on whose sum- 
 
 202 
 
The Tokaido 
 
 mit a colossal statue of the deity stands high against the 
 sky. For more than a century this bronze goddess of 
 Mercy has been the object of pious pilgrimages, the pil- 
 grims clapping their hands and bowing in prayer to all 
 the thirty-three Kwannons cut in the face of the solid 
 rock-base on which our lady of pity stands. 
 
 We reached the long, dull town of Toyohashi at dusk, 
 to find the large tea-house crowded with travellers. 'I'wo 
 rooms looking out upon a sultry high-walled garden were 
 given us, and for dining-room a tiny alcove of a place on 
 one of the middle courts. This room was so small and 
 close that we had to leave the screens open, though the 
 corridor led to the large bath-room, where half a dozen 
 people splashed and chattered noisily and gentlemen 
 with their clothes on their arms went back and forth be- 
 fore our door as if before the life class of an art school. 
 The noise of the bathers was kept up gayly, until long 
 after midnight, and no one in the tea-house seemed to 
 be sleeping. By four o’clock in the morning such a 
 coughing, blowing, and sputtering began in the court 
 beside my room that I finally slid the screens and looked 
 out. At least a dozen lodgers were brushing their teeth 
 in the picturesque little quadrangle of rocks, bamboos, 
 and palms, and bathing face and hands in the large 
 stone and bronze urns that we had supposed to be orna- 
 mental only. Later, the gravel was covered with scores 
 of the wooden sticks of tooth-brushes, beaten out into a 
 tassel of fibres at one end, and with many bo.\es emptied 
 of the coarse, gritty tooth-powder which the Japanese 
 use so freely. 
 
 The last day of our long jinrikisha ride was warm, the 
 sun glared on a white, dusty road, and the country was 
 flat and uninteresting.. Each little town and village 
 seemed duller than the other. Wheat and rape were 
 being harvested and spread to dry, and in the farm-yards 
 men and women were hatchelling, beating out the grain 
 
 20 ? 
 
'Jinrikisha Days in yapan 
 
 with flails, and winnowing it in the primitive way by 
 pouring it down from aflat scoop-basket held high over- 
 head. Nobody wore any clothes to speak of, and the 
 whole population turned out to watch the amazing spec- 
 tacle of foreigners standing spell-bound until our jinrik- 
 ishas had gone by. 
 
 At Arimatsu village we passed through a street of 
 shops where the curiously dyed cotton goods peculiar to 
 the place are sold. For several hundred years all Ari- 
 matsu has been tying knots down the lengths of cotton, 
 twisting it in skeins, and wrapping it regularly with a 
 double-dyed indigo thread, and then, by immersion in 
 boiling water, dyeing the fabric in curious lines and star- 
 spotted patterns. A more clumsy and primitive way of 
 dyeing could not be imagined in this day of steam-looms 
 and roller-printing, but Arimatsu keeps it up and pros- 
 pers. 
 
 At sunset we saw the towers of Nagoya castle in the 
 distance, and after crossing the broad plain of ripening 
 rape and wheat, the coolies sped through the town at a 
 fearful pace and deposited us, dazed, dusted, and wear\-, 
 at the door of the Shiurokindo, to enjoy the beautiful 
 rooms just kindly vacated by Prince Bernard, of Sa.\e- 
 Weimar. 
 
 'I'he Shiurokindo is one of the handsomest and largest 
 of the tea-houses a foreigner finds, its interior a lab)Tinth 
 of rooms and suites of rooms, each with a balcony and 
 private outlook on some pretty court. The walls, the 
 screens, recesses, ceilings, and balcony rails afford stud- 
 ies and models of the best Japanese interior decorations. 
 The samisen’s wail and a clapping chorus announced that 
 a great dinner was going on, and in the broader corridors 
 there was a passing and repassing of people arrayed in 
 hotel kimonos. 
 
 As the wise traveller carries little baggage, the tea- 
 houses furnish their customers with ukatas, or plain cot- 
 
 204 
 
The Tokatdo 
 
 ton kimonos, to put on after the bath and wear at night. 
 These gowns are marked with the crest or name of the 
 house, painted in some ingenious or artistic design; and 
 guests may wander round the town, even, clad in these 
 garments, that so ingeniously advertise the Maple-leaf, 
 the Chrysanthemum, or Dragon tea-house. All guides, 
 and servants particularly, enjoy wearing these hotel robes, 
 and travellers who dislike to splash their own clothing 
 march to the bath ungarmented, assuming the house 
 gowns in the corridor after their dip. These ukatas at 
 the Shiurokindo were the most startling fabrics of Ari- 
 matsu. and we looked in them as if we had been throw- 
 ing ink-bottles at each other. 
 
 Until the long jinrikisha ride was over we had not felt 
 weary, as each day beguiled us with some new interest 
 and e.xcitement ; but when we stepped from those baby- 
 carriages at the door of the Shiurokindo we were dazed 
 with fatigue, although the coolies who ran all the way 
 did not appear to be tired in the least. Their headman, 
 who marshalled the team of ten, was a powerful young 
 fellow, a very Hercules for muscle, and for speed and 
 endurance hardly to be matched by that ancient deity. 
 At the end of each day he seemed fresher and stronger 
 than at the start, and he has often run si.xty and si.xty- 
 five miles a day, for three and four days together. He 
 led the procession and set the pace, shouting back warn- 
 ing of ruts, stones, or bad places in the road, and giving 
 the signals for slowing, stopping, and changing the order 
 of the teams. On level ground the coolies trotted tan- 
 dem — one in the shafts, and one running ahead with a 
 line from the shafts held over his shoulder. Cfoin<r down- 
 
 O 
 
 hill, the leader fell back and helped to hold the shafts ; 
 going uphill, he pushed the jinrikisha from the back. 
 
 'I'he jinrikisha coolies make better wages than farm 
 laborers or most mechanics. Our men were paid by the 
 distance, and for days of detention each man received 
 
 2 os 
 
''Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 twenty-five cents to cover the expense of his board and 
 lodging. They earned at an average one dollar and ten 
 cents for each day, but out of thii paid the rent of the 
 jinrikisha and the Government tax. Where two men and 
 a jinrikisha cover one hundred and eighty miles in four 
 days they receive thirteen dollars in all, which is more 
 than a farm laborer receives in a year. As a rule, these 
 coolies are great gamblers and spendthrifts, with a fond- 
 ness for sake'. Our headman was a model coolie, sav- 
 ing his money, avoiding the sake-bottle, and regarding 
 his splendid muscle as invested capital. When he walked 
 in to collect his bill, he was clean and shining in a rus- 
 tling silk kimono, such as a well-to-do merchant might 
 wear. In this well-dressed, distinguished-looking person, 
 who slid the screens of our sitting-room and bowed to us 
 so gracefully, we hardly recognized our trotter of the 
 blue-cotton coat, bare knees, and mushroom hat. He 
 explained that the other men could not come to thank 
 us for our gratuities because they had not proper 
 clothes. In making his final and lowest bows his sub- 
 stantial American watch fell out of his silk belt with a 
 thump ; but he replaced it in its chamois case with the 
 assurance that nothing hurt it, and that it was with the 
 noon gun of Nagoya castle whenever he came to town. 
 
 CHAPTER XXI 
 NAGOYA 
 
 In this day of French uniforms, Gatling-guns, and 
 foreign tactics, it is only in Nagoya that the garrison 
 occupies the old castle ; the fortress, with its gates and 
 moats, remains unchanged, and the bugle - calls echo 
 daily around the quaintly -gabled citadel. In the great 
 
 2O6 
 
Nagoya 
 
 parade-grounds outside the deep inner moat rise foreign- 
 looking barracks and offices, and dumpy little soldiers 
 in white-duck coats and trousers and visored caps stand 
 as sentries on the fixed bridges, and in the portals of the 
 huge, heavy-roofed, iron-clamped gate-ways. Of course 
 these guards should be men in old armor, with spears 
 and bows, and the alarms should be given on hoarse- 
 toned gongs or conch -shell bugles, as in feudal days. 
 Instead, the commandant of Nagoya has on his staff 
 young nobles of old feudal families, who speak French, 
 German, or English, as they have been taught in foreign 
 military schools. A dapper little lieutenant, in spotless 
 gloves and an elaborately - frogged white uniform, con- 
 ducted us along the deep moat, over the bridge, and un- 
 der the great gate of tlie citadel, wliose stones, timbers, 
 and iron clampings would defy a dozen mediajval armies. 
 Gay chatter about la belle J’aris, which the little lieuten- 
 ant had learned to adore in his student-days, echoed un- 
 der the yet more ponderous inner gate, and the ghosts 
 of the old warriors must have groaned at the degeneracy 
 of their sons. 
 
 Below the frowning citadel is an old palace, wherein 
 the son of lyeyasu, the first Prince of Owari, lived in state 
 and entertained the Shogun’s messengers. The empty 
 rooms are musty and gloomy from long neglect, but the 
 beautifully-carved and colored ceilings, and the screens 
 and recess walls, decorated by famous artists with paint- 
 ings on a ground of thinnest gold-leaf, remain the sole 
 relics of his splendor. 
 
 The great donjon tower of the citadel, rising in five 
 gabled stories, is surmounted by two golden dolphins, 
 the pride of Nagoya. Made over two hundred years 
 ago, each solid goldfish is valued at eighty thousand dol- 
 lars, and many legends are attached to them. A covet- 
 ous citizen once made an enormous kite wherewith to fly 
 up and steal the city's treasures, but he was caught and 
 
 207 
 
Jmrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 put to death in boiling oil. The golden pets were never 
 disturbed until one of them was taken down and sent 
 with the Government exhibits to the Vienna Exposition 
 in 1873. On the return voyage it sank to the bottom 
 of the sea with the wrecked steamer All. Like the old 
 lacquers and porcelain, the golden dolphin suffered no 
 sea change, and, after a few months’ immersion, was 
 brought up and returned to its high perch on the tower, 
 while all Nagoya rejoiced to see it flashing in the sun 
 once more. 
 
 The donjon tower is a fine example of the old archi- 
 tecture, and the massive joists of keyaki would build 
 barracks for twenty regiments. Inside the tower is an 
 inexhaustible well, called the “Golden Water,” which, 
 in time of siege, would enable a rice-provisioned garri- 
 son to hold out for years. Up a stair- way of massive 
 timbers one climbs, half in darkness to the top, to look 
 down upon the broad Nagoya plain, the blue bay, and 
 the busy port of Yokkaichi opposite, in the sacred prov- 
 ince of Ise. 
 
 Commercially, Nagoya is best known as the centre of 
 a great pottery and porcelain district, Seto in Owari be- 
 ing as famous as Staffordshire in England. In the Seto 
 suburb porcelain clay is found, and silica exists in large 
 quantities a few miles away. From the castle tower one 
 sees the smoke of continuous lines of kilns surrounding 
 the valley, and all the ware is sent in from these vil- 
 lages to Nagoya for distribution. Here the finest egg- 
 shell porcelain, rivalling the French ware, is made, much 
 of it going to Yokohama to be decorated for the foreign 
 market. Seto itself has given its name to all porcelain, 
 and especially to the pale, gray-green ware so commonly 
 used in Japanese households. Old green Seto ware is 
 highly esteemed, both for its soft tinting and its peculiar 
 glaze, suggesting jade or lacquer to the touch more than 
 hard, kiln-burnt porcelain. The bulk of the commoner 
 
Nagoya 
 
 heavy porcelain is decorated here for the foreign mar- 
 ket — men, women, and small boys mechanically repeating 
 the monstrous designs in hideous colors, which they ig- 
 norantly suppose to represent western taste, and which 
 the western world accepts as “so Japanese.” Modern 
 Owari is least desirable and least Japanese of all the 
 wares of Japan, but as thousands of dollars pour annu- 
 ally into Nagoya for these travesties of national art, 
 their manufacture and e.xport will still go on. Recently 
 the Seto potteries have been turning out large tea-cad- 
 dies, with double or pierced covers, by tens of thousands, 
 daubing them with the discordant colors of cheap for- 
 eign mineral paints. Across the ocean they are called 
 Japanese rose-jars, although the rose was unknown in 
 Japan until the entrance of foreigners, and the rose-jar 
 and the pot-pourri it contains would greatly astonish a 
 Japanese. But as Nagoya and Seto are made rich and 
 happy by badly decorated porcelain tea-caddies, indus- 
 try gains if art loses. 
 
 Thirty thousand Nagoyans are engaged in the manu- 
 facture of a cheap cloisonne enamel, ship-loads of plaques 
 and vases with one unvarying hard, pale-blue ground be- 
 ing exported annually. Tlie powdered porcelain from 
 Seto’s imperfect pieces forms the base of the enamel 
 used, and the two industries work together economically. 
 
 In Nagoya town are shops filled with the charming 
 Banko ware, made across the bay at Yokkaichi, which 
 still retains all its old merits, unaltered by the demands 
 of foreign markets. Banko teapots worked out of sheets 
 of thin clay, pressed, folded, cut, and patterned in white 
 mosaic or glazed designs in low relief, resemble nothing 
 so much as bits of soft painted crapes stretched over 
 hidden frames, and these fragile, unglazed pieces are all 
 the more pleasing in the midst of Nagoya’s keramic 
 nightmares. 
 
 Nagoya being a little off the line of tourist travel, its 
 
 o 209 
 
^inrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 curio shops are not entirely stripped of their best things. 
 As Owari’s princes exchanged porcelains liberally with 
 the daimios of Hizen and Kaga, some rare pieces of old 
 Imari and Kutani are often chanced upon, as the impov- 
 erishment of great families, and the rage for foreign 
 dress and fashions, tempts the better class to part with 
 heirlooms. Whole afternoons wore on as we made our 
 way into the graces of certain curio dealers, that they 
 might disclose tneir jealously-guarded treasures. These 
 old men of Nagoya have a real affection for the beauti- 
 ful things of the past, made before any foreign demands 
 had corrupted and debased the native art. Once con- 
 vinced of the intelligent interest of their customer, the 
 owners proudly open the go-down, and the swords, the 
 lacquer, and the porcelains appear, and, lifted from their 
 boxes, stripped of cotton and silk wrappings, are set forth. 
 These old dealers are men wholly of the past, who medi- 
 tate and smoke long over an offer, and if they agree to 
 the price solemnly and slowly clap their hands as a rati- 
 fication of the terms. Four times we passed by the largest 
 curio shop in Nagoya, led by the tea-jars and boxes in 
 the front to suppose that it was only the abode of a tea- 
 merchant. When we had accidentally bought some choice 
 tea there, we were invited back to a court, where two go- 
 downs were crowded with old porcelains and lacquer. 
 Near by was another shop where arms, armor, Buddhas, 
 altar-pieces, saints, images, carvings, candlesticks, koros, 
 robes, trappings, and all the paraphernalia of priests, tem- 
 ples, warriors, and yashikis were heaped up on the floor 
 and hung overhead. 
 
 The coolies had been anxious about our rate of prog- 
 ress on the last Tokaido days, fearing to miss the great 
 matsuri of the Nagoya year, which, celebrating the deeds 
 of the founder and patron saints of the city, has been 
 maintained with great pomp and splendor for centuries. 
 The procession was to take four hours in passing, and 
 
Nagoya 
 
 our landlord engaged places for us in the house of a shoe- 
 dealer in the main street. The dealer in geta and dzori 
 dealt only in those national foot coverings, but, yielding 
 to foreign fashions, had set up a sign of 
 
 “ Shoes the Shop.” 
 
 The sliding screens of the front wall of the room over 
 the shop were removed, and bright red blankets thrown 
 over the ledge and spread out on the eaves of the lower 
 story. All the houses were open and decorated in this 
 same way, and lanterns hung in rows from the eaves and 
 from upright posts at the door-way. 
 
 The worthy shoe-dealer's blankets and lanterns were 
 just like his neighbors', but when three foreigners ap- 
 peared at the low balcony, then the multitude stopped 
 and stared open-mouthed at that unusual spectacle, and 
 we divided popular interest with the procession as long 
 as we remained there. Policemen were perple.xed be- 
 tween their duty of making the crowds move on and their 
 own pleasure of having a look at the strangers. Soldiers 
 from the garrison stared by hundreds, and the police- 
 men requested them to depart, as well as the rustics and 
 townspeople. Policemen rank much higher, in a way, 
 than the soldiers, the guardians of the peace being near- 
 ly all descendants of the old samurai, the two-sworded, 
 privileged retainers of feudal days, while the common 
 soldier is enlisted from the farm laborers ; and one quick- 
 ly sees how much more regard the lower classes have for 
 the gunsa than for the soldier. 
 
 The procession began with high ornamental wooden 
 cars, or dasha, set on wheels hewn from single blocks 
 of wood, and drawn by ropes, to which every pious per- 
 son was supposed to lend a hand. Regular coolies were 
 engaged for the steady wheel-horse work, and sang a 
 wild chorus as men with stout sticks pried the clumsy 
 
’Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 wheels up for the first turn. The corner posts and up- 
 per railings of the dasha are lacquered in black or red, 
 and finished with plates of open-work brass, or elabo- 
 rately-gilded carvings. The sides are hung with cur- 
 tains of rich old brocade or painted cloth, and the railed 
 top is a stage, on which puppet-shows and tableaux repre- 
 sent scenes from mythology and legend. On one car 
 Raiden, the red Thunder God, mounted on a rearing 
 charger, shook his circle of drums, and Suzume, the 
 priestess, repeated her sacred dance before the cave. 
 Comic scenes took best with the audience, however, and 
 the jolly old shojo, men who come up from the bottom 
 of the sea for a revel on shore, wearing mats of bright 
 red hair and gowns of gorgeous brocade, were received 
 with greatest favor. They ladled out sake from a deep 
 jar, and finally stood on their heads on the rim of the 
 jar and drank from the depths. There were only twelve 
 dasha in line, but they stopped every fifty feet while the 
 puppets were put through their performances. 
 
 Succeeding the cars came a d.iimio’s train, preceded 
 by heralds in quaint, mediteval costume, and presenting 
 every phase of the old-time parade. Chinese sages and 
 instructors, Korean prisoners, falconers and priests walk- 
 ed in line after the daimios, who were mounted on horses 
 half hidden in clumsy but beautiful old trappings. The 
 men in white silk gowns and lacquer hats, who took the 
 daimios’ places at the head of the line, are descendants 
 of those great families of the province, whose members 
 have ridden in Nagoya’s matsuri parades for centuries. 
 After them came an endless line of men in armor, the 
 suits of mail being either heirlooms of the wearers or 
 provided from the rich stores of such things owned by 
 the temple. The armor surpassed the treasures of curio 
 shops, and the dents and cuts in the cuirasses and hel- 
 mets attested their antiquity. Having sat from eleven 
 o’clock until three in the upper room with the family of 
 
 212 
 
lYiio^oja 
 
 the shoeman. we parted with elaborate expressions of 
 esteem on both sides, and with siicli bows and prostra- 
 tions from them that we wondered how our guide would 
 contrive to slip a gift into their hands. 
 
 Nagoya maiko and geisha are celebrated throughout 
 Japan for their beauty, grace, and taste in dress, and a 
 geisha dinner is as much a property of Xagoya as the 
 golden dolphins of the old castle. At ours we engaged 
 tw > geisha to sing and play, and four maikos to dance 
 
Jinrikzsha Days in Japan 
 
 in their richest costumes. As the guests were Japanese 
 the feast was made a foreign dinner of as many courses 
 as our guide and magician, Miyashta, could conjure from 
 Nagoya’s markets and the Shiurokindo’s kitchen. Our 
 three friends rustled in early, clad in ceremonial silk 
 gowns, each with his family crest marked in tiny white 
 circles on the backs and sleeves of his haori, or coat. 
 At every praise of Nagoya, which the interpreter repeat- 
 ed to them on our behalf, they rose from their high 
 chairs and bowed profoundly. At table the play of the 
 knife and fork was as difficult to them as the chopsticks 
 had once been for us, but they carried themselves 
 through the ordeal with dignity and grace, and heroic- 
 ally ate of all the dishes passed them. 
 
 Towards the end of the dinner a gorgeous paroquet 
 of a child appeared on our open balcony. Her kimono 
 was pale blue crape, painted and embroidered with a 
 wealth of chrysanthemums of different colors. Her obi, 
 of the heaviest crinkled red crape, had flights of gray 
 and white storks all over its drooping loops, and the 
 neck-fold was red crape woven with a shimmer of gold 
 thread. Her face was white with rice powder, and her 
 hair, dressed in fantastic loops and puffs, was tied with 
 bits of red crape and gold cord, and set with a whole dia- 
 dem of silver chrysanthemums. She came forward smil- 
 ing with the most charming mixture of childlike shyness 
 and maidenly self-possession, becoming as much inter- 
 ested in our curious foreign dresses as we in her splen- 
 did attire. 
 
 Presently, against the background of the night, ap- 
 peared another dazzling figure — Oikoto, the most be- 
 witching and popular maiko of the day in Nagoya. She, 
 too, was radiant in gorgeously-painted crape, a red and 
 gold striped obi, and a crown of silver flowers. Oikoto 
 had the long, narrow eyes, the deeply-fringed lids, the 
 nose and contour of face of Eg\-ptian women. Her hand 
 
 2‘4 
 
Nagoya 
 
 and arm were exquisite, but it was her soft voice, her 
 dreamy smile, and slowly lifted eyelids that led us cap- 
 tive. Oikoto san and the tiny maiko fluttered about 
 the table, filling glasses, nibbling sweetmeats, answering 
 questions, and accepting our frank admiration with grace 
 incomparable. Two more brilliantly- dressed beauties 
 entered, and with them the two geisha and their instru- 
 ments. One of the geisha, O Suwo san, was still a beau- 
 ty, who entered with a quiet, languid grace and dignity, 
 and whose marvellous black eyes had magic in them. 
 
 The geisha struck the samisens with the ivory sticks, 
 the wailing chorus began, and there succeeded a fan- 
 dance, a cherry blossom- dance, and an autumn -dance, 
 the four brilliant figures posing, gliding, moving, turning, 
 rising, and sinking slowly before our enchanted eyes. 
 One dance demanded quicker time, and the dancers 
 sang with the chorus, clapping their hands softly and 
 tossing their lovely arms and swinging sleeves. The 
 three gentlemen of Nagoya joined in that pman to the 
 cherry blossoms and the blue sky, accenting the verse 
 with their measured chanting ; and one of them, taking 
 part in a musical dialogue, danced a few' measures in 
 line with the maiko very well and gracefully. 
 
 The closing dance — a veritable jig, with whirls and 
 jumps, rapid hand-clapping, and chanting by the maiko 
 — ended in the dancers suddenly throwing themselves 
 forward on their hands and standing on their heads, 
 their feet against the screens. 
 
 “That is what we call the foreign dance: it is in for- 
 eign style, you know. You like it V’ asked the interpret- 
 er on behalf of our guests ; and our danna san had the 
 temerity to answer that it was very well done, but that it 
 was now going out of fashion in America. 
 
 After the seven dances the maiko stood in a pictu- 
 resque row against the balcony rail and fanned them- 
 selves until supper was brought in for them and set on 
 
 215 
 
Jinrzkisha Days in Japan 
 
 low tables, whereon were placed many cups and bowls 
 and tiny plates, with the absurd bits and dolls’ portions 
 that constitute a Japanese feast. 
 
 The incongruous and commercial part of the geisha 
 and maiko performance came in the shape of a yard-long 
 bill, on which were traced charges of seventy-five cents 
 an hour for each maiko, which included the two accom- 
 panists, and the jinrikisha fares to and from the enter- 
 tainment. Unwritten custom required of us the supper 
 for the performers, and a little gratuity or souvenir to 
 each one. 
 
 When we begged the lovely Oikoto for her photograph, 
 she proudly brought us one which showed that exquisite 
 creature transformed into a dowdy horror by a foreign 
 gown and bonnet, which the Nagoya photographer keeps 
 on hand for the use of his customers. 
 
 CH.APTER XXII 
 LAKE BIWA AND KIOTO 
 
 After the pace of the jinrikisha the slow train from 
 Nagoya to Nagahama, on Lake Biwa, seemed to attain a 
 dizzy speed. Rising continually, we reached a hilly re- 
 gion where the road-bed crossed a chain of tiny valle)’s, 
 penetrated mountain-tunnels, and cut through pine for- 
 ests and bamboo groves. 
 
 At Nagahama we rested in a lake-side tateba, content 
 with the glorious view, and in no way eager to search 
 for its famous kabe crapes. Lake Biwa, with long, wood- 
 ed slopes running down to the shore, and mountains bar- 
 ring all the horizon, with smooth water and a blue sky, 
 offers sixty miles of charming sail. Little thatched-roof 
 villages, and the wide sweeping gables of temples show 
 
 216 
 
Lake Biwa and Kioto 
 
 here and there in the solitude of pines, and the crest of 
 one high promontory is girt with the white walls of Hi- 
 kone castle. Many legends belong to this mediaeval for- 
 tress, the scene of so many famous events, whose last 
 daimio was murdered in Tokio by disaffected followers, 
 soon after he negotiated, as prime-minister, the treaties 
 of 1858. 
 
 At Otsu, at the lower end of the lake, the splendid old 
 temple of Miidera and its monastery on the heights com- 
 mand the town and lake, and the soldiers’ memorial col- 
 umn overlooks the eight great sights of Lake Biwa which 
 are painted on half the fans, kakemonos, and screens of 
 Japan. One of these eight wonders is Miidera, with its 
 long and lofty avenues, the green twilight of its primeval 
 groves, its yellow, moated walls and frowning gate-ways 
 that hide in the enchanted forest; its ancient shrines, its 
 terraces, and lichen-covered bell-tower, home of the le- 
 gend of Benkei and his bell. Benkei was a muscular 
 priest who lived on Mount I liyeizan overlooking the lake. 
 The other priests coveted the splendid bell of Miidera, 
 which had been presented by the ruler of the kingdom 
 of women living at the bottom of Lake Biwa to Hidesato 
 for valiantly slaying a giant centipede that had frightened 
 these ladies of the lake by its forays. The priests in- 
 duced Benkei to steal the bell by promising him as much 
 soup as he could eat, and he threw it over his shoulder 
 and carried it to the top of the mountain. But its silvery 
 tongue kept crying “ I want to return,” and the priests 
 threw it down the mountain-side, over which it rolled, re- 
 ceiving many dents and scratches, to its old bell-tower. 
 Near by it is the giant soup-kettle, in which the priests 
 cooked Benkei’s mess of pottage, and touching both 
 relics of course verifies the legends. At the end of the 
 monastery groves are large barracks, and troops of the 
 chubby-faced, boyish-looking soldiers are always stroll- 
 ing through the arching avenues of the still old forest. 
 
’Jinrikisha Days in "Japan 
 
 The greatest sight of Biwa, and one of the wonders of 
 Japan, is the old pine-tree of Karasaki, which has stood 
 for three hundred years on a little headland a couple of 
 miles above Otsu, with a tiny village and a Shinto tem- 
 ple all its own. Its trunk is over four feet in diameter, 
 and, at a height of fifteen feet, its boughs are trained lat- 
 erally and supported by posts, so that it looks like a 
 banyan-tree. The branches, twisted, bent, and looped 
 like writhing dragons, cover more than an acre of ground 
 with their canopy. The tips of the boughs reach far 
 out over the water, and the sensitive Japanese hear a 
 peculiar music in the sifting of the rain-drops through 
 the foliage into the lake. High up in the tree is a tiny 
 shrine, and the pilgrims clap, their hands and stand with 
 clasped palms, turning their faces upward as they pray. 
 A heavy stone wall protects this sylvan patriarch from 
 the washing of storms and floods. 
 
 Under the branches a legion of small villagers, inti- 
 mating by pantomime their desire to dive for pennies, 
 untied their belts and dropped their solitary cotton gar- 
 ments as unconcernedly as one might take off hat or 
 gloves. They frolicked and capered in the water as much 
 at home as fishes and as loath to leave it. Fleeing from 
 this body of too attached followers, we were whirled 
 down the road to Otsu to eat the famous Biwa trout, 
 passing on the way a woman, who sat at ease in her bath- 
 tub by her own door-step, calmly scrubbing herself with a 
 bag of rice bran, and contemplating her neighbors, the 
 road, and the lake scenery the while. 
 
 On Mount Hiyeizan, by the ruined Buddhist temples 
 and monasteries, the American missionaries of different 
 denominations have a long- established summer camp, 
 where they enjoy a sort of Japanese Chautauqua circle, 
 their tents and buildings the only signs of habitation 
 where once stood hundreds of temples with their thou- 
 sands of priests. 
 
 2lS 
 
Till'. URICA l' I’lNK- l lUCl’. A I' KAKASAKI 
 
Lake Biwa and Kioto 
 
 From the old temple of Ishiyama, east of Otsu, is seen 
 the famous Seta bridge and Awatsu, where the lake takes 
 on a wondrous silvery sheen when the sun shines and 
 the wind blows, these being three more of the famous 
 sights of Biwa. The grounds of Ishiyama contain what 
 is known as a dry garden, where blackened rocks and 
 rocks free from every green thing are piled fantastically 
 with strange landscape resemblances. In the temple is 
 a prayer-wheel, which is turned by thousands of pilgrims 
 ever)' summer, and in a small room off the temple a 
 priest showed us the writing-box and ink-stone of Mu- 
 rusaki Shikibu, a poetess and novelist of the tenth cen- 
 tury, whose work, the Genji Monogatari, is the great 
 classic of its age. The remaining wonders of Lake Biwa 
 are the flights of the wild geese, the return of the fishing- 
 boats to Yabashi, and Mount Hira with the winter snows 
 on its summit. 
 
 From Otsu over to the Kioto side of the mountains we 
 went by train, rushing down the long grade and through 
 tunnels to the great plain, where sits the sacred city, the 
 capital and heart of old Japan, incomparable Kioto, Sa- 
 ikio, or Miako. We saw it in the sunset light, the west- 
 ern hills throwing purple shadows on their own slopes, 
 and the long stretch of wheat fields at their base turned 
 to a lake of pure gold. The white walls of the Shogun's 
 castle, the broad roof of the old palace, and the ridges 
 of temples rose above the low, gray plain of house roofs 
 and held the sun’s last level beams. 
 
 After the imitations and tawdriness of modern Tokio, 
 the unchanged aspect of the old capital is full of dignity. 
 After many long stays in spring-time, midsummer, and 
 midwinter, Kioto has always remained to me foremost 
 of Japanese cities. Yaamis, the foreigner’s Kioto home, 
 with its steep terraced garden, its dwarf-pine and bloom- 
 ing monkey-tree, its many buildings at different levels, 
 its flitting figures on the outer galleries, is like no other 
 
 22 \ 
 
yi7irikisha Days in yapa?i 
 
 hostlery. Yaaini, proprietor of this picturesque hotel, 
 is a personage indeed. He and his brother were pro- 
 fessional guides until they made their fortunes. Their 
 shrewd eyes saw further fortunes in a Kioto inn, where 
 foreigners might find beds, chairs, tables, knives, forks, 
 and foreign food, and they secured the old Ichiriki tea- 
 house, midway on the slope of Maruyama, the mountain 
 walling in Kioto on the east. The Ichiriki tea-house 
 was the place where Oishi Kura no Suke, the leader of 
 the Forty-sev’en Ronins, played the drunkard during 
 the two years that he lived near Kioto, before he avenged 
 the death of his lord. With it was bought an adjoining 
 monastery, belonging to one of the temples on Mount 
 Hiyeizan, and these two original buildings have expand- 
 ed and risen story upon story, with detached wings here 
 and there, until the group of tall white buildings, with 
 the white flag floating high up in the midst of Maru- 
 yama’s foliage, is quite castle -like. While the obnox- 
 ious foreign treaties are in force, no foreigners except 
 those in Japanese employ are allowed to live in Kioto, 
 or even to visit it without a passport, and this secures 
 Yaami in his monopoly. As a matter of fact, Yaami is 
 not the family name of the two pleasant and prosper- 
 ous-looking men who walk about in silk kimonos, with 
 heavy gold watch-chains wound about their broad silk 
 belts, and who have the innocent faces of young chil- 
 dren, save for the shrewdness of their eyes. Yaami is the 
 corruption of Yama Amida (Hill of Buddha), which is 
 the name of the hotel, and the two men belong to the 
 Inowye family, a clan not less numerous in Japan than 
 the Smiths of English-speaking countries. In parts of 
 the house one finds relics of monastery days in dim old 
 screens of fine workmanship, and there is a stone-floored 
 kitchen, vast as a temple, with cooks serious as priests, 
 wielding strange sacrificial knives, and who, in midsum- 
 mer, wear an apron only, apparently as a professional 
 
 222 
 
Lake Biwa and Kioto 
 
 badge rather than as a garment. The momban, or gate- 
 keeper, sits, spider-like, in a web of his own, a mere 
 doll’s house by the gate-way. In olden times, and even 
 to-day, in large establishments, the momban announces 
 an arrival with strokes upon his gong, but this particu- 
 lar functionary corresponds more nearly to the Parisian 
 octroi. All who enter the gates answer for themselves 
 and pay tribute, or they are forever barred out. Even 
 coolies disgorge their black-mail to the colony of fleet- 
 footed brethren who hold a valuable monopoly at Ya- 
 ami’s gate, and in guilds and labor organizations the 
 Orient is ages older and wiser than the Occident. 
 
 All of Maruyama’s slope is holy ground and pleasure- 
 ground. Tea-houses and bath-houses are scattered in 
 between the great temples, and prayer-gongs and pious 
 hand - clapping are heard in unison with samisens and 
 revellers’ songs. Praying and pleasuring go together, 
 and the court-yard of the Gion temple at the foot of the 
 hill is lined with monkey-shows and archerp ranges, and 
 in the riding-schools the adventurous may, for a few cop- 
 pers, mount a jerky horse and be jolted around a shady 
 ring. There, too, are many rows of images of fierce, 
 red -cloaked Daruma, the Buddhist saint, who sailed 
 across from Korea on a rush -leaf. He sat facing a 
 wall for nine years, and wore off his lower limbs, and 
 now his image, weighted with lead, is the target for 
 merry ball-throwers, and is seen in every quarter of the 
 empire. 
 
 From the airy galleries on Maru\-ama the city lies be- 
 low one like a relief map. The river, the Kamogawa, 
 crossed at intervals by long bridges, cuts the city in two. 
 From each bridge a street runs straight on to the west- 
 ward. By day these thoroughfares look like furrows 
 ploughed through the solid plain of gray-tiled roofs; but 
 at night they shine with thousands of lamps and lanterns, 
 and their narroWj wavering lines of fire look like so many 
 
 223 
 
^inrikisha Days in ’Japa7i 
 
 torchlight processions, and the river is one broad belt of 
 light. 
 
 I first saw Kioto on the last day of the Gion matsuri, 
 a festival which lasts for a month and brings all the 
 population out-of-doors into one quarter during the even- 
 ing. By dusk a babel of music and voices had arisen, 
 which finally drew us down the steep and shady road, 
 and through the great stone torii, to the Gion’s precincts. 
 The court-yard was almost deserted, and looking through 
 the great gate way to Shijo Street the view was dazzling 
 and the shouts and chatter deafening. The narrov.’ street 
 was lined with rows of large white paper lanterns hang- 
 ing above the house doors, and rows hanging from the 
 eaves. Lanterned booths lined the curb, while humbler 
 venders spread their wares on the ground in the light of 
 flaring torches. Crowds surged up and down, every man 
 carrying a paper lantern on the end of a short bamboo 
 stick— the literal lamp for the feet — women bearing small- 
 er lanterns, amd children delighting themselves with gay- 
 ly-colored paper shells for tiny candles. Boys marched 
 and ran in long single files, shouting a measured chant 
 as they cut their way through the crowd and whirled 
 giant lanterns and blazing torches at the end of long 
 poles. 
 
 From Gion gate to Shijo bridge the street was one 
 wavering, glittering line of light, and crowded solidly 
 with people. Where the street narrows near the bridge 
 there is a region of theatres and side-shows, and there 
 banners and pictures, drums and shouting ticket-sellers, 
 and a denser crowd of people gathered. .A. loud shout 
 and a measured chorus heralded a group of men carry- 
 ing a Brobdingnagian torch, a giant bamboo pole blaz- 
 ing fiercely at its lofty tip. The crowd surged back to 
 the walls as the torch-bearers ran by and on to the mid- 
 dle of Shijo bridge, where they waved the burning wand 
 in fiery signals to the other bridges that the real proces- 
 
 224 
 
Lake Biwa and Kioto 
 
 sion was starting. More torches and lanterns, lines of 
 priests in garments of silk and gauze, wearing strange 
 hats, beating and blowing strange instruments ; and a 
 sacred red chair, reason for all this ceremony, was borne 
 on from the Gion to a distant Shinto sanctuary to remain 
 until the matsuri of the following year. 
 
 From Shijo bridge to Sanjo bridge Kioto’s river-bed 
 is like a scene from fairy-land throughout the summer, 
 and during the Gion matsuri the vision is enhanced. The 
 tea-houses that line the river-bank with picturesquely 
 galleried fronts set out acres of low platform tables in 
 the clear, shallow stream. The water ripples pleasantly 
 around them, giving a grateful sense of coolness to these 
 resthetic Japanese, who sit in groups on the open plat- 
 forms, smoking their pipes and feasting under the light 
 of their rows of lanterns. All the broad river-bed is 
 ablaze with lights and torches, and on the dry, gravelly 
 stretches a multitude of small peddlers, venders, and 
 showmen set up their attractive tents and add to the gen- 
 eral glitter and illumination. Hundreds linger and stroll 
 on the bridges to admire the gay sight, for as only this 
 people could have conjured up so brilliant a spectacle 
 out of such simple and every-day means, so only they can 
 fully enjoy its beauty and charm. All the children wear 
 their gayest holiday clothes on such a great matsuri 
 night, and the graceful women of the old capital, bare- 
 headed, rustling in silk and gauze, their night-black hair 
 spread in fantastic loops and caught with beautiful hair- 
 pins, are worthy of their surroundings. 
 
 We left the bridge and wandered over the loose gravel 
 and rocks of the river-beds, crossing by many planks and 
 tiny bridges from one small island of shingle to another. 
 There were countless fruit-stands, with their ingenious 
 little water-fountains spraying melons and peaches to a 
 dewy coolness and freshness, hair-pin stands glittering 
 with silver flowers, and fan and toy and flower booths, 
 
Jinrikisha Days i?i "Japan 
 
 and all the while we wandered there the people watched 
 and followed with a respectful curiosity that amused but 
 could not annoy. Attracted by the beautiful face of a 
 young girl just within the curtained door of a side-show, 
 we paid the one cent entrance fee to see the conjurers. 
 The tent was empty when we entered, but such a stream 
 of natives poured in after us as to delight the proprietor 
 and encourage the musicians to pound out more violent 
 airs. A few miserable poodles were made to walk on two 
 legs and otherwise discomfort themselves at the bidding 
 of the beautiful girl, whose strange soft eyes and lovely 
 face were set olf by an elaborate coiffure, a coronet of 
 silvery hair-pins, and a kimono of gray silk shot with 
 many tinsel threads. We foreigners found the faces and 
 holiday garb of the people more interesting than the per- 
 formance, and the natives in turn seemed equally ab- 
 sorbed in watching us. Horse-shows, where daring but 
 terrified Japanese bestrode steeds and ambled three times 
 around the ring for a peifny, puppet-show's, juggler-shows, 
 and peep-shows drew us in turn from one end of the river- 
 bed fair to the other, and when too weary to w-alk we 
 remounted to the bridge to admire afresh this feast 
 of lanterns, until at midnight we sought the groves of 
 Maruyama. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII 
 KIOTO TEMPLES 
 
 Kioto is seen at its best in summer-time, in the fulness 
 and color of its out-door life. Though the great plain of 
 the city bakes and quivers in the sun, the heat is no 
 greater than in other cities. The views from Maruyama 
 are always enchanting, and the sunset sky is not lovelier 
 than the dawn, Avhen all the hill-side lies in cool, green 
 
 226 
 
Kioto Temples 
 
 shade, when the opposite mountain-wall wears a veil of 
 rose and lilac, and the air above the plain of gray roofs 
 is full of filmy mists and tiny smoke-wreaths. 
 
 All travellers are abroad at sunrise or in the early 
 morning, for by ten o’clock the sun blazes down with 
 fury, and humane people keep their jinrikisha coolies 
 and themselves in-doors. With the cooling dusk mos- 
 quitoes swarm from all these gardens and hill-side groves, 
 and the victim fans and slaps until he creeps for safety 
 under his mosquito-net, which, unhappily, does not ex- 
 clude the nimble fiea, whose ravages test both his en- 
 durance and his temper. At sunrise all the temples in 
 Kioto open their gates for the first mass, and at dawn 
 pilgrimages to these sacred spots may begin, the odor 
 and silence of that dewy hour adding to their i^eace and 
 sanctity. 
 
 All the way from Vaami's to the Yasaka pagoda and 
 the Kiomidzu temple the hill-side is covered with temple 
 and monastery grounds, the way leading through broad, 
 tree-shaded avenues and narrow paths by bamboo groves 
 or evergreen thickets. Wide, flagged walks and grand 
 stair-ways follow the terraces to temples and bell-towers, 
 screened by open-work walls and approaclied through 
 monumental gate-ways made beautiful by carving, gild- 
 ing and painting, inlaid metals, and fine tiles. Crossing 
 from one temple enclosure to another, the walk extends 
 for two miles along the brow of the hill through beauti- 
 ful grounds. The park-like demesne of Higashi Otani, 
 with its imperial tombs, adjoins Vaami’s, and next it is 
 the Kotaiji, with its noble avenues. At the end of one 
 broad path-way, traversing the upper part of the Kotaiji 
 grounds, the Yasaka pagoda, with its five stories of curv- 
 ing roofs and gables hung with old bronze bells, stands 
 like a picture in the arching frame of green. { These ven- 
 erable pagodas, their walls covered with wondrous carv- 
 ings and bracketings, faded to dim red and tarnished 
 
 227 
 
yinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 gold, with the gray and white tiles of their picturesque 
 roofs half overgrown with mosses and vines, the topmost 
 ridge finished with a tapering, spiral piece of iron, de- 
 light the lover of the picturesque. Yasaka’s cracked 
 and tongueless bells have long ceased to swing and ring 
 with every breeze, but they give an airy and fantastic 
 touch to the fine old structure. The pagoda dates from 
 the sixth century, and for twelve hundred years its four 
 altars have heard the prayers of faithful BuddhistSy/* The 
 early light gilds its eastern wall, and the rich sunset 
 makes of it a palace of the imagination. To me it seemed 
 most beautiful one late afternoon, when, hurrying down 
 the steep steps of a narrow street behind it, I saw its 
 outlines, delicate and strong, against a glowing orange 
 sky. 
 
 All about the pagoda and the neighboring slopes of 
 Kiomidzu are potteries and shops for the sale of the 
 cheap porcelain and earthen-ware that pilgrims and visit- 
 ors are prone to buy on their way to and from the temples. 
 The eminence is known as Teapot Hill, and the long, 
 steep street leading from Gojo bridge to the Kiomidzu 
 gates is lined on either side of its hilly half-mile with 
 china shops. There one may collect his three hundred 
 and sixty-five teapots in an hour, and few leave without 
 a souvenir of Kiomidzu porcelain, be it from Kanzan’s or 
 Dohachi’s godowns of exquisite w'ares, or from the long 
 rows of charming little open shops. Kiomidzu is the 
 centre of the porcelain-makers’ district, as the manufact- 
 urers of faience are grouped together in the Awata 
 quarter, a mile beyond, and behind the little shop-fronts 
 ai^ blank walls are busy work-rooms and burning kilns. 
 
 I The founding of the Kiomidzu temple is lost in fable, 
 and its legends are many and confusing. All the Japan- 
 ese rulers, warriors, and Shoguns have had something to 
 do with the place, and every foot of its enclosure is his- 
 toric. It is the popular temple of the people, enshrin- 
 
 22S 
 
Kioto Temples 
 
 ing one of the thirty -three famous Kwannons of the 
 empire, to whicli pilgrims flock by thousands, and where 
 one sees the most active forms of the faith.' Climbing 
 the breathless hill-slopes and stone stair -ways the visitor 
 reaches a giant gate-w'ay, in whose shadow mendicant 
 priests stand with extended bowl, straw hats concealing 
 them to the shoulders, and their maize and purple gar- 
 ments hung with rosaries. There are two pagodas and 
 innumerable stone lanterns and shrines, upon which the 
 faithful toss pebbles as they pray. If the stone remains 
 the prayer is answered, and the pilgrim proceeds with a 
 lightened heart. The Hondo, or main hall, is a most 
 ancient building, one half resting on the slope of the 
 hill and the rest extending in a broad platform propped 
 up by heavy timbers and scaffolding over the face of a 
 precipice, rfrom this platform jealous husbands used 
 to hurl their wives ; those who survived the fall of one 
 hundred and fifty feet to the jagged rocks below being 
 proved innocent of wrong-doing, and those who per- 
 ished guiltv. There are no rows of ticketed cloirs at 
 the steps of the Hondo, nor soft, clean mats within. 
 'I'he hall is open and benches are set before the altar, 
 where the weary, dusty pilgrim may sit and, resting, 
 pray. Votive tapers are brought to the shrine, and the 
 low beams overhead are covered with votive pictures. 
 
 One fortunate afternoon we chanced upon a matsuri 
 at Kiomidzu. All Teapot Hill was crowded with peo- 
 ple, girls and children in their gayly-colorcd crapes and 
 gauzes vying in brightness with the decorated houses. 
 I’riests, sitting on small, canopied platforms, hammered 
 silver-toned gongs to call the faithful to give offerings. 
 Coins were tossed in generously on the blankets where 
 the priests sat, but they were not the thick modern cop- 
 per sens, nor yet silver. Money-changers had their lit- 
 tle stands along the via sacra, and in e.xchange for a 
 sen the believers received a handful of ancient rins and 
 
 229 
 
‘Jinriktsha Days in Japan 
 
 half-rins. Thus provided, the pilgrim could bestow his 
 pious alms on each group of priests, and if he followed 
 the polite custom of wrapping any money gift in a bit 
 of soft paper, the priests could not tell whether he had 
 thrown silver or copper. Within the temple grounds 
 tateba were crowded with feasters and ten -drinkers, 
 dozens of fruit-stands were piled with slices of water- 
 melon, and fans painted with Kiomidzu scenes were 
 sold on every side. 
 
 Inside the temple itself the scuffle of clogs and mut- 
 terings of pilgrims drowned all sounds save the silvery 
 notes of the gongs. On the image - covered altar, one 
 hundred and ninety feet in length, veiled by clouds of 
 incense, were dimly visible the gilded statue of the di- 
 vine Kwannon, the special patroness of Kiomidzu, and 
 the figures of the priests. It was not easy to pick one’s 
 way among the kneeling multitudes offering their fer- 
 vent prayers oblivious to all surroundings. As one pil- 
 grim departed the rest crowded forward, continuing the 
 beseeching '''' Kamu Amida Butsu” (Hear me. Great 
 Lord Buddha) t\hich they mutter so rapidly that only a 
 long-drawn Na-na-na-na-na-a-a'’’ is audible as they 
 press their palms together and wind their beads around 
 their hands. 
 
 In the second temple, or Amida, were more candles, 
 incense, and priests, and more kneeling people. [_At the 
 end of the hanging platform of this temple is a small, 
 latticed shrine dedicated to Kamnosube-no-Kami, the 
 goddess who watches over lovers. He who would make 
 sure of the affections of his beloved buys a printed 
 prayer from the priest, rolls it into a narrow strip, and 
 then, with the thumb and little finger of the right-hand, 
 ties it to Kamnosube-no-Kami’s grating, and implores 
 her aid. Jif any other fingers ^re used to tie the knot, 
 or if they even touch the prayer - paper, the charm is 
 broken and the goddess is deaf. While we looked on 
 
 230 
 

 m'sMl 
 
 |fil3i'S 
 
 IH’BrO 
 
 'HBBOliSflfia.J? 
 
 ManRiii’iiNiiD: 
 
 * >> ■WmiK'121 ib. afa aiilHi ■■ m 
 
 0DO m||0_K1i^3tP 
 
 TIIK TKIir-I.OVI'R’s SHRINK AT KIOMIDZU 
 
Kioto Temples 
 
 one pretty creature in a red crape underdress and a 
 dark-blue gauze kimono, who blushed most beautifully, 
 bent her anxious face to the grating and deftly w'ound 
 her fingers in and out. k'ollowing her a middle-aged 
 coolie tossed in his fractional coin, rang, clapped, and 
 tied his sentimental petition to the lattice. 
 
 Holiday crowds poured up and down the broad paved 
 walks, wandered about the paths, or gathered in the pa- 
 vilions, while new throngs toiled up the stone staircases 
 to join in the festival. On the overhanging platforms 
 sacred dances had been performed all day, giving place 
 towards nightfall to the low tables covered with red 
 blankets, around which companies picturesquely grouped 
 themselves, while pretty nesans pattered back and forth 
 to serve them. The whole scene was so spectacular and 
 fascinating that we sat there watching the moving 
 crowds and looking out over the city below us until 
 the sun sank in clouds of splendid color, and twink- 
 ling lights began to creep upward from the streets. 
 
 Near the top of Teapot Hill a narrow lane diverges 
 into a dense bamboo grove, where the feathery tips meet 
 far overhead, and only a green twilight filters down to 
 the base of the myriad slender columns. This bamboo 
 grove is one of the finest in Kioto, and its cool shade is 
 most grateful on a summer day. Beyond it is the fa- 
 mous Spectacle Bridge, a massive stone pile, whose two 
 low arches are not unlike a bowed spectacle -frame. 
 'I'he lotus-pond which it crosses is surrounded in the 
 early summer mornings with breakfasting parties, who 
 sit there to see the splendid flowers open their cups 
 with the first rays of the sun. When that show is over 
 these flower-lovers wander through the farther confines 
 of Nishi Otani, with its superb bronze gates and dragon- 
 guarded tanks, and its imperial tombs hidden away in 
 the quiet groves. 
 
 The chain of temples still lengthens southward, and 
 
 *33 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 among the most ancient, surrounded with walls of Titanic 
 bowlders, is the Dai Hutsu temple, with its huge' image 
 of gilded wood, and its fallen bell, whose interior would 
 make a temple in itself. A stone monument, the Mimi- 
 zuka, covers the heap of thousands of human ears, cut by 
 Hideyoshi’s generals from the heads of enemies slain in 
 the Korean expedition, salted and brought home as proof 
 of prowess. Last is the Sanjiusangendo, or Hall of the 
 Thirty-three Thousand Buddhas, which, with its rows and 
 rows of tall gilded statues, is a curious place, but less like 
 a sanctuary than a wholesale warehouse of sacred images. 
 
 Northward from Yaami’s the chain of temples extends 
 along the leafy hill-side, first among them being the great 
 Chioin sanctuary, one of the largest, oldest, and richest 
 in Kioto. Its colossal gate-way, its long avenues, great 
 stone embankments, terraces, staircases, and groves of 
 ancient trees proclaim its age and endless honors. 
 Stretching over surrounding acres run the yellow walls of 
 its monastery grounds and priests’ houses. I'he Chioin’s 
 altar is a mass of carved and gilded ornaments surround- 
 ing a massive golden shrine, while the ceiling and walls 
 of the vast interior are hardly less splendid. Occasional 
 worshippers kneel in the vast matted hall muttering their 
 prayers, but usually only a solitary old priest is seen in- 
 dustriously hammering at a drum, shaped like a huge, 
 round sleigh-bell. From five o'clock in the morning un- 
 til the temple closes at four in the afternoon the hard, 
 mechanical thunk, thunk never stops. A nice old woman, 
 who must be a professional mender, judging by her in- 
 cessant patching and darning of blue-cotton garments, 
 takes care of the shoes while visitors roam through the 
 temple stocking-footed ; and proudly does she point out. 
 among the bracketed eaves, the sun-umbrella which the 
 great builder of the temple purposely left there. Back of 
 the main temple are other shrines and suites of recep- 
 tion-rooms, with screens and ceilings decorated by fa- 
 
 234 
 
Kioto Temples 
 
 mous artists, and quiet comers where abbot and priest 
 may sit and look upon the exquisite little gardens. 
 
 If I were a good Buddhist I should say a prayer or two 
 to the Chioin’s great bell, an inverted cup of bronze 
 eighteen feet in height, breathing music so sweet that it 
 thrills the listener, and ringing so seldom that no one 
 willingly misses its voice. This bell hangs by itself in 
 a shady place at the top of a long stone staircase, and is 
 struck from the outside by a swinging wooden beam that 
 brings out soft reverberations without jar or clang. This 
 huge hammer is unchained on rare days of the month at 
 the sunrise hour, and in the stillness of dawn one can- 
 not tell whence the sound comes. It is in the whole air ; 
 under one’s feet, or tingling and beating within one’s 
 body, while yet the ear seems to drink in the very ec- 
 stasy of sound. 
 
 About Xanjenji’s lofty gate-way are clustering tea-bush- 
 es, and between its ancient shrine, its tombs, and pictu- 
 resque bell-tower modern engineering has brought the 
 aqueduct from Lake Biwa, the long tunnel emerging from 
 the hill-side back of the buildings. Further on are lyekan- 
 do, with its lotus lake and verdant cemeterj-; X'iyakuoji’s 
 pretty garden and cascade ; and Shishigatami, Shinniodo, 
 and Yoshida, each with its distinctive charm and interest. 
 
 The way from these sacred places, passing through the 
 potters’ district of Awata, and coming suddenly out on a 
 level of rice fields, with Kurodani’s pagoda and grove 
 rising like an island from their midst, has been likened 
 to the abrupt transportation from Rome to the Cam- 
 pagna. Kurodani is a beautiful old sanctuary, and the 
 steep hill on which stands its great pagoda is an ideal 
 Buddhist burial-ground. Tombs, stone tablets, and lan- 
 terns, and hundreds of images of Buddha, in stone and 
 bronze, crowd against each other, and some priest or pil- 
 grim, ever picturesque, is always moving up or down the 
 broad gray staircase. 
 
 J35 
 
Ji)irikisha Days in Japan 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV 
 
 THE KONTO TEMPLES AND THE DAIMONJI 
 
 As an evidence of the vitality of their faith the Monto 
 Buddhists point to their great new temple in the south- 
 ern part of the city. .This Higashi Hohgwanji (Eastern 
 Temple) was eight years in building, at an enormous 
 cost, and is the largest temple in Japan. The squared 
 trunks of keyaki-trees that support floor and roof are of 
 a fine, close grain, that lasts for centuries without paint 
 or preserving process. [A collection of thick black ropes 
 hangs from the beams, all of them made from the hair 
 of pious women too poor to offer other contributions. 
 'I'he largest rope is five inches in diameter and two hun- 
 dred and fifty feet long, the hair, wound in a dozen sep- 
 arate strands around a slender core of hemp, having 
 been given by three thousand five hundred of the pious 
 maids and matrons of the province of Echizen. Here 
 and there in this giant cable are pathetic threads of 
 white hair, the rest being deep black. Each summer 
 pious men came to give their days’ labor to the temple 
 when they had no money. The best workers in wood 
 from several provinces, craftsmen descended from gen- 
 erations of wood-carvers, were brought together to labor 
 for several years on the decorative panels, carving from 
 solid blocks of hard keyaki wonderful birds and flow- 
 ers, curling waves and dashing spray — designs full of 
 movement and life. 
 
 This Shin, or Monto sect of Buddhists, is one of the 
 richest and largest. Its temples are always built in the 
 
 236 
 
The Monto Temples and the Daimonji 
 
 heart of cities, and always in pairs, a Nishi Hongwanji 
 (Western Temple) and a Higashi Hongwanji (Eastern 
 Temple) being found in Tokio, Kioto, and Osaka. At 
 the Nishi Hongwanji of Kioto the vast interior discloses 
 masses of carving, gilding, lacquer, damascening, and 
 paintings on golden groundwork, and Monto altars are 
 more .splendid than those of any other sect. This Hong- 
 wanji is very rich, having been endowed with lands and 
 mines in the days of Hideyoshi, its special protector, 
 and the temple enclosure holds many relics of the Taiko. 
 Connected with the temple is a great yashiki, or abbot’s 
 residence, and the wall -screens and superb ceilings, 
 brought from Hideyoshi’s castle at Eushimi, south of 
 Kioto, to adorn the suites of reception-rooms, are finer 
 than any in the imperial palace. 'I’he carved, gilded, 
 and lacquered ceilings, the wonderful paintings on gold- 
 leaf surfaces, the damascened mountings of the screens, 
 the vast audience hall, the private rooms, tlie No pavil- 
 ion, and the court where the enemies’ heads were dis- 
 played, are all magnificent. In a corner of the grounds 
 is the pleasure -garden of Hideyoshi, a leafy, lake -cen- 
 tred paradise, and a marvel of artistic arrangement, with 
 its winding water overhung with wistaria arbors, crossed 
 by picturesque bridges, rellecting its stone lanterns, thick- 
 ets of oleander, bamboo, pine, palm, and banana trees, 
 and the two beautiful miniature palaces within the maze. 
 On a pine-covered knoll is the thatched summer-house, 
 where the fierce yet poetic warrior sat in his armor to 
 watch the moon rise over the trees and turn the lake to 
 a silver shield at his feet. 
 
 The Hongwanji services are splendid and impressive 
 ceremonies ; the companies of gorgeously-clad priests, 
 the chanting, the incense, the lighted tapers, the bells, 
 the opening of the doors of the golden shrine to display 
 the im.age of Tuddha, all bearing a strange resemblance 
 to the worship of Romish churches. I'he faithful kneel, 
 
 i37 
 
Jinrtkisha Days in Japan 
 
 touch themselves, and use the rosary in prayer; and high 
 mass at the Hongwanji might almost be high mass at 
 St. Mark’s. Mass is celebrated at five o’clock on every 
 morning of the year, and all day worshippers may come 
 to kneel and pray before the altars. On the first and 
 fifteenth days of each month special services are held at 
 two o’clock in the afternoon, and every January recurs 
 a week of prayer in honor of the founder of the Shin 
 sect, when priests come from all parts of the empire to 
 the mother-temple. The fortnightly afternoon services 
 consist of readings from the sacred scriptures, and the 
 chanting of Japanese and Chinese sacred poems by some 
 twenty priests in black gauze stoles; a larger chorus, 
 hidden behind the central shrine and altar, joining in 
 and responding. The high-priest, in a cardinal and gold 
 brocade kesa, sits directly facing the shrine, and at in- 
 tervals touches the swinging plate of bronze used as a 
 gong in the order of worship. The golden shrine, in a 
 great gilded alcove, or chancel, bears countless gilded 
 lotus flowers and candelabra, and slender columns of in- 
 cense rise from the priests’ low reading-desk. At the 
 conclusion of the chanted service the doors of the shrine 
 are opened, and the sacred image displayed in a silence 
 broken only by low strokes on the gong. Then the 
 priests file away, and the faithful, flocking into the va- 
 cant place behind the rail, and kneeling where the priests 
 have knelt, prostrate themselves, rub their rosaries in / 
 their palms, and repeat with ecstatic fervor the invoca- 
 tion : “ Namu Amida Butsu ” (Hail, Great Lord Buddha). 
 
 Every year, on the temple steps, the contributions of 
 rice from distant provinces are stacked high in their 
 cylindrical straw bales, themselves emblems of abun- 
 dance. This rice is sent as an annual tribute from dif- 
 ferent parts of the empire to the head-temple of the sect 
 at Kioto, to be used for offerings in the sanctuaries, for 
 the priests’ food, and for alms to the poor. 
 
 23S 
 
The Monto Temples and the Daimonji 
 
 The present high-priest has a longer genealogy than 
 the Emperor, and is the seventy-third of his family, in 
 direct succession, to live in the same Kioto yashiki. Be- 
 sides his ecclesiastical rank, he is a nobleman of the 
 first order, and moves in the imperial circle, his modern 
 brougham with liveried men being often seen driving in 
 and out of the palace enclosures in the western end of 
 the city. Besides his temple services, he directs the 
 large college which the Hongwanji maintains for the 
 education of young men for the priesthood and for ad- 
 vanced philosophical studies for lay students. In its 
 library is a vast literature of Buddhism, the scrolls of 
 silk and paper in boxes of priceless gold lacquer facing 
 the neatly-bound volumes of Sinnett, Sir Edwin Arnold, 
 and other foreign writers. The college employs teachers 
 of all European languages, and intends to send mission- 
 ary workers to European countries. One of the priestly 
 instructors, Mr. Akamatsu, spent several years in Eng- 
 land, and has made comparative religions his great study. 
 This admirable scholar is an admirable talker as well, 
 and every student of Buddhism in Japan is referred to 
 his vast stores of information. The breadth and liber- 
 ality of Mr. .Vkamatsu’s views are shown in his belief in 
 the brotherhood of all religions, their likeness, and their 
 convergence towards “ that far-olT, divine event, towards 
 which the whole creation moves.” It was he who drew 
 up and translated that new canon of his faith, which in- 
 troduced passages from the Sermon on the Mount, and 
 who explained that these contained exactly the Bud- 
 dhist tenets. The Shin I5uddhists are called the Protes- 
 tants of that faith. The priests may marry, and are not 
 required to fast, to do penance, make pilgrimages, or 
 abstain from animal food. 'I'hey believe in salvation by 
 faith in I’uddha. and in those cver-higher transmigra- 
 tions of the soul which finally attain Nirvana. Their 
 priests maintain that the presence of Christian mission- 
 
 23a 
 
Jinrikislia Days in Japan 
 
 aries has made no difference with their people, the schol- 
 arly and intelligent seeing that the two faiths differ only 
 in a few articles and practices. For the lower orders, 
 these spiritual shepherds declare Buddhism to be the 
 better religion, its practice for centuries having made 
 the masses the gentle, kindly, patient, and contented 
 souls that they are. One priest, sent to Europe to study 
 the effects of Christianity, reported that vice, crime, and 
 misery were greater there than in Japan, and that the 
 belief of the west seemed less able to repress those evils 
 than the belief of the east. These Monto priests, too, 
 express broad views about the reciprocity of nations and 
 the fair e.xchange of missionaries. Now that English 
 clergymen and thinkers study Buddhism in the monas- 
 teries of Ceylon, avowing their acceptance of the articles 
 with much sacred ceremony, Monto apostles may yet 
 preach to the people of England and America. How- 
 ever this may be, the priests do not fear the proselyting 
 labors of the Doshisha teachers in Kioto, and speak 
 warmly of its good works, and particularly of its hospi- 
 tal and training-school for nurses. 
 
 In 1885 the first American missionaries came to Kio- 
 to, and as the sacred city is beyond the treaty limits, 
 the college and hospital are maintained under the name 
 of the Doshisha company, and the foreigners engaged 
 in the work are ostensibly in Japanese employ. Back 
 of the Christian Japanese, who stands as president of 
 this company, are the rich Mission Boards, which furnish 
 the money, and direct its expenditure and the method 
 of work. Each teacher in the Doshisha school is really 
 a missionary, and outside the class-room carries on ac- 
 tive evangelical work. School buildings, hospital, and 
 residences for the foreign teachers all front on the high 
 yellow walls of the imperial palace grounds, significant 
 testimony to the changes that have come, the barriers 
 and prejudices that have given way. The school is 
 
 240 
 
Ihe Monto Temples and the Daimonji 
 
 crowded to its furthest capacity, the hospital is besieged, 
 and physicians overworked. The teachers claim that 
 all the students are Christians, that the new religion is 
 spreading, and that the people are most anxious to know 
 about it. While they do not affirm that Buddhism and 
 the old religions are dying, the success of their work 
 sustains their conviction. They have erected substan- 
 tial brick buildings and comfortable dwellings, and have 
 a general air of permanency. The choice of Dr. J. C. 
 Berry as one of the pioneers in this enterprise was most 
 fortunate ; his tact and urbanity having availed as much 
 in dealing with the Japanese authorities as his zeal and 
 ability in planning and promoting the work, and an e.x- 
 ceptional staff has been gathered around him. 
 
 Of foreign missions in Japan there are the French 
 Catholic, Russian - Greek, English and Canadian work- 
 ers belonging to both Established Church and dis- 
 senting sects, while the h'oreign Mission Boards of the 
 United States have more than three hundred agents 
 and teachers in Japan, nearly all of whom have fami- 
 lies. Meanwhile, 191,968 Shinto temples, 14,849 Shinto 
 priests, and the whole inlluence of the Government en- 
 courages this state religion, of which the Emperor is the 
 visible head. There are 72,039 Buddhist temples, and 
 56,266 Buddhist priests and consecrated nuns proclaim 
 that faith, while pilgrims to the thirty -three famous 
 Kwannons of the empire do not lessen in number. A 
 large fraction of the people profess no religion whatever, 
 among whom are many of the younger generation of 
 nobles, who, having studied and lived abroad, have 
 adopted materialism, atheism, or agnosticism, like other 
 foreign fashions. When an American devotee of theos- 
 ophy expounded his occult science in a round of temple 
 addresses he aroused a polite interest, but caused no 
 e.xcitement and attracted no body of followers. A Uni- 
 tarian agent enjoyed greatest favor among the highest 
 
 Q 24' 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 circles of the capital, his system of higher philosophy 
 appealing strongly to those cultivated thinkers and men 
 of letters. 
 
 The common people, like the ignorant of other races, 
 do not at all comprehend the religion they do profess, 
 observing its forms as a habit or a matter of blind con- 
 vention, and celebrating its events with ceremonies and 
 decorations, festivals and anniversaries, whose signifi- 
 cance they cannot explain. Japanese streets suddenly 
 blossom out with flags and lanterns at every door-way 
 and along miles of eaves, and if you ask a shopkeeper 
 what this rejoicing means, he will reply, “ IVakarimasen," 
 or Shirimasen” (I do not know). Then some learned 
 man tells you that it is the anniversary of the death of 
 Jimmu Tenno, or the autumn festival, when the first rice 
 of the garnered crop is offered to the gods by the Em- 
 peror in the palace chapel, by the priests at every Shin- 
 to shrine, and at every household altar in pious homes, 
 or some other traditional occasion kept as a Govern- 
 ment holiday. Closing the Government offices on Sun- 
 day, and making that a day of rest, was a matter of 
 practical convenience merely, and the result of the 
 adoption of a uniform calendar with the rest of the 
 world, and a modern military establishment on foreign 
 models. 
 
 One of the festivals of a religious character which is 
 understood by the people, and is, perhaps, the most re- 
 markable of all Kioto’s great summer illuminations, is 
 that of the Daimonji, at the end of the Bon Matsuri, or 
 Festival of the Dead. According to Buddhist belief, the 
 spirits of the departed return to earth for three days in 
 mid-August, visiting their families and earthly haunts, 
 and flitting back to their graves on the night of the third 
 day. During the continuance of the Bon Matsuri, lan- 
 terns and paper strips are hung in front of those houses 
 in which a death has occurred during the year, and burn- 
 
 242 
 
The Monio Temples and the Daimonji 
 
 ing tapers and bowls of food are set before the little 
 household shrines. Alike in the backs of shops, in tfte 
 humblest abodes, and in villas and noble yashikis, lights, 
 offerings, and fragrant incense welcome back the dead. 
 In the cemeteries the bamboo sticks at each gravestone 
 are daily filled with fresh flowers, and on the night of 
 their return the spirits are guided to their resting-places 
 by the light of lanterns and oil-tapers burning through- 
 out these cities of their silent habitation. This beauti- 
 ful custom, sanctified by the observance of many centu- 
 ries, is tinged with little sadness, and the last night of 
 the Festival of the Dead is the great Festival of Lan- 
 terns, the most brilliant of the long, gay, fantastic Kioto 
 summer. 
 
 We were kindly invited by a Japanese gentleman to 
 witness the illumination from the upper story of a pa- 
 goda-like school-house, that rose high above all the roofs 
 in the heart of the city. Two hundred children were 
 chirping and chattering in the open-sided class-rooms of 
 the lower floors, all eager to see the Daimonji, the great 
 signal-fires on the hills. All sat on their heels in order- 
 ly rows, and silently bobbed to the mats at sight of us, 
 going on afterwards with their merry babble, which all 
 through the summer evening floated up to us in happy 
 chorus. 
 
 As dusk gave way to dark, we beheld a glimmer of 
 light like a waving torch on the side of the mountain 
 that stands like a tower beyond Maruyama. Another 
 and another flash shone out against the dark face of 
 Daimonji-yama’s long slope, until the flames joined and 
 lines of fire ran upward, touched, crossed, and finally 
 blazed out in the gigantic written character Dai, in out- 
 line not unlike a capital A. Next a junk appeared in 
 fiery outlines on the slope north of the city ; another 
 mystic character glowed on the next hill ; and to the 
 north-west a smaller Dai showed, like the reflection of 
 
 ^ 4 ? 
 
Jinrikisha Days in "Japan 
 
 the first huge symbol. Full in the west gleamed a torii, 
 a pillared gate- way of fire. From every house-top and 
 from the bridges came the shouts of enthusiastic spec- 
 tators, and the children in the rooms below us twittered 
 like a box full of sparrows. For centuries the priests of 
 mountain temples have taught their simple parishioners 
 to lay their gathered firewood in the proper lines, and 
 regular trenches mark the course of each device. The 
 longer lines of the big Dai are each a half-mile in length, 
 and the five miles’ distance of our point of view dwarfed 
 them to perfect proportions. These fiery symbols burned 
 for half an hour before they began to waver, and long 
 after their images still danced and burned in our vision 
 against the succeeding blackness. 
 
 Down in the city the crowds surged through the lan- 
 terned streets, each adding the illumination of his hand- 
 lantern to the scene. The river-bed was all recrossing 
 lines and arches of lights, and mjTiad points of uncov- 
 ered flames were reflected in the waters. The hill-sides 
 twinkled and glowed with the innumerable torches in 
 the cemeteries, and thus, lighted back to their tombs by 
 all the city and the hill-side, the Buddhist spirits rest 
 until the next midsummer season recalls them to their 
 joyous Kioto. 
 
 CHAPTER XXV 
 THE PALACES AND CASTLE 
 
 Kioto remains faithful to its traditions, and jnelds 
 blit slowly to the foreign fashions which absorb Tokio. 
 Tokio has nineteenth-century political troubles, even dem- 
 agogues and hare-brained students, that unruly young ele- 
 ment, the soshi, keep it in a state of agitation, and some- 
 times appeal to the old two-handed sword, the dagger, 
 
 244 
 
The Palaces and Casile 
 
 and the cowardly bomb. But Kioto, devoted to its old 
 order, maintains the reign of peace, while the arts flour- 
 ish. 
 
 For the thousand years during which this ancient Sa- 
 ikio remained the home of the Emperor, and of his nom- 
 inal subject, the Shogun, its western half was crowded 
 with the life centering about the two rulers. The ancient 
 Emperors \vere hidden within the vast palace enclosure, 
 the centre of other large demesnes, whose yellow walls 
 were marked with the five horizontal white lines which 
 indicate imperial possessions. This collection of palaces 
 and the yashikis of the kuges, or court nobles, were then 
 surrounded by one exterior wall and moat, making an 
 immense imperial reservation — a small isolated city. 
 Within a few years this exterior wall has been destroyed, 
 streets have been opened, and much of the space has 
 been turned into a public park. The imperial palace 
 buildings cover ten acres of ground, and are surrounded 
 by twenty-six acres of ornamental park. In each of the 
 four yellow outer walls is a richly roofed and gabled 
 gate-way, as stately as a temple, the ends of the beams, 
 the ridges, and eaves decorated with golden chrysanthe- 
 mum crests. The great gate, opened only for the Em- 
 peror and his train, and through whose central passage 
 only the sacred being himself may be borne, faces south, 
 as does the throne, in accordance with the old supersti- 
 tions of the East. The evil influences always threatening 
 from the north-east are guarded against by many temples 
 beyond that side of the palace. 
 
 In these days of departed greatness only the Daidokoro 
 Mon (the august kitchen gate), a fine gabled structure in 
 the western wall, is used. After the visitor presents the 
 elaborate official permit, obtained by his legation from 
 the Imperial Household Department of Tokio, and 
 stamped after a personal inspection of the holder by the 
 Kioto bureau of that department, there is much running 
 
 245 
 
’Jinrikisha Days in yapan 
 
 to and fro of ancient officials, much restamping and re- 
 cording, before he is led through the precinct by an at- 
 tendant. Even with this guarantee, the severe and state- 
 ly old guardians, in their ancient dress and tonsure, seem 
 to look on the intruder with suspicion. 
 
 The Japanese gosho is not exactly translated by the 
 word “ palace,” and is merely a greater yashiki, or spread- 
 out house, constituting the sovereign’s residence. This 
 gosho consists of so many separate roofed, one-story 
 wooden buildings as to make a small village. Each room, 
 or suite of rooms, occupies a distinct building, its outside 
 gallery or veranda forming the corridor, and its sliding 
 screens the inner walls. Each building has the great 
 sweeping roof of a temple, the belief in the divinity of 
 the Emperor, and his headship of the Shinto faith, re- 
 quiring that his actual dwelling should be a temple, rigid- 
 ly simple as a Shinto shrine, with thatched roof and un- 
 painted woods. These clustered houses are the survival 
 of the old nomad camps of Asia, as the upward curving 
 gables of the roof are a permanent form of their sagging 
 tent-tops. The palace has suffered from many fires, the 
 last occurring in 1854, but each rebuilding has followed 
 the original models, and the gosho looks just as it did 
 centuries ago. The same straw mats, open charcoal bra- 
 ziers, and loose saucers of oil in paper lamp-frames, in- 
 viting a conflagration there as in the humblest Japanese 
 home. 
 
 The walk around the outer galleries and connecting 
 corridors takes half an hour, and one must go stocking- 
 footed, or in the curious slippers furnished by the guar- 
 dians. In summer the recessed and sunless apartments 
 are cool and dim, but winter makes them bitterly cold 
 and forlorn. Except for two thrones, there is nothing 
 to be called furniture in the palace. The silk-bordered 
 mats of the floor, the paintings on the sliding screens, 
 the fine metal plates on all the wood-work, the irregular- 
 
 246 
 
The Palaces and Castle 
 
 ly-shelved recesses, quaint windows, curious lattices, and 
 richly-panelled ceilings constitute its adornments. All 
 the wonderful kakemonos, vases, and curios were stored 
 in godowns when the Emperor left Kioto, and the seals 
 have not since been broken. On the screens in the pri- 
 vate apartments are many autograph poems, written by 
 court poets or imperial improvisators. The tea-rooms 
 and the garden tea-houses show how important were the 
 long-drawn ceremonies of cha no yu in those leisurely 
 days of the past. 
 
 The courts surrounding the state apartments are sand- 
 ed quadrangles, their surfaces scratched over in fine pat- 
 terns by the gardeners’ bamboo rakes for the easy 
 detection of strange footprints. In the court-yard before 
 the old audience hall a cherry-tree, a wild orange-tree, 
 and a sacred bamboo, all emblematic, grow at either 
 side of the broad steps. In the middle of the wide, 
 temple- like apartment commanding this court stands 
 the sacred white throne of past centuries, a square tent 
 or canopy of white silk, with rich red borders at the 
 edges of the overlapping curtains. Two antique Chinese 
 dogs guard the throne. On New-year’s Day, and at rare 
 intervals when the Emperor gave audience to his vassal 
 jailer, the Shogun, lie sat on a silk cushion within the 
 closed tent, and only his voice was heard, 'speaking in 
 the quavering, long-drawn tones still used by the actors 
 in the No dance. The imperial princes stood at either 
 side of the throne, the kuge and officials of the highest 
 rank knelt on the steps, and the lowest officials in at- 
 tendance, the jige or “down to the earth” subjects, 
 prostrated themselves on the sands of the court, while 
 the mournful and muffled tones of the sacred voice 
 sounded. 
 
 When the Emperor gave his first audiences after the 
 Restoration, in 1868, he occupied a newer throne in the 
 Shishinden, a large audience hall with a lofty ceiling 
 
 247 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 supported by round wooden columns. On the lower 
 part of the rear wall are some very old screens painted 
 with groups of Chinese and Korean sages. The floor is 
 of polished cedar, and the throne is like that of his an- 
 cestors, but with the curtains rolled up from the front 
 and two sides. It stands on a dais, guarded by the Chi- 
 nese dogs brought as trophies from Korea, and holds 
 
 THE THRONE OF 186S. 
 
 within it a simple lacquered chair, with lacquer stands 
 for the sacred sword and seal. After those audiences of 
 1868 the Emperor travelled to Tokio in a gold-lacquered 
 norimon^ or closed litter, guarded by a train clad in the 
 
 248 
 
The Palaces and Casile 
 
 picturesque dress and armor of centuries before, and 
 equipped with curious old weapons. He, himself, wore 
 voluminous silk robes and a stiff lacquer hat, and the 
 faithful kuges were attired in gorgeous brocades and silks. 
 When the Emperor and court returned to Kioto in 1878, 
 to open the railway to the seaport of Hiogo-Kobe, he was 
 dressed like a European sovereign, alighted publicly 
 from his railway car, and drove to the palace in a smart 
 brougham, escorted by troops with western uniforms and 
 weapons. 
 
 The Shiro, or Nijo castle, half a mile south of the pal- 
 ace, where the Shoguns flaunted their wealth and power, 
 is a splendid relic of feudal days. The broad moat, 
 drawbridge, strong walls, and tower- topped gate -ways 
 and angles date from the middle of the sixteenth century. 
 The great gate-way inside the first wall is a mass of elab- 
 orate metal ornament, from the sockets of the corner 
 posts to the ridge-pole, but the many trefoils of the To- 
 kugawas have been everywhere covered by the imperial 
 chrysanthemum. All the rooms, but especially the two 
 splendid audience- chambers, with a broad dais before 
 each tokonoma, are marvels of decorative art, rich in 
 gilded screens, with exquisite paintings and fine metal 
 work, wonderfully carved ra 7 mna, and sunken ceiling 
 panels, ornamented with flower circles, crests, and geo- 
 metric designs. But, alas ! a hideous Brussels carpet, a 
 round centre-table, and a ring of straight-backed chairs 
 have crowded their vulgar way into these stately rooms, 
 as into every government building and office, large shop, 
 and tea-house in Kioto. 
 
 The Shoguns had the Kinkakuji, the Ginkakuji, and 
 other suburban villas to which they might resort, and in 
 which many of them ended their days as abbots and 
 priests. The Emperors had only the exquisite Shuga- 
 kuin gardens at the foot of Mount Hiyeizan for their 
 pleasurings, until the Restoration gave all such rebel 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 property to the crown. The Kinkakuji (the gold -cov- 
 ered pavilion) and the Ginkakuji (the silver -covered 
 pavilion) stand at opposite sides of the city, each sur- 
 rounded with landscape-gardens, from which nearly all 
 Japanese gardens are copied. Both are as old as the 
 Ashikaga Shoguns, and both are now monasteries. The 
 Kinkakuji is the larger, and was even more splendid be- 
 fore it was despoiled of so many rare and historic stones 
 and garden ornaments, but the place is still a paradise. 
 Yoshimitsu, third of the Ashikaga Shoguns, built the 
 Kinkakuji, and thither the great Ashikaga retired to end 
 his life. This refuge figures in the many novels of the 
 time of the Ashikagas, when the War of the Chrysanthe- 
 mums, the Japanese War of the Roses, raged, and 
 the Emperors with the kuges suffered actual want and 
 privation. The memory of this third Ashikaga is ab- 
 horred, because he paid tribute to China and accepted 
 from that country in return the title of “ King of Japan 
 but he so fostered luxury and art that some of his other 
 sins are forgiven him. The pretty little palace at the 
 lake’s edge, with its golden roof and lacquered walls, 
 has successfully withstood the centuries, and is still in- 
 tact. In the monastery buildings near the gate-way are 
 shown many wonderful kakemonos and screens, and in 
 one court is a pine-tree trained in the shape of a junk, 
 hull, mast, and sail perfectly reproduced in the feathery, 
 living green needles of the tree. It is most interesting 
 to see how the patient gardeners have bent, interlaced, 
 tied, weighted dowm, and propped up the limbs and twigs 
 to produce this model, with the slow labor of a century. 
 
 To the Ginkakuji retired the dignified Yoshimasa, 
 eighth of the Ashikaga Shoguns, to found a monastery 
 and to meditate, until with Murata Shinkio, the priest, 
 and Soami, the painter, he evolved the minute and elab- 
 orate ceremonies of cha no yu. The weather-beaten 
 boards and finely thatched roof of the first ceremonial 
 
T/i2 Palaces and Casile 
 
 tea-house in Japan, built before Columbus set sail for 
 the Zipangu of Marco Polo, are greatly revered by Jap- 
 anese visitors. Beautiful is the way to the Ginkakuji, past 
 the high walls and gate-ways of monasteries, past the 
 towering gates of countless temples, up their long shad- 
 ed avenues, and on by bamboo groves and terraced rice 
 fields. You buy wooden admission tickets for ten sen, 
 which you give to a little acolyte, who opens the inner 
 gate-way. This chisai bonze san (small priest) might have 
 been twelve years old, but looked not more than five 
 when I first knew him, and from shaven head to san- 
 daled foot he was a Buddhist priest in miniature. This 
 Shinkaku, leading the way to the lake with solemn 
 countenance and hands primly clasped before him, sud- 
 denly broke forth into a wild, sing-song chant, which 
 recited the names of the donors of the rocks and lan- 
 terns to the great Ashikaga Yoshimasa. He made us 
 take off our shoes and creep up the steep and ancient 
 stair-way of the Ginkakuji to see a blackened and vener- 
 able image of Amida. Morning, noon, and night service 
 is said before the altar in the little old temple by the 
 lake, and this small priest burns incense, passes the sa- 
 cred books, and assists the wrinkled and aged priests in 
 the observances of the Zen sect of Buddhists. Back of 
 the monastery buildings is a lotus pond, where the great 
 pink flower- cups fill the air with perfume, and every 
 morning are set fresh before Buddha’s shrine. 
 
 Going westward from Kioto the traveller crosses rice 
 fields, skirts a long bamboo hedge, and comes to the 
 summer palace of Katsura no Miya, a relic of the Tai- 
 ko’s days. An aunt of the Emperor occupied it until 
 her recent decease, and to that is probably due its per- 
 fect preservation. An ancient samurai with shaven crown 
 and silken garments receives, with a dozen bows, the 
 handful of official papers that constitute a permit to visit 
 the imperial demesne. Dropping his shoes at the steps, 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 the visitor wanders through a labyrinth of little rooms, 
 each exquisite, simple, and charming, with its golden 
 screens and gold-flecked ceilings. The irregularly shelved 
 recesses, the chigai dana of each room, the ramma, the 
 lattices and windows, are perfect models of Japanese taste 
 and art ; and the Taiko’s crest is wrought in silver, gold, 
 and bronze on all the mountings, and is painted and 
 carved everywhere. The open rooms look upon a lovely 
 garden, and paths of flat-topped stones lead through the 
 tiny wilderness of lake, forest, thicket, and stream ; over 
 old stone bridges, stained and lichen-covered, to pictu- 
 resque tea-houses and pavilions, overhanging the lake. 
 Stone Buddhas and stone pagodas stand in shadowy 
 places, and stone lanterns under dwarf pine-trees are re- 
 flected in the curve of every tiny bay. It is an ideal Jap- 
 anese garden, with the dew of a midsummer morning on 
 all the spider w'ebs, and only the low note of the grass- 
 hoppers to break the stillness. 
 
 Although all tourists spend a day in shooting the rapids 
 of the Oigawa, it seems to me a w’aste of precious Kioto 
 time and a performance out of harmony with the spirit of 
 the place, although in May the blooming azaleas cause 
 that wild and narrow canon to blaze with color. The 
 flat-bottomed boats dart through the seven-mile gorge 
 and dash from one peril of shipwreck to another, just 
 saved by a dextrous touch of the boatmen’s poles, which 
 fit into holes in the rocks that they themselves have worn. 
 The flooring of the boats is so thin as to rise and fall with 
 the pressure of the water, in a way that seems at first 
 most alarming. The passage ends at Arashiyama, a steep 
 hill clothed with pine, maple, and cherry-trees, which in 
 cherry-blossom time, or in autumn, is the great resort of 
 all Kioto, whose pleasurings there form the theme of half 
 the geisha’s songs and the accompanying dances. From 
 the tea-house on the opposite bank the abrupt mount- 
 ain-side shows a mat of densest foliage. A torii at tire 
 
The Palaces and Castle 
 
 river's edge, stone steps and lines of lanterns lead to a 
 temple on the summit, and down through the forest float 
 the soft, slow beats of a temple-bell. The tea-house is 
 famous for its fish-dinners, where iai, fresh from the cool, 
 green river, are cooked as only the Japanese can cook 
 them, and the lily bulbs, rice sandwiches, omelettes, and 
 sponge-cake are so good that the place is always crowded. 
 
 Katsura no Miya is just below Arashiyama, and after 
 one morning spent in the little palace, with its restful 
 shade and stillness, our half-naked coolies ran with us 
 through the glaring sunlight to the tea-house beside the 
 cool waters of the Oigawa. They barely waited for us 
 to step out of the jinrikishas before they plunged, laugh- 
 ing and frolicking, down the bank and leaped into the 
 river, splashing and swimming there like so many frogs. 
 They had run ten miles that morning, half of the way 
 under a baking sun, the perspiration streaming from 
 their bodies, and they plunged into the river as they 
 were, taking off their one cotton garment and washing 
 it, while they cooled themselves in the rushing waters. 
 Then, lying down quite uncovered in their own quarters 
 of the tea-house, they ate watermelon and cucumber, 
 drank tea and smoked, until they dropped asleep in the 
 scorching noonday of a cholera summer. In the late 
 afternoon, when it was time to begin the long ride back 
 to Maruyama, they limped out to us, lame and stiff in 
 every joint and muscle, coughing and croaking like ra- 
 vens. We felt that tliey must die in the shafts, but ex- 
 ercise soon relieved the cramped and stiffened limbs, 
 and they trotted on as nimbly as ever over the hills to 
 Kioto. 
 
 The coolie and his ways are matters of much interest 
 to foreigners, but after a time one ceases to be amazed 
 at their endurance or their recklessness. After the most 
 violent exercise, ninsoku, the coolie, will take off his one 
 superfluous garment and sit in summer ease in his dec- 
 
’Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 orated skin. Back, breast, arms, and thighs are often 
 covered with elaborate tattooed pictures in blue, red, and 
 black on the raw -umber ground. His philosophy of 
 dress is a simple one. AVhen the weather is too hot to 
 wear clothes they are left off, and a wisp of straw for the 
 feet, a loin-cloth, and a huge flat hat, a yard in diameter, 
 w'eighing less than a feather, are enough for him. When 
 there is no money to buy raiment he tattoos himself with 
 gorgeous pictures, which he would never hide were there 
 not watchful policemen and Government laws to compel 
 him into some scanty covering. 
 
 The diet of these coolies seems wholly insufficient for 
 the tremendous labor they perform — rice, pickled fish, 
 fermented radish, and green tea affording the thin nutri- 
 ment of working-days. Yet the most splendid specimens 
 of physical health are reared and kept in prize-fighting 
 condition on what would reduce a foreigner to invalid- 
 ism in a week. I remember that while resting one hot 
 morning under Shinniodo’s great gate -way, my coolie, 
 who by an unusually early start had been interrupted 
 in his breakfast of one green apple, asked for some tea- 
 money. I watched the hungry pony while he treated his 
 companions to a substantial repast of tea and water- 
 melon. Strengthened and recuperated, he came back, 
 shouldered camera and tripod, and as he walked down 
 the hot flagging, complacently picked his teeth with 
 the sharp point of one tripod stick — a toothpick four 
 feet long ! 
 
Kioto Silk Industry 
 
 CHAPTER XXVI 
 KIOTO SILK INDUSTRY 
 
 Kioto remains the home of the arts, although no lon- 
 ger the seat of government. For centuries it ministered 
 to the luxury of the two courts, which gathered together 
 and encouraged hosts of artists and artisans, whose de- 
 scendants live and work in the old home. Kioto silks 
 and crapes, Kioto fans, porcelains, bronzes, lacquer, carv- 
 ings, and embroideries preserve their quality and fam.e, 
 and are dearer and better than any other. 
 
 Silk is the most valuable article of export which Japan 
 produces, and raw silk to the value of thirty millions of 
 yens goes annually to foreign consumers, while the home 
 market buys nearly seven millions of yens’ worth of man- 
 ufactured fabrics. The Nishijin quarter of Kioto and 
 the Josho district, north-west of Tokio, are the great silk 
 centres of Japan, and any silk merchant, fingering a crape 
 gown, will tell instantly which of the rival districts pro- 
 duced it. Recently Kofu, west of Tokio, and Hachioji, 
 twenty miles south, have become important centres of 
 manufacture as well. The silk market has its fluctua- 
 tions, its panics, and its daily quotations by cable ; but 
 raw silk has so inherent a value that it is a good collat- 
 eral security at any bank, and the silk-broker is as well 
 established and important a personage in the mercantile 
 world of the Orient as the stock-broker in the Occident. 
 Next to specie or gems, silk is the most valuable of com- 
 modities in proportion to its bulk, the cargo of a single 
 steamer often representing a value of two million dollars 
 
 255 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 in gold. The United States is the greatest consumer of 
 Japan’s raw silk. In 1875 fifty-three bales only of raw 
 silk and cocoons were shipped to America. Three years 
 later two thousand three hundred and thirty-six bales 
 were sent, and in 1887 sixteen thousand eight hundred 
 and sixty -four bales, while Europe took only fourteen 
 thousand bales. Our share of the raw silk is nearly all 
 consigned to Pater.son. N. J. With the opening of this 
 great foreign trade, silk is dearer to the Japanese con- 
 sumer than twenty years ago ; and while it still furnishes 
 the ceremonial dress, and is the choice of the rich, cot- 
 ton, and of late, wool, have taken its place to a great ex 
 tent. 
 
 Everywhere the rearing of the worms goes on. The 
 silk districts and villages are always thriving, prosper- 
 ous, and tidily kept, forming peaceful and contented 
 communities. Each house becomes both a nursery for 
 the worms and a home factory, where every member of 
 the family engages in the work. Wages in silk districts 
 range from eight to twenty cents, in United States gold, 
 for a day’s work of eighteen hours, the higher price be- 
 ing paid to the most expert and experienced only. The 
 houses are all spacious, kept most exquisitely clean, ven- 
 tilated, and held to an even temperature. Sheets of pa- 
 per coated with eggs, and looking like so much sand- 
 paper, will in a few days fill the waiting trays with tiny 
 white worms. The mulberry-leaves have to be chopped 
 as fine as dust for these new-comers, which are daily 
 lifted to fresh trays by means of chopsticks, the fingers 
 being too rough and strong for such delicate handlings. 
 For a week at a time the tiny gluttons crawl and eat, 
 then take a day and night of sleep, maintaining this rou- 
 tine for five weeks, when, having grown large enough, 
 they begin to wind themselves up in cocoons. Then the 
 cauldron of boiling water and the whirling reel change 
 the yellow balls into great skeins of shining silk, ready 
 
 256 
 
Kioto Silk Industry 
 
 to be twisted, tied, and woven either at home or across 
 the seas. Compressed into bales of a picul’s weight, or 
 133^ pounds, the raw silk finds its way to market, or, 
 woven in hand looms in the usual thirteen-inch Japanese 
 widths, or in wider measures for the foreign trade, it is 
 again sold by weight, the mome being the unit. One 
 hundred and twenty mome are equal to one pound. 
 Twenty-five yards of fine white handkerchief-silk weigh 
 from 150 to 200 mome, and 100 mome of such silk 
 varies in price from si.x to seven dollars, gold. 
 
 Steam-looms are fast supplanting the old hand-ma- 
 chines in Xishijin and Josho. The Government sent 
 men to study the methods in use at Lyons and bring 
 back machinerj', and now there are filatures and facto- 
 ries in all the silk districts. Private corporations are 
 following the Government e.xample. At the Kwangioba 
 no Shokoba the first e.xhibition of foreign machines, with 
 instruction in their use, was given. To-day the lively 
 clatter of the Jacquard loom is heard above the slow, 
 droning noise of the hand-loom behind Nishijin’s miles 
 of blank walls. Slowly the weavers are abandoning the 
 rude loom, which was probably in use, like gunpowder, 
 at an age when Europeans clothed themselves in skins 
 and lived in cav'es ; and the singing draw-boy is descend- 
 ing from his high perch, where he has so long been lift- 
 ing the alternating handful of threads that make the 
 pattern. 
 
 In a tour of the Xishijin factories, one scorching Au- 
 gust day, we saw many of these primitive hand-looms, 
 with half-clad weavers tossing the shuttles of silk and 
 gold thread, their skin shining with the heat like polished 
 bronze, and marked all over with the scars of moxa 
 cones. Everywhere w’ere gathered books upon books 
 filled with samples of superb brocades, many of them 
 more than a century old. Everj-Avhere we were regaled 
 with sweets and thimble-cups of lukewarm amber tea, 
 
Jinrikis/ia Days in 'Japan 
 
 that seemed harmless as water, but murdered sleep. 
 Everywhere Ave found a new garden more enchanting 
 than the last, and everywhere the way in which work- 
 room and kitchen, living-room and sales-room were com- 
 bined ; women, children, family, workmen, and servants 
 were ruled over by the master of the home and factory, 
 offered a curious study in political economy and patri- 
 archal government. 
 
 Until the Emperor, and finally the Empress and court 
 ladies abandoned the national dress, the court-weaver of 
 brocade remained a considerable personage, for he and 
 his ancestors had been both tailors and dress-makers to 
 those august personages. We visited the beautiful gar- 
 den and lantern-hung verandas of this artistic dictator, 
 and sipped tea, fanned the while by attentive maids, 
 while the stout, dignified, and prosperous head of the an- 
 cient house and our Japanese official escort conversed. 
 Afterwards we were shown the books of brocade and 
 silks manufactured for the imperial family and court. 
 The gorgeousness of some of these, especially the blaz- 
 ing red brocade, stiff with pure gold thread and covered 
 with huge designs of the imperial chrysanthemum, or 
 the Paulownia crest of the Emperor's family, fairly daz- 
 zled us. We saAV the pattern of the old Emperors’ cere- 
 monial robes, and patterns designed by past Empresses 
 for their regal attire. Several of these were of a pure 
 golden yellow, woven with many gold threads ; one de- 
 sign half covered with fine, skeleton bamboos on the 
 shimmering, sunshiny ground. The splendid fabrics that 
 bear the imperial crest may be woven only for the reign- 
 ing family, and their furniture-coverings, draperies, and 
 carriage- linings are as carefully made and guarded as 
 bank-note paper. Squares of thickest red silk, wrought 
 with a single gold chr}’santhemum, are woven for the 
 Foreign Office, as cases for state papers and envoys’ 
 credentials. Rolls of the finest white silk were ready to 
 
Kioto Silk Industry 
 
 be made into undergarments for the Emperor, who, nev- 
 er wearing such articles twice, obliges his tailor to keep 
 a large supply ready ; and these garments that have once 
 touched the sacred person are highly treasured by loyal 
 subjects. 
 
 The weaver exhibited flaming silks covered with huge 
 peonies, or fine maple-leaves, or circles of writhing dra- 
 gons, which the outside million may buy if they choose, 
 but not a sixteen-petalled chrysanthemum are they priv- 
 ileged to obtain from him in any way. In discussing the 
 changeableness of the American taste, Kobayashi and 
 his staff w'ondered that the mass of our people did not 
 care for silks that would wear forever, rather than for 
 the cheap fancies of the moment. The Japanese cling 
 to the really good things that hav'e stood the test of a 
 century’s taste, and Japanese ladies had a pride in wear- 
 ing the brocade that had been theirs for a lifetime and 
 their mothers’ before them. In noble families inherited 
 ceremonial dresses are as highly treasured as the plate 
 and jewels of European families, though they are now 
 seldom worn. Rolls of such silks and brocades were 
 often presented by Emperor and Shogun to their court- 
 iers, and the common saying, “ He wears rags, but Ins 
 heart is brocade,” attests the esteem in which these ni- 
 s/tikis (brocades) were held in olden times, and those 
 yesso nishikis, with their reverse a loose rainbow of woof 
 threads, are far removed from the thin, flat, papery, char- 
 acterless stuffs known as Japanese brocades in the cheap 
 foreign trade. 
 
 A heavy silk tapestr}-, peculiar to Japan, although sug- 
 gested by Chinese models, is best woven now at the 
 Dotemachi Gakko, an industrial school for girls, main- 
 tained by the Government. The art had nearly died 
 out when the aged tapestry-weaver was brought to the 
 school and given a class of the most promising pupils. 
 The fabric is woven on hand -frames, the design being 
 
 259 
 
Ji?iriktsha Days in Japan 
 
 sketched on the white warp threads, wrought in with 
 shuttles or bobbins, and the threads pressed down with a 
 comb. Each piece of the design is made by itself, and 
 connected by occasional cross threads, or brides, as in 
 lace. The fabric is not dear, considering its superior 
 beauty and durability, as compared to the moth-inviting 
 tapestries of the Gobelins and Beauvais, and conven- 
 tional and classic designs are still followed, the old dyes 
 used, and gold thread lavishly interwoven. 
 
 The gold thread employed in weaving brocades and 
 tapestries is either a fine thread wound with gold foil, 
 a strip of tough paper coated with gold-dust, or threads 
 wound with common gold - paper. The fineness and 
 quality of the gold affect the cost of any material into 
 which it enters, and in ordering a fabric or a piece of 
 embroidery one stipulates closely as to the gold-thread 
 employed. The fine gold -wires of Russian brocades 
 are very rarely used, because of their greater cost. The 
 manufacture of gold thread is an open secret, and wom- 
 en are often seen at work in the streets, stretching and 
 twisting the fine golden filaments in lengths of twenty 
 and thirty feet. 
 
 The old dyers were as much masters of their craft as 
 the old weavers ; and in trying to match the colors in a 
 piece of yesso nishiki, I once went the round of Paris 
 shops and dress makers’ establishments in vain. Noth- 
 ing they afforded would harmonize with the soft tones 
 of the old dyes. A distinguished American connoisseur, 
 wishing to duplicate a cord and tassel from one of his 
 old lacquer boxes, took it to a Parisian cord-maker. The 
 whole staff looked at it, and the proprietor asked per- 
 mission to unravel a bit, to decipher the twist and obtain 
 some long threads for the dyer. But with months of 
 time allowed him, he could not reproduce the colors nor 
 braid a cord like the original, nor even retwist the Jap- 
 anese cord he had unravelled. 
 
 260 
 
Kioto Silk Industry 
 
 Velvet-weaving is one of the old arts, but it was ac- 
 complished by the most primitive and laborious means, 
 and the fabrics, dull and inferior to foreign factory 
 velvets, do not rank among the more characteristic pro- 
 ductions of Japanese looms. Kioto's painted velvets are 
 unique, however, and charming effects are obtained by 
 painting softly-toned designs on the velvet as it comes 
 from the loom, with all the fine wires still held in the 
 looped threads. The painted parts are afterwards cut, 
 and stand in softly-shaded relief upon the uncut ground- 
 work. 
 
 The crape guild of Kioto is as large, and commercially 
 as important, in this day, as the brocade guild, whose 
 members rank first among manufacturers. All crape is 
 woven in tans, or lengths of sixty Japanese s/iaku, two and 
 a half shaku being equal to an English yard. On the loom 
 this material is a thin, lustrous fabric, hardly heavier 
 than the gauze on which kakemonos and fan mounts are 
 painted. It is so smooth and glossy that one cannot 
 discover the smoother warp and twisted woof threads, 
 alternately tight and loose, which give it its crinkly sur- 
 face. When finished, the web is plunged into a vat of 
 boiling water, which shrinks the threads and ensures the 
 wrinkled and lustreless surface. Once dried the tans 
 are tied like skeins, and lying in heaps, look like so much 
 unbleached muslin. Crape must be dyed in the piece, 
 and stretched, while damp, by bracing it across with in- 
 numerable strips of bowed bamboo. In the bath the 
 pieces shrink from one-third to one-half in width, and a 
 full tenth in length, but the more they shrink the more 
 cockled is the surface. When finished the tan may 
 measure from seventeen to twenty-four yards in length, 
 but weight and not measure determines its value, and 
 the scales are used instead of the yard-stick. 
 
 While the Chinese weave only the original Canton 
 crape, with its heavy woof and firmly twisted threads, 
 
 261 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 the Japanese have produced a dozen kinds, each wrin- 
 kled, cockled, waved, and crinkled in different ways. 'I'he 
 great Joshu district produces not as many kinds of crape 
 as Kioto, and Nishijin’s looms are busier each year, weav- 
 ing crapes as light and thin as gauze, or as heavy and 
 soft as velvet ; some costing only thirty or forty cents 
 a yard, and others two and three dollars for an arm’s 
 length. The soft, thick, heavily -ribbed kabe habuiai, 
 
 KABE HABL'TAI 
 
 once kept for ceremonial gowns and the favorite gifts of 
 the great, is most e.xpensive, having heavier threads and 
 larger cockles than other crapes, and never showing 
 crease or wrinkle. Plain crape, or ckirimen, differs as the 
 fineness of thread and the closeness of weaving add to its 
 weight. Ebisu chirimen might be called repousee, from 
 the scale-like conve.xities of its surface, and is a most 
 fascinating fabric. Finest and most exquisite of all is 
 
 262 
 
Kioto Silk Industry 
 
 the lustrous kinu chirimen, or crinkled silk, which shows 
 only the finest lines and parallel ridgings marking its 
 surface lengthwise. Used chiefly for the carelessly tied 
 obi of the bath kimono, or as obishime, tied over the 
 
 CHIRIMF.N 
 
 womens’ heavy satin and brocade obis to keep their stiff 
 folds in place, these stringy scarfs add a last artistic 
 touch of color to a costume. Kinu chirimen shrinks 
 half its width, but loses nothing in length in the bath, 
 and a tan a yard wide ranges from eighteen to twenty- 
 eight dollars in price. Kanoko ckirhncn is plain crape 
 dotted over with knots or projections in different colors, 
 a result arrived at by processes similar to those em- 
 ployed at Arimatsu for dyeing cotton goods. 
 
 Yamanuxi, so little known outside the home market, is 
 a most artistic fabric, roughly and loosely woven of the 
 threads of the wild, mountain silk-worm, that is fed on 
 
 263 
 
^Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 oak -leaves. Yamamai has the natural yellow color of 
 the cocoons, is considered both a cure and preventive 
 of rheumatism, and is often worn at the command of 
 foreign physicians. It is softer to the touch than the 
 Chinese pongee, not being weighted with the clay dress- 
 ing of Shantung pongees, while much heavier than the 
 Indian tussores, all three of these fabrics being the 
 product of the same wild oak-spinner. 
 
 The painted crapes of Kioto, specially designed for 
 children’s holiday dresses and obis, are works of art, in 
 the manufacture of which the old capital holds almost a 
 monopoly. All the elaborate processes of patterning 
 
 EBISU CHIRIMEN 
 
 such crapes were shown us one morning at Nishimura’s 
 great establishment. First, on a square of white crape, 
 wrung out in water and pasted down at the edges on a 
 board, the outline of the principal design was sketched 
 
 264 
 
Kioto Silk Industry 
 
 in indigo. This line was then carefully covered by a 
 thread of starch, drawn from a glutinous ball held upon 
 the point of a stick, while the painter turned and tilted 
 the crape to receive it. This starch, or “ resist,” as oc- 
 cidental dyers term it, is to prevent the spreading of the 
 colors by capillary attraction, and the limits of every 
 color must be carefully defined, unless the fabric is to 
 be made one of those marvellous studies of blended and 
 
 KI.NU CUIRIMEN 
 
 merging tints. As soon as the first color dried, the first 
 starchy outline was washed out, and another drawn for 
 the second color. After the removal of each “ resist,” 
 the square was stretched on bowed bamboos and dried 
 over a hibachi. 'J'he artist had purposely worked out 
 his design with such cunning that it was only when the 
 last touches in red had been given that we discovered 
 the Daimonji’s fires burning on the mountain-side, and 
 
 26s 
 
Jinrtki'sha Days in Japan 
 
 a troop of men, women, children, and jinrikishas, all 
 with glowing lanterns, figuring as silhouettes on Sanjio 
 bridge. 
 
 When a whole tan of crape is to be painted, much of 
 the design may be stencilled through perforated card- 
 board, but, in general, the best painted crapes display 
 free-hand sketches, with patterns never exactly repeated, 
 nor exactly matching at the edges. After the general 
 outline is sketched, the tan, sewn together at the ends, 
 is made to revolve horizontally on two cylinders, like a 
 roller towel, passing before a row of seated workmen, 
 each of w'hom adds a single color, or applies the “ resist,” 
 and slips it along to the next. Sitting on the mats, the 
 soles of his feet turned upward in his lap, in a pose that 
 a circus contortionist might envy, each workman has a 
 glowing hibachi at his knees, over which he dries his 
 own work. And such work ! Hazy rainbows on misty 
 skies, flights of birds, shadows of trees and rushes, 
 branches of pines and blossoming twigs, comical fig- 
 ures, animals, and fantastical chimeras, kaleidoscopic ar- 
 rangements of the most vivid colors the eye can bear. 
 These painted crapes are beyond compare, and the Eng- 
 lish and Dutch imitations in printed delaines fall ab- 
 surdly short. 
 
 Following the Chinese example, Kioto silk-weavers 
 now make silk rugs equalling the famous ones of Pe- 
 kin. Even when new they have a finer bloom and 
 sheen than the old prayer-rugs of western Asia, but their 
 designs, first made from the suggestions of an American 
 house, are neither Japanese, Turkish, nor at all Orien- 
 tal, nor do they allow the best effects to be obtained. 
 At two dollars a square foot, these thick, soft rugs make 
 the costliest of floor coverings in a country where the 
 cotton and hemp rugs of Osaka sell for a few cents a 
 square foot, and the natural camel’s-hair rugs of North 
 China for eighteen cents a square foot. 
 
 266 
 
Embroideries and Curios 
 
 
 CHAPTER XXVII 
 EMBROIDERIES AND CURIOS 
 
 Their range of stitches, their ingenious methods and 
 combinations, and the variety of effects attained with the 
 needle and a few strands of colored silk, easily place the 
 Japanese first among all embroiderers. Although China 
 taught them to embroider, they far surpass the Chinese 
 in design, color, and artistic qualities, while they attain 
 a minute and mechanical exactness equal to the soul- 
 less, expressionless precision of the best Chinese work. 
 They can simulate the hair and fur of animals, the 
 plumage of birds, the hard scales of fishes and drag- 
 ons, the bloom on fruit, the dew on flowers, the muscles 
 of bodies, tiny faces and hands, the patterned folds of 
 drapery, the clear reflection of lacquer, the glaze of por- 
 celains, and the patina of bronzes in a way impossible to 
 any but the Japanese hand and needle. Sometimes they 
 cover the whole groundwork with couched designs in a 
 heavy knotted silk, and this peculiar embroidery has the 
 name of kindaii nuitsuke. With floss silk, with twist- 
 ed silks, with French knots, and with gold and silver 
 thread, couched down with different colored silks, with 
 silk threads couched, and with concealed couchings, a 
 needle-worker attains every color effect of the painter; 
 nor does the embroiderer disdain to use the brush, or 
 to powder and spatter his designs with gold, nor to en- 
 croach upon the plastic art by his wonderful modelling 
 of raised surfaces, rivalling the sculptor with his counter- 
 feit faces. His invention and ingenuity are inexhausti- 
 ble, and the modern craftsmen preserve all the skill of 
 their ancestors. 
 
 267 
 
Jinrikisha Days in yapan 
 
 The oldest existing piece of Japanese needle-work is 
 the mandalla of a nun, kept at Tayema temple in Yaina- 
 to, which is certainly of the eighth century, although 
 legend ascribes it to the divine Kwannon. Pieces of 
 equal antiquity, doubtless, are in the sealed godowns of 
 Nara temples, but very little is known of them. The 
 latest triumphs of the art, pieces showing the limit of 
 the needle’s possibilities, are the ornamental panels and 
 makemono executed for the Tokio palace, and other 
 work by the same artists exhibited at Paris in 1889. 
 This exhibition work was executed under imperial com- 
 mand at Nisliimura’s, the largest silk-shop in Kioto, a 
 place to which every visitor is piloted forthwith. Solid 
 brown walls, black curtained doors, and the crest of 
 three hexagons are all that one sees from without ; but 
 the crest is repeated at door-ways across the street and 
 around corners, until one realizes what a village of crape- 
 weavers and painters, velvet-weavers and embroiderers, 
 is set in the heart of Kioto by this one firm. The master 
 of the three hexagons has taken innumerable medals, 
 gold, silver, and bronze, at home and abroad, and, in re- 
 sponse to every invitation to make a national exhibit. 
 Government commands are sent him at Kioto. The 
 blank outer walls and common entrance, the bare rooms 
 with two or three accountants sitting before low desks, 
 do not indicate the treasures of godown and show-room 
 that lie beyond. In an inner room, with an exquisite 
 ceiling of interlaced pine shavings, curtains, kakemono, 
 screens, and fukusa are heaped high, while others are 
 continually brought in by the small porters. In spite of 
 the reputation and the artistic possibilities of the estab- 
 lishment, it sends out much cheap, tasteless, and in- 
 ferior work to meet the demands of foreign trade, and 
 of the tourists who desire the so-called Japanese things 
 they are used to seeing at home. 
 
 For the old embroideries, those splendid relics of the 
 
 268 
 
Embroideries and Curios 
 
 national life with its showy and picturesque customs, 
 the buyer must seek the second-hand clothes-shops, the 
 pawn-shops of the land. In the Awata district lives the 
 great dealer w'ho gathers in old kimonos, obis, fukusas, 
 kesas, temple hangings, brocades, and embroideries from 
 the godowns of nobles, commoners, priests, actors, saints, 
 and sinners, to whom ready money is a necessity. Gei- 
 shas and actors, with the e.xtravagant habits of their 
 kind, are often forced to part with their wardrobes, and 
 the second-hand shops are half filled with beautiful and 
 purely Japanese things which they have sacrificed. When 
 I first beheld “my uncle ” of .-\wata, his was a dark, ill- 
 smelling, old do’ shop, with two bushy-headed, poorly- 
 dressed attendants. Gilbert and Sullivan unwittingly 
 made his fortune, and the old dealer could not at first 
 understand why the foreign buyers, hitherto indifferent, 
 should suddenly crowd his dingy rooms, empty his go- 
 downs, and keep his men busy collecting a new stock. 
 'I'hree years after my first visit there was a large, new 
 building with high-heaped shelves, replacing the dirty old 
 house and its questionable bales tied up in blue cotton, 
 and horribly suggestive of smallpox, cholera, and other 
 contagions. Prices had trebled and were advancing 
 steadily, with far less embarrassment of choice in the 
 stock than formerly. 
 
 The gorgeous kimonos of actors and geishas offered 
 at such shops far outnumber those richly-wrought gowns 
 worn by women of rank at holiday times and at the pal- 
 ace, and most of the showy and gorgeously-decorative 
 gowns displayed in western drawing- rooms have ques- 
 tionable histories. Even the stores of No dance cos- 
 tumes have been drawn upon, and choice old brocades 
 are rarer now than good old embroideries. The priest’s 
 kesa, or cloak, a symbolic patchwork of many pieces, 
 and the squares and bits from temple tables, for a long 
 time offered exquisite bits of meshed gold-thread and 
 
 269 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 colors, and on the back of such pieces one often found 
 poems, sacred verses, and fervent vows, written by the 
 pious ones who had made offerings of them to the 
 temples. 
 
 The stores of fukusas seemed inexhaustible a few years 
 ago, and I can remember days of delight in that ill-smell- 
 
 FUKCSA 
 
 ing old corner of Awata, when one out of everv five fuku- 
 sa was a treasure, while now there are hardly five good 
 ones in a hundred of those needle pictures. The finest 
 work was lavished on these squares of satin or crape, 
 
Embroideries and Curios 
 
 which former etiquette demanded to have laid over the 
 boxes containing gifts or notes, both box and fukusa to 
 be duly admired and returned to the sender. These cer- 
 emonial cloths were part of the trousseau of every bride 
 of high degree, and old families possess them by scores. 
 The nicest etiquette ordered the choice of the fukusa, 
 and the season, the gift, the giver, and the receiver were 
 considered in selecting the particular wrapping. The 
 greatest artists have made designs for them, and a few 
 celebrated ones, bearing Hokusai’s signature, are owned 
 by European collectors. The crests of the feudal families 
 become familiar to one from their constant repetition on 
 fukusas. Numberless Japanese legends, and symbols as 
 well, constantly reappear, and no two are ever exactly 
 alike in design or execution, however often one may see 
 the same subject treated. Equally popular are all the 
 symbols of long life — the pine, the plum, the bamboo ; the 
 tortoise with the fringed shell that lives for a thousand 
 years; the peach that took a thousand years to ripen; the 
 stork, the old man and woman under the pine-tree hail- 
 ing the rising sun — and all, when wrapping a gift, equal- 
 ly convey a delicately expressed wish for length of days. 
 'J'he fierce old saints and disciples, who with their drag- 
 ons and tigers live on old Satsuma surfaces, keep com- 
 pany with the sages who rode through the air on storks, 
 tortoises, or carp, or stand unrolling sacred scrolls be- 
 neath bamboo groves. And the Seven Household Gods 
 of Luck, the blessed Shichi Fukujin, are on the fukusa 
 as well. There smile Daikoku, the god of riches, upon 
 his rice-bags, hammer and purse in hand ; Ebisu, the god 
 of plenty, with his little red fish ; Jurojin, the serene old 
 god of longevity, with his mitred cap, white beard, staff, 
 and deer; high-browed Fukurokujin, lord of popularity 
 and wisdom ; Hotei, spirit of goodness and kindness, 
 sack on back, fan in hand, and children climbing and 
 tumbling over him; black-faced Bishamon, god of war 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 and force, holding his lance and miniature pagoda; and 
 Ilenten Sama, goddess of grace and beauty, playing the 
 lute. 
 
 Takara Bune, the good -luck ship, the New-year’s 
 junk, with dragon beak and silken sail, bearing rich 
 gifts from the unknown land, is another favorite subject. 
 I'o sleep with takara bune’s image under one’s wooden 
 pillow on New-year’s night insures good-luck and good 
 dreams for the rest of the year. Quite as significant are 
 the takara mono, the ancient and classic good-luck sym- 
 bols, which are the hat, hammer, key, straw coat, bag or 
 purse, sacred gem or pearl, the scrolls, the clove, the 
 shippo, or seven precious things, and the weights. These 
 emblems, introduced everywhere, fill flower-circles, or the 
 spaces and groundwork of geometrical designs, and are 
 always received with favor. The shojo, who have drunk 
 sake until their hair has turned red, the rats and the rad- 
 ish, the cock on the temple drum, poems in superb let- 
 tering, all ornament the fukusa, and there the mysterious 
 tnanji, or hook-cross, and the miisu tomoye, or three com- 
 mas curved within a circle, are continually reproduced. 
 
 This manji is the Svastika, or Buddhist cross of In- 
 dia, which appears in the frescos of the Pyramids and 
 the Catacombs, in Greek art, in Etruscan 
 tombs, in the embroideries and missals of 
 medijEval Europe, in the Scandinavian de- 
 sign known as Thor's hammer, in old Eng- 
 lish heraldr)’, in the Chinese symbol called 
 the “tablet of honor,” and on innumerable 
 temple ornaments. 
 
 Five of the old daimio families had the manji as their 
 crest, and it came to Japan from China and India, along 
 with the Buddhist religion. On old armor, flags, and war 
 fans it is constantly found, and it is the sign of life, of the 
 four elements, of eternity ; the portent of good-luck, the 
 talisman of safety from evil spirits, and an amulet against 
 
Embroideries and Curios 
 
 threats or harm from any of the four quarters ; while 
 the word “manji” is derived from the Chinese w'ord 
 “mantse,” meaning ten thousand. 
 
 The mitsu tomoye is another universal symbol of in- 
 numerable meanings. It occurs on the crests of eight 
 daimio families ; on temple drums, lanterns, 
 the ends of tiles, and on Daikoku’s mallet. 
 
 It is variously said to represent falling 
 snow, leaping flames, dashing water, and 
 clouds; the thongs of a warrior’s glove, 
 uncurling fern -fronds, the down of seed 
 pods; the three great elements, fire, air, and water, the 
 origin of matter, the great principles of nature, an orien- 
 tal trinity. On house-tiles and ridge-poles it invokes 
 protection from the three evils — fire, thieves, and Hood, 
 and everywhere these two mysterious symbols confront 
 one. 
 
 Kioto abounds in curio-shops, ranging from the half- 
 mile long row on either side of the Manjiuji to the 
 splendid accumulations and choice art collections of 
 Ikeda, Hayashi, Kiukioda, Takada, and the bazaar at the 
 foot of Maruyama. At Ikedas, which is really an art mu- 
 seum filled with precious things, the processes of damas- 
 cening and lacquering may be watched. It has been prov- 
 en of late that, when patrons will pay a price to warrant 
 the endless labor and care, as good lacquer may be made 
 to-day as formerly. Connoisseurs admit that they are 
 often deceived, and that they are able to tell the qual- 
 ity only, and not the age, of any really choice piece. 
 The new is as indestructible as the old, if carefully made. 
 .'V pin-point or a hot coal leaves no mark, a year’s bath 
 in sea-water no trace, and amateur photographers have 
 found it proof against the acids and chemicals of dev'el- 
 oping fluids. Vet this substance, enduring as crystal, is 
 made by coat upon coat of an ill-smelling black varnish, 
 which, stirred in a tub with iron-filings, and set in the 
 
 S *73 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 sun to thicken and blacken, may be seen daily in the 
 streets of any Japanese city. New lacquer is so poison- 
 ous to many persons that the curious are content to 
 watch at a distance, while the workmen apply coat after 
 coat, set the article in a moistened box to dry slowly, 
 and grinding and polishing surface after surface, add 
 those wonderful decorations that result in a trifle light 
 as air and precious as gold or gems. 
 
 The “ incense-shop ” is one of the choicest and most 
 truly Japanese of curio-shops. It looks, from the street, 
 an every-day affair ; but after propitiating the attendants 
 by a purchase of perfume, the inner wealth is revealed 
 in rooms filled with the choicest old wares. The sales- 
 men tempt the visitor with rare koros, or incense -burn- 
 ers, and, in an elementary way, the master plays the dai- 
 mio's old game of the Twenty Perfumes. He sprinkles 
 on the hibachi’s glowing coals some little black morsels 
 in the shape of leaves, blossoms, or characters; scatter- 
 ing green particles, brown particles, and grayish ones, 
 and showing the ignorant alien how to catch the as- 
 cending column of pale-blue smoke in the bent hand, 
 close the fingers upon it, and convey it to the nose. 
 You cannot tell which odor you prefer, nor remember 
 which dried particle gave forth a particular fragrance. 
 The nose is bewildered by the commingled wreaths and 
 mixed cathedral odors, and the master chuckles delight- 
 edly. 
 
 There are certain curio-shops of an even more exalted 
 kind, unknown to tourists, and reserved to Japanese 
 connoisseurs and to those few eminent foreign residents 
 who, in taste and appreciation, are Japanese. There, 
 little tea-jars, ancient tea-bowls, and ornaments for the 
 ink- box delight those to the manner born, and com- 
 mand great prices ; and there one sees the precious iron 
 pots of Riobondo lifted from brocade bags, and ancient 
 pieces of wrought and inlaid bronze and iron, old hel- 
 
 374 
 
Embroideries and Curios 
 
 mets and swords, such as are to be found nowhere 
 else. 
 
 Tokio and Osaka rival the Kioto makers of the finer 
 modern metal -work, all three cities having been equal 
 capitals and centres of wealth and luxury in the feudal 
 days, when the armorer was the warrior’s right-hand. 
 The descendants of the ancient metal-workers of Kioto 
 still labor at the old forges, and marvels of art, as well 
 as of patient labor, come from the various workshops of 
 the town. Both old and new designs are emplo\’ed to 
 beautify new combinations of metals, but at the present 
 day the metal-workers’ art expends itself on trifling 
 things. Instead of adorning armor and weapons and 
 fashioning their exquisite ornaments, the artists’ taste 
 and skill must be lavished on vases, placques, incense- 
 burners, hibachis, water-pots, and flower-stands, and the 
 countless cheap trifles and specimens of bijouterie made 
 for exportation. In the coloring, cutting, and inlaying 
 of bronze the Japanese are unrivalled ; but for the great 
 metal-work of the empire the student of native art must 
 visit private collections and the treasures of the great 
 curio-shops. 
 
 Feudal life invested swords and armor with their high 
 estate, and gave the armorer his rank, l ire fine temper 
 of the old blades has long challenged European admira- 
 tion, and the sword-guards, the knife- handles, and the 
 minute ornaments of the hilt are beyond compare. Sen- 
 timent, legend, and poetry glorify the sword, and the 
 edict of 1871, which forbade their use as weapons, in- 
 creased their value as relics, and brought thousands of 
 them into the curio market. In rich and noble families 
 they have always been treasured, but collections of fine 
 blades are found in other countries as well, and the 
 names of Muramasa and Masamune' and the Miochin 
 family, are as well known as that of Benvenuto Cellini 
 to connoisseurs of metal-work anywhere. 
 
 »75 
 
Jinri/eisha Days zn Japan 
 
 In the earlier uncommercial times little distinction was 
 recognized in the comparative value of metals. Tlieir 
 fitness for the purpose required, and the effectiveness of 
 their tints and tones for carrying out ornamental de- 
 signs, were what the artist considered. One metal was 
 as easily wrought by him as another. Iron was like clay 
 in his competent hands, and he moulded, cut, and ham- 
 mered as he willed, using copper, gold, silver, iron, tin, 
 zinc, lead, and antimony simply as pigments, and com- 
 bining them as a painter would his colors. The well- 
 known shibuiclit, or mixed copper and silver, and shakzido 
 or mixed iron, copper, and gold, are only general names 
 for the great range of tints and tones, shading from 
 tawniest-yellow to darkest-brown and a purple-black, 
 and from silver-white to tlie darkest steely-gray. Silver 
 and gold were inlaid with iron, the harder metal upon 
 the softer, and solid lumps of gold, silver, and lead are 
 found encrusted in bronze in a way to defy all known 
 laws of the fusion of metals. While good and even mar- 
 vellous work is still done, the old spirit is gone, and the 
 objects of to-day seem almost unworthy the art lavished 
 on them. 
 
 The magic mirror is still manufactured in Kioto, and 
 although the tourist is often assured that it does not 
 exist, innumerable specimens prove that the face of a 
 common polished steel mirror, of good quality, will reflect 
 the same design as tliat raised in relief on its back. With 
 small mirrors ten inches in diameter, as with the largest, 
 in their elaborate lacquered cases, one may throw, with 
 a ray of sunlight, a clear-cut image on wall or ceiling. 
 The pressure of the uneven surface at the back, the va- 
 rying density of the metal, and the effect of polishing, 
 all combine to give this curious attribute to these kaga- 
 ?ni, which are gradually giving place to foreign glass and 
 quicksilver. 
 
 276 
 
Potteries and Pater Wares 
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII 
 POTTERIES AND PAPER WARES 
 
 The porcelains of Kiomidzu, renowned as they are 
 tliroughout Japan, figure lightly in the export trade lists, 
 as compared to the immense shipments of decorated 
 faience from the Awata district, for which there is such 
 demand in foreign countries. On the main street of 
 that quarter, which is the beginning of the Tokaido, the 
 larger establishments cluster near together, and Kinko- 
 zan, Tanzan, and Taizan attract one in turn. Latticed 
 walls and plain gate-ways admit visitors to a succession 
 of show-rooms, where they may wander and look. As 
 it is the characteristic Japanese custom to consider every 
 foreigner as a mere sight-seer, who puts tradesmen to 
 trouble for nothing, the bushy-headed young men in 
 their clean, cool cotton gowns make no effort to sell 
 until he purchases something. Then he is led tlfrough 
 further rooms to godowns or upper chambers, and their 
 more desirable wares are displayed. 
 
 Kinkozan’s specialty is the manufacture of the fine, 
 cream-colored faience with a crackled glaze, which, when 
 decorated in one way, is known as Kioto or Awata ware, 
 and when covered with a blaze of color and sildina: is 
 the gaudily gorgeous, modern, or Kioto Satsuma, export- 
 ed by ship-loads to America, where its crude hues and 
 che.ip effects are enjoyed. No cultivated Japanese, 
 however, would ever give these monstrosities a place in 
 his own home. In .America these garish si.x-months-old 
 vases and koros are even passed off as old Satsuma, 
 
 277 
 
'Jhirikisha Days in Japan 
 
 to which softly- toned and simply - decorated w'are it 
 is no more like than is a Henri Deux tazza to a Limo- 
 ges garden - stool. Kinkozan turns out also a coarse 
 shippoyaki, or doisomiee enamel, some on faience and 
 some on copper ground ; and the blue-and-white-gowned 
 young man will lead one past garden and godown, and 
 show one every stage and process of the manufacture of 
 the different wares. The potters sit in little open al- 
 coves of rooms, each with his low wheel and heap of 
 clay before him. One old man sits with his feet doubled 
 up before him, his right foot locked fast in the bend 
 of the left knee, and the left foot laid sole upward on 
 the right thigh, in the impossible attitude of so many 
 Buddhas. This position he maintains with comfort for 
 hours, and this lean, bald - headed, old man, wearing 
 nothing but a loin-cloth and a pair of huge, round, owl- 
 ish spectacles, is as interesting as his work. He puts a 
 handful of wet gray clay on the wheel before him, mak- 
 ing it revolve with a dexterous touch of the hand, while 
 he works the lump of clay into a thick, broad bowl. \\’ith 
 his fingers and a few little sticks he soon stretches the 
 bowl upward, narrows it for a neck, broadens and flat- 
 tens it a little at the top, and presently lifts off a graceful 
 vase and sets it on a board with a row of others. In an- 
 other place the workmen are grinding and working the 
 clay ; in another, preparing the glaze and applying it, 
 and near them are the kilns in every stage. In a further 
 garden the decorators are at work, each with his box of 
 brushes and colors beside him, the vase being kept in 
 half-horizontal position before him by a wooden rest. 
 Each piece goes from one man to another, beginning 
 with the one who sketches the designs in faint outline, 
 thence passing to him who does the faces, to a third who 
 applies the red, to a fourth who touches in the diaper- 
 work and traceries, and so on to the man who liberal- 
 ly bestows the gilding. Lastly, two women slowly bur- 
 
 27S 
 
Potteries and Paper I Pa res 
 
 nish the gold by rubbing it over with wet agates or car- 
 nelian. 
 
 At the other houses faience, in an infinity of new and 
 strange designs and extraordinary colors is seen, each 
 less and less Japanese. All these Awata potters work 
 almost entirely for the foreign market, and their novel- 
 ties are not disclosed to the visitor, nor sold in Japan, 
 until they have had their vogue in the New York and 
 London markets. From those foreign centres come in- 
 structions as to shapes, colors, and designs likely to prove 
 popular for another season, and the ceramic artists ab- 
 jectly follow these foreign models. All this helps to con- 
 fuse a stranger ; for, though the wares are named for the 
 districts, towns, and provinces of their supposed nativi- 
 ty, he finds them made everywhere else — Satsuma, in 
 three or four places outside of Satsuma ; the Kaga of 
 commerce, almost anywhere except in Kaga ; while un- 
 decorated porcelain is brought from France by ship-loads 
 to be decorated and sent out again, and everywhere the 
 debasing effect of imitation and of this yielding to for- 
 eign dictates appears. 
 
 Cart-loads, car-loads, and ship loads of screens go from 
 the great ports to foreign countries, and in Kioto the 
 larger proportion of these are manufactured. Whether 
 byobu, the screen, is a purely Japanese invention, or a 
 variation of the hinged door easily suggested to any 
 primitive people who can watch Nature’s many trap- 
 doors and hinges, this people certainly makes most per- 
 sistent use of it. Twenty different kinds may be seen in 
 one’s daily rides past the little open houses, but never 
 does one discover the abominations in coarse gold thread 
 on black satin grounds so common in our country and 
 so highly esteemed. The four-fold or six-fold screen of 
 a Japanese house has its plain silk, paper, or gold-leaf 
 surface, covered with one large design or picture extend- 
 ing over the whole surface, instead of the narrow panels 
 
 279 
 
Jitiri7cis/ia Days in Japan 
 
 and patches of separate pictures which Western taste de- 
 mands. In great establishments and monasteries there 
 is a tsui iate, or flat, solid screen of a single panel, within 
 the main door-way or vestibule — a survival of a Chinese 
 fashion, intended less to baffle inquisitive eyes than to 
 keep out evil spirits and beasts. Peculiar to Kioto are 
 screens on which phosphorescent paint is used. A fa- 
 vorite design for these is the rice field at dusk, starred 
 with flickering fire-flies, whose lights glow the more as 
 the room darkens. A half century ago Gioksen, the ar- 
 tist, achieved great fame with these phosphorescent fire- 
 flies; and recently the idea has been revived, with a fine 
 promise of being vulgarized, growing coarser and cheaper 
 in execution and poorer in quality, to meet the demands 
 of the barbarian markets of the Occident. In the New- 
 year week, when each family brings out its choicest 
 screens, the display in the best streets is an art exhibition. 
 
 Screens of all sorts are more important in summer life 
 than clothing, and, of necessity, are greatly relied on in 
 the absence of garments. Screens with tiny windows in 
 them shelter the undressed citizen and give him glimpses 
 of the road, and screens with a variety of shelves and 
 hooks bring a whole kitchen to the side of the hibachi 
 on a windy day. Among summer screens, the common- 
 est is the sudare, or curtain of reeds or tiny bamboo 
 joints strung on threads. The waving of these strings 
 and their tinkling sound are supposed to suggest the 
 freshness of the stirring breeze, and the Japanese imag- 
 ination transforms the bits of crystal, strung here and 
 there, into cool rain-drops slipping down the bamboo 
 stems. The taste of the foreign buyer has vulgarized 
 the sudare, which is often a nightmare of crude design 
 and worse color, weighted with glass beads of every col- 
 or, and even made entirely of beads. The sudare in the 
 streets of a Japane.se town is almost as surely a sign of 
 a shop where shaved ice and cooling drinks may be had, 
 
 280 
 
Potteries and Paper Wares 
 
 as is our striped pole of the Occidental barber’s prem- 
 ises. 
 
 Kioto fans are celebrated, but they are no better now 
 than those of other cities, and prettier Japanese fans are 
 sold in New York for less money than in Japan, because 
 the enormous foreign demand keeps the best fan-paint- 
 ers and fan-makers of Kioto constantly employed on ex- 
 port orders. American importers send their buyers to 
 Kioto and Osaka every spring to order fans for the fol- 
 lowing j’ear. Designer and maker submit hundreds of 
 models, and the buyer offers suggestions as to color and 
 shapes. The men who execute these large orders sel- 
 dom have an open shop or sales-room, and their places 
 are known only to the trade. Thousands and hundreds 
 of thousands of ogi, or folding fans, go annually from 
 the port of Hiogo-Kobe to America, and as many more 
 from Yokohama ; while of the flat fans with handles, 
 the uc/iaca, the number is even greater. One American 
 railroad company has for years taken a hundred thou- 
 sand uchiwa each season for advertising purposes, one 
 side being left plain, to be printed upon after they reach 
 the United States. 
 
 The fan is the most ancient and important utility in 
 Japan, and since Jingo Kogo invented the ogi, after the 
 model of a bat's wing, men, women, and children have 
 never ceased carrying one in their summer obi folds. 
 Tans are the regulation gift upon every occasion and lack 
 of occasion, and a large collection is acquired in the 
 fewest summer weeks. Every large shop and tea-house 
 has its own specially decorated and perfectly well-known 
 uchiwa to be given to patrons, who in that way declare 
 their wanderings; and at feasts each guest receives a 
 plain white ogi, upon which poems, autographs, and 
 sketches are to be traced by his fellow-guests. 
 
 Formerly, Kioto shops exhibited many more kinds of 
 fans than at present. Among them were the court fan.s. 
 
Jtnrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 or /liogi, made of twenty-five broad wooden sticks strung 
 together, and wound with heavy silk cords, and as long 
 as the Empress retained the old dress she and her ladies 
 carried these heavy and useless articles. 'I'he siiehiro, or 
 wide-end fans of the priests, were a specialty of Kioto 
 and Nara, and the suehiro accompanied every gift at 
 New Years, weddings, and anniversaries, as certainly as 
 the red and gold cords and oddly folded little papers 
 now do. The gumbai uchiwa, heavy war fans, often with 
 iron or bronze outer-sticks, went with each suit of armor; 
 and the large oblong uchiwa, descending from priests to 
 No dancers and to umpires in games and contests, were 
 equally well-known productions of Kioto. P ans serve an 
 infinite variety of purposes and speak a language in this 
 land of their own, and no season or condition of life is 
 without its ministrations. The fanner winnows his grain 
 with a fan, the housewife blows up the charcoal fire with 
 a fan, and gardeners, sitting for hours on patient heels, 
 will softly fan half-open flowers until every petal unfolds. 
 P’or specific gift.s, specific designs and colors appear. 
 One fan may be offered to a lady as a declaration of love. 
 Another serves as her sign of dismissal, and the Japan- 
 ese are often amused to see foreigners misapply the lan- 
 guage and etiquette of fans. 
 
 Although gas and electricity light every Japanese city, 
 and American and Russian kerosene come in whole car- 
 goes, the manufacture of paper lanterns increases apace, 
 for now all the quarters of the globe demand them. Con- 
 structing the flimsy frames is a sleight-of-hand process, 
 and with the same deftness the old lantern-makers dash 
 on designs, characters, and body-colors, with a bold brush. 
 But one must live in Japan to appreciate the softened 
 light of lanterns, and in the lavish and general nightly 
 use of them learn all the fairy-like and splendid effects 
 to be obtained with a bit of paper, some wisps of bamboo, 
 and a little vegetable wax poured around a paper wick. 
 
 282 
 
Potteries and Paper Wares 
 
 Cotton goods are largely manufactured in Kioto, and 
 at all seasons the upper reaches of the Kamogawa’s 
 broad, stony bed are white with bleaching cloth. The Ka- 
 mogawa’s water, which is better for tea-making, for rice- 
 boiling, and for mixing dyes than the water of any other 
 stream in Japan, is also sovereign for bleaching, and its 
 banks are lined for a long distance with dyeing establish- 
 ments. The river-bed, paved with stones under each of its 
 great bridges, is dreary, wind-swept, and colorless in win- 
 ter-time, as compared to its summer brilliancy; but in Jan- 
 uary it is the place of the kite-flyers, and Hideyoshi’s 
 bronze-railed Shi jo bridge — the southern end of the To- 
 kaido, the centre from which all distances are measured 
 — commands a view of an unexampled aerial carnival. 
 'I'liousands of giant kites float upward, and the air is 
 filled with a humming, as they soar, sweep, and circle 
 over the city like huge birds. Kite combats take place 
 in mid-air, and strings covered with pounded glass cut 
 other strings, and let the half-animate paper birds and 
 demons loose. Jinrikisha coolies on bridges and streets 
 must dodge the hanging strings, and boys run over and 
 into each other while watching their ventures ; but the 
 traditional kite-flying grandfathers whom one reads about 
 in Western prints are conspicuous by their absence. 
 
 There is a game of battledore and shuttlecock much 
 played at the same season by the girls, the battledore a 
 flat wooden paddle ornamented with gaudy pictures of 
 Japanese women. The game is a pretty one, and the 
 girls are wonderfully graceful in playing it, the long 
 sleeves and the flying obi-ends taking on expressive ac- 
 tion when these charming maidens race and leap through 
 its changes. 
 
 Kioto is not without its theatres and places of amuse- 
 ment. ever ready to beguile one from the sight-seeing 
 and shopping rounds. Its great actor is Nakamura, and 
 it maintains an academy for the training of maiko and 
 
 283 
 
'Jinrtkisha Days iti Japan 
 
 geisha, where every spring there is a long-drawn-out fes- 
 tival of dances to help on the rejoicings of the cherry- 
 blossom season. But its great place of amusement, its 
 Vanity Fair, is the narrow theatre or show street running 
 from Sanjio to Shijo Street, just beyond the bridges. 
 This thoroughfare is lined all the way with rows of 
 shops, labyrinthine bazaars, stalls, and booths, theatres, 
 side-shows, peep-shows, puppet-shows, wax-works, jug- 
 glers, acrobats, wrestlers, trained animals, story-tellers, 
 fortune-tellers, all exploited by the voice and drum of 
 their loquacious agents at the door-way. No jinrikishas 
 are allowed to run on this highway, and day and night, 
 morning and midnight, it is filled with strolling people 
 and playing children. In winter it is a cheering refuge 
 from the wider, wind-swept streets, and in summer days 
 it is cool and shady, the pavement constantly sprinkled, 
 and the light and heat kept out by mat awnings stretch- 
 ed across the narrow road -way from roof to roof, in 
 Chinese fashion. At night it is the busiest place in 
 Kioto, even with the rival attraction of the river-bed; 
 crowded with revellers, torches flaring, drums and gongs 
 sounding, the high - pitched, nasal voices, of the show- 
 men sing-songing their stories and programmes; and 
 peddlers, pilgrims, priests, men, women, and children, 
 and the strangers within their gates, making up the 
 throng. Once when a giantess was on exhibition in 
 a tent the spectators, instead of being awed by her he- 
 roic eight feet of height, were convulsed with laughter 
 at sight of her. Every movement of the colossus sent 
 them into fresh spasms. It was like a personification 
 of some netsuke group to see this huge creature, with 
 hair-pins like clubs, and clogs as large as a door-step, 
 standing with folded arms, while pigmy visitors climbed 
 up to perch like insects on her shoulders. 
 
 In this ever-open market one may buy the tailless cats 
 of the country ; forlorn, spiritless creatures, staying at 
 
 284 
 
Golden Days 
 
 home and in-doors at night, and never going on midnight 
 prowls. Or, if he prefer, there are the wonderful long- 
 tailed Tosa chickens, fowls kept in tall, bamboo cages, 
 that their tail-feathers, measuring ten and twelve feet in 
 length, may make a graceful display. When they are let 
 out to scratch and wander about like other chickens, 
 their precious feathers are rolled up in papers and pro- 
 tected from any chance of harm. Japanese spaniels, or 
 Kioto chins, those little black-and-white, silky-eared pets, 
 with big, tearful, goggle eyes, and heads as round and 
 high as Fukurokojin’s, are fashionably dear, ranging from 
 five to forty dollars each, even in their native town. 
 
 From the lower end of Theatre Street a covered way 
 leads to the fish-market of the city, a dark, cool, stone- 
 floored place, where more peculiar things may be bought, 
 and more picturesque groups may be studied, in the 
 strange Rembrandtesque light, than anywhere else in 
 Kioto. The foreign artists, who carry away scores of 
 sketches of Japanese life, seem never to find this fish- 
 market, nor in general to seize the best and least hack- 
 neyed subjects. Most of their pictures have been long 
 anticipated by the native photographers, and the foreign 
 artist repeats, with less fidelity, the familiar scenes and 
 subjects, with that painstaking western method that, to 
 the Japanese eye, leaves as little to the imagination as 
 the photograph itself. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIX 
 GOLDEN DAYS 
 
 Nammikawa, the first cloisonne artist of the world, has 
 his home, his workshop, and his little garden in a quiet 
 corner of the Awata district. Most visitors never pass 
 beyond his ante-room, as Nammikawa holds his privacy 
 
Jinrikzsha Days m Japan 
 
 dear, and that small alcove with the black table gives lit- 
 tle hint of what lies beyond. 'I’he more fortunate visitor 
 follows the master through a dark recess to a large room 
 with two sides open to the garden, and a tiny balcony 
 overhanging a lakelet. He claps his hands, and big 
 golden carp rise to the surface and gobble the mochi 
 thrown them. In that little paradise, barely sixty feet 
 square, are hills, groves, thickets, islands, promontories, 
 and bays, a bamboo - shaded well, and a shrine, while 
 above the farthest screen of foliage rise the green slopes 
 of Maruyama. 
 
 A Japanese friend, who described Nammikawa as 
 “ the most Japanese and most interesting man in Ki- 
 oto,” took us to drink tea with him in this charming gar- 
 den, and, on the hottest afternoon of a hot Kioto sum- 
 mer, we noted neither time nor temperature until the 
 creeping shadows warned us to depart. Old Japan seem- 
 ed to re-live in the atmosphere of that garden, and a cha 
 no yu was no more finished than the simple tea-ceremo- 
 ny the master performed there. By the old etiquette a 
 Japanese gentleman never intrusted to any servant the 
 making of tea for a guest, nor allowed the fine art of 
 that simple, every-day process to be exercised unseen. 
 The tea-tray, brought and set before the master, bore a 
 tiny jeweblike tea-pot of old Awata, and the tiny cloi- 
 sonne cups with plain enamelled linings were as richh' 
 colored as the circle of a tulip’s petals, and smaller far. 
 With them was a small pear-shaped dish, not unlike our 
 gravy-boats, a beautiful bronze 7nidzu isttgi, or hot-water 
 pot, and a lacquer box holding a metal tea-caddy filled 
 with the finest leaves from Uji tea-gardens. Taking a 
 scoop of yellowed ivory, carved in the shape of a giant 
 tea-leaf, our host filled the little tea-pot with loosely- 
 heaped leaves, and having decanted the hot water into 
 the little pear-shaped pitcher to cool a little, poured it 
 upon the tea -leaves. Immediately he drew off the 
 
 286 
 
Golden Days 
 
 palest amber fluid, half filling each cup, and presented 
 them to us, resting on leaf-shaped stands or saucers of 
 damascened metal. The tea was only lukewarm when 
 we received it, but as delicate and exquisitely flavored as 
 if distilled of violets, as rich and smooth as a syrup, the 
 three sips of it constituting a most powerful stimulant. 
 In the discussion of tea-making that followed, our Jap- 
 anese mentor explained to us that to the epicurean 
 tea-drinkers of his country, boiling water was an abom- 
 ination, as it scorched the leaves, drove out the fine 
 fragrance in the first cloud of steam, and extracted the 
 bitterness instead of the sweetness of the young leaves. 
 “ It may be well enough to pour boiling water on the 
 coarse black tea of China’s wild shrub,” said this delight- 
 ful Japanese, “but the delicate leaf of <?///- cultivated tea- 
 plant does not need it.” 
 
 With the tea our host offered us large flat wafers of 
 rice and fancy confections in the shape of most elab- 
 orate asters and chrysanthemums, too artistic to be eat- 
 en without compunction. The cups were refilled with 
 the second and stronger decoction, whicli set every nerve 
 tingling, and then only were we permitted to see the 
 treasures of Nammikawa’s creation. From box and 
 silken bag within bag were produced vases, whose lines, 
 color, lustre, and brilliant intricacy of design made them 
 beautiful beyond praise. They were wrought over with 
 finest traceries of gold, silver, and copper wires, on 
 grounds of dull Naples yellow, soft yellowish-green, a 
 darker green, or a rich deep-red, wonderful to behold, 
 the polished surface as even and flawless as that of a 
 fine onyx. 
 
 One by one some smaller pieces were brought in, in 
 little boxes of smooth white pine, beautifully made 
 and joined. Nammikawa opened first the cotton wad- 
 ding, then the inevitable wrapping of yellow cloth, and 
 lastly the silken covers, and handled with a tender rev- 
 
 2S7 
 
'jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 erence these exquisite creations of his genius, every one 
 of which, when placed on its low teak-wood stand, showed 
 faultless. For two years his whole force was at work on 
 the two sixteen-inch vases which went to the Paris Ex- 
 position, and four years were given to the himperor’s 
 order for a pair for his new' palace. These bore the 
 imperial emblems, and dragons writhed between chrys- 
 anthemums and through conventional flower-circles and 
 arabesques, and the groundw’ork displayed the splendid 
 red, green, russet, mottled gold, and glistening avanturine 
 enamels, whose secret Nammikawa holds. For it is not 
 only in his fine designs, but in the perfect composition 
 and fusing of his enamels and the gem-like polish that 
 this great artist excels all rivals. 
 
 In another garden, concealed by a bamboo hedge, is 
 the tiny laboratory, and the one work-room where less 
 than twenty people, all told, execute the master’s de- 
 
 IN NAMMIKAWA’S W'ORK-ROO.M 
 288 
 
Golden Days 
 
 signs. One etches these patterns on the copper base, 
 following Xammikawa's delicately traced outlines : an- 
 other bends and fastens the wires on the etched lines, 
 and a third coats the joinings with a red oxide that, after 
 firing, unites the wires more firmly to the copper. Oth- 
 ers dot the paste into the cell-like spaces, or sit over tubs 
 of water, grinding with fine stones, with charcoal, and 
 deer-horn the surface of the pieces that have been fired. 
 Xammikawa adds the master-touches, and after conduct- 
 ing the final firing, himself gives them the last incompar- 
 able polish, after his men have rubbed away for weeks. 
 These workmen come and go as they please, working 
 only when the spirit moves them, and doing better work, 
 the master believes, when thus left to their own devices. 
 All of them are artists whose skill is a family inheritance, 
 and they have been with Xammikawa for many years. 
 The most skilful of these craftsmen receive one yen a 
 day, which is extravagant pay in this land of simple liv- 
 ing. and shows in what high esteem they are held. A 
 few women are employed in the polishing and the sim- 
 pler details, and. while we watched them, were burnish- 
 ing a most exquisite tea-pot covered with a fine foliated 
 design on pale yellow ground. This treasure had been 
 bought bv some connoisseur while the first rough filling 
 of paste was being applied, .and he had bided his time 
 for a twelvemonth, while the slow processes of filling and 
 refilling the cells, and firing and refiring the paste had 
 succeeded one another until it was ready for the first 
 grinding. 
 
 Fifty or sixty small pieces, chiefly vases, caskets, and 
 urns, three and four inches high, and ranging in price 
 from thirty to ninety yen each, are a whole year's output, 
 and larger pieces are executed by special order at the 
 same time with these. Xammikawa does not like to seil 
 to the trade, and has been known to refuse the requests 
 of curio merchants, making his customers pay more if he 
 
 T 289 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 suspects that they are buying to sell again. It is his 
 delight to hand the precious article to its new owner, en- 
 joining him to keep it wrapped in silk and wadding, and 
 always to rub it carefully to remove any moisture before 
 putting it away. He cautions visitors, when they attempt 
 to handle the precious pieces in his show-room, not to 
 touch the enamelled surface with the hand, the metal 
 base and collar being left free on each piece for that 
 purpose. Nor must two pieces of cloisonne ever be knock- 
 ed together,, as the enamel is almost more brittle than 
 porcelain. Curiously enough, this great artist uses no 
 mark nor sign-manual. “ If my work will not declare it- 
 self to be mine, then the marking will do no good,” he 
 says ; and, indeed, his cloisonne is so unlike the crude 
 and commonplace enamels e.xported from Japan by ship- 
 loads for the foreign market, that it does not need the 
 certification of his name. 
 
 Nammikaw'a has the face of a saint, or poet — gentle, 
 refined, and intellectual — and his beautiful manner and 
 perfect courtesy are an inheritance of the old Japan. 
 His earlier days were not saintly, although they may 
 have been poetical. He was a personal attendant of 
 Prince Kune no Miya, a brother of Prince Komatsu, and 
 cousin of the Emperor, and was brought up in the old 
 court life with its atmosphere of art and leisure. The 
 elegant young courtier was noted for his gayety and im- 
 providence. He remained in Kioto when the court moved 
 northward, and all at once ceased his dissipations, even 
 putting aside his pipe, to devote himself to e.xperiments 
 in the manufacture of cloisonne, for which he had always 
 had a passion. In his laboratory there is a square 
 placque, a bluish bird on a white ground diapered with 
 coarse wires, wdiich w'as his first piece. One can hardly 
 believe that only fifteen years intervene between this 
 coarse, almost Chinese, specimen of his w^ork, and the 
 vases for the Emperor's palace. From the start he threw 
 
 290 
 
Golden Days 
 
 himself into his profession with his whole soul and spirit. 
 Incessant experiments in the solitude of his laboratory 
 and work room at night, and the zeal and patience of a 
 Palissy at the furnace, conquered his province. He is 
 still constantly studying and experimenting, and always 
 fires his pieces himself, keeping long vigils by the little 
 kiln in the garden. 
 
 Hurry and money-making he despises. Gazing dream- 
 ily out into his garden, Nammikawa declared that he had 
 no ambition to have a large godown, a great workshop, 
 and a hundred workmen ; that he always refused to take 
 any large commissions or commercial orders, or to promise 
 a piece at any given time. Neither good art nor good 
 work can be commanded by money, he thought, nor did 
 he want his men to work faster, and therefore less care- 
 fully, because greater prices are offered him for haste. 
 It was his pleasure, he said, to take years for the execu- 
 tion of a single piece that might stand flawless before 
 all connoisseurs, and receive its just reward of praise or 
 medals. 'I'he latter are dearer to him than any sum of 
 money, and in his own garden he finds happiness with 
 them. 
 
 There is a Nammikawa of Tokio who is not to be con- 
 founded with this Kioto artist. The Tokio enameller 
 h.is an entirely different style, a simple design thrown in 
 a broad style upon an unbroken groundwork, easily dis- 
 tinguishing his work from any other ; but Nammikawa 
 of Tokio deals directly with the trade, even contracting 
 with foreign curio dealers for seasons of work, and makes 
 replicas of his exquisite pieces by the score for them. 
 Imitators of his style have arisen, and already many 
 cheap pieces, copying his best models, can be purchased 
 in foreign cities. 
 
 riie idling most delightful of all in Kioto is going 
 over and over again to the same places, doing the same 
 thing repeatedly, and arriving at that happy and emi- 
 
 291 
 
Ji)irikisha Days in Japan 
 
 nently Japanese frame of mind where haste enters not; 
 time is forgotten, days slip by uncounted, and limits 
 cease to be. The spring days, when the rain falls in 
 gauziest mist — the rain that is so good for young rice — 
 or summer days, when the sun scorches the earth and 
 burns one’s very eyeballs, seem to bring the most un- 
 broken leisure and longest hours in any agreeable refuge. 
 
 Sitting on Yaami’s veranda, with the great plain of 
 the city wreathed in mists or quivering in heat, I have 
 recognized my indebtedness to Griffis, Dresser, Mitford, 
 Morse, and Rein, those authorities on all things Japan- 
 ese, not to mention Murray and his ponderous guide- 
 book, whose weight and polysyllabic pages strike terror 
 to the soul of the new-comer. Griffis I read, until Tairo 
 and Minamoto, Hideyoshi and lyeyasu, grew as familiar 
 as William the Conqueror and the Declaration of Inde- 
 pendence ; Dresser’s text and illustrations were a con- 
 stant delight and illumination, explaining the incompre- 
 hensible and pointing to hidden things; and Morse’s 
 Japanese Homes laid bare their mysteries, and made ev- 
 ery fence, roof, rail, ceiling, and wall take on new feat- 
 ures and expression. Rein’s is the encyclopredia, and 
 he the recorder, from whose statements there is no ap- 
 peal, and to him we turned for everything. It is only 
 on the sacred soil that the student gets the true value 
 and meaning of these books ; while nothing so nearly 
 expresses and explains the charm of the countrj- as that 
 prose idyl, Percival Lowell’s Soul of the Far East, nor so 
 perfectly fits one’s moods on these long, leisure days, and 
 Mifford’s Tales of Old Japan are of ceaseless delight. 
 
 In this Japanese atmosphere the traveller feels what 
 he misses through his ignorance of the vernacular, and 
 is even inspired with a desire to study the language ; but 
 a little skimming of the grammar usually brings down 
 that vaulting ambition. It is easy to pick up words and 
 phrases for ordinary use, as all servants understand some 
 
 2Q2 
 
Golden Days 
 
 English, and every hotel and shop has its interpreter. 
 Upper-class people, whom one meets socially, always 
 speak English, French, or German. Scholars declare 
 that the mastery of the language takes from twelve to 
 thirty years, and the compiler of the standard lexicon 
 modestly says for himself that forty years is not enough. 
 With a few most illustrious exceptions, no foreigner, who 
 h.is not learned Japanese almost before his own tongue, 
 has ever been able to grasp its idioms so as to express 
 himself with clearness and accuracy. The whole theory 
 and structure of the language are so different from and 
 so opposed to European speech — so intricate and so ar- 
 bitrary, that the alien brain fails to grasp it. The lower, 
 middle, and upper classes have each a different mode of 
 expression, and the women of each class use a still sim- 
 pler version. He who learns the court language cannot 
 make himself understood by shop-keepers or serv'ants. 
 He who has acquired coolie-talk insults a gentleman by 
 uttering its common words and inelegant expressions in 
 his presence. 
 
 As if the differences between the polite and the com- 
 mon idioms and names for things did not make verbal 
 complications enough, the imperial family and their sat- 
 ellites hav'e a still finer phraseology with a special vocab- 
 ulary for their exclusive use. Sake, or rice brandy, be- 
 comes kukon at court; a dumpling, which is a dango in 
 the city, becomes an ishi-ishi when it enters the palace- 
 gates ; and a shirt, or juban, is transmuted to a heijo on 
 an imperial back. Well-bred women say o hiya for cold 
 water, and men always call it mizu. A dog not only gets 
 the honorific prefi.x o, but if you call him, you say polite- 
 ly 0 ide, just as you would to a child ; while the impera- 
 tive koi ! koi ! (come, come,) is polite enough for the rest 
 of the brute creation. Children say umamma for food, 
 but if you do not say omamma instead, nesans will gig- 
 gle over your baby talk. 
 
 393 
 
Jinrikisha Days in 'Japan 
 
 Dialects and localisms contribute still further to con- 
 fusion of tongues. A hibachi in Kioto is a shibachi in 
 Yokohama, as a Hirado vase is a Shirado one. When 
 you inquire a price, you say ikura for “ how much ” in 
 Yokohama, and nafnbo 'm Kioto. All around Tokio the 
 g has the sound of ng, or gamma nasal, and this nasal 
 tone of the capital is another point of conformity with 
 the modern French. 
 
 Everywhere in Japan an infinity of names belongs to 
 the simplest things. Twenty- five synonyms for rice are 
 given in Hepburn’s smaller dictionary, all as different as 
 possible. Rice in every stage of growing, and in every 
 condition after harvesting, has a distinct name, with no 
 root common to all. Endless mistakes follow any inex- 
 actness of pronunciation. The numerals, dki, ni, san, ski, 
 " 0 , rokn, shk/ti, Jiachi, ktt, jn, are easily memorized, and 
 learning to count up to one hundred is child’s play com- 
 pared to the struggle with French numerals. It is not 
 necessary to say “ four times twenty, ten, and seven,” be- 
 fore ninety-seven is reckoned; that is simply jn s/iichi, 
 or nine tens and a seven. Twenty is ni jn, thirty is san 
 ju, fifty is go jn, and so through the list. The ordinal 
 numbers have dai prefixed or ban added, and “fourth ” is 
 then yo ban. That ichi ban means “number one,” and ni 
 ban, “number two,” surprises people who had supposed 
 that Mr. Ichi Ban and Mr. Ni Ban owned the great Japan- 
 ese stores that used to exist in two American cities. After 
 learning the plain cardinal and ordinal numbers, the neo- 
 phyte must remember to add the s}’llable shiki when 
 mentioning any number of animals, nin for people, ken 
 for houses, so for ships, cho for jinrikishas, hai for glasses 
 or cups of any liquid, hon for long and round objects, 7iiai 
 for broad and flat ones, Isn for letters or papers, satsu for 
 books, wa for bundles or birds. Any infraction of these 
 rules gives another meaning to the intended phrase, and 
 the slightest v.ariation in inflection changes it quite as 
 
Golden Days 
 
 much. If you want three Jzurumas, you say “ kuruma san 
 c/io,” and five plates are sa?'a go tnai.” To say simply 
 saiyo (yes), or lye (no), is inadmissible. The whole state- 
 ment must be made with many flourishes, and frequent 
 do gozarimas ns adorn a gentleman’s conversation. 
 
 If a curio dealer asks whether you wish to see a koro, 
 and you look for the word in the lexicon, you find that 
 koro means, according to Dr. Hepburn’s dictionary, time, 
 period of time, a cylindrical wooden roller used in moving 
 heavy bodies, the elders, old people, tiger and wolf, i.e., 
 savage and cruel, stubborn, bigoted, narrow-minded, a 
 road, a journey, a censer for burning incense, and the sec- 
 ond or third story of a house. So, too, kikn may mean a 
 chrysanthemum, or a compass and square, a rule, an 
 established custom, the moment or proper time; fear, ti- 
 midity, and a score of other things. The chief compensa- 
 tions of tlie language are its simple and unvarying rules 
 of pronunciation, every syllable being evenly accented, 
 every vowel making a syllable, and, pronounced as con- 
 tinental vowels are, giving music to every word. 
 
 The written language is the study of another lifetime. 
 Having the Chinese written language as its basis, the 
 Chinese, Japanese, and Koreans can all understand one 
 another in this form common to all, though not in the 
 spoken tongue. It is common to see Chinese and Jap- 
 anese coolies writing characters in the air, in the dust, or 
 in the palms of their hands, and seeming to make them- 
 selves intelligible in this classical sign language. The 
 written language has the katagana, or square characters, 
 and the hiragana, or “grass” characters, the latter sim- 
 pler and more nearly corresponding to our script or run- 
 ning hand. 
 
 The efforts of scholars are now turned to Romaicising 
 or transliterating the Japanc.se sounds and characters, 
 and expressing them by the common alphabet of Latin 
 and .\nglo-.Saxon people, basing it on phonetic spelling. 
 
 S95 
 
^inrikisha Days in Japa7i 
 
 Volapuk, the new universal language of all nations, offers 
 great difficulties to the Japanese, for although Schleyer, 
 its inventor, kindly left out the r, which the Chinese can- 
 not pronounce, he left in the /, which is a corresponding 
 stumbling-block for the Japanese, who is seldom a natural 
 linguist. 
 
 CHAPTER XXX 
 
 SENKE AND THE MERCHANTS’ DINNER 
 
 It required an elaborate negotiation extending through 
 two weeks, as well as the tactful aid of an officer of the 
 Kioto Kencho to arrange for me a cha no yu at the house 
 of Senke, the great master of the oldest school of that 
 art. Senke was about going to Uji to choose his teas ; 
 he was changing his teas; he was airing his godowns, and 
 he sent a dozen other excuses to prevent his naming a 
 day. Not until it had been explained fully to this great 
 high-priest of the solemnity that I had studied cha no 
 yu with his pupil, Matsuda, and that, knowing that Mat- 
 suda had first studied the Hori no Uji method, I was pur- 
 suing the art to its fountain-head, to make sure that no 
 heterodox version of the Senke method had betrayed my 
 inexperience, would he consent to receive me. 
 
 Senke is a descendant of Rikiu, the instructor and 
 friend of Hideyoshi, the Taiko. For years they prac- 
 tised the “ outward ” rites together, and wrote poems to 
 one another, until Hideyoshi admired Rikiu’s beautiful 
 daughter. Rikiu refused her to him, and estrangement 
 followed. Rikiu had built a .splendid gate-way for the 
 Daitokuji temple, within which, as was the fashion of the 
 time, he had placed a small wooden statue of himself. 
 Taiko Sama, riding through with his train one day, was 
 
 296 
 
Settkd and ihe Merchatits Dinner 
 
 told of the statue overhead. He declared it an insult to 
 him, the Shogun, and sent to Rikiu the fateful short sword, 
 the UHikazashi, and the great master died the honorable 
 death of seppuku, or hara kiri. 
 
 “And the daughter? Did the Taiko get her after Ri- 
 kiu's death ?” we asked, as we sat waiting in Senke’s 
 garden, listening to the many histories connected with the 
 place. “ Wakarimasen ” (I do not know), said our friend, 
 with that Japanese indifference to the end of a story that 
 so perplexes the western mind. 
 
 Senke has a lovely garden beyond the palace walls, and 
 reached by deserted streets, whose blank walls shelter 
 aristocratic homes. Crossing a court, we crept through 
 a small door in a large gate-way and entered this retreat, 
 whose floor was all irregular stones, covered evenly with 
 a soft, velvety, green moss. Upon this verdant surface 
 fell dappled shadows and an occasional ray of sunshine 
 from a canopy of maple, cherry, and pine branches, care- 
 fully clipped and trained so ns to form an even tent-roof 
 over the whole enclosure. The stillness w’as unbroken, 
 though upon this strange paradise looked out a dozen 
 exquisitely simple tea-rooms, each isolated and sheltered 
 from the view of any other. Pupils come to Senke from 
 all parts of Japan, but even when every tea-room is in 
 use the same hush reigns. To subdue us to what we 
 were to work in, and to enhance Tortune’s supreme fa- 
 vor of a cha no yu in the Taiko’s manner, we were made 
 to wait and wait before we were invited into the cool 
 twilight of a large tea-room. The house has been burn- 
 ed twice since Hideyoshi's day, but each time has been 
 exactly reproduced, so that virtually we sat where the 
 Taiko had sat for many hours, and we used the verita- 
 ble bowls, spoons, trays, and tea-caddies sanctified by 
 his touch three hundred years ago. The Taiko’s crest 
 was on the simple, gold decked screens of the room, and 
 an autograph verse on a kakemono, and a single pink 
 
Jinrikisha Days in ’Japan 
 
 lily in a bronze vase, were the ornaments of the toko- 
 noma. 
 
 Senke, now past seventy years of age, receives few 
 pupils himself, but neither he nor his handsome son of 
 about thirty years is wholly incurious as to the strange 
 fashions that have entered the country since the Res- 
 toration. We bowed with the profound solemnity of 
 mourners, but with the vigilance of spies we watched 
 Senke as he built the fire, laid on the white azalea char- 
 coal, dropped some chips of sandal-wood, and boiled his 
 historic iron kettle. Then followed the feast of many 
 delicate dishes— tea; bean-soup, with bits of egg-plant; 
 raw fish with shreds of dalkcn and fresh ginger; tai- 
 soup, with sea -weed and mushrooms; broiled with 
 shoyti ; bamboo - soup ; dried Shikoku salmon; broiled 
 birds ; Kaga walnuts, preserved in a thick syrup, and 
 other dishes ; each course accompanied by rice, and 
 ending with barley-water. An old iron sake-pot and 
 shallow red lacquer sak^-cups were passed around with 
 the various dishes, and we gravely pledged one another 
 and the master who served us. \\'hen the dried fish was 
 brought in my Kencho friend nipped off some choice 
 bits w'ith his chop sticks and offered them on a paper to 
 our host, who ate them, and put the paper in his sleeve. 
 At the end of the feast the first guest — the one sitting 
 nearest the tokonoma — wiped all his bowls and dishes 
 clean with paper, which he put in his sleeve, and we fol- 
 lowed his example. V.'ith the thirteenth course we gath- 
 ered up our tray of sweets and retired to the garden, 
 waiting there until soft strokes on an old bell called us 
 back to the room, which had been swept, and the pict- 
 ure and vase in the tokonoma changed. Senke, too, had 
 replaced his dark gauze kimono by one of pale -blue 
 crape, and sat in a reverent attitude. U'ith infinite de- 
 liberation he went through the solemn rites, and duly 
 presented us each with a bowl of green gruel more bitter 
 
 298 
 
Scnke and the Merchants’ Dinner 
 
 than quinine, twelve spoonfuls of powdered tea being 
 the measure used. This was his koi cha. The usu cha 
 was a less strong decoction, demanding a simpler cere- 
 mony, and was served in a bowl passed around for all to 
 sip from in turn. Previous study enabled us to note in- 
 telligently every movement of the old master, and the 
 significant position of each thumb and finger, hand, el- 
 bow, and wrist, as the venerable artist of cha no yu ex- 
 emplified the grace and niceties of the “outward” 
 school. 
 
 At the proper time we asked the history of the imple- 
 ments used in the ceremony. The na tsiimc, or tea- 
 bowl of Raku ware, in Jo-o shape, belonged to Rikiu, 
 Jo-o having been the teacher of Rikiu, and the arbiter 
 of the form of many implements of cha no yu. The 
 little bamboo slip with a fiat, curved end, which lifted 
 the powdered tea from its box, was cut by Rikiu. It 
 bears no decoration or mark, and is of the ordinary 
 shape ; but this commonplace cha shaku cannot be bought 
 for even two hundred dollars. The Emperor Komei, 
 father of the present Emperor, was taught by the elder 
 Senke, and bequeathed to his master various autographs 
 and an incense-box of great antiquity. Driven though 
 he is by the spirit of innovation and progress, the pres- 
 ent Emperor occasionally enjoys a few quiet hours at 
 cha no yu. The Empress is most accomplished in its 
 ceremonial, and delights in the little poems which guests 
 are always expected to write for the host. 
 
 When the moment arrived for the production of these 
 tributes at Senke’s tea, our Japanese friends dashed 
 them off in an instant, as if, with the return to their cer- 
 emonial silk gowns, they had returned to the habits of 
 thought of old Japan, when poetry filled the air. Hut 
 one of them whispered, to encourage us, “ I have been 
 thinking it these two weeks.” 
 
 With regret we saw cha ire (tea-caddy), cha wan (tea- 
 299 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 bowl), cha sen (tea -whisk), and cha shaku (teaspoon), 
 tied up in their precious brocade bags, and, with pro- 
 found obeisances, we took leave of Senke, feeling that 
 for a day we had slipped out of our century, and almost 
 out of our planet, so unlike is the cha no yu to any other 
 function in this irreverent, practical, and pushing era. 
 
 Of our friend, who had drained two of three’bowls of 
 it, we asked, “ Does not this strong tea make you nerv- 
 ous, keep you awake, give you the cha ni yoita, or tea 
 tremens ?” 
 
 “ Oh no,” he answered ; “ I do not drink enough of 
 it. I am very careful. But my friends, when they be- 
 gin the study of English and foreign branches, find that 
 they must stop drinking it. The English seems to bring 
 into action many nerves that we do not use, and the 
 drink is probably exciting enough in itself.” 
 
 Eoreign teachers say tlie same thing, and at the Do- 
 shisha school tobacco must be given up, though, next to 
 tea, it is the great necessity of the Japanese. 
 
 Kioto's maiko and geisha performances are, of course, 
 more splendid than those of any other city. The great 
 training-school of maiko conforms to the classic tradi- 
 tions, and critics and connoisseurs assemble at the Ka- 
 burenjo theatre each spring when the famous Kioto 
 dance, the Miakodori, is given by troops of maiko. 
 
 Did I not possess the ocular proof of a fan and a few 
 souvenirs I could believe the fete which I saw to have 
 been but a midsummer night's dream. A club of the 
 great merchants of the city, wishing to do honor to two 
 Tokio officials, devised a dinner, or geisha party, and in- 
 cluded their American friends. The evening was one of 
 the heaviest, hottest, and sultriest of the Kioto summer, 
 and, after the sun sank in a bed of mist, swarmed with 
 myriads of mosquitoes. Later, the full moon poured 
 down a flood of silvery light that seemed to quiver with 
 heat, yet, apparelled in our uncomfortable regulation cos- 
 
 300 
 
Senke and the Merchants Dtnner 
 
 tume, we found our w'ay through the lanes to the dark 
 gate-vva\s of Nishi Otani’s long approach. The broad 
 stone path lay marble-white in the moonlight between 
 rows of gigantic trees, the tall stone lanterns looked like 
 ghostly sentries, and fire-flies floated through the still, hot 
 darkness. At the foot of the avenue a line of red lan- 
 terns hung glowing and motionless in mid-air, like so 
 many strange fruits on the black branches. When we 
 passed into the open, moonlighted court of the Gion 
 temple and under its giant torii, we were received at a 
 wide door-way by the master of the feast and the whole 
 tea-house staff. 
 
 Above were our forty-four hosts of the evening, among 
 whom were the court brocade-weaver, the great merchant 
 of painted crapes, the maker of the incomparable enam- 
 els, the masters of the great potteries and bronze works, 
 and a few artists. We bowed three or four times to each 
 gentleman, who bowed twice as often to us, and we won- 
 dered how these quiet, grave, and gracious hosts, in their 
 rustling garments of dark striped silks and their white 
 ta/>/s, could look so cool and fresh. 
 
 All the screens of the upper floor had been taken out, 
 and three sides of the room were open to the night. We 
 were conducted to seats at one end, the company grave- 
 ly dropped upon the cushions ranged along either side, 
 and the master of ceremonies, a great silk merchant and 
 manufacturer, made a formal speeeh of welcome, and 
 begged us to accept the poor repast they were about to 
 offer. Every one bowed three times, a proper response 
 was made, we all bowed again, and a file of nesans in 
 dark silk gowns brought in tiny cups of tea. Then fol- 
 lowed ten of the most famous maiko of Kioto, dazzling 
 beauties, who advanced noiselessly, two by two, in ex- 
 quisite kimonos of painted crape and obis of woven 
 sunshine, and with coronals of silver hair-pins on their 
 heads. As they drew near, all gliding with the- same 
 
 30 « 
 
Jinrikisha Days in "Japan 
 
 slow grace, they knelt and set before us the ozens, or low 
 lacquer tables, liolding cups, bowls, chopsticks, and nap- 
 kins. Two tiny maiko then entered with large trays of 
 sweetmeats, and the master of ceremonies lifted off with 
 his chopsticks and set before us sections of confection- 
 ery — waves and fan -tailed goldfish, an impressionist 
 sketch in sugar of rippling water filled with darting fish. 
 On Nabeshima and Owari plates, and in lacquer and por- 
 celain bowls, were served innumerable courses — soups, 
 omelet, lily bulbs, chicken, small birds, jellies, many un- 
 known and delightful dishes — and with each remove, 
 rice, lifted from a fine, red-lined, gold lacquer rice box 
 furnished with a big lacquer spoon worth six silver ones. 
 Tai, the sterlet of Japan, the arbitrary accessory of any 
 great feast, whose curiously shaped bones are symbols 
 of hospitality and abundance, was accompanied by a 
 peppery salad, and followed by more birds, by bamboo 
 sprouts, and a stew of bechc-de-mer, before the appearance 
 of the piece de resistance. 
 
 The maiko advanced in a broad line, two of them 
 bearing a large tray on which lay a magnificent carp, 
 still breathing, and with his scales shining as if just 
 drawn from the water. The master of ceremonies ad- 
 vanced, and, receiving the tray from the maiko, set it 
 on the mats and turned it .glowly around for all to be- 
 hold. As the maiko retired all leaned forward to watch 
 the noble carp, as it lay quivering on its bed of moss 
 and cresses, with a background of greenery like a true 
 Japanese garden. This custom of serving the living fish 
 at a feast is a survival of a traditional usage that for- 
 eigners seldom witness. Morsels of the fish were pres- 
 ently lifted from its back and passed to the company. 
 To us the performance was a kind of cannibalism pos- 
 sessing a horrible fascination, but the epicures uttered 
 sounds expressive of appreciation as they lingered over 
 the delicious morsels. A sudden jar or turning of the 
 
 302 
 
Scnke and the Merchants Dinner 
 
 tray made the carp writhe, and left upon us a sense of 
 guilty consent and connivance which lasted for days. 
 
 Rice and eels were next served, another soup, more 
 fowl, and then, with sponge-cake, fruits, and additional 
 cups of tea, the feast concluded. Centuries ago the 
 Portuguese taught the Japanese to make sponge-cake, 
 and now they surpass in the art even a New England 
 house-keeper with “faculty.” With each course there 
 had been an exchange of sake-cups and the drinking of 
 innumerable healths, with amazing elaboration of eti- 
 quette. Each guest must accept the proffered pledge, 
 extend it to be filled, touch the forehead, drink, empty, 
 and return it to the giver, that he may repeat the same 
 routine. The guests in their rustling garments moved 
 about the mats, sitting before one and another in turn 
 for a little chat and an exchange of sake-cups, and for- 
 mal speeches and responses were made as well. 
 
 Throughout the feast the geishas twanged the koto 
 and the samisen, and the maiko in painted crapes and 
 gorgeous brocades danced with choral accompaniment. 
 Their broad obis were tied in Osaka fashion, in long 
 butterfly loops that spread the golden and glistening 
 fabric all over the back of their scant, clinging kimonos. 
 'I’hese lovely young creatures slowly posed, through 
 dance after dance, bending, swaving, and turning with 
 exquisite grace, moving their golden fans in time with 
 tlie wail of the instruments and the plaintive burden of 
 the song explaining the pantomime. It was a strange 
 scene— the room, open to the summer night, hung round 
 with crimson lanterns and lighted with the soft glow 
 from the tall andons ; the lines of sitting figures in their 
 rich silk garments, and the dark faces lost in reverie as 
 they followed the mazes of the golden-robed dancers. 
 
 After the dinner and between their dances the maiko 
 seated themselves before the guests to entertain them 
 with their wit and badinage, to fill the sake-cups, and to 
 
 303 
 
yinriktsha Days in Japati 
 
 let the company admire them. Raiha was the name of 
 one demure beauty, who inquired of us which one of 
 them was loveliest according to our foreign standards. 
 While we considered, some became coquettish and full 
 of little Japanese airs and graces, but whatever sparkle 
 and expression they threw into their eyes, the meekest 
 look was given to the whole face by the broad touch of 
 carmine on the lower lip. The final decision gave Raiha 
 tliree of the foreign votes, and the one dissenter con- 
 formed when our Japanese friends assured him that she 
 was the reigning professional beauty of Kioto. And we 
 thought her shy, distinguished manners, her silver thread 
 of a voice, and her demure eyes and smiles more charm- 
 ing even than her lov'ely face. 
 
 At midnight, when a monastery bell was softly boom- 
 ’ng from the mountain-slopes, we began our adieus. 
 Nearly one hundred and forty bows were to be made by 
 each of us, for, after bowing three or four times and say- 
 ing “ sayonara ” to each of our hosts, we had to bid adieu 
 to the lovely maikos and acknowledge the salutations of 
 the tea-house attendants. When we sat down at the 
 door way to have our shoes put on, we were dizzy enough 
 to be grateful for the fanning that the tea-house girls be- 
 stowed upon us. A chorus of sayonaras accompanied us 
 as we followed the coolies with their long lanterns out 
 through the torii and into the black shadows of the tem- 
 ple grounds. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXI 
 THROUGH UJI TO NARA 
 
 An early morning start, with many jinrikishas and 
 tandems of coolies ; a wild spin through the streets, past 
 shops, temple gates and walls ; by the innumerable toriis 
 and lanterns forming arches and vistas in the groves of 
 
 •304 
 
I’lCKINc; TEA 
 
Through Uji to Nara 
 
 Inari, the great temple of the fox-god, and we came out 
 on the plain beyond Fushimi; then an irregular, hilly 
 country, green with ancient pine and bamboo groves, 
 every open valley and hill -side set with low, green 
 mounds of tea-bushes ; sandy, white roads, clear rush- 
 ing streams, and we were in the heart of Uji, the finest 
 tea district of Japan. 
 
 Groups of bobbing hats beside the tea-bushes, carts 
 loaded with sacks and baskets of tea-leaves ; trays of 
 toasting tea- leaves within every door -way, a delicate 
 rose-like fragrance in the air ; women and children sort- 
 ing the crop in every village ; and this was the tea sea- 
 son in its height. Here were bushes two and three 
 hundred years old yielding every year their certain har- 
 vest, and whole hill-sides covered with matted awnings 
 to keep from scorching or toughening in the hot sun 
 those delicate young leaves, which are destined to be- 
 come the costly and exquisite teas chosen by the sov- 
 ereign and his richest subjects. 
 
 Then we toiled up bush-covered steeps to cross ele- 
 vated river-beds; rode through towered floodgates of 
 dry watercourses, down to the green plain their lost 
 waters had fed ; through village streets, and past many 
 a picturesque tateba, in one of which stood a little yel- 
 low Cupid in the sunshine that filtered through a wis- 
 taria trellis ; and so on through ever-changing country 
 scenes to the tamous view of Nara’s temples, trees, and 
 pagodas. 
 
 Nara ! A mountain-side covered with giant trees bound 
 together by vines and old creepers ; an ancient forest 
 seamed with broad avenues, where the sunlight falls in 
 patches and deer lie drowsing in the fern ; double and 
 triple lines of moss-covered stone lanterns massing them- 
 selves together, their green tops dim in the dense shad- 
 ow ; temples twelve centuries old ; the booming of bells, 
 and the music of running water. 
 
 307 
 
'Jinrikiska Days in Japan 
 
 Nara! The ancient capital, the cradle of Buddhism, 
 and still the holy place of pilgrimages ; its forest paths 
 echoing the jingle of the devotees’ ringed staffs, the 
 mutter of their prayers, and the clink of their copper 
 offerings at the temple gates. A place of stillness and 
 dreams ; an Arcadia, where the little children and the 
 fawns play together, and the antlered deer eat from 
 one's hand, and look up fearlessly with their soft human 
 eyes. Old Shinto temples, where the priestesses dance 
 the sacred measures of Suzume before the Sun Goddess’s 
 cave ; temples where Buddha and Kwannon sit in gild- 
 ed glory on the lotus, and lights, incense, and bells ac- 
 company the splendid ceremonies of that faith. 
 
 The great antiquity of Nara makes the magnificence 
 of Nikko, with its Shogun’s tombs, seem almost parvenu. 
 It is the good-fortune of the older fane that its distance 
 from the railroad — twenty-six miles — saves it from the 
 rush of progress and the stream of tourists. 
 
 The founder of Nara rode up to the mountain on a 
 deer to choose a residence for himself, and ever since 
 the deer have been petted and protected. Groups of 
 them, lying under the trees, permit themselves to be ad- 
 mired, and feeding parties turn their pretty pointed 
 heads to look after the visitor. The does and fawns, 
 however, hide in the dark fern - covered ravines. All 
 through the forest and temple grounds are little thatched 
 houses, tyhere tea for man and corn-meal for deer are 
 sold, together with the little carved images and deer-horn 
 toys for which Nara is famous. It is a pity that the 
 Japanese name for deer is such a harsh, unmusical word 
 as shika, which even the little children, who toddle after 
 the pretty creatures with out stretched hands, cannot make 
 musical. Plump little country maids, with their tied-up 
 sleeves, are heard from sunrise until dusk calling up the 
 deer to be fed — “A'l?.' kof ko! kol" (Come ! come ! come ! 
 come !) and at the word “ Ko ” even the fattest and heav- 
 
 308 
 
Through Uji to Nara 
 
 iest stag lumbers forward and nibbles from their hands. 
 Moving at leisure, these deer have a stiff, wooden gait, 
 and seem badly-proportioned animals. It is when one 
 leaps and bounds down some avenue, or across a clear- 
 ing, that it shows its grace. The gentleness of these 
 Nara pets is due, of course, to the long immunity from 
 violence enjoyed by their race, beloved and protected by 
 gods and men. Only once have they ever been harmed, 
 and that blow was dealt by a young Japanese convert 
 to Christianity, who struck at them as emblems of hea- 
 thenism ! 
 
 The atmosphere of Nara is serene and gentle — the 
 true atmosphere of Japan. The priests are quiet, cour- 
 teous old men, and the little priestesses, soft-footed and 
 tranquil, dance in a slow succession of dignified poses. 
 The Kasuga temple is a very cathedral of Shintoism, a 
 place of many court -yards, surrounded by gates, and 
 buildings painted bright Shinto red, with sacred straw 
 ropes and symbolical bits of rice-paper hanging before 
 the open doors. Venerable cryptomeria-trees, worthy of 
 a California grove, stretch the great buttresses of their 
 roots over the ground of the court-yard, and one thatch- 
 ed roof lovingly embraces the trunk of a crooked old 
 tree that almost rests on it. Wistaria vines, thick, gnarl- 
 ed, and lichen-covered with the growth of years, hang in 
 giant festoons from the trees, roll in curves and loops 
 over the ground, and, climbing to the top of the tallest 
 pines, hang their clusters of pale-green leaves like blos- 
 soms against the dark evergreens. A giant trunk, from 
 which grow branches of the camellia, cherry, plum, wild 
 ivy, wistaria and nandina, is a perpetual marvel. All 
 through the woods the wistaria runs wild, leaps from tree 
 to tree, and ties and knots itself in titanic coils. 
 
 In such lovely scenes the Kasuga priests lead an ideal 
 existence. They marry, they raise families; their little 
 daughters perform the sacred dance in the temple for a 
 
 305 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 certain number of years, and they may leave the priest- 
 hood if they wish. All the brotherhood wear the loose, 
 flowing purple trousers, white gauze coats, and black, 
 helmet-shaped caps prescribed by the Shinto rules ; and 
 besides making the morning and evening offerings to 
 the gods, and conducting special ceremonies on the two 
 purification days of the year, they play the ancient flute 
 and drum, and chant a hymn while the sacred dance is 
 given. For a poetic, philosophical, meditative, or lazy man 
 nothing could be more congenial than this life. Hurry, 
 novelty, and the rush of events come not near Xara, which 
 is in the land “wherein it seemed always afternoon.” 
 
 The pilgrims, who trudge from the most distant prov- 
 inces with bell and beads and staff, make up the greater 
 number of visitors, and their white garments, straw san- 
 dals, cloaks, and hats, are of a fashion centuries old. 
 Bands of these votaries go through the temple courts, 
 in charge of voluble guides, who intone a description of 
 the places in the way of their craft the world over. One 
 or two old men seem always to be sauntering up the long 
 avenue, stopping frequently to rest, praying at every 
 shrine, and muttering to themselves praises of the sacred 
 place. Their wrinkled faces glow with pleasure, and 
 they delight in watching the deer, to whom the tinkle of 
 a pilgrim’s bell or iron-ringed staff is always a promise 
 of cakes. 
 
 To the antiquarian, Nara is full of interest. The 
 temples, founded in the seventh and eighth centuries, 
 were the first Buddhist sanctuaries in Japan; Buddhism, 
 coming from India by way of China and Korea, having 
 found its first home here when Xara was the imperial 
 capital. Four empresses and three emperors held the 
 sceptre between 708 and 782, and all the region is his- 
 toric ground. The great city, that covered the plain for 
 centuries after that imperial day, has shrunken to a small 
 provincial town, still eloquent of the past. The Shinto 
 
 310 
 
Through Ujt to Nara 
 
 temples, as their rules provide, have been rebuilt every 
 twenty years, the original buildings being exactly dupli- 
 cated each time, so that, in their freshness and perfect 
 repair, they look now as they did a thousand years ago. 
 The Buddhist shrines have been burned, rebuilt, half 
 abandoned at times ; and in recent years, since their 
 lands were taken from them and their revenues withheld, 
 have suffered seriously. The largest image of Buddha 
 is the Nara Dai Butsu. The seated deity, 63 feet in 
 height, was set upon his lotus pedestal in 749, and once 
 the head of the statue fell off and was broken, and twice 
 the temple burned and melted it. The temple enshrin- 
 ing the bronze deity is now dilapidated, and the huge 
 corner beams and brackets of the roof are braced with 
 timbers, so that an earthquake would be likely to over- 
 set the holy place. 
 
 The great two-storied gate way of the Dai Butsu tem- 
 ple has stood for eleven centuries and more, and is a 
 picturesque, weather-beaten old structure, apparently 
 strong enough to resist the assaults of another thousand 
 years. Colossal Nio, with hideous countenances, stand 
 on guard in niches, and within is a large green court- 
 yard, and a closed gallery on the two sides that connect 
 the gate-way with the temple — the cloister of a European 
 cathedral. A huge bronze lantern, one of the earliest 
 examples of such work, is said to have long contained 
 the sacred fire brought from Ceylon. The great Buddha 
 itself is disappointing, because seen too near. The face 
 is sixteen feet long and over nine feet wide, and the ex- 
 pression is not calm, soulful, and meditative, as Buddha 
 in Nirvana should be, but heavy and stolid, with a hard, 
 unmeditative stare. The gilding with which the statue 
 was once covered has worn away with time, leaving it as 
 dark and blackened as befits its Hottentot countenance. 
 On the great halo are images six and eight feet high 
 that look like pygmies. 
 
 3 >* 
 
yinrikisha Days in yapan 
 
 Behind the Buddha is a museum of antiquities con- 
 nected in some way with the temple and its founders 
 and patrons. Here are kept the carpenters’ tools with 
 which the first temple was built, and prehistoric-looking 
 fragments of bronze and iron to which the stranger finds 
 no clew. A door of the palace whereon Kusunoki, the 
 Chevalier Bayard of Japan, wrote a farewell message 
 with his arrow when he went away to his last battle, 
 images, carvings, old armor, weapons, and trappings, 
 afford the Japanese visitor much delight. But the real 
 treasures of Uai Butsu are the relics left to it by one of 
 the Nara Emperors, who built a substantial log store- 
 house in the enclosure, and bequeathed to the temple 
 everything his palace contained. Palaces were small in 
 those days, and their furnishings scanty ; but the cloth- 
 ing, household effects, and ornaments of the dead ben- 
 efactor were brought to this storehouse and carefully 
 sealed up. Every summer, after the rainy season ends, 
 the treasures are aired, the inventory verified, and the 
 place sealed up again. Three of the greatest nobles of 
 the empire are associated with the high-priest in the care 
 of these Nara relics, and the storehouse can only be 
 opened by an imperial order transmitted in the hand- 
 writing of the emperor. Only royal or greatly distin- 
 guished visitors may ask this privilege, as it is a great 
 trouble and expense to get the guardians together. Its 
 value as a collection and as a picture of the life of the 
 eighth century is hardly appreciated by the Japanese, 
 who chiefly reverence its sacredness as connected with 
 the person of an early Emperor. An imperial commis- 
 sion, made up of officers of the imperial household and 
 of art connoisseurs, examined, classified, and catalogued 
 the treasures of the Nara and Kioto temples in i£88. 
 Mr. Kuki, late Japanese minister to the United States, 
 and president of this commission, had even this imperial 
 treasure-house opened and the precious relics photo- 
 
 312 
 
Through Uji to Nara 
 
 graphed. The commission and its staff numbered over 
 twenty people, and the old guardians of the storehouse 
 w'ere much disturbed by this invasion of their carefully 
 closed domain, which they would have resisted if they 
 could. 
 
 On the hill above the Dai Butsu temple are other Bud- 
 dhist sanctuaries ; the Nigwatsudo and the Hachiman 
 being devoted respectively to the goddess Kwannon and 
 to Hachiman, god of war. Both are resorts for the 
 summer pilgrims, and the droning of prayers, the clap- 
 ping of hands and rattle of coins, are heard all day long. 
 Stone terraces and staircases, mossy stone lanterns and 
 green drinking-fountains make the old places picturesque, 
 and the platforms afford magnificent views across to the 
 bold mountain-wall in the west that divides Nara from 
 Osaka's fertile rice plain. In the court-yards are sold 
 maps, wood-cuts, and bunches of little cinnamon twigs 
 that the pilgrims find refreshing, and there do captive 
 monkeys perform grotesque antics. One may often see 
 here the Hiyokudo (the hundred times going) performed 
 by faithful pilgrims, who walk a hundred times around 
 in the fulfilment of a vow. 
 
 Between these Buddhist temples and the Shinto 
 shrines, hidden in their forest park, there intervenes a 
 smooth, grassy mountain, called the Mikasayama, or 
 “Three-hat hill,” because of its three ridges. Every de- 
 vout pilgrim climbs the delusive, velvety-looking slope 
 to the stone at the third summit to look out upon the 
 rich province of Yamato, “ the heart of Japan,” and the 
 scene of so many battles, wars and sieges as to be also 
 called “the cockpit of Japan.” 
 
 h'ar as the eye can reach the valley is levelled off in 
 rice fields. Tea-bushes stripe the more rolling country 
 with their regular lines of thick, dark foliage ; bamboo 
 groves add a softer, more delicate green, and deepest of 
 all are the tones of the pines. 
 
 V- 3-3 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 Near the base of the hill, but high enough to com- 
 mand a wide prospect, runs a narrow road lined with 
 little tea-houses and toy-shops where souvenirs are sold. 
 Nara is famous for its cutlery and its India ink, and 
 swords, daggers, knives and scissors are sold by shop- 
 men who perform extraordinary feats to test the temper 
 of their blades. India ink pressed into fantastic shapes, 
 and writing -brushes made of deer’s hair, are carefully 
 tied up in the pilgrim’s wallets, with the famous little 
 Nara nitigio, or images carved in wood. The Nara nin- 
 gios always represent the legendary priests and people 
 who founded Nara, and in these carvings the rural art- 
 ists display great talent, giving wonderful expression to 
 the tiny faces that are left rough faceted as first chipped 
 off with the knife. 
 
 These tea-houses and shops interpose a neutral and 
 worldly barrier between the cluster of Buddhist estab- 
 lishments at the one side and the region of Shintoism 
 beyond. From the tea-house gates the road makes a 
 curve off into the wistaria-tangled forest to conduct jin- 
 rikishas to the lower level, but the pilgrims descend, in- 
 stead, four long flights of rough stone steps, that are 
 wonderfully picturesque with these quaint moving fig- 
 ures and the queer little shops that hang to the borders 
 of the stairs, climbing up and down the hill with them. 
 
 At the foot of the steps the road reappears, crossing 
 a narrow creek-bed on a high bridge that gives one 
 beautiful views of a dark little ravine, across which the 
 trees nearly meet and the ancient creepers are looped 
 and knotted. A little red shrine and a path lined with 
 stone lanterns mark the beginning of the temple enclos- 
 ure, dense woods rising at one side of the stone lanterns 
 lighting the path to the ancient Shinto sanctuary of Ka- 
 suga, and open glades stretching out at the other. A 
 few shops and tea-booths break the line of lanterns on 
 one side 3 the road is canopied with a great wistaria trel- 
 
 3*4 
 
Through Uji io Nara 
 
 lis, and a spring bubbles up in a stone basin in the midst 
 of rock-work almost hidden in shade and moss. Weary 
 pilgrims stop in this grateful shade to drink and to rest 
 themselves at any hour of the day. 
 
 Passing the stall for the sacred white pony of the gods 
 and some brightly-painted red wooden buildings, one en- 
 ters a great court-yard with lanterns hanging from the 
 eaves of the buildings and galleries surrounding its four 
 sides, through whose doors are visible only a mirror and 
 many-folded papers pendent from a straw rope. This 
 symbolism suffices the believers, who kneel devoutly be- 
 fore it and toss in their coppers as a prelude to their 
 prayers. Beside the shrine is the treasury of the tem- 
 ple. containing famous swords, the gold-mounted armor 
 and helmets of great heroes, and lacquer-boxes holding 
 precious writings and paintings. The queer saddles 
 worn by the deer at the old matsuris are preserved, and 
 yards of panoramic paintings on silk, depicting those 
 splendid pageants of the old days, when the Emperor 
 sent his representative down to witness the parade, and 
 even the deer took part. The closed shrines, scattered 
 through the forest, are quite as impressive as the holy of 
 holies in this temple, and here the bareness and empti- 
 ness of Shinto worship strike the beholder. Each of the 
 four little red chapels in a row has a fine bamboo cur- 
 tain concealing the interior, and the middle chapel into 
 which the pilgrims may look as they pay and pray, pre- 
 sents to their gaze only a screen painted with mythical 
 beasts. A large covered pavilion in the court-yard was 
 provided for the convenience of praying daimios in the 
 time when piety was spectacular, and when the whole 
 retinue of a great man assisted at his devotions. In an- 
 other pavilion the towns-people burn beans and sow them 
 abroad every winter to drive away evil spirits. 
 
 Every twentieth year the priests plant trees to furnish 
 further timbers, but in Kasuga’s court are two famous 
 
 3>5 
 
Jinrikts/ia Days in ’Japan 
 
 old cryptomeria, now too sacred to be felled even for 
 such purposes, and one, enmeshed in the coils of a wis- 
 taria, is a marvel even in Nara. Without the square, 
 heavy-timbered, red gate-way of the court two avenues 
 meet, both lined with rows and rows of tall stone lan- 
 terns covered with moss and overhung with the dense 
 foliage of the meeting trees. One avenue leads to a 
 smaller temple, and the other, dropping by a flight of 
 stone steps, turns to the right and descends in a long 
 slope, bordered with regiments of stone lanterns, to a 
 large red torii. Thence it pursues its way, bordered still 
 with massive lanterns, for three-quarters of a mile to the 
 greater torii, marking the limit of the sacred grounds 
 and the beginning of the village streets. Other lantern 
 lines, paths, and staircases join it, and a bronze deer, 
 sitting among rough, mossy bowlders under a dense can- 
 opy of trees and creepers, pours a stream of pure spring- 
 water into a granite basin. There are more than three 
 thousand of these stone lanterns along the Kasuga ap- 
 proaches, all of them gifts from daimios, nobles, and rich 
 believers ; and in days when the temples were rich and 
 faith prosperous, they were lighted every night. At pres- 
 ent it is only during great festivals that wicks and saucers 
 of oil are set in all the lanterns, but some sixty points of 
 flame flicker nightly in the dense shadows by the Kasuga 
 gate, giving most weird effects. 
 
 From Kasuga gate the upper avenue of lanterns leads 
 to the Wakamiya shrine, dedicated to the early gods of 
 the Shinto religion. Here the old custom of the sacred 
 dance is kept up, and a group of young priestesses is in 
 waiting to repeat the measures danced by Suzume before 
 the Sun Goddess's cave in prehistoric times. The little 
 ministrants are all between the ages of nine and twelve, 
 timid, gentle, and harmless as the deer that often stray 
 in and watch them. Their dress is the old costume of 
 the imperial court — a picturesque lower garment or di- 
 
 3>6 
 
N T1IK KASrOA TEMPI.F. GRorNDS 
 
 
Through Uji to Nara 
 
 vided skirt of the brightest cardinal-red silk, and a white 
 kimono, with square sleeves and pointed neck filled with 
 alternate folds of red and white. When they dance they 
 wear loose kimonos of white gauze, painted with the 
 wistaria crest of the Kasuga temple, the front of the 
 gauzy garment half covering the red skirt, and the back 
 pieces trailing on the mats. Their faces are plastered 
 so thickly with white paint that they lose all expression, 
 and, following the old fashion, their eyebrows are shaved, 
 and two tiny black dots high up in the middle of their 
 foreheads take the place of them. \Vith lips heavily 
 rouged, the countenance is more a mask than a human 
 face. The hair, gathered together at the back of the 
 neck, is tied with loops of gold paper, and then, folded 
 in soft white paper, allowed to hang down the back. 
 Long hair-pins, with clusters of wistaria and red camel- 
 lia, are thrust across the top of the head, and fastened 
 so that they stand out like horns over the forehead. In 
 detail the costume is not pretty, but in its general effect 
 it is singularly bright and picturesque. 
 
 One may have as many sacred dancers and as long a 
 dance as he will pay for, and as soon as the money is 
 received the two priests get into their ceremonial white 
 gowns and high black hats, and, sitting before the an- 
 cient drums, chant, pound, and blow on doleful pipes an 
 accompaniment for the little dancers. The sacred dance 
 is solemn enough, and each dancer has a fan and a bunch 
 of bells, from which hang long strips of bright-colored 
 silks. 'I'hey advance, retreat, glide to right and left, raise 
 their fans, shake their sacred baby-rattles, and, with few 
 changes in the measure, repeat the same figures and 
 movements for a certain length of time. If one pays 
 more money they repeat the same thing, and the priests 
 can wail the endless accompaniment by the hour. To 
 us the dance was simply a curious custom ; but the de- 
 vout old pilgrims, who have hoarded up their money for 
 
 3‘9 
 
ytnrikisha Days in yapan 
 
 the journey for months and often years, feel it to be a sol- 
 emn and sanctified service. It is pathetic to see their 
 faces glowing and their eyes filled with tears at the fine 
 spectacle that is so rare an event in their lives, and which 
 croivns their summer pilgrimage to the old shrines of their 
 faith. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXII 
 KARA 
 
 In the last week of June, the proprietor of the tea field 
 beneath our veranda conducted a second picking of his 
 stumpy little bushes. From sunrise until dusk rose a 
 chorus of children’s voices beyond the hedge. The first 
 and best crop having been gathered weeks earlier with 
 the first fire -flies, this hubbub accompanied only the 
 gleaning after the harvesters. It was a pretty picture in 
 the foreground of the magnificent view — these little blue 
 and white figures in huge wash bowl hats, with touches 
 of bright red here and there in their costumes. The 
 headman sat comfortably under a fig-tree, with no cloth- 
 ing to speak of, smoked his pipe, and watched the young- 
 sters at work. When they toiled up to him with full bas- 
 kets, he weighed the load with a rude steelyard and sent 
 them back, so that some of the tea-pickers were always 
 moving up and down the paths between the compact 
 rows of bushes, and grouped about the patriarch under 
 the fig-tree. The leaves were spread in the sun all day 
 and carried off at night in large sacks and baskets. Walk- 
 ing out through the woods one day, with two little red- 
 gowned priestesses from the Kasuga temple, we came 
 upon a tiny village, and there found the same tea-leaves 
 being toasted in shallow paper-lined baskets over char- 
 coal fires. The attendants rubbed and tossed the fra- 
 
 320 
 
Nara 
 
 grant leaves, that were soon dried enough to suffice for 
 tlie home market. 
 
 Although secular occupations prosper, and Nara cut- 
 lery and ink rank high in public favor, the temple life of 
 Nara is its real existence. Every day pilgrims and tour- 
 ists passed before us in processions whose variety of 
 people and costumes was endless. Yet in all the weeks 
 the European coat and trousers only once appeared in 
 those sacred aisles. Every morning two or more of 
 the little red-robed priestesses came, hand in hand, to 
 spend an hour or two beside my friend’s easel. The old 
 priests, in their white gowns and purple skirts, were very 
 courteous and hospitable, and as our stay lengthened we 
 grew to feel ourselves a part of the sacred community. 
 The little priestesses carried us to their homes to drink 
 tea, and the priests brought their friends to watch the 
 methods of the foreign artist. Among the sight-seers 
 and visitors to the Shinto shrines and their guardians 
 were many Ihiddhist priests, whose shaved heads and 
 black or yellow gauze gowns made them conspicuous. 
 'I'he priests of the two faiths seemed to fraternize and to 
 treat each other with the greatest consideration. Their 
 speech, as we heard it, was always so formal, so gentle, 
 and so loaded with honorifics and the set phrases of 
 politeness that there could never have been any theo- 
 logical controversies. A few Buddhist nuns, also, made 
 pilgrimage to Kasuga's ancient groves ; creatures unfem- 
 inine and unbeautiful enough in appearance to be saintly 
 in the extreme. They wear white kimonos under gauze 
 coats, with a skirt plaited to the edge of them — the same 
 costume that priests wear — and they shave their heads 
 with the same remorseless zeal. These bald-headed 
 women give one a strange sensation, for in the absence 
 of their dusky tresses their eyes appear too prominent, 
 and it is easy to perceive an unnatural, snaky glitter in 
 them. There are several nunneries near Nara and one 
 
 321 
 
Jinrikts/ia Days in Ja/>an 
 
 in Kioto, but all the inmates assume the same priests’ 
 dress and shave their heads, and we inferred that all the 
 six hundred Buddhist nuns in the empire were equally 
 ugly. 
 
 At the edge of the little town of Nara is a large pond, 
 wherein a court romance of the eighth century declares 
 a lovelorn maiden to have drowned herself for sake of a 
 fickle Emperor. Above this historic pond stands a fine 
 old five-story pagoda, and the scattered buildings remain- 
 ing from what was once a great Buddhist establishment. 
 This Kobukuji temple dates back to the year 710, but 
 has been burned and rebuilt again and again. After the 
 downfall of the Shoguns, who were Buddhists, the res- 
 toration of the Emperor to power made Shinto the es- 
 tablished faith. In the zeal attending the revival of 
 Shinto, Buddhism was almost laid under a ban. Bud- 
 dhist priests hid themselves, and Buddhist pictures, stat- 
 ues, and books were concealed. Moreover, the craze for 
 foreign fashions induced a contempt for the old temples 
 and pagodas, 'i'wo of the buildings of Kobukuji were 
 torn down and the statues in them destro)'ed. Ropes 
 were even placed about the beautiful old pagoda, which 
 would have met the fate of the Column Vendome had 
 not the saner citizens leagued together to preserve it. 
 In this calmer day, the Japanese of whatever faith look 
 upon this ancient pagoda, the old bell, and the venera- 
 ble buildings of the Buddhist establishments as the pride 
 of Nara. 
 
 The town of Nara is a well-kept little provincial settle- 
 ment, but with nothing especially characteristic or inter- 
 esting in its clean streets. One goes to see the black 
 gnomes at work, kneading their dough of rapeseed-oil, 
 soot, and glue, pressing it into moulds, baking it, and 
 supplying the country with its best writing ink. While 
 the Japanese india-ink is not equal to the Chinese ink, 
 some of it is very expensive. It requires a connoisseur 
 
 322 
 
Nara 
 
 to tell why a stick the size of one’s little finger should 
 cost one or two dollars at the manufacturer’s shop, while 
 a cake three or four times as large, and apparently of the 
 same substance, should be only a tenth of that price. 
 The few curio-shops offer almost nothing to the most dili- 
 gent searcher, and the town itself makes small claim 
 upon the average visitors, who come to see the temples 
 and enjoy the surroundings and the view from the sacred 
 groves on the heights. In the little row of tea-houses 
 along the brow of Mikasa}’ama, one is in the midst of 
 Nara’s real life and atmosphere, and in the detached 
 pavilions and houses scattered through their gardens 
 the visitor is confronted with the most attractive phases 
 of a Japanese traveller’s e.xistence. The e.xquisite sim- 
 plicity and beauty of these tiny houses, with their encir- 
 cling galleries, all the four sides open to the air and 
 view, the silence of the garden, broken only by the 
 trickling water as it falls from bamboo pipe to bronze 
 basin or tiny lakelet, render it an Arcadia. For a small 
 sum one may have one of these tiny houses to himself, 
 a dainty box for cha no yu, and a doll’s kitchen accom- 
 panying each pavilion. On sunny days the garden is a 
 small paradise, with the moving figures of guests and at- 
 tendants always giving a human interest to the pictu- 
 resque bits of landscape. On rainy days the pictures 
 are as many, but done in soberer tones. On those rainy 
 June days, when there were few smart showers, but a 
 steady, persistent, fine drizzle that left everything soaked 
 with moisture, the domestics pattered about our garden 
 from house to house, perched on their high wooden 
 clogs, with their skirts tucked high above their bare feet, 
 twirling huge oil-paper umbrellas above their heads. 
 At night they came to close our amados noisily, and to 
 hang up the mosquito-nets of coarsely-woven green cot- 
 ton — nets the size of the room itself, fastened by cords 
 at the four corners of the ceiling, and exhaling the musty, 
 
 323 
 
'Jinrikisha Days m "Japan 
 
 mildewed odor that belongs to so many things Japanese, 
 and is so inevitable in the rainy season. From all the 
 foliage mosquitoes swarmed by myriads, and a candle- 
 flame attracted winged things that only an entomologist 
 could name ; insects so small and light that one breathed 
 them ; gorgeous golden - green beetles, rivalling their 
 Brazilian congeners ; and huge black stag-horn beetles 
 that dealt one a sharp blow with the force of their com- 
 ing. At night, too, the domestic rat asserted itself, and 
 this pest and disturber of tea-house life ran riot in the 
 empty chamber between the beautiful wooden ceilings 
 
 IN THE TEA-HOUSE 
 ’(24 
 
Nara 
 
 and the real roof. The thin wood acted as a sounding- 
 board, and their scampering and racing, and the thud of 
 the pursuing weasels, was an all-night and every-night 
 affair. The Japanese themselves seem to feel no hostil- 
 ity towards rats and mice, and at Yaami’s and at Nara 
 the proprietor and staff sit quietly in the great office and 
 kitchen-room, which are so nearly one, and allow these 
 followers of Daikoku to scamper over their ledgers, be- 
 tween the groups on the mats, and to perform feats of 
 racing and balancing on the rafters ov^erhead. 
 
 The flimsiness of our little house, no less than the 
 absurd walls and gates of the moated demesne, seemed 
 to invite robbery, but in that Arcadia there were no rob- 
 bers. The habitation was left alone for hours with ev- 
 ery screen wide open, and countless things in view that 
 might have tempted curious handling at least, but noth- 
 ing was disturbed nor lost, 'riiere was no provision for 
 locking the screens of any room, nor for making the 
 amados proof against any amateur burglar, the need of 
 such a protection never having been felt — a sufficient 
 commentary on the people. 
 
 Nesans, coolies, and small boys were all so individual, 
 so characteristically Japanese, so untouched by and un- 
 used to foreign influences, that they were an unceasing 
 delight ; and so unintentionally theatrical and pictu- 
 resque that for day after day we felt ourselves to be living 
 in a theatre, and Nara’s hill-side to be one vast revolving 
 stage. We had easily fallen into the serene and peace- 
 ful routine of Nara life, and become so interested in 
 those surrounding us, that there was a real sadness on 
 our own part when easel, camera, and koris were packed, 
 and those simple, affectionate people bade us their tear- 
 ful sayonaras. 
 
 It was a rainy morning, and the green rice plain looked 
 greener under the gray sky as we rode away from Nara. 
 Men and women were working in the fields, wading knee- 
 
 325 
 
Jinrikisha Days in ^apan 
 
 deep in the mud and water, stirring the muck around 
 the young shoots, and tearing up the water-weeds with 
 iron hooks. No other grain requires as much care as 
 rice, and from the first transplanting from the seed-bed 
 until the ears of grain are formed, there is continuous 
 grubbing in the mire of the paddy fields. The legions 
 of frogs that live in them share their abode with horrible 
 slugs, snails, blood-suckers, and stingers of many kinds, 
 against whose assaults the poor farmers wrap their legs 
 knee-high with many thicknesses of cotton cloth. Fol- 
 lowing the level plain and skirting instead of surmount- 
 ing the bold mountain-spur, all the twenty-six miles from 
 Nara to Osaka ran through rice fields. Every little square 
 of dyked paddy-field had its workers. In some the first 
 ploughing was being done; in others the water was being 
 worked into the soil ; and, farther on, men and women, 
 standing ankle- deep in the muck, were setting out the 
 tiny green shoots. Here and there laborers were tread- 
 ing water-wheels to pump water from the lower to the 
 higher levels, or with long sweeps dipping it slowly up 
 from wells. 
 
 'I'here are seven great Buddhist monasteries around 
 Nara, all more or less in decay, but all possessing relics 
 of great historic interest and value. Several of them 
 show their white walls, like fortresses, high on the mount- 
 ain-side, and in them linger the remnants of a once rich 
 and numerous priesthood — their sacred retreats being so 
 remote and inaccessible that not half a dozen foreigners 
 have ever visited them. 
 
 Horiuji, half-way to Osaka, is the largest of these 
 Nara monasteries, and its pagoda and Hondo are the 
 oldest wooden buildings in Japan. Both were com- 
 pleted in the year 607, and both are intact, solid, and 
 firm enough to endure for twelve centuries more. To 
 students of Buddhism, Horiuji is a Mecca, on account of 
 its wealth of scriptures, statues, pictures, and relics, dat- 
 
 3^6 
 
Nara 
 
 ing from the time when that faith had just been intro- 
 duced from China. To art connoisseurs its interest is 
 unique because of its old Hondo, containing frescos ex- 
 ecuted by a Korean artist at the time of its erection, 
 which, with one exception, are the only frescos proper 
 in Japan, and among the few paintings executed on a 
 surface erect before the artist. All other paintings in 
 Japan — kakemono, panels of screens, and sections of 
 ceilings or wall space — are done with the wood, paper, 
 or silk lying on the floor before the seated artist. These 
 Horiuji frescos are dim and faded, and only pale wraiths 
 and suggestions of haloed saints, here a head and there 
 a bit of drapery, can be made out. In necent years at- 
 tention has been called to these works. By imperial 
 command an artist came down from Tokio to copy them; 
 and when the Imperial Art Commission came from their 
 Nara work to inspect and catalogue the Horiuji treas- 
 ures, Ogawa, their photographer, spent two days at work 
 making flash-light exposures in the dark interior of the 
 Hondo. 
 
 Among the sacred relics of Horiuji is the veritable 
 eyeball of Buddha, the legacy of the holy Shotoku Tai- 
 sho, the Emperor who founded Horiuji, and left to it 
 statues of himself, carved by his own hand at different 
 ages. Shotoku d'aisho talked when he was four months 
 old, and a little later conversed in eight languages all 
 at once. It is therefore- easy to believe that when this 
 prodigy of legend was a year old, and, turning to the 
 East, with clasped hands repeated the invocation of his 
 sect — '' Xamic Amida Butsii (Hail, or Hear us. Great 
 Buddha !) — he found this precious relic of Buddha’s 
 body, the eyeball, in his hands. That he knew it to be 
 an eyeball is not the least part of the miracle, as it looks 
 most like tlie tiny, discolored pearl of a common oyster; 
 'I'lie eyeball of Buddha is shown every day at high noon, 
 a special mass being chanted by the priest while the relic 
 
 3^7 
 
’Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 is displayed. For a consideration, and for the welfare 
 of the temple treasury, the mass may be repeated at any 
 hour. The celebrant, a very old priest, when called from 
 the monastery, came in splendid apparel of brocade and 
 gauze, and entering the little temple, knelt, touched a 
 silver- voiced gong, and prayed before a gilded shrine 
 with closed doors and a wealth of golden lotus orna- 
 ments. Then he slowly drew forth from an altar recess 
 a large bundle, covered with rich red and gold brocade 
 and tied with heavy silk cords, laid it reverently on a 
 low table before the altar, and, with a muttered chant of 
 prayer, untied and laid back bag after bag of old bro- 
 cade, each lined with silk of some contrasting color and 
 tied w'ith thick cords. After the ninth bag was opened, 
 an upright case, covered with more brocade, appeared, 
 lifting which, the priest produced a little rock-crystal 
 reliquary, and set it upon a golden lotus as a pedestal. 
 'I'he reliquary was in the shape of the conventional 
 lJuddhist tomb — a cube, a sphere, and a pyramid, placed 
 one above the other — and the bits of flawless crystal 
 were held together by silver wires. In the hollow' sphere 
 lay the dingy relic, that rattled like a pebble when it w'as 
 turned for one to see it. The holy man never once 
 paused iii his muttered chant from the time he lifted the 
 precious bundle from the altar until he had replaced the ten 
 silken wrappings and set the sacred relic back in its niche. 
 
 In one of the buildings are queer oven-shaped humps 
 in the floor, covering secret chambers, where for twelve 
 centuries offerings of gold have been dropped for the 
 rebuilding of the temples in case of fire. These hoards 
 cannot be touched except on the occurrence of the ci- 
 lamity feared, and the priests even resisted the wish of 
 the Imperial Art Commission to break open the vaults 
 to examine the coins believed to be there. A Boston art 
 connoisseur, who visited Horiuji a few years ago, and 
 found its priests poor and its art treasures in need of 
 
 328 
 
Nara 
 
 care and restoration, started a fund for that purpose, and 
 himself took in charge the rehabilitation of one precious 
 old screen. Many valuable paintings, tattered, mould- 
 ered, and mildewed almost to extinction, were thereby 
 rescued. Four other contributors have since subscribed 
 generous amounts to this fund, all of whom, by strange 
 coincidence, were from Boston. 
 
 On a hill back of the main sanctuaries is a most curi- 
 ous octagonal temple, filled with the votive offerings of 
 those who have been restored to health, or received other 
 answers to prayer. The outside walls are half -hidden 
 by the hundreds of six-inch-square boards, upon which 
 are painted the suffering pilgrims who have been cured, 
 and a ledge is heaped high with awls, the conventional 
 offering of the deaf whose hearing has been restored. 
 Locks of hair, short swords, daggers, steel mirrors, and 
 devices in coins are hung on tlie doors. The circular 
 altar within the stone-floored temple, containing many 
 old statues and sacred images, has its base completely 
 plated with overlapping sword-guards, short swords, and 
 little steel mirrors. Helmets and bits of armor are ev- 
 erywhere, and the long shell hair-pins of Japanese wom- 
 en have been offered in such numbers that, woven to- 
 gether with silk cords into curtains or screens, they hang 
 like banners before and beside the altars. All around 
 the walls and over the rafters, as far up into the dark- 
 ness as one can see, hang short swords, ranged closely 
 side by side, overlapping mirrors, guards, bows, arrows, 
 curious weapons and pieces of armor, coins, and hair- 
 pins. Near this extraordinary place is a nunnery, where 
 a family of holy women have the shaved heads and dis- 
 figuring garments of priests, their altars and images, their 
 daily service, and the same routine of life in every way. 
 
 Rounding the last spur of hills and crossing a broad 
 river, the road reaches the great Osaka plain, lying in a 
 broad semicircle between the mountains and the shores 
 
 329 
 
Jmrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 of the Inland Sea. On these vast alluvial flats rice is 
 still the main crop, and the sakd made from it is consid- 
 ered the best in the empire. All over this emerald plain 
 the farmers could be seen at work, their wide hats show- 
 ing like so many big mushrooms when the wearers, sunk 
 deep in the muck of the paddy fields, bent over their 
 work. On the prairie-like level of the plain the irrigating 
 system is simple and ingenious. Everywhere the farmers 
 were plastering up the little dikes that keep the water 
 within its limit and pattern the plain with a gigantic 
 check -work of narrow black lines and serve as foot- 
 walks from field to field. No fences or high barriers 
 break the even level, and those strange contrivances, the 
 primitive Persian water-wheels, may be seen every few 
 rods. This Persian wheel, with its row of hanging boxes, 
 is put in motion by a man who climbs it in treadmill 
 fashion, the boxes scooping up the water from the lower 
 level and discharging their burden into a trough at the 
 top, whence the stream flows from field to field by almost 
 imperceptible changes of level. The wheelman wears 
 only the loin-cloth prescribed by law and a wisp of blue 
 towel knotted about his head. Occasionally he fastens 
 a big paper umbrella to a long bamboo pole, and plants 
 it where it will cast a small shadow on him, but usually 
 he tramps his uncomplaining round in the blaze of the 
 tropical sun, a solitary and pathetic, but highly pictu- 
 resque figure, isolated thus on the vast green plain. More 
 Oriental, even, are the groups at the wells, shaded by 
 straw mats or umbrellas on long poles, while they work 
 the same long well-sweeps as the shadoofs of the Nile. 
 
 Far off, like an island in this sea of green, rise the 
 castle towers and the pagoda -tops of Osaka, and for 
 hours we hardly seemed to gain upon the vision, but the 
 runners, saving themselves for a last effort and taking a 
 sip of tea in the suburbs, raced down through the streets 
 and over the bridges at a gait never before equalled. 
 
 330 
 
OsaAa 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIII 
 OSAKA 
 
 ^ Osaka, the great commercial city of Japan, with its 
 ^population of over 361,000 souls, stretches out its square 
 miles of gray-roofed houses at the edge of the plain, 
 where the waters of the Yodogawa reach Osaka Bay. 
 Bars and shallows prevent large vessels from reaching 
 the city, and Kobe-Hiogo, twenty miles across the arc of 
 the bay, is its seaport. The branching river and the in- 
 numerable canals intersecting the city have given Osaka 
 the name of the “ Venice of Japan as if a trading city, 
 built on a level plain, with canals too wide and houses 
 too low and dull in color to be in the least picturesque, 
 could be considered even a poor relation of the “ Bride 
 of the Sea.” The “ Chicago of Japan ” is a fitter title, for 
 if no pork-packing establishments exist, the whole com- 
 munity is as energetically absorbed in money-making, the 
 yen, instead of the almighty dollar, being the god chiefly 
 worshipped, and Osaka’s Board of 'I'rade the most ex- 
 citing and busy one in the empire. 
 
 Osaka has been prominent in the history of Japan 
 from the very earliest times, and at the time of the 
 Restoration the rebel Shogun made his last stand and 
 fought his last battle at Osaka castle. The next great 
 event in Osaka’s annals was the flood of 1885, which 
 was without parallel in this country of floods. During 
 the last weeks of the rainy season of June the rain fell 
 in torrents for more than a week, and a typhoon, sweep- 
 ing the region, deluged the adjoining provinces. Lake 
 Biwa rose many feet above its usual level, the rivers 
 doubled and redoubled their size, and the whole Osaka 
 
Jinriktsha Days in 'Japan 
 
 plain was a lake. The rivers having been raised arti- 
 ficially above the level of the surrounding country for 
 the irrigation of the rice fields, their banks and levees 
 melted away before the rush of waters, and the plain was 
 scoured by swift currents running eight and fifteen feet 
 deep over the rice fields. Farm-houses and villages dis- 
 appeared in a day, and the wretched people saved them- 
 selves and their few effects by taking to boats and rafts 
 or seeking refuge in trees. After two weeks of high- 
 water and continuing rains, the flood subsided and the 
 wreck was more apparent. A few farmers, by replanting 
 and careful tending, obtained crops that season, but 
 hundreds and hundreds of the homeless and destitute 
 were sheltered and fed in the unused barracks at Osaka 
 castle. 
 
 In the city itself only the castle and a few business 
 streets were left above water, and thousands of houses 
 and godowns were ruined ; the mud - walls under the 
 heavy tiled roofs collapsing like card -houses in the 
 current. One hundred and forty-six bridges were car- 
 ried away, and, for a time, boats were the only vehicles 
 and means of communication. The suffering and desti- 
 tution were terrible, and Osaka’s many industries were 
 paralyzed. But in the shortest time after the subsidence 
 of the waters temporary bridges and ferries were estab- 
 lished, embankments patched up, houses rebuilt, and 
 tlie city returned to its busy ways. Except for the mud- 
 stained walls and the heaps of drift and debris on roof- 
 tops, little reminded one of the disaster as we sped 
 through the stone-paved streets. House-boats went up 
 and down the river each evening with geisha and maiko 
 singing happily, and koto and samisen ringing on the air 
 till midnight. Jiutei’s queer hotel, a foreign inn up-stairs 
 and a Japanese tea-house below stairs, was the scene of 
 as much feasting as ever, and the recuperative power of 
 Osaka’s people surprised one at every turn. 
 
Osaka 
 
 The castle is the great show-place of Osaka, and al- 
 though the palace, which was the heart of the great for- 
 tress, was burned in 1868, much remains to be seen. The 
 area enclosed by the massive outer walls and the great 
 moat is immense, and the clustered towers, and buildings, 
 crowning the one elevation on all the Osaka plain, show 
 commandingly from every point. The angles of the walls 
 are sharpened and curve inward like the bow of a battle- 
 ship, and on each corner remain quaint white towers with 
 curving black roofs piled one upon another. The castle 
 walls are wonders of masonry; single stones forty-six feet 
 in length and ten or twelve feet square being built in 
 on either side of the main gate. Other stones, twenty 
 feet in height, and roughhewn as they came from the 
 quarry, stand at angles of the walls like miniature El 
 Capitans. Nearly all these titanic blocks are known to 
 the Japanese by particular names, each with its legends 
 attached ; but the foreigner puzzles long to decide how 
 those primitive builders brought such masses of granite 
 from the quarries on the island of Kiushiu and placed 
 them in these walls without the aid of steam or modern 
 appliances. Three massive walls of defense, one within 
 another, separate the castle proper from the surrounding 
 barracks and parade-ground, and the headquarters are 
 within the third enclosure. A dapper little lieutenant in 
 spotless white uniform received our party at the temple- 
 like headquarters building, one scorching August morn- 
 ing, and conducted us through a fourth wall, and up 
 broad stone stair-ways to the lookout of the old citadel. 
 His orderly ran ahead with field-glasses, and from that 
 airy perch, three hundred feet above the city, we could 
 look over an immense stretch of country and down upon 
 the city roof-tops, from which the air rose quivering with 
 heat. At eight o’clock in the morning at that high point 
 the air was intensely hot, and the stones seemed to scorch 
 our feet ; yet up there was a well of deliciously cool water, 
 
 333 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 an unfailing supply for the garrison at all times and 
 through many sieges. 
 
 Returning to headquarters we met the commandant 
 in such a beautiful snow-white uniform, covered with so 
 many fine lines of white braid, as must make any man 
 regret having to lay it aside for the dark and sombre 
 winter regimentals. The bowing and interchange of con- 
 ventionally courteous greetings between the commandant 
 and the two Tokio officials whom we accompanied was a 
 charming exhibition of the old etiquette, just a little mod- 
 ified by the new. The cool, shady room, where tea and 
 cake and wine awaited us, had been built on the founda- 
 tions of the old house where Hideyoshi lived, and its in- 
 terior was panelled and ceiled with wondrous paintings 
 and carvings brought from one of the Taiko’s distant 
 castles. Before it stood a pine-tree, planted by the 
 daughter of that Napoleon of Japan, and there had been 
 enacted the brilliant drama of feudal life which Judith 
 Gautier has immortalized in The Usurper, a story which 
 invests Osaka’s castle with romance. 
 
 Then we spent two scorching hours in the gun-foun- 
 dery and arsenal outside the castle walls, where the ma- 
 chinery w'as German from Chemnitz founderies, and the 
 guns were made on Italian models. No foreigners were 
 visible about the place, and the machinery was managed 
 by Japanese workmen. 
 
 Next to its arsenal, Osaka takes pride in its mint, 
 w'hich is larger and better supplied with machinery than 
 any of the Government mints in the United States. An 
 army of workmen and workwomen in uniform tend the 
 machines, and melt, cast, cut, stamp, weigh, and finish 
 the coins, which, under the values of yens and sens, cor- 
 respond exactly to our coinage of dollars and cents. 
 The mint possesses a fine collection of coins, including 
 the coins and medals of all countries, as well as a com- 
 plete set of Japanese coins from the earliest days. 
 
 334 
 
Osaka 
 
 Another interesting Government institution is the ba- 
 zaar for the exhibition and sale of goods of Osaka man- 
 ufacture. All Japanese cities have these hakurankwai 
 (exposition), but no other is on so great a scale and so 
 crowded with beautiful things as this one. There one 
 may see all that any workshop turns out or any dealer has 
 for sale without the tedious process of bowing, taking 
 off one’s shoes, and sitting in tailor-fashion for an hour 
 before the desired articles are shown. All the goods are 
 marked in plain figures, and the fi.xed price obviates the 
 bargaining and the rattle of the soroban. There is an ad- 
 mission fee of a few coppers, and a percentage is charged 
 on all sales to support the institution. One may spend 
 a day in the labyrinth of rooms studying Osaka’s many 
 industries ; and everything, from gold and silver ware, 
 crapes, brocades, lacquers, enamels, porcelains and carv- 
 ings to food preparations, patent medicines, and imita- 
 tions of foreign goods, is to be found there. There is 
 even a department of plants and flowers, a hall of antiq- 
 uities, a section of toys, acres of china shops, and spec- 
 imens of everything made, sold, or used in that bustling 
 city. Evening brings electric lights and a military band, 
 and this industrial fair is made popular and profitable 
 all the year round. 
 
 Osaka is the centre of great iron, copper, and bronze 
 industries. Its artists decorate the finest modern Sat- 
 suma in microscopically fine designs, and the mark of 
 Gioksen, of Osaka, on tiny vase or koro stamps the piece 
 as the best example of the day. d'he soft yellow and 
 richly- toned wares of Idzumi kilns find their market 
 through Osaka, and the carving of teakwood into cabi- 
 nets and stands, or mounts, for vases and tokonoma or- 
 naments, is held almost as a monopoly by a great com- 
 pany of Osaka artisans. Its book trade and drj^-goods 
 trade are very great, and its chief silk -store, which is 
 still purely Japanese, displays the choicest fabrics of 
 
 335 
 
Jinrtkisha Days in ^apan 
 
 Kioto looms, and stuffs that only after much searching 
 are seen elsewhere. The straw goods trade is an im- 
 portant one, and its paper industries are on an even 
 greater scale. Fans are exported from Osaka by mill- 
 ions, the United States taking one fan for each inhab- 
 itant of the great republic. 
 
 Stamped leather is another product of Osaka, but is 
 chiefly exported to Trieste, to be made up there and at 
 Vienna into the pocket-books, portfolios, card and cigar 
 cases that cost so much in American jewelry and sta- 
 tionery stores. At Toyono’s, the largest leather factory, 
 squares of stamped leather were shown us in more than 
 a hundred designs of bugs, birds, and fish, covering the 
 ground, each piece of leather being about twenty-four 
 inches square, and selling at one or two dollars for the 
 single piece. Larger pieces, stamped with large and elab- 
 orate designs in gold or colors, and used for the foreign 
 trade as panels for wall decorations, mounted to ten and 
 fifteen dollars each, the size and quality of the leather 
 and work of the artist enhancing the price. The cost of 
 one of the large square brass dies from which the im- 
 pressions are made averages one hundred and fifty dol- 
 lars. In the old days the two-feet-square surface of brass 
 could be engraved in the finest all-over designs for half 
 that sum. The leather is stamped from these dies by a 
 hand-press, and after the stamping workmen sit on their 
 heels and color the designs. 
 
 An industry peculiar to Osaka is the manufacture of 
 floor rugs of cotton or hemp. These Osaka rugs were 
 much esteemed in feudal days, when the daimio had the 
 monopoly and sent them as gifts ; but in these prosaic 
 days a stock company and a large factory supply the 
 home market and the great foreign demand for these 
 inexpensive and pleasing articles. 
 
 Half the kairos sold in Japan are marked with an 
 Osaka manufacturer’s name, and in cold weather or in 
 
 336 
 
Osaka 
 
 illness the possessor of the kairo calls Osaka blessed. 
 For be it known that the kairo is a little tin box with 
 perforated sides and a sliding top covered with cloth. 
 Kairo zumi are three-inch paper cases filled with the 
 finest persimmon-leaf charcoal. You light one end of a 
 paper, drop it in the kairo, and blow it until it glows ; 
 slip the cover in and wrap the kairo in a handkerchief 
 or special bag. The little charcoal stick will burn for 
 three, or even six hours, giving a steady, even heat all 
 the time. It comes in many sizes, is curved in many 
 ways to fit closely to the body, and its weight is al- 
 most nothing. The commonest kairo, about four inches 
 long by two inches high, costs three or five cents, ac- 
 cording to the quality of cloth pasted over it, and each 
 package of the zumi costs a cent and a half. On winter 
 days one often sees the Japanese holding kairos in their 
 hands, tucking them in their obis, and slipping them 
 down their backs. They are serviceable in keeping 
 dampness out of the piles of linen in house - keeper’s 
 closets, and at night they assume the function of the an- 
 cient warming-pan. In .America it has been considered 
 only as a toy, a muff-warmer, or a pocket-stove. But its 
 best use is in the sick-room, where it will keep a poultice 
 or hot cloth at an even heat for days. A chill, a cramp, 
 or a rheumatic pain is charmed away by its steady, gen- 
 tle heat ; and in neuralgia, bound on the aching nerves, 
 it soothes them. Headaches have been known to yield 
 to it, and in sea-sickness the kairo overcomes the ago- 
 nizing chills and relieves the suffering. Our heavy rub- 
 ber hot-water bags, that are always leaking and suddenly 
 cooling, may well be superseded by the little kairo. 
 
 Osaka has curio-shops that are small museums filled 
 with the choicest industrial art of old Japan, and this 
 rich commercial city rivals Tokio and Kioto in its 
 amusement world, and has a theatre street a mile long. 
 Its theatres, its wrestlers, its maiko and geisha are as 
 
 V 337 
 
Jinrzkisha Days in Japan 
 
 well known as its industries, and its jinrikisha runners 
 are reckoned the swiftest in the empire. The lattex spin 
 over the stone-paved streets and bridges and round cor- 
 ners at a terrifying pace, all for si.v cents an hour, and 
 usually speed the departing guest to the station early 
 enough to allow him a half-hour at the little tea-houses 
 in the park, to eat cubes of the superlative Osaka sponge- 
 cake. The maiko and geisha of this southern capital are 
 renowned for their grace, beauty, and wit ; their taste in 
 arranging the obi and dressing the hair ; their cleverness 
 in inventing new dances ; and the entertainments in 
 which they figure, under the lanterned awnings of the 
 house-boats as they float up and down the river at night, 
 are unique among such fetes. 
 
 There are many rich and splendid temples in Osaka 
 that seem to have suffered little since the protection of 
 the Shogun and the court were withdrawn. Osaka, To- 
 kio, and Kioto, the three capitals, are the three religious 
 centres; and the Buddhist establishments, the extensive 
 yellow-walled monastery grounds in the district beyond 
 the Osaka castle are worthy of a capital. The numbers 
 of priests in the streets, the thousands of summer pil- 
 grims, and the scores of shops for the sale of temple or- 
 naments, altar furnishings, rosaries, and brocade trian- 
 gles for the shelf of household images, give a certain 
 sacerdotal aspect to the busy town. Oiie temple possesses 
 many relics of the Fort3’-seven Ronins, and at its annual 
 matsuri, when these are exhibited, the surrounding courts 
 are almost impassable with the crowds and the merry 
 fair. The twin Monto temples are splendid structures, 
 and priests from the Kioto Hongwanjis often assist in 
 their ceremonials. 
 
 As one approaches Osaka from Kara, Tennoji's roofs 
 and pagoda are seen at the same moment with the castle 
 towers. This pagoda is one of the few in Japan which 
 visitors are allowed to climb, and contains enough wood 
 
 338 
 
Osaka 
 
 and rough timber to build twenty like it after occidental 
 methods. Such steep and clumsy stairs and ladders are 
 harder to climb than mountains; for the climber crawls 
 over and creeps under heavy beams, and fairly twists 
 himself upward, getting an occasional peep down the 
 dark well-hole, where the builders’ secret is hidden. Vis- 
 itors wonder how pagodas are made to stand in an earth- 
 quake country, and why these spindling edifices should 
 be built up without regard to the inevitable tremble, un- 
 til they see in the hollow chamber, or well, an exagger- 
 ated tongue or pendulum hanging from the topmost 
 beams. 
 
 This tongue, made of heavy beams bolted together in 
 a mass, is equal to about half the weight of the whole 
 structure. It descends nearly to the base of the pagoda, 
 and at the shock of an earthquake the large pendulum 
 slowly swings, the structure sways, and settles back safely 
 to its base. 
 
 In a tall sheathed bell-tower near the pagoda there is 
 a most interesting shrine where parents hang the gar- 
 ments of sick and dying children. The whole interior is 
 filled with little kimonos and bibs, and the long rope of 
 the gong overhead is covered with them, while tearful 
 women cluster round the priests in the small interior, 
 and a continuous service seems to go on before the 
 altar. In the court-yard a large stone water-tank, sunk 
 a few steps and covered with a pavilion roof, contains a 
 stone tortoise pouring a constant stream of water into 
 the reservoir, on whose surface the faithful, buying 
 wooden shavings or prayer-papers from the priests, cast 
 these petitions and go away content. 
 
 Others fill little bottles with the water and carry it 
 home as a specific against many ills. In a pond near by 
 live hundreds of turtles. The ka)nc climb up on wooden 
 platforms in the pond and sun themselves, but at the 
 clap of the hand and the sight of popped beans floating 
 
 339 
 
Jinrikisha Days in 'Japan 
 
 about, the whole colony dive off and swim towards their 
 benefactor. 
 
 All around Tennoji are the yellow walls of the mon- 
 asteries, with miniature moats and heavy gate-ways, and 
 this quarter is a religious city by itself, which was once 
 a separate suburb with a population of 30,000. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIV 
 KOBE AND ARl.MA 
 
 Travellers had cause to rejoice when the Tokaido 
 railroad made it a twenty-four hours’ journey on dry land 
 from Tokio to Kobe, the foreign settlement adjoining 
 the ancient town of Hiogo. It is almost always a miser- 
 able trip by water, notwithstanding the beauty of Fuji 
 and the coast. Chopping seas, cross-currents, and un- 
 expected pitchings and motions disturb the equilibrium 
 even of an old sailor, and the trip to Kobe often lays 
 him low, while smiling skies and seemingly smooth wa- 
 ters seem to make a mock of him. \Vhen typhoons 
 sweep, the province of Kii is a magnet for them, and 
 frightful seas rage around that point which guards the en- 
 trance to the Inland Sea. 
 
 Kobe, as the port of Osaka and Kioto, and the outlet 
 of the great Yamashiro tea-district, is an important place 
 commercially ; its growth more than equalling Yoko- 
 hama’s since the opening of the port. Beginning with 
 less than 10,000 native inhabitants in the town of Hiogo 
 in 1868, it had risen to more than 80,000 in 1887. The 
 foreign colony has increased in proportion, and in 1888 
 its foreign trade amounted to $42,971,976. Of this sum 
 $24,667,906 were imports, and $18,304,070 were e.xports. 
 Ships of all nations lie at anchor in its busy harbor, and 
 
 no 
 
Kobe and' Arima 
 
 the many American sailing vessels that come out loaded 
 with kerosene return with cargoes of rags, camphor, and 
 curios, by which general invoice name are included the 
 cheaper porcelains, lacquers, fans, lanterns, toys, and tri- 
 fles made for the foreign trade. 
 
 Kobe, lying at the head of the Inland Sea, sheltered 
 from the ocean, and screened even from the land by the 
 low range of mountains back of it, possesses the best 
 and driest climate of any of the treaty ports now open 
 for the residence of foreigners. The soil is sandy, and 
 the site, facing southward, enjoys to the full the winter 
 sun and summer winds. The town, beginning in lines 
 of houses that run down from each velvet, green ravine 
 in the abrupt hill-wall, slopes steeply to the water’s edge, 
 and there spreads out in a long Bund, one part of which, 
 lined with foreign residences, banks, and consulates, is 
 the pride of Kobe. This foreign Bund is much less pict- 
 uresque than the native or Hiogo Bund, off which lie 
 hundreds of curious junks, that at night display constel- 
 lations of softly glowing lanterns on their masts, while 
 the whole harbor and hill-side twinkle with open lights, 
 and the electric search-lights of the men-of-war Hash 
 broad rays over the scene. 
 
 At the end of the native Bund Government buildings 
 close the street, and the railway wharf and sea-wall follow 
 a long point of land that runs far out into the bay, and 
 is capped by a fortress with a round stone tower and a 
 light house. A double line of ancient trees marks the 
 course of the Minatogawa, which centuries ago was 
 turned from its proper channel and made to run along 
 this high embankment. A steep slope of forty feet in 
 some places leads from the level of the Hiogo streets to 
 the banks of this watercourse, which are turfed over, 
 shaded with rows and groves of pines and enormous 
 camphor-trees, and made gay with garden-plots and pict- 
 uresque tea-houses. The dry river-bed is a play -ground 
 
 341 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 for legions of children, and during matsuris it is crowded 
 with booths and side-shows. Hiogo, meaning “ arsenal,” 
 figures prominently in ancient history, and here Kusu- 
 noki Masashige, that ideal hero and model of chivalric 
 valor, fought the last battle of the War of the Chrysan- 
 themums and established the sovereignty of the Empe- 
 ror Go-Daigo in the fourteenth century. Kusunoki's 
 memory is worshipped everywhere, but the Nanko tem- 
 ple in Hiogo is dedicated to his memory, and on anni- 
 versary days its matsuris are brilliant and picturesque 
 affairs. Besides this great Shinto temple, Hiogo has a 
 Buddhist establishment of equal importance — the Shin- 
 koji, outside whose sanctuary sits a colossal bronze 
 Buddha of serene, majestic countenance, its granite 
 pedestal rising as an island in the midst of a lotus 
 pond. 
 
 Properly speaking, the Minatogawa lies in Hiogo, but 
 where ancient Hiogo ends and modern Kobe begins no 
 mortal can see. The Motomachi, the main street of 
 Kobe, winds its narrow length from the banks of the 
 Minatogawa to the Foreign Concession, beyond which 
 warehouses, tea -firing godowns, and foreign residences 
 stretch and spread in every way outside the narrow lim- 
 its of the tract conceded to alien residents in the treaties. 
 Kobe means “head,” or “gate of god,” probably in ref- 
 erence to its position at the entrance of the Inland Sea. 
 While so picturesquely placed it is the model foreign 
 settlement of the East, and the municipal council — a 
 mixed board of consular and native officials — has never 
 allowed its right to that fame to be questioned. A pretty 
 park down in the heart of the Concession, shaded with 
 ancient camphor-trees and ornamented by hedges, groups 
 of palms, tliatched summer-houses, and a bell-tower, was 
 once the execution - ground of Hiogo. A small temple 
 that stood near it has given way to a large tea-firing go- 
 down, and native children tumble and play w’here the 
 
 342 
 
Kob^ and Arima 
 
 headsman used to bind mutilated bodies or ghastly heads 
 to high poles and set them up at the corners, after imme- 
 morial usage. The park, or recreation-grounds for the 
 foreign colony, lies, beside the long embankment of an- 
 other elevated river-bed on the opposite side from the 
 Minatogawa. 
 
 Every gap in the Kobe hills leads to some lovely little 
 valley, and orange groves dot the hill-sides. In one green 
 ravine are the falls of Nunobiki, where a clear mountain 
 stream takes two long plunges down sheer granite walls, 
 drops in foaming cascades past old rice-mills, and courses 
 on over the sloping plain to the sea. The Moon temple 
 shines, a white spot, far up towards the summit of the 
 steep, green mountain, and, with the more accessible 
 falls, offers the two favorite points for visitors’ excur- 
 sions. P'arther along the brow of the hill stands the 
 Gold Ball temple, a whitewashed structure, looking like 
 an exaggerated country meeting-house, with its roof sur- 
 mounted by a gilded sphere, and with nothing even sug- 
 gesting Buddhism in its appearance. While it is an eye- 
 sore to every one else, the natives, who contributed the 
 money to build this monstrosity of what they consider 
 foreign architecture, are delighted with its unique and 
 bizarre appearance. Around it lies a populous grave- 
 yard, many of the stones gray with the mosses of centu- 
 ries. Others, newly erected, are family memorials, bear- 
 ing the names of those members already buried there 
 written in black characters, and the names of the living 
 in red. It is a curious custom ; but to the Japanese, who 
 even point with pride to the red letters of their own names 
 on these family monuments, it is rational and right. Cre- 
 mation is the funeral rite preferred, and up a narrow val- 
 ley behind the temple is the crematory, much used both 
 by rich and poor. The process is simple and inexpen- 
 sive, and the visitor always encounters some funeral train 
 accompanying a body to that little white temple of fire, 
 
 343 
 
Jiurikisha Days in 'Japan 
 
 or some family group bearing the ashes down to the 
 cemetery for final rest. 
 
 A line of tea-houses bands the brow of the hill; in- 
 numerable Shinto shrines lost among the pine-trees show 
 their long lines of torii at the edges of the groves ; and 
 at another point the schools and homes of the large 
 American missionary colony make a settlement quite to 
 themselves. 
 
 Kobe' is almost entirely given up to the trade in cheap 
 goods for the foreign market. The streets are lined and 
 the shops filled with such porcelain, bronze, paper, and 
 lacquer monstrosities ; such burlesques of embroidery 
 and nightmares of color as crowd the Japanese stores in 
 the cities of America, chief customers of this trade. One 
 Chicago importing house takes more of such goods an- 
 nually than the whole kingdom of Belgium, one of the 
 oldest, richest, and most densely populated countries 
 of Europe. The curio-shops proper have diminished in 
 numbers as the rage for foreign trade increased, until 
 there remains almost alone the establishment of an 
 old samurai, who still retains the shaved crown and gun- 
 hammer cue of his class. Despising modern ways and 
 business signs, this one simply hung a huge sword over 
 his gate-way and left his customers to stumble upon him 
 accidental!)', push their way through a rubbish and lum- 
 ber-room, and pursue their unguided path across the gar- 
 den. Of recent years even this old conservative has 
 relented a little and made his entrance more plainly allur- 
 ing ; but formerly each comer felt the excitement of dis- 
 covering some jealously hidden treasure-house. Within, 
 there is still a room full of old saddles, state kagos, 
 military trappings, and banners ; a place crowded with 
 spears, lances, and color standards; a chamber piled high 
 with brocade gowns, uniforms and temple hangings ; 
 hundreds of carved and gilded Buddhas, divine Kwan- 
 nons more or less battered and worn, and hoards of old 
 
Kobd and Arzma 
 
 porcelain, lacquer, bronze, and carvings. The last room 
 looks upon a little garden with its inevitable miniature 
 pond crossed by a stone bridge with stone lanterns, and 
 stunted pines on the slope of a small mountain. Be- 
 yond this garden are more stores of armor, coins, and 
 ancient things, and a second story doubles the whole 
 lower labyrinth of the place. An army might be equipped 
 from this magazine of military stores, or a pantheon fitted 
 out with Buddhas, Kwannons, Nios, lesser gods, and 
 gilded images. All these deities are certified to have 
 come from the Nara or Mount Hiyeizan temples, which 
 are tlie miraculous sources of supply of everything sacer- 
 dotal in this part of Japan. One fortunate tourist, who 
 bought a Buddha of Hari Shin, found that the jewel in 
 the forehead was a diamond instead of a crystal, which, 
 when cut in facets, proved to be worth several hundred 
 dollars. Of this incident the old samurai prefers not to 
 talk, and to change the subject his agile son refills the 
 tea-cups, unrolls more kakemonos, or displays the swords 
 and helmets “of my father’s young time.” 
 
 Through Kobe the colored straw mosaics of Tajima 
 province on the west coast find their market, as well as 
 the basket wares of Arima, a village lying fifteen miles 
 inland. One goes from Kobe to Arima by jinrikisha, 
 and starting in the dew and freshness of a summer morn- 
 ing at si.x o’clock, we reached the grateful shade of the 
 Taiko’s maple in the tea-house garden soon after nine. 
 As we rose by degrees through the suburbs of Kobe, 
 and drew nearer its glorious green hill-wall, we had a 
 superb view of the opaline bay, set with the black hulls 
 of great merchant ships, the white ones of foreign men- 
 of-war, and dotted with the square white sails of hun- 
 dreds of junks and fishing-boats. A sudden turn in the 
 road took us behind the sharp spur of a hill, and a nar- 
 row canon lay before us with the road clinging to one 
 side wall. All the way we followed watercourses — the 
 
 343 
 
Ji?trtkisha Days m Japan 
 
 road now in some wild ravine, and again running up 
 some emerald rice valley. All the v/ay we met primitive 
 ox-carts carrying their loads down to Kobe, each driver 
 bearing an equally heavy load hanging from the ends 
 of a pole across his shoulders. The oxen’s horns were 
 bound with fantastic bits of red cloth, their feet shod 
 with straw sandals ; and the cart was braked on the 
 slopes by the main force and strength of the driver ex- 
 erted against a long tongue or pole that also served 
 to guide it. These placid, easy-going oxen, with their 
 hard-working drivers walking beside them, afford some 
 of the best pictures of the old road-side scene.s. Small 
 boys trudged at their fathers’ heels with bundles of bas- 
 kets or firewood over their shoulders, and women carried 
 their share of the family load. 
 
 When the bamboo groves and rice fields of Arima’s 
 neighborhood appeared, the paddy fields, lying terrace 
 below terrace on a rounding hill-side in waving, irregular 
 lines, easily suggested the terraced basins around the 
 Yellowstone hot springs; the Japanese farmer uncon- 
 sciously repeating, in larger outlines of vivid green, wh.at 
 the overflowing waters have built up in snowy deposits 
 in the Montana Park. Arima, which lines the sides of 
 a steep gorge through which a wild mountain - stream 
 dashes, is as picturesque as a mountain village in Swit- 
 zerland. The houses are built almost one on top of 
 another, with narrow, winding streets, where the heavy 
 projecting roofs almost meet. Stone steps ease the 
 steep slopes for the villagers, and the clatter of clogs 
 and the sight of the peasants going up and down the 
 stair-ways, half-hidden by the loads of grass or straw on 
 their backs, recall similar pictures in the crooked little 
 mountain hamlets of Northern Italy. At the tea-house 
 we wandered through an intricate garden before reach- 
 ing the steps of the detached pavilion, on whose balcony 
 were chairs and hammocks, and before which loomed a 
 
 346 
 
FARM LAIiOKERS 
 
Kobi and Arima 
 
 peqjendicular green mountain-wall with its base sunk in 
 the feathery, spray-like tops of bamboo groves. To us 
 came peddlers and packs with samples of everything 
 the town could offer, and the rooms were soon a bazaar 
 of bamboo wares. 
 
 All the afternoon we roamed about Arima, climbing 
 its steep streets and threading its narrow by-ways. In 
 the glaring white sunlight the shops were caves of cool 
 shadow, and we found them filled with everything that 
 bamboo will make, from clothes-baskets to toothpicks, 
 and all selling for a song. 'I'heir weight is almost noth- 
 ing, but, with the most ingenious packing, the space they 
 consume makes tlie cost of shipment to America equal 
 that of production. E.xcept the necessaries of life, noth- 
 ing seems to be sold in Arima save bamboo baskets and 
 straw work ; and every house is a basket-factory, where 
 father, mother, children, and almost babes, weave bas- 
 kets or prepare the bamboo. Heredity asserts itself 
 again, and these descendants of generations of basket- 
 makeis work with a de.xlerity equalling sleight-of-hand 
 tricksters. Arima’s industrial life is a fine study in po- 
 litical economy. 
 
 The hill -side is musical with the boom of Buddhist 
 bells and echoing clang of Shinto gongs; but more 
 strangers toil upward for a drink from the sparkling, 
 ice-cold soda spring beside one temple, than to pray at 
 its door-way. For centuries Arima’s hot- springs have 
 wrought their cures, and sufferers from rheumatism and 
 skin diseases have flocked to its pools. The Govern- 
 ment has charge of the springs, and the waters are con- 
 ducted to a large bath-house in the heart of the village, 
 where free baths in the common pool are open to every 
 one, and where private baths may be obtained at a tri- 
 fling charge. 
 
Jinrikisha Days in "Japan 
 
 CHAPTER XXXV 
 THE TEA TRADE 
 
 Since Commodore Perry opened Japan to the world 
 his countrymen have been consuming more and more of 
 its teas each year, the United States and Canada being 
 almost her only customers, England and Russia, the 
 great tea-drinking countries of Europe, buying hardly 
 enough to serve as samples. Each year the United 
 States pays over $7,000,000 for the nerve-racking green 
 tea of Japan. Besides the price of the tea, a trifle of 
 $11,000,000 goes to Japan for raw silk and cocoons. In 
 return, Japan imports from America less than $2,000,000 
 in kerosene oil, and another $1,000,000 in clocks, watch- 
 es, and leather. It is this balance of trade that disturbs 
 United States officials in Japan, who see England sell- 
 ing that thrifty nation over $18,000,000 in cotton, wool- 
 len, and iron goods, and taking from it a little over 
 $3,000,000 of manufactured silks, curios, and art goods. 
 Meanwhile Russian petroleum arrives by ship -loads, 
 and, handled by the largest English firm in the East, is 
 being pushed and sold by the smallest retailers at less 
 than the Standard Oil Company’s fluid. 
 
 The tea -plant, as every one knows, is a hardy ever- 
 green of the camellia family. It grows a thick and 
 solidly-massed bush, and at a first glance at a field reg- 
 ularly dotted and bordered with the round bushes set- 
 ting closely to the ground, one might easily mistake it 
 for box. In the spring the young leaves crop out at 
 the ends of the shoots and branches, and when the 
 whole top of the bush is covered with pale golden-green 
 
 350 
 
The Tea Trade 
 
 tips, generally in May, the first picking takes place. 
 The second picking belongs to the fire-fly season in 
 June, and after that great festival tea comes in from 
 the plantations in decreasing quantities until the end of 
 August. The choicer qualities of tea are never e.xport- 
 ed, but consumed at home. Choice basket -fired tea, 
 such as is used in the homes of the rich and well-to-do 
 Japanese, sells for one and two dollars a pound. There 
 are choicer, more carefully grown and prepared teas, 
 which cost as high as from seven to ten dollars a pound ; 
 but such teas are shaded from the hot suns by matted 
 awnings, and the picker, going down lines of these care- 
 fully tended bushes, nips off only the youngest leaves or 
 buds at the tip of each shoot. The average tea, bought 
 by the exporters for shipment to the United States and 
 Canada, is of the commonest quality, and according to 
 Japanese trade statistics, the average value is eleven cents 
 a pound as it stands, subject to the export duty and ready 
 for shipment abroad. There are often sales of whole 
 cargoes of Japan tea at auction in New York for fifteen 
 cents a pound. Families who buy this same brand from 
 their grocers at forty or sixty cents a pound may judge 
 to whom the greater profits accrue. 
 
 Japan tea came into market as a cheaper substitute 
 for the green teas of China, those carefully rolled young 
 hysons and gunpowders of our grandmothers’ fancy. Eu- 
 rope has never received the Japan teas with favor, but 
 tile bulk of American importations is Japanese, and the 
 taste for black tea is being cultivated very slowly in the 
 great republic. For green tea, the leaves are dried over 
 hot fires almost immediately after picking, leaving the 
 theine, or active principle of the leaf, in full strength. F'or 
 black tea, the leaves are allowed to wilt and ferment in 
 heaps for from five to fourteen days, or until the leaf turns 
 red, and the harmful properties of theine have been partly 
 destroyed. The Oolong tea of South China is nearest to 
 
Jiftrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 green tea, its fermentation being limited to three or five 
 days only, while the richly-flavored black teas of North 
 China, from the Hangkow, Ningchow, and Keemung dis- 
 tricts, are allowed to ferment for twice that period to pre- 
 pare them for the Russian and English markets. The 
 choicest of these black teas go to Russia, a part of the 
 crop still being carried by camel trains from the end of the 
 Grand Canal near Pekin to the terminus of the trans-Si- 
 berian railway. It is also shipped by steamers to Odessa ; 
 and as the tea is thoroughly fired and sealed in air-tight 
 packages, it makes no difference in the quality of the in- 
 fusion afterwards whether the tea-chests were jolted by 
 camel caravans from Tungchow to Irkutsk, or pitched 
 about in a ship’s hold — much as caravan tea is celebrated 
 in advertisements for the American public. 
 
 The Japanese Government made experiments in the 
 manufacture of black tea in the province of Ise, but the 
 results were not satisfactory, and no further efforts have 
 been made to compete in that line with China. Japan 
 will continue to furnish the world’s supply of green tea, 
 but as the demand for such stimulants declines, a great 
 problem will confront its tea-farmers. 
 
 Kobe and Yokohama are the great tea ports, each one 
 draining wide districts, and their streets being fragrant 
 with the peculiarly sweet odor of toasting tea-leaves all 
 summer long. 
 
 At Kobe thirteen firms, of which only two .are Ameri- 
 can, are engaged in the tea-trade. In Yokohama there 
 are twenty -eight firms, thirteen being English, eleven 
 American, two German, and two Japanese. One American 
 firm has invented machinery for firing and coloring the 
 tea, the leaves being tossed and turned by inanimate iron 
 instead of by perspiring coolies. As there are no pat- 
 ent laws in Japan, and as the Japanese are very quick at 
 copying, this machinery has to be very carefully watched, 
 taken apart, and locked up every night. * Several thou- 
 
The Tea Trade 
 
 sand men, women, and even children are busily employed 
 during the four months of the busy season — May, June, 
 July, and August. A steam saw-mill, set up by a specu- 
 lative American, makes a business of supplying tea-chests 
 to these firms, although some still depend on their own 
 carpenters. The matting and the sheets of lead for cov- 
 erin>; and lining the boxes come from China. Each firm, 
 too, has a little art and printing establishment attached, 
 where the gaudy labels for chests and cans are block- 
 printed. One firm often has a hundred different pic- 
 torial labels for its packages of tea, that number of names 
 being applied to the one kind of tea shipped. 
 
 Of each consignment made, a sample can of tea is for- 
 warded by mail, while a duplicate sample can is retained 
 by the exporter. 
 
 The young tea-leaves picked in May and early June 
 comprise more than half of the whole season’s crop, suc- 
 ceeding growths of leaves being coarser and having less 
 flavor. This tea, picked by women and children in the 
 fields, is roughly dried in shallow baskets lined with pa- 
 per over charcoal fires, and is then sold to commission 
 dealers in the interior towns and villages. They sort it 
 into grades, toast it once more, and ship it to the treaty 
 ports in rough paper sacks, boxes, and baskets. Some 
 of it comes by junks to Yokohama. Over and over the 
 tea is tested by sample infusions and the leaves care- 
 fully inspected. All summer, at the exporting houses, 
 the tea -tasters are busy with their rows of white cups. 
 A certain weight of leaves is put in each cup, the boil- 
 ing water is poured on and allowed to stand for five 
 minutes. 'I'he expert notes, meanwhile, the color of the 
 liquid and the aroma, carefully watches the unrolling of 
 the leaves, and then tastes the brew by slow sips, medi- 
 tatively, discriminatingly. The tea-taster takes care to 
 swallow very little, as its effects are disastrous in time. 
 Tea-tasters as a rule follow their business but a few 
 
 z 353 
 
Jinrzkisha Days in 'Japan 
 
 years, severe nerve and stomach trouble being brought 
 on by the constant sipping of so much powerful stimu- 
 lant. Of course they command high salaries. Astonish- 
 ing stories are told of the acuteness of their sense of 
 taste and the certainty of their judgments. Their deci- 
 sion sets the price, and the dickering with the Japanese 
 commission merchant is always settled by the tea-taster’s 
 estimates. 
 
 In the tea-firing godowns the dried leaves are stacked 
 in heaps as high as a haystack, when it makes a solid, 
 cohesive mass, that can be cut off like hay with a patent 
 hay-knife. In nearly every case the firing is superin- 
 tended by a Chinese compradore, and his assistants are 
 Japanese. 
 
 The tea-firers bring their cooked rice and their own 
 teapots with them, and snatch refreshment whenever 
 there is a lull in the work. They are searched at night 
 when they leave, and with the sweet simplicity of chil- 
 dren they keep on trying to secrete the leaves, always 
 being caught at it. d'lieir work consists in standing over 
 round iron pots sunk in a brick framework for the thir- 
 teen hours of a day’s work, and stirring and tossing tea- 
 leaves. There are charcoal fires under the iron pans, 
 and all day they must lean over the hot iron and brick. 
 The tea is given this extra firing to dry it thoroughly 
 before its long sea-trip, and at the same time it is “pol- 
 ished,” or coated with indigo, Prussian blue, gypsum, and 
 other things which give it the gray lustre that no dried 
 tea-leaf ever naturally wore, but that American tea-drink- 
 ers insist on having. Before the tea-leaves are put in 
 the pans for the second firing men, whose arms are dyed 
 with indigo to the elbows, go down the lines and dust a 
 little of the powder into each pan. Then the tossing and 
 stirring of the leaves follows, and the dye is worked thor- 
 oughly into them, the work being regulated by overseers, 
 who determine when each lot has been fired enough. It 
 
 354 
 
The Tea Trade 
 
 requires a certain training to keep the tea-leaves in con- 
 stant motion, and it is steady, energetic work. 
 
 This skilled labor is paid for at rates to make the 
 Knights of Labor groan, the wage list showing how im- 
 possible tea-culture is for the L'nited States until pro- 
 tectionist tea -drinkers are ready to pay ten dollars a 
 pound for the commonest grades. During the four busy 
 months of the tea season the firers are paid the equiva- 
 lent of eleven and four-tenths cents, United States gold, 
 for a day's work of thirteen hours. Less expert hands, 
 who give the second firing, or polishing, receu'e nine and 
 si.x-tenths cents a day. Those who sort and finally pack 
 the tea, and who work as rapidly and automatically as 
 machines, get the immense sum of fifteen cents a day. 
 Whole families engage in tea-firing during the season, 
 earning enough then to support them for the rest of the 
 year; or, rathei; pinching for the rest of the year on what 
 they earn during this brief season. In autumn little tea 
 is fired, but the whole force of workmen can be had at the 
 shortest notice, though the godown may have been closed 
 for weeks. One compradore, notified at eleven o’clock 
 at night that tea must be fired the next day to fill a 
 cable order, had four hundred coolies on hand at day- 
 break, many of them summoned after midnight from 
 their villages, distant over seven miles from the godowns. 
 This mysterious underground telegraphy in the servants’ 
 quarters is one of the astonishing things of the East. 
 
 Tea-firing begins at six o’clock in the morning, the 
 coolies clattering into the settlements on their wooden 
 clogs at dawn, and going home at dusk. They wait pa- 
 tiently outside the compounds until the lordly Chinaman 
 comes to summon as many workers as he wants for the 
 day, whether two- hundred, three hundred, or four hun- 
 dred. All these guilds in the Orient have their estab- 
 lished rules of precedence among themselves ; each one 
 knows his rights and his place, and desperate as may be 
 
’Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 their need of the small pittance, there is no pushing or 
 fighting. Foreigners who live near godowns complain 
 of the babble of the coolies before daylight, and a tea- 
 firing godown always declares its nearness by the con- 
 fused hum of the several hundred cheerful voices all day 
 long. The Japanese lower classes are the most talkative 
 people under the sun, and rows of jinrikisha coolies 
 never sit quietly in waiting, like the red-nosed Parisian 
 cabmen, dozing or reading feuilletons, but are always 
 jabbering, laughing, playing games and tricks on one 
 another. The long, hot day’s work does not check the 
 tea-firers’ loquacity in the least, and at dusk they are as 
 sociable as at dawn. One frenzied resident, whose door- 
 steps, window-sills, and shady curb-stones were favorite 
 resting-places for the tea -firing coolies, determined to 
 know the subjects discussed with such earnestness and 
 sonorous phrases. His interpreter reported on three 
 consecutive mornings that, for three mortal hours, one 
 group of ten coolies, sitting on patient heels, cheerfully 
 discussed the coming rice crop. 
 
 Philanthropists see fit to drop a tear over the lives of 
 the workers in the tea-godowns, although these victims 
 seem as cheerful and well satisfied with their lot as hu- 
 man beings can be. The women and young girls are 
 rather picturesque with their blue cotton towels folded 
 over their heads, and as the Japanese have remarkably 
 pretty hands, the play of their fingers in the moving 
 streams of tea -leaves is pleasant to watch. How they 
 endure the slow, killing heat of the charcoal fires in tor- 
 rid weather, on their diet of tea, rice, and shreds of cold 
 fish, is a marvel to indolent, meat-eating foreigners. The 
 pathetic sights are the women with young babies on their 
 backs trudging home from the godowns at sunset, the 
 babies having been danced around on the backs of older 
 children in the godown-yard all day, or laid down in some 
 safe corner near the mother's charcoal-pan. I asked a 
 
 336 
 
The Tea Trade 
 
 most humane woman once why charity did not take the 
 form of a creche, or day nursery. The answer was that 
 it would be impossible to support such an institution in 
 so small a community of foreigners. Each godown would 
 need a large creche of its own ; the poor women could not 
 afford to spare a half-penny of their earnings, and the 
 problem must solve itself. 
 
 If man cannot live by bread alone, many foreign resi- 
 dents live by tea alone, and live luxuriously. Great fort- 
 unes are made quickly in the tea trade no longer, as in 
 earlier days. Romance departed with the clipper ships, 
 and the cable and freight steamers reduced the tea trade 
 to prosaic lines. Only the best and most experienced 
 men now succeed in this trade, but the tea -merchant 
 toils in his counting-room and godown only from April 
 to October. Then he closes and locks it all behind him, 
 and usually goes over to the United States to look after 
 his interests and orders there. Tea has its fluctuations, 
 like corn or cotton, although it is a crop that never fails, 
 with the added disadvantages of the great distance from 
 the final markets and the expensive cable communica- 
 tions to make it uncertain and full of speculation. As 
 it takes fifty days for the fast tea steamers to reach New 
 York by way of the Suez Canal, the tea -picking season 
 is over when the exporter learns of the arrival and sale 
 of his invoices. On account of the heavier freight charges 
 that way, only a fraction of the crop crosses the Pacific 
 to be shipped by rail across the continent from San 
 Francisco, the New York steamers by way of the Suez 
 Canal requiring but a little longer time, saving half the 
 cost to the shipper, and adding the convenience of a 
 single handling of the cargo. 
 
 'I’lie first of the season’s crop is fired and hurried olT 
 as quickly as possible; tea steamers racing through Suez 
 to New York, and the overland railroads rushing cargoes 
 across the United States in special trains, as if they were 
 
 35 / 
 
Jinrtkisha Days in Japan 
 
 perishable. With the exception of the four Pacific Mail 
 steamers running to San Francisco, English ships carry all 
 this tea to American markets. The tea steamers discharg- 
 ing cargo at New York usually load there for Liverpool, 
 and arrive in Japan in time for the next season, or some- 
 times make two trips to New York in one season. While 
 the tea is moving freights are high, but in the autumn 
 they decline. One or two sailing ships take entire car- 
 goes of tea to Tacoma each season, and send them across 
 the continent by the Northern Pacific Railroad. The 
 greatest market for Japan teas in America is now cen- 
 tering at Chicago instead of New York, and prophetic tea- 
 merchants expect to have San Francisco become the 
 headquarters and great distributing point. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVI 
 
 THE INLAND SEA AND NAGASAKI 
 
 In making six trips through the Inland Sea I have 
 seen its beautiful shores by daylight and moonlight and 
 in all seasons — clothed in the filmy green of spring, 
 golden with ripened grain or stubble, blurred with the 
 haze of midsummer heat, and clear in the keen, midwin- 
 ter winds that, sweeping from the encircling mountains, 
 sting with an arctic touch. 
 
 My first sail on its enchanted waters was a September 
 holiday, the dim horizon and purple lights prophesying 
 of the autumn. From sunrise to dark, shadowy vistas 
 opened, peaceful shores slipped by, and heights and 
 islands rearranged themselves. The coast of south- 
 eastern Alaska is often compared to the Inland Sea, but 
 the narrow channels, wild canons, and mountain -walls 
 of the Alaska passage have no counterpart in this Area- 
 
 358 
 
The Inland Sea and A'agasakt 
 
 dian region. The landlocked Japanese water is abroad 
 lake over two hundred miles long, filled with islands, 
 and sheltered by uneven shores. Its jagged mountains 
 of intensest green nowhere become wild enough to dis- 
 turb the dream -like calm. Its verdant islands lie in 
 groups, the channel is always broad and plain, and signs 
 of human life and achievement are always in sight. 
 Along the shores stretch chains of villages, with stone 
 sea-walls, castles, and temples soaring above the clus- 
 tered roofs or peeping from wooded slopes, and the ter- 
 raced fields of rice and grains ridging every hill to its 
 summit and covering every lower level. Stone lanterns 
 and torii mark the way to temple groves, and cemeteries 
 with ancient Buddhas of granite and bronze attest that 
 these little communities are centuries old. Junks and 
 sampans lie anchored in fleets, or creep idly across the 
 water, and small coasting steamers thread their way in 
 and out among the islands. Only one port of the Inland 
 Sea between Kobe and Nagasaki is open to the foreign- 
 er, and e.xcept by authority of his passport he cannot 
 set foot on these tantalizing shores save at Hiroshima, 
 where the Government naval station is. 
 
 At Shimonoseki tile'll nland Sea ends, and ships pass 
 out by the narrowest of its channels — a channel that 
 boils with tide-rips and across which a chain once held 
 all craft at bay. New forts replace the old ones bom- 
 barded by the combined English, Dutch, French, and 
 American fleets in September, 1868. The “Shimono- 
 seki .VfTair ” is conspicuous in the annals of the scandal- 
 ous diplomacy and international bullying that has con- 
 stituted the policy of Christian nations in their relations 
 with Japan. 'I'he United States did, indeed, make a late 
 and lame apology for its disgraceful share in tlie plun- 
 dering of a weaker people, by restoring its portion of 
 the indemnity, thus tardily acknowledging the injustice 
 of its conduct. 
 
 359 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 Ships following down the coast pass by the island of 
 Ikeshima, the scene of an outrage even less creditable 
 to the United States than the Shimonoseki iniquity. In 
 1887 the U. S. S. Omaha chose this inhabited island as 
 the scene of target practice, terrifying the inhabitants 
 by throwing their shells quite across the island, and 
 maiming and killing many villagers, who, after the mimic 
 bombardment was over, ventured down, in the pursuit 
 of their labors, among the unexploded shells. Our 
 Government did, indeed, offer $15,000 indemnity to the 
 wounded survivors ; but the whole affair affords one 
 more instance of the injustice which stronger nations 
 have always shown towards this w’eaker power. No 
 British man-of-war would do its torpedo practising on 
 the cliffs of Mount Desert ; nor a Russian cruiser care- 
 lessly train its guns on the Isle of Wight ; nor a German 
 ironclad choose an inhabited island off the coast of 
 France for a target, and expect to atone for “ the un- 
 fortunate affair ” with a beggarly sum of money. In 
 view of the enormous indemnities claimed in earlier 
 days for the death of Richardson and for the common- 
 est brawlers of the ports, the Japanese are free to draw 
 their own conclusions concerning the justice and good 
 faith of Christian peoples. 
 
 As travel increases, the harbor of Nagasaki will be 
 everywhere known as one of the most picturesque in the 
 world. Green mountains, terraced and wooded to their 
 very summits, have parted far enough to let an arm of 
 the sea cleave its way inland, and chains of islands with 
 precipitous shores guard the entrance of the tortuous 
 reach. The town seems to have run down from the ra- 
 vines and spread itself out at the end of the inlet, and 
 temples, tea-houses, and the villas of foreign residents 
 cling to the hill-side and dot the groves on the heights. 
 
 But Nagasaki has seen its great days, having lost its 
 importance when the opening of the port of Kobe took 
 
 360 
 
The Inland Sea and Nagasaki 
 
 the tea trade to the upper end of the Inland Sea, around 
 which lie the great tea districts of Japan. Its coal mines 
 and its million-dollar dry-dock make it a harbor that no 
 ships pass by, more vessels entering annually than at 
 Yokohama. All the naval fleets coal here, and buy the 
 greater part of their supplies in this cheap market, and 
 fleets of foreign men-of-war are always at anchor. Rus- 
 sian convict ships on their way to Vladivostock touch 
 at Nagasaki, but only the few shipping merchants who 
 provision them are allowed on board during the few days 
 which precede the departure of the gloomy hulks for Si- 
 beria. 
 
 By losing its tea trade and becoming chiefly a station 
 for coal and supplies, Nagasaki remains less affected by 
 foreign influences than any other open port in Japan. 
 Its people are more conservative than those of the north- 
 ern island, and cling to inherited customs and costume 
 tenaciously. The old festivals are kept up with as much 
 spirit as ever, and boat-loads of farmers praying for rain 
 often make Nagasaki’s harbor ring with their shouts and 
 drum - beating. Twenty of these rustics, sitting by the 
 gunwales in one long boat, and paddling like so many 
 Indians in a war-canoe, go up and down the narrow fiord 
 waving banners and tasselled emblems. 
 
 While the inhabitants kept it, Nagasaki’s observance 
 of the Bon, the festival of the dead, was even more pict- 
 uresque than the Daimonji of Kioto. On the night when 
 Nagasaki’s spirits were doomed to return to the place 
 of the departed, lights twinkled in all the graveyards, 
 and the mourners carried down to the water’s edge tiny 
 straw boats set with food offerings. These they lighted 
 and started off ; and the tide, bearing the frail flotilla 
 Iiere and there, finally swept it out to sea — a fleet of 
 fire, a maze of floating constellations. Many junks and 
 bridges were burned on these festival nights, and the 
 authorities have forbidden the observance. 
 
 361 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 While Nagasaki was the first port opened to foreign- 
 ers, it now has fewer foreign residents than any other. 
 There are large mission establishments, but, outside of 
 their community, the society open to the consuls and 
 merchants is very limited when the harbor is empty of 
 men-of-war. Their villas on the heights are most luxu- 
 rious, and the views these con)mand down the narrow 
 fiord and out to the ocean entrancing. Life and move- 
 ment fill the harbor below. Ships, junks, and sampans 
 come and go ; bells strike in chorus around the anchor- 
 age-ground ; whistles echo, bands play, saluting and sig- 
 nalling flags slip up and down the masts, and the bang 
 and long- rolling echo of the ships’ guns make mimic 
 war. At night the harbor lights are dazzling, and the 
 shores twinkle to the very hill-tops. The crowded masts 
 of native junks are as trees hanging full of golden, glow- 
 ing spheres, and electric flash-lights from the men-of-war 
 illuminate sections of hill and town and harbor niches. 
 
 The Nagasaki winter is delightful — clear, bright, sun- 
 ny days continually succeeding each other ; but in sum- 
 mer-time the climate leaves much to be desired. The 
 air is heavy with moisture, and when the thermometer 
 registers 90° there is a steamy, green-house temperature 
 that encourages the growth of the hundred varieties of 
 ferns that amateur botanists collect on these hills. This 
 damp heat is exhausting and wearing, trying to temper 
 and patience, and annihilating to starch and artificial 
 crimps. Man’s energy fails with his collar, and although 
 all the sights of the empire were just over the hill, the 
 tourist would miss them rather than go to see them. 
 Everything mildews then ; boots taken off at night are 
 covered with green mould in the morning, gloves spot 
 and solidif}', and fungi gather on any clothing packed 
 away. Every morning, on balconies and clothes-lines, is 
 aired and sunned the clothing that nevertheless mildews. 
 Only a strong sense of reverence for a hero’s memory 
 
 36^ 
 
The Inland Sea and Nagasaki 
 
 can then lead one up the terraces of the public gardens 
 near the O Suwo temple to see the tree that General 
 Grant set out. When he came to Nagasaki, both the 
 General and Mrs. Grant planted trees to commemorate 
 the visit, and his autograph certificate recording the 
 event was cut in fac-simile on the face of the large, 
 irregular stone between the two saplings. Though the 
 trees have been most carefully tended, one died and had 
 to be replaced, but both now promise to spread into a 
 generous shade. At the tea-house where the great Japan- 
 ese dinner was given by the local governor, with maiko 
 and geisha and jugglers performing between the courses, 
 they still preserve the floor-cushion on which their illus- 
 trious guest was seated, and bring it out to show to fa- 
 vored Americans. To the Japanese, General Grant and 
 Commodore Perry mean America ; nor could we have 
 sent them better types than the great sailor who peace- 
 ably opened Japan to the world, and the greater soldier 
 who made use of war only to insure enduring peace. 
 
 'I’he Portuguese and Dutch have left records of their 
 occupancy here in the si.xteenth and seventeenth centu- 
 ries. Francis Xavier and the Jesuit fathers who suc- 
 ceeded him converted thousands of Japanese to Chris- 
 tianity, and though it had been supposed that the 
 persecutions and tortures under lyeyasu had destroyed 
 the Christians, the opening of the country after the 
 Restoration discovered whole communities of them near 
 Nagasaki, who retained their belief, wore the peculiar 
 dress prescribed for them by the Jesuits, knew the prayers 
 and forms, and made the sign of the cross. Nothing in 
 the Book of Martyrs e.vceeds the tortures and sufTering 
 of these Christians, who would not deny their religion, 
 nor tread upon the paper picture of Christ, as they 
 were bidden to do. The tradition goes that at Pappen- 
 berg, the precipitous little island at the mouth of the 
 harbor, thousands of converts were forced by spear- 
 
 363 
 
Jinrikt'sha Days in Japa 7 i 
 
 points into the sea, but the best scholars and authorities 
 now discredit this wholesale horror, of which no trust- 
 worthy record exists. 
 
 From 1641 the Dutch lived as prisoners on the little 
 island of Deshima, where the porcelain bazaar now stands, 
 suffering incredible restrictions and humiliations for the 
 sake of monopolizing the trade of the country. Naga- 
 saki’s children and beggars still follow strangers with 
 the shout, Hollander san ! Hollander san!” as a re- 
 membrance of those first foreign residents, and in curio- 
 shops queer clocks and ornaments show the adaptation 
 and imitation of many Dutch articles by the Japanese. 
 
 The fact of Nagasaki's being only a port of call makes 
 its curio market fluctuate in proportion to the number 
 of merchantmen and men- of- war in port. When the 
 harbor is full, no resident visits the curio-shops, whose 
 prices always soar at such times. Tortoise-shell carv'- 
 ing is a great industry of the place, but porcelain is still 
 the specialty of this southern province, where the art was 
 first introduced. Those wares of South Japan known 
 anciently as Nabeshima and Hirado are the finest of 
 Japanese porcelains, their blue and white beauty being 
 simply perfect. The potters rvho brought the art from 
 Korea and China settled in Satsuma and Hizen, and 
 the kilns of Arita and Kagoshima are still firing. The 
 Dutch carried the Arita w'are to Europe under the name 
 of Hizen. This porcelain is now more commonly term- 
 ed Imari, while Deshima is another general name for 
 the modern product, and Nabeshima and Hirado are 
 the words used by connoisseurs in classifying the older 
 wares. This confusion of names misleads the traveller, 
 who cannot at once discern that Hizen is the name of 
 the province, , Arita of the town where the potters live 
 and the .kilns are at work, Imari of the port from which 
 it is shipped, Nabeshima the family name of that daimio 
 of Hizen who brought the potters from Korea, and Hi- 
 
 36-t 
 
The Inland Sea and Nagasaki 
 
 rado of the town on the island of that name which pro- 
 duced the priceless pieces sent as gifts to Shogun or 
 fellow-daimios. Modern Imari ware is much too fasci- 
 nating and tempting to the slender purse, but when one 
 acquires a fondness for the exquisite porcelains the old 
 Nabeshima made for themselves, learns the comb-like 
 lines and the geometrical and floral marks on the under- 
 side that characterize them, and is aroused to the per- 
 ception of the incomparable “seven boy” Hirado, his 
 peace of mind is gone. Genuine old Hirado vases or 
 plates, with the seven boys at play, or even five boys or 
 three boys, are hardly to be bought to-day, and the count- 
 less commercial imitations of the old designs do not de- 
 ceive even the amateur connoisseur. Old Satsuma is even 
 rarer, and a purchaser needs to be more suspicious of it 
 in Japan than in London. It is true that the air is full 
 of tales of impoverished noblemen finally selling their 
 treasures ; of forgotten godowns being rediscovered ; and 
 of rich uncles leaving stores of Hirado and Satsuma to 
 poor relations, whose very rice-box is empty. Ilut the 
 wise heed not the voice of the charmer. The credulity 
 of the stranger and the tourist is not greater than the 
 ignorance of residents who have been in the country for 
 years without learning to beware of almost everything on 
 which the Emperor’s chrysanthemum crest, the Tokugawa 
 trefoil, or the Satsuma square and circle stand conspic- 
 uous. 
 
 The fine modern Satsuma, all small pieces decorated 
 in microscopically fine work, is painted chiefly by a few 
 artists in Kioto and Osaka, and their work and signa- 
 tures are easily recognized. The commoner Satsuma — 
 large urns, koros, vases, and plates — is made in the 
 province of Satsuma and in the Awata district of Kioto, 
 but it is decorated anywhere — Kobe, Kioto, Yokohama, 
 and Tokio all coating it with the blaze of cheap gilding 
 that catches and delights the foreign eye. Once upon 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 a time ship- loads of porcelains, bronzes, and lacquer 
 were sold for a song; fine bells going for ship ballast, 
 and ships’ cooks using veritable old Satsuma jars to put 
 their drippings in. But that time is not now. A collec- 
 tion of old Satsuma lately gathered up in Europe by a 
 Japanese buyer brought five times its cost when disposed 
 of in Japan. Some notion of the wealth of art works, 
 and of the great stores the country contained in the 
 old days, may be conveyed by the drain of these twenty 
 years, since Japanese art began to revolutionize the art 
 world. The Restoration, the Satsuma rebellion, the 
 adoption of foreign dress for the army and the court, 
 each sent a flood of rare things into the curio market, 
 and hard times still bring forth treasures. The great 
 collectors and connoisseurs are now so generally known 
 that sacrifices of choice curios are made directly to them 
 by private sale, and not in the open market. Govern- 
 ment has begun to realize the irrecoverable loss of the 
 country, and the necessity of retaining what still re- 
 mains, and lists and photographs are being made of all 
 art treasures stored in the Government and temple go- 
 downs throughout the empire. Much has been de- 
 stroyed by fire, of course, and it is said that the priests 
 themselves have put the torch to their temples at the 
 approach of the official commission that would have dis- 
 covered what priceless temple treasures they had sold 
 in times of need. All the Buddhist establishments suf- 
 fered loss of revenues after the Restoration, and only 
 by secretly disposing of the sacred objects in the go- 
 downs were many priests kept from starvation. 
 
 While the Dutch were there, Nagasaki had a large 
 trade with China, and still does a great business with 
 that country in the exportation of dried fish. It smells 
 to heaven all along the Bund, and in the court-3’’ards of 
 the large warehouses men and women turn in the sun 
 and pack into bags oblong brown things that might be 
 
 366 
 
The InlaJtd Sea and Nagasaki 
 
 either the billets of wood used in cricket, or old boot- 
 soles. These hard blocks are the dried bonito which, 
 shaved on a plane, stewed, and eaten with rice, are a 
 staple of food in both countries, and not unpalatable, as 
 we found while storm-bound on Fuji. 
 
 Almost all the coal used in China and Japan, and by 
 the Asiatic fleets of the different nations, comes from the 
 mines on the island of Takashima, at the entrance of 
 Nagasaki’s fiord-like harbor. Cargoes of it have been 
 sent even to San Francisco with profit, although this soft 
 and very dirty fuel is much inferior to the Australian 
 coal. The Takashima mines and the dry- dock at Na- 
 gasaki are owned by the Mitsu Bishi company, which 
 retained those properties when it sold its steamship line 
 to the Government, and the coal-mine brings in two 
 million yen a year to its owners. Its deepest shaft is 
 only one hundred and fifty feet down, and barges carry 
 the coal from the mouth of the shafts to the waiting ships 
 in harbor. 
 
 In 1885. the year of the great cholera epidemic, the 
 village of mining employes was almost depopulated. 'I'he 
 harbor was nearly deserted, the American and English 
 mission stations were closed, and the missionaries and 
 their families tied to Mount Hiyeizan. Only the Cath- 
 olic fathers and the nuns remained, much to the concern 
 of the governor and officials, who begged them to go. 
 On our way to China we touched at Nagasaki while the 
 epidemic was at its height, but no passenger was allowed 
 to go ashore, and all day we kept to the decks that were 
 saturated with carbolic acid. It took six hours to coal 
 the ship, and from noon to sundown we beheld a water 
 carnival. As the first coal-barge drew near, a man in the 
 airy summer costume of the harbor country — which con- 
 sisted of a rope around his waist — jumped over the side 
 and swam to the stern of our steamer. lie was like a 
 big, brown frog kicking about in the water, and when he 
 
 367 
 
Jinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 came dripping up the gang-way the faithful steerage stew- 
 ard gave liim a carbolic spraying with his bucket and 
 brush. The barge was hauled up alongside and made 
 fast, and our consignment of coal was passed on board 
 in half-bushel baskets from hand to hand along a line 
 of chanting men and women. Nothing more primitive 
 could be imagined, for, with block, tackle, windlass, steam, 
 and a donkey engine on board, it took a hundred pairs 
 of hands to do their work. At the end of each hour 
 there was a breathing spell. Many of the women were 
 young and pretty, and some of them had brought their 
 children, who, throwing back the empty baskets and 
 helping to pass them along the line, thus began their 
 lives of toil and earned a few pennies. The passengers 
 threw to the grimy children all the small Japanese coins 
 they possessed, and when the ship swung loose and started 
 away their cheerful little sayonaras long rang after us. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVII 
 IN THE END 
 
 And after a foreigner has spent months or years in 
 the midst of these charming people, what has he discov- 
 ered them to be ? What does the future hold for them ? 
 To what end did Commodore Perr}' precipitate upon 
 them the struggle and ferment of the nineteenth cen- 
 tury ? The present generation ceasing to be what their 
 forefathers were, what do they expect of their descend- 
 ants ? Is our world thoroughly to occidentalize them, 
 or will they slowly orientalize us ? Which civilization is 
 to hold, and which is the better ? These are the unsolv- 
 able problems that continually confront the thoughtful 
 observer. 
 
 368 
 
In the End 
 
 The Japanese are the enigma of this century ; the most 
 inscrutable, the most paradoxical of races. They and 
 their outward surroundings are so picturesque, theatrical, 
 and artistic that at moments they appear a nation of 
 poseurs — all their world a stage, and all their men and 
 women merely players ; a trifling, superficial, fantastic 
 people, bent on nothing but pleasing effects. Again, the 
 Occidental is as a babe before the deep mysteries, the 
 innate wisdom, the philosophies, the art, the thought, the 
 subtle refinements of this finest branch of the yellow 
 race. To generalize, to epitomize is impossible ; for they 
 are so opposite and contradictory, so unlike all other 
 Asiatic peoples, that analogy fails. They are at once 
 the most sensitive, artistic, and mercurial of human be- 
 ings, and the most impassible, conventional, and stolid ; 
 at once the most logical, profound, and conscientious, 
 and the most irrational, superficial, and indifferent; at 
 once the most stately, solemn, and taciturn, and the 
 most playful, whimsical, and loquacious. While history 
 declares them aggressive, cruel, and revengeful, experi- 
 ence proves them yielding, merciful, and gentle. The 
 same centuries in which was devised the elaborate re- 
 finement of cha no yu saw tortures, persecutions, and 
 battle-field butcheries unparalleled. The same men who 
 spent half their lives in lofty meditation, in indicting 
 poems, and fostering art, devoted the other half to gross 
 pleasures, to hacking their enemies in pieces, and watch- 
 ing a hara kiri with delight. Dreaming, procrastinating, 
 and referring all things to that mythical }nionichi (to-mor- 
 row), they can yet amaze one with a wizard-like rapidity 
 of action and accomplishment. The same spirit which 
 built the Shinagawa forts during the three months of 
 Commodore Perry’s absence at times animates the most 
 dilatory tradesmen and coolies. 
 
 There is no end to the surprises of Japanese character, 
 and the longer the foreigner lives among them the less 
 
 2 A 369 
 
yinrikisha Days in Japan 
 
 does he understand the people, and the less do his facts 
 contribute to any explanation. Their very origin is mys- 
 terious, their Ainos the rock on which ethnologists foun- 
 der. Their physical types present so many widely differ- 
 ing peculiarities that one cannot believe in any common 
 source, or in the preservation of the race from outside 
 influences for so many centuries. Some coolie possesses 
 the finely-cut features, perfectly-modelled surfaces, and 
 proudly-set head of a Roman emperor. Some peer ex- 
 hibits the features, the stolidity, and the slow, guttural 
 articulation of a Sioux Indian, and it is common to see 
 coolies identical in figure and countenance with the na- 
 tive races of the north-west coast of America. One group 
 of children might come from an Alaskan village, and in 
 another group frolic the counterparts of Richter’s fisher 
 boys of Italy. At times the soft, musical speech flows 
 like Italian ; at other times it is rough and harsh, and 
 rumbles with consonants. 
 
 Their very simplicity, their childlike naivete, deceives 
 one into a conviction of their openness, while a myste- 
 rious, invisible, unconquerable barrier rises forever be- 
 tween us and them. The divergence of life and thought 
 began in Western Asia too many ages since for the races 
 that followed the setting sun to find, at this late day, the 
 clew to the race that sought the source of the sun’s rising. 
 China, which once gave the Japanese their precepts and 
 models and teachers, shows now more differences than 
 resemblances. Far as the pupils have departed from 
 the traditions of the instructor, there yet remains a celes- 
 tial conservatism, a worship of dry formality, and a re- 
 spect for the conventional which the new order over- 
 comes but slowly. The missionaries in China, who have 
 to contend against the apathy or open hostility and the 
 horrible surroundings of the native population, greatly 
 admire the Japanese, and envy their colleagues who live 
 in so beautiful a country, among so clean, courteous, and 
 
 370 
 
In the End 
 
 friendly a people, so eager to learn and so quick to ac- 
 quire. It is true that foreign merchants and officials in 
 China laud the superior qualities of the Celestial, and 
 infer a superficiality and want of seriousness in the Jap- 
 anese; but the alien who has dwelt in Japan experiences 
 a new homesickness when he exchanges a Japanese port 
 for one across the Yellow Sea, with “Nanking” instead 
 of “Nippon ” servitors about him. The Japanese make 
 an unconscious appeal to a sentiment deeper than mere 
 admiration, but the secret of the fascination they exer- 
 cise defies analysis. 
 
 Politically and socially, the Japanese copy the exam- 
 ples of the western world ; and the Restoration, with its 
 consequences, furnishes the most astonishing political 
 problem of the century. The sudden abandonment of 
 the old order, the upspringing of a whole nation armed 
 cap-a-pie in modern panoply of peace, has been too amaz- 
 ing to be at once accepted, at least among Europeans, as 
 a real and permanent condition of things. If Europe 
 cannot take the United States seriously after a whole 
 century of steadfastness, much less can it comprehend 
 an alien nation like Japan in a brief score of years. 
 
 A constitution and a parliament have been volunta- 
 rily given to a people who had hardly chafed under au- 
 tocratic forms, or even demanded a representation. Its 
 military and naval establishments, its police organiza- 
 tion, and its civil service are modelled upon the best of 
 many foreign models. Its educational system is com- 
 plete, an admirable union of the best of American, Eng- 
 lish, and German methods. Its postal establishment, 
 its light-houses, telegraphs, railways, hospitals equal those 
 of the W'est. And all this was accomplished, not by 
 slow growth and gradual development, the fruit of long 
 need, but almost overnight, voluntarily, and at a wave 
 of the imperial magician's wand. 
 
 This new birth, this sudden change from feudalism 
 
 37 > 
 
Ji)tri/:is/ia Days in 'Japan 
 
 and the ISIiddle Ages to a constitutional Government 
 and the nineteenth century of Europe and America, is a 
 unique spectacle. This spectacle — this unparalleled 
 effort of a people to lay aside what they were born to 
 reverence and follow, because alien customs seemed to 
 promise a greater good to a greater number — this spec- 
 tacle, which should have challenged the admiration, the 
 sympathy, and the generous aid of western nations — 
 has been met almost by their opposition. A weaker 
 people groping towards the light, learning by the saddest 
 experiences, has been hampered, bound, and forced from 
 its chosen way by the Christian nations, who have taken 
 every shameful advantage of superior strength and as- 
 tuteness. Unjust treaties were forced upon the Japan- 
 ese at a time when they could not protest, and when 
 they could neither understand nor foresee the workings 
 of them. Backed by a display of naval strength, these 
 treaties were pressed upon the little nation, and by the 
 bully’s one argument a revision of these unjust agree- 
 ments has been denied them for these thirty years ; al- 
 though the Japan of to-day, its conditions and institu- 
 tions are, in no one particular, what they were at the 
 time of the first negotiations. Pathetic have been the 
 struggles of citizens and statesmen, while the most high- 
 spirited of races has been forced to submit to political 
 outrages or face the consequences of war — the imposi- 
 tion of yet harder terms by their oppressors. Limited 
 in its revenues by these very treaties, Japan can the less 
 consider war with unscrupulous western powers. The 
 Government, in its efforts to secure foreign training for 
 its people, has been fleeced, imposed upon, and hood- 
 winked, through its ignorance of foreign ways. Reluc- 
 tantly admitting the perfidy of one people, the Japanese 
 have turned to another. In consequence, they are be- 
 rated for their fickleness and love of change, and taunt- 
 ed with the fact that American, English, and German 
 
 372 
 
In the End 
 
 influences, successively, have been uppermost at court, 
 and their languages and customs successively fashion- 
 able. The Germans, to our shame be it said, have dealt 
 with them more honorably than any other people, and 
 the present triumph of German interests has been well 
 deserved. 
 
 The ambition, the courage, and persistency of this 
 small nation, in the face of sucli hindrances, is wonder- 
 ful ; and their struggles with strange tongues, strange 
 customs, and strange dress, all at once, were heroic. In- 
 different critics ascribe this peaceful revolution to a love 
 of novelty and an idle craze for foreign fashions. They 
 claim that it is but a phase, a fleeting fancy, a bit of mas- 
 querading, to be abandoned when the people weary of 
 it, or attain their ends. I’ut fickleness is not the charac- 
 teristic of thousands of persons of one race, pursuing the 
 same objects for thirty years ; nor could a nation of such 
 taste and intelligence adopt and adhere to strange cus- 
 toms for the mere sake of novelty. Prophecies of retro- 
 gression discredit themselves, now that a whole genera- 
 tion has grown up to whom the new is the established 
 order. Japanese youths, educated and trained abroad, 
 have returned home to fill the places of foreign instruc- 
 tors and managers. Each year fewer and fewer foreign- 
 ers are needed in Government departments and institu- 
 tions. “ Japan for the Japanese ” is a familiar cry. The 
 desire for enlightenment and the impulse towards prog- 
 ress were the result of forces already acting from within, 
 long before Commodore Perry’s black ships came to an- 
 chor in Mississippi Bay, and still potent as then. 
 
 In this day the way to distinction and power is open to 
 the humblest. There is a baton in every knapsack, an im- 
 perial councillor’s star in every school-room. 'I'he mer- 
 chant has been ennobled, the samurai have sat at the 
 Emperor’s table, the eta walks free, the equal of other citi- 
 zens, and the humblest peasant has inviolable civil rights. 
 
 373 
 
'Jinrikisha Days in yapait 
 
 Women have come out of their guarded seclusion, and 
 enjoy a social existence and importance and a legal 
 equality, and their educational opportunities are ever 
 enlarging. Marriage laws, divorce laws, and property 
 laws secure to them rights greater than some European 
 women hold. 'I'he family life and authority remain un- 
 changed, and the privacy of the home is jealously guard- 
 ed, no foreigner penetrating to that sacred centre. The 
 family ceremonies and festivals are observed as punctil- 
 iously as ever. The nobility and the official class lead 
 the social life of Europeans, but the conservatism of the 
 middle or merchant class still clings to the old order, 
 which another century may find almost unchanged. 
 
 The art of Japan has already revolutionized the west- 
 ern world, leaving its impress everywhere. The quick 
 appropriation of Japanese ideas and expressions marks 
 an era in the Occident as distinct as that of the Renais- 
 sance. For all her giving with full hands, we can return 
 nothing to this most art-loving of nations. Western ex- 
 amples and teachings, and the ignorant demands of west- 
 ern trade, have wrought artistic havoc in the Island Em- 
 pire. Wherever foreign orders have been received, the 
 simplest work has so deteriorated, has been so vulgar- 
 ized and cheapened, that recognized efforts are now 
 making to arrest this degradation of the national art. 
 Cultivated Japanese, appalled at this result of western 
 teachings, encourage artists and artisans in the study of 
 national masterpieces and the practice of the old methods, 
 and the labors of these public-spirited citizens are ably 
 seconded by the Government. The foreign professor of 
 drawing, with his hard pencils and his plaster casts, is a 
 functionar)’ of the past. To-day the youth of Japan holds 
 to his own writing-brush, and begins, as aforetime, with 
 the one stroke, two stroke, and three stroke sketches that 
 lie at the root of the old masters’ matchless art. Strange- 
 ly enough, all perception of the beauty and relation of 
 
 374 
 
In the End 
 
 color seems to leave the Japanese when they use foreign 
 materials. The people who have all their lives wrought 
 and used and worn the most harmonious combinations 
 of color in their garments and household goods, will ex- 
 ecute monstrosities in Berlin wools in place of the rich 
 old fukusa, and combine the crudest and most hostile 
 hues with unconcern. The very use of foreign furnish- 
 ings or utensils seems to abate the national rage for 
 cleanliness, and in any tea-house that aspires to be con- 
 ducted in foreign fashion, one discovers a dust, disorder, 
 shabbiness, and want of care that is wholly un-Jap- 
 anese. 
 
 Nor in other ways has contact with foreigners wrought 
 good to these people. Conservative families have been 
 mortified and humiliated by what seems to them the 
 roughness and vulgarity of the manners of their sons 
 and daughters who had been educated abroad. Many 
 gentlemen even, in Tokio, long refused their daughters 
 a foreign education for this reason. The mission-schools 
 for girls found it necessary to engage masters of cha no 
 yu and of native deportment and etiquette, to instruct 
 the pupils ill their charge. Among the lower classes 
 the decay of courtesy, under foreign influences, was 
 rapid. The bold, impertinent, ill-mannered coolies and 
 nesans of the treaty ports are as unlike as possible to 
 the same people in interior or remoter towns. 
 
 If the people are to lose their art, the fine finish of their 
 manners, the simplicity of living, all the exquisite charm 
 of their homes. Commodore Perry should be rated as their 
 worst enemy. If they refine and make better what they 
 now receive from the Occident, as they did with what 
 China gave them long ago, is it not possible that Japan 
 will surpass the world in the next century? Already 
 the art workshop of the globe, has it no greater mission, 
 as travel brings all countries nearer together, than to 
 become the play-ground and holiday country of all na- 
 
 375 
 
Jinrikisha Days in ’Japan 
 
 tions, occupying the same relation to both hemispheres 
 that Switzerland does to Europe ? 
 
 Surely some better lot than that awaits this charming 
 people, who so quickly win the admiration, sympathy, 
 and affection of the stranger that is within their gates. 
 
INDEX 
 
 Actors, q6, 97, 283. 
 
 Ainos, 370. 
 
 Akamatsu, Mr., 239. 
 
 Akasaka, 125. 
 
 Alaska, 358, 370. 
 
 Aleshine, Mrs., 2. 
 
 Aleutian Islands, 2. 
 
 Amado, 141, 144, 162, 323. 
 Amah, 24, 174. 
 
 Amenomori, Mr., 139. 
 
 Amida, 230, 238, 251. 
 
 Andons, 90, 14 1. 
 
 Anthem, tlie National, 116. 
 Arashiyama, 252, 253. 
 
 Alima, 345, 346, 349. 
 
 Arimatsu, 204, 205. 
 
 Arisugawa, Prince Takehito, 124. 
 Arita, 364. 
 
 Armor, 106, 210, 212, 237, 249, 
 275. 329. 344- 
 Arnold, Sir Edwin, 95. 
 
 Art, Club, Tokio, 50. 
 
 Commission, Imperial, 312, 
 
 Japanese, 50, 374. 
 
 327. 328. 
 
 Asahiko, the Empress Dowager, 
 123. 
 
 Prince Kuni, 128. 
 
 Asakusa, 47, 51, 52. 
 
 Ashikaga, 250, 251. 
 
 Atago Vaina, 49. 
 
 Attu, Island of, 2. 
 
 Awata, 228, 235, 269, 270, 277, 
 279, 2S5, 286, 3C5. 
 
 Awatsu, 221. 
 
 Raku, 99. 
 
 Baltimore, 51. 
 
 Bamboo, 35, 136, 233, 346, 347. 
 Banko ware, 209. 
 
 Baths, 128, 169, 170, 173, 194, 
 195. 203, 349- 
 Battledore, 283. 
 
 I Bazaars, 131, 273, 335. 
 
 Beauvais, 260. 
 
 Behring Strait, 2. 
 
 Belgium, 344. 
 
 Benkei, 217. 
 
 Benten, the Goddess, 41, 42, 272. 
 
 Dori, 13, 15. 
 
 Berry, Dr. J. C., 241. 
 
 Bird, Miss Isabella, 146. 
 Bishamon, 271. 
 
 Biwa, 22. 
 
 Lake, 179, 216-218, 235, 
 
 331- 
 
 Black tea, 351, 352. 
 
 Bleaching, 2S3. 
 
 Bluff, the, Yokohama, 7, il. 
 Board of Trade, 331. 
 
 Bon Festival, 242, 361. 
 
 Boston, 51, 328, 329. 
 
 Botan, 77. 
 
 Bridge, the Sacred Red, 148, i6o. 
 Brocades, 63, 257-259. 
 
 Bronze, 275, 276. 
 
 Buddha, 38, 78, 148, 157, 222, 
 230, 234, 235, 237, 238, 308, 
 311, 312, 327, 342, 344, 345. 
 359- 
 
 Buddhism, 21, 47, 135, 138, 230, 
 236, 237, 239, 241, 310, 311, 
 313, 321, 322, 326, 327, 338, 
 342, 366. 
 
 Bund, Hiogo, 341. 
 
 Kobe, 341. 
 
 377 
 
Itidex 
 
 Bund, Nagasaki, 366. 
 
 Yokohama, 3, 4, 8. 
 
 Cables, telegraphic, 23, 255, 357. 
 Camels, 165, 352. 
 
 Camphor, 52, 341. 
 
 Canada, 351. 
 
 Canadian Pacific Co., 2. 
 
 Canton, 261. 
 
 Cape King, 3. 
 
 Caravan, 352. 
 
 Carp, 78, 193, 286, 302, 303. 
 Castle, Kioto, 249. 
 
 Nagoya, 206-208. 
 
 0.saka, 331-334. 
 
 Shidzuoka, 197. 
 
 Tokio, 125. 
 
 Catacombs, 272. 
 
 Cats, 154, 284. 
 
 Cemeteries, 158, 243, 244, 343, 
 361. 
 
 Ceylon, 240, 311. 
 
 Cha no yu, 91, 113, 127, 132, 250, 
 296, 297, 299, 369, 375. 
 Chapel, the Imperial, 128. 
 Charcoal, 170, 337. 
 
 Chautauqua, 218. 
 
 Chemnitz, 334. 
 
 Cherry blos.soms, 69-74, 252, 253. 
 Chicago, 331, 344. 
 
 Chickens, 52, 285. 
 
 Children, 4, 16, 54. 
 
 China, i, 20, 31, 47, 120, 250, 
 272, 310, 327, 351, 352, 364, 
 367. 371. 375- 
 Chinatown, 20. 
 
 Chinese, 20, 65, 113, 120, 135, 
 238, 247, 248, 261, 272, 284, 
 295. 322. 
 
 Chioin temple, 234, 235. 
 Chirimen, 262-264. 
 
 Chit, 26. 
 
 Chit-book, 26. 
 
 Chiuzenji, 165-167. 
 
 Cholera, 254, 367, 36S. 
 Chopsticks, 88, 128, 214. 
 Christianity, 240, 241, 363. 
 Chrysanthemum, 29, 65, 81, 95, 
 260. 
 
 Order of the, 112. 
 
 Chrysanthemum, War of the, 
 250, 342. 
 
 Citadel, 333. 
 
 Climate, 22, 23, 362. 
 
 Clipper ships, 357. 
 
 Coal, 361, 367, 368. 
 
 Coins, 14, 328, 334. 
 
 Columbus, Christopher, 25. 
 Compradores, 21, 355. 
 Concession, foreign, 342. 
 Constitution, the new, 114, 371. 
 Consuls, 46. 
 
 Coolies, 8, 9, 205, 206, 253, 254, 
 325, 356, 375- 
 Court circle, 131, 132. 
 
 costume, 116, 119, 120, 
 
 316- 
 
 Crabs, 42. 
 
 Crapes, 13, 261, 267. 
 
 cotton, 13, 283. 
 
 Creche, 357. 
 
 Cremation, 343. 
 
 Cross, Buddhist, 272. 
 Cryptomeria, 141, 309, 316. 
 Cupid, 307. 
 
 Dai Bl'tsu, 38, 234, 311-313. 
 Daidokoro Mon, 245. 
 
 Daikoku, 137, 271, 273. 
 
 Dai Maru, 62. 
 
 Daimios, 44, 141, 212, 272, 315. 
 Daimonji, 242-244, 265, 361. 
 Daitokuji, 296. 
 
 Daiyagawa, 147, 148, 154, 174. 
 Dancing, 90, 132, 154, 215, 252, 
 315, 316, 319. 
 
 Dango-zaka, 81, 82. 
 
 Danjiro, 105, 109. 
 
 Daruma, 223. 
 
 Dasha, 211. 
 
 Declaration of Independence, 
 292. 
 
 of New Constitution, 1 14- 
 
 Deer, 307-310. 
 
 Deshima, 364. 
 
 Dialects, 294. 
 
 Divorce, 374. 
 
 Dohachi, 228. 
 
 Doshisha, 240, 241. 
 
 Dotemachi Gakko, 259. 
 
Index 
 
 Drama, the, 96, 100. 
 
 Dramatic literature, 99-101. 
 Dresser, Dr. C., 96, 292. 
 Dry-docks, 361, 367. 
 
 Dutch, the, 364, 366. 
 
 Dyeing, 204, 205, 260, 261, 283, 
 
 354- 
 
 E. \rthquakes, 61. 
 
 Ebisu, 264, 271. 
 
 Echigoya, 62. 
 
 Edinburgh, Duke of, 98. 
 Education, 57, 240, 241, 371, 
 
 373. 375- 
 
 Eels, 95. 
 
 El Capitan, 333. 
 
 Electric lights, 23, 104, 126, 282. 
 Embroideries, 267, 268. 
 Emperor, the. See Mutsu Hito. 
 Empress, the. See llaruko. 
 
 the Dowager. See Asahiko. 
 
 Enamel, cloisonne, 209, 278, 285- 
 
 2gt. 
 
 Engei Kyokai, 97. 
 
 Enoshima, 38, 41, 42. 
 
 Eta, 96, 159, 373. 
 
 Etruscan, 272. 
 
 Execution-ground, 342. 
 
 Eyeball, Buddha’s, 327, 328. 
 
 F. ACE-rOWDF.R, 12. 
 
 Faience, 277. 
 
 Fans, 281, 366. 
 
 Farm-houses, 12. 
 
 Fea,st of Dolls, 54. 
 
 of Lanterns, 243. 
 
 Festival, boys’, 56. 
 
 Fine Arts Club, Tokio, 50. 
 Fireflies, 1S8, 280, 320, 351. 
 Fires, 59. 
 
 Fish, 40, 42, ’285, 366. 
 Fla.sh-ligbt, 327, 341, 362. 
 
 Fleas, 145. 
 
 Fleur-de-lis, 77. 
 
 P'loorls, 331, 332. 
 
 Florists, II, 49, 81. 
 
 Flower festivals, 65-86. 
 
 Frescos, 327. 
 
 Fruits, 22. 
 
 Fuji-san, the Goddess, 176, 186. 
 
 Fujiyama, l, 3, 12, 34, 35, 41, 
 
 49-51. 175-1S9. 191. 192. 195, 
 
 196, 202. 
 
 Fujiyeda, 199. 
 
 Fujiwara, 123. 
 
 Fukiage gardens, 129. 
 Fukurokojin, 271. 
 
 Fukusa, 270-272. 
 
 Funerals, 21, 139. 
 
 Fushimi, 237, 307. 
 
 Fusuma, 141. 
 
 Futa-ara, 158. 
 
 Futen, 158. 
 
 Futon, 145, 173, 182. 
 
 G.\mm.\n, 159. 
 
 Gardening, ii. 
 
 Garden-parties, Imperial, T15, 
 1 16. 
 
 Gate-keeper, 223. 
 
 Gatling-guns, 206. 
 
 Gautier, Judith, 334. 
 
 Geisha, 90, 213, 269, 284, 300, 
 303.. 332, 337- 
 “ Genji Monogatari,” 221. 
 Genoske, loi, no. 
 
 Giantess, 284. 
 
 Gilbert and Sullivan, 269. 
 Ginkakuji, 249. 
 
 Ginza, 43, 53. 
 
 Gioksen, 280, 335. 
 
 Gion temple, 223-225, 301. 
 Gobelins, 260. 
 
 Go-Daigo, the Emperor, 342. 
 Gods, Seven Household, 271. 
 Gojo bridge, 228. 
 
 Gold Ball temple, 343. 
 
 Golden Koi, 95. 
 
 Gold-thread, 260. 
 
 Gompachi and Komurasaki, 134. 
 Gosekke, 130. 
 
 Gotemba, 176, 187. 
 
 Grammar, Japanese, 292. 
 
 Grant, General U. S., 50, 129, 
 
 363- 
 
 Greek, 272. 
 
 Green tea, 351, 352. 
 
 Griffis, Rev. \V. E., 170, 292. 
 Guides, 146. 
 
 Guilds, 223, 264, 355. 
 
 379 
 
Index 
 
 Gunpowder tea, 351. 
 
 Gunsa, 21 r. 
 
 Gwariobai, 69. 
 
 Hachi-ishi, 140, 147. 
 
 Hachiman, 39, 41, 313. 
 
 Hachioji, 255. 
 
 Hair-pins, 16, 54. 
 
 Hakodate, 22. 
 
 Hakone, 35, 175, 176, 191. 
 
 Hama Rikiu, palace of, 129. 
 Hamamatsu, 201. 
 
 Hamana, lake of, 201. 
 
 Hana michi, 104. 
 
 Hangkow, 352. 
 
 Hara kiri, 106, 297. 
 
 Hari Shin, 345. 
 
 Ham, the Crown Prince, 124. 
 Haruko, the Empress, 112-114, 
 124, 299. 
 
 Hayashi, 273. 
 
 Hechima, 10. 
 
 Heloise and Abelard, 134. 
 
 Henri Deux, 278. 
 
 Hepburn, Rev. J. C., 294, 295. 
 Hibachi, 87, 265. 
 
 Hidetada, 49. 
 
 Hideyoshi, 91, 234, 237, 283, 292, 
 296. 297, 334. 
 
 Higashi Hongwanji, 236. 
 
 Otani, 227. 
 
 Hikone, 217. 
 
 Hina Matsuri, 54. 
 
 Hiogo. See Kobe. 
 
 Plira, INIount, 221. 
 
 Hirado, 294, 364, 365. 
 
 Hirakana, 99, 295. 
 
 Hiroshima, 359. 
 
 Hiyakudo, 313. 
 
 Hiyeizan, Mount, 217, 218, 222, 
 249, 345- 
 Hizen, 210, 364. 
 
 Hoishigaoka, 92. 
 
 Hokkaido, 12. 
 
 Hokorokojin, 192. 
 
 Hokusai, 51, 271. 
 
 Holidays, 53. 
 
 Homura, 21. 
 
 Honchodori, 13. 
 
 Honmaru, 125. 
 
 Honolulu, 2. 
 
 Horiuji, 326-328. 
 
 Hospitals, 1 14, 371. 
 
 Hotei, 271. 
 
 Hot springs, 169, 170, 173, 
 349- 
 
 House-boats, 57, 58,-332, 338. 
 Household Gods, 271. 
 
 Hyson, 351. 
 
 Ice, 22, 280. 
 
 Ichijo Takada, 113, 130. 
 
 Ichiriki, 222. 
 
 Idzumi ware, 335. 
 
 Ihai, 128. 
 
 Ikeda, 273. 
 
 Ikegami, 77, 135, 136. 
 
 Ikeshima, 360. 
 
 Imaichi, 143. 
 
 Imari, 210, 364, 365. 
 
 Incense, 274. 
 
 India, 272. 
 
 Ink, 321. 
 
 Inland Sea, 42, 330, 340-342, 
 358, 359- 
 
 Insects, 140, 145, 284, 324. 
 
 Iris, 77. 
 
 Irkutsk, 352. 
 
 Ise, 208, 352. 
 
 Isezakicho, 15. 
 
 Ishiyama, 218. 
 
 Ito, Count, 120, 130. 
 
 Countess, 121. 
 
 lyekando, 235. 
 lyemitsu, 39, 149, 153. 
 lyeyasu, 39, 49, 149, 150, 157, 
 207, 292. 
 
 Iwakura, 130. 
 
 Jacquard, 257. 
 
 Japan Stream, 3. 
 
 “Japanese Homes,” by Prof. E. 
 
 S. Morse, 292. 
 
 Jimmu Tenno, iii. 
 
 Jingo Kogo, 2S1. 
 
 Jinrikisha, 8, 9, 205, 338. 
 
 Jiutei, 332. 
 
 Jo-o, 299. 
 
 Josho, 255, 257. 
 
 Jugglers, 19, 137, 226. 
 
 380 
 
Index 
 
 Junks, 197, 341, 345, 353, 359, 
 361, 362. 
 
 Jurojin, 271. 
 
 Kabe habutai, 216, 262. 
 Kaburenjo, 300. 
 
 Kaga, 131, 210, 279. 
 
 ’ Kagami, 276. 
 
 Kago, 162, 189. 
 
 Kagoshima, 29, 364. 
 
 Kairos, 336, 337. 
 
 Kake, 22. 
 
 Kamakura, 3S-40. 
 
 Kame, 339. 
 
 Kameido, 47, 69, 77, 78. 
 Kamnosube-no-Kami, 230. 
 Kamogawa, 223, 283. 
 
 Kanagawa, 4, 7, 8, 15, 28. 
 Kanaya, 199, 200. 
 
 Kanda, 47. 
 
 Kanoko chirimen, 263 
 Kaiiozan, 36. 
 
 Kanzan, 228. 
 
 Kappa, 141. 
 
 Karasaki, 218. 
 
 Kasuga, 309, 314-316, 319. 
 Kasukabe, 78. 
 
 Katakana, 295. 
 
 Katase, 41. 
 
 Katsura no Miya, 251. 
 
 Kawawa, 29, 30. 
 
 Keemung, 352. 
 
 Kegon-no-taki, 174. 
 
 Keiki, 131, 197. 
 
 Kekko, 147. 
 
 Kencho, 46, 296 
 
 Kerosene, 182, 102, 282, 341, 330. 
 
 Kesa, 138, 269. 
 
 Keyaki, 200, 208, 236. 
 
 Kii, 340. 
 
 Kiku. See Chrysanthemum. 
 Kimigayo, n6. 
 
 Kinkakuji, 249, 250. 
 
 Kinkozan, 277, 27S. 
 
 Kiomidera, 196, 277. 
 
 Kiomidzu, 228. 
 
 Kioto, 8, 46, 61, 111-113, 125, 
 130, 189, 216, 221, 223-304, 
 312, 346, 365. 
 
 Kindan-nuitsuke, 267. 
 
 38 
 
 Kinu chirimen, 263. 
 
 Kites, 283. 
 
 Kiukioda, 273. 
 
 Kiushiu, 125, 333. 
 
 Kobayashi, 259. 
 
 Kobe, 46, 249, 281, 331, 340-349, 
 
 352, 365- 
 
 Kobo Daishi, 148, 159, 200. 
 Kobukuji, 322. 
 
 Kodzu, 175, 189. 
 
 Kofu, 255. 
 
 Komatsu, Prince, 129. 
 
 Komei, the Emperor, 299. 
 Komurasaki and Gompachi, 134. 
 Konoye, 130. 
 
 Korea, i, 120, 159, 223, 234, 295, 
 _ 310, 364. 
 
 Kori, 140. 
 
 Koro, 153, 277, 295. 
 
 Kotaiji, 227. 
 
 Koto, 22, 1 13, 332. 
 
 Koyokwan, 87, 99, 124. 
 
 Kudan, 47. 
 
 Kuge, 1 13, 130, 245, 249, 250. 
 Kujo, 130. 
 
 Kuki, R., 312. 
 
 Kune no Miya, Prince, 290. 
 Kuni Asahiko, Prince, 128. 
 Kurodani, 235. 
 
 Kusunoki Masashige, 312, 3.;2. 
 Kutani, 210. 
 
 Kwangioba no Shokoba, 257. 
 Kwannon, 52, 202, 203, 229, 230, 
 241, 268, 313, 344. 
 
 Lacquer, 48, 49, 150, 273, 274. 
 Landscape-gardening, ii, 39, 129, 
 133- 134. 250-252, 286, 345. 
 Language, the Japanese, 24, 292- 
 296. 
 
 Lanterns, 57. 224, 243, 282. 
 Lava, 176, 181, 182. 
 
 Le.ad, 353. 
 
 Leather, 336. 
 
 Leeks, Mrs., 2. 
 
 Legations, 46, 148. 
 
 Light-houses, 3, 341, 37'. 
 Limoges, 278. 
 
 London, 279. 
 
 Loquat, 22. 
 
Index 
 
 Lotus, 45, 78, 233, 342. 
 
 Lowell, Percival, 292. 
 
 Luck emblems, 179, 272. 
 
 Luck, gods of, 271. 
 
 Maeda, Marquis, 131. 
 
 Maiko, 90, 213, 284, 300-304, 
 332, 337- 
 Mandalla, 268. 
 
 Manji, 272. 
 
 Manjiuji, 273. 
 
 Marco Polo, 251. 
 
 Marriage, 113, 374. 
 
 Maruyama, 222, 223, 243, 253, 
 273, 286. 
 
 Masamune, 275. 
 
 Masonry, 334. 
 
 Matsuda, 92, 296. 
 
 Matsuri, 21, 53, 165, 197, 211, 
 224, 229, 242, 342, 361. 
 Mecca, 326. 
 
 Meguro, 134, 135. 
 
 Meiji, the era of, 112. 
 Metal-work, 275, 276, 335. 
 Miako, 221. 
 
 Miakodori, 300. 
 
 Midway Island, 2. 
 
 Midzu ame, 37, 200. 
 
 Miidera, 217. 
 
 Mikado, 112. 
 
 Mikasayama, 313, 323. 
 
 Military, the, 45, 133. 
 
 Mimizuka, 234. 
 
 Minamoto, 292. 
 
 Minatogawa, 341, 342. 
 
 Mine. 35. 36- 
 Mint, 14, 334. 
 
 Miochin, 275. 
 
 Mirror, magic, 276. 
 
 Mishima, 192-195. 
 
 Missals, 272. 
 
 Missionaries, ii, 25, 46, 218, 240, 
 241, 367. 
 
 Mississippi Pay, 12, 15, 31, 135, 
 373- 
 
 Mitford, A. B., 292. 
 
 Mito yashiki, 133. 
 
 Mitsu Bishi Company, 367. 
 Mitsuya, 192. 
 
 Mitsu tomoye, 272, 273. 
 
 Miyanoshita, 175, 176, 187, l88, 
 191. 
 
 Miyashta, 147, 214. 
 
 Moats, 44, 197, 207, 333. 
 Momban, 223. 
 
 Mome, 257. 
 
 Monasteries, 227, 234, 250, 326, 
 
 340. 
 
 Montana, 346. 
 
 Monsoon, 23. 
 
 Monto sect, 236-240. 
 
 Moon temple, 343. 
 
 Mori, 130. 
 
 Morse, Prof. E. S., 135, 292. 
 Motomachi, 342. 
 
 Mound builders, 147. 
 
 Moxa, 35, 36, 257. 
 
 Mukojima, 70, 71, 74. 
 
 Mulberry, 134, 202. 
 
 Murata Shinkio, 250. 
 
 IMuramasa, 275. 
 
 “ Murray’s Guide-book,” 292. 
 Murusaki Shikibu, 221. 
 Musanokoji, 92. 
 
 Museums, 47, 312. 
 
 Mutsu Hito, the Emperor, ill, 
 1 12, 241, 299. 
 
 Nabeshima, 105, 153, 302, 364, 
 365. 
 
 Nagahama, 2x6. 
 
 Nagasaki, i, 360-368. 
 
 Nagoya, 204, 206-216. 
 
 Nakadori, 64. 
 
 Nakamura, 283. 
 
 Nakasendo, 146. 
 
 Nakayama Yashiki, 124. 
 Nammikawa, 285-291. 
 
 Nanjenji, 235. 
 
 Nanko temple, 342. 
 
 Nantaisan, 48, 166-168, 174. 
 Napoleon, 334. 
 
 Nara, 268, 282, 304, 307-327, 
 338, 345- 
 Navajo, 186. 
 
 Negishi, 30. 
 
 Nesan, 32, 87, 88, 140, 141, 167, 
 188, 301, 325, 375. 
 Newspapers, 23, no, 133. 
 New-years, 20,32,65,66, 272,282. 
 
 382 
 
Index 
 
 New York, 279, 2S1, 357. 
 Nichiren, 135, 13S. 
 
 Nigwatsudo, 313. 
 
 Kihombashi, 43. 
 
 Nijo, 125, 130, 249. 
 
 Nikko, 38, 48, 140, 147, 191, 
 308. 
 
 Nil, steamer, 208. 
 
 Ningchow, 352. 
 
 Ningio, Nara, 314. 
 
 Nirvana, 131, 239, 311. 
 
 Nishi Hongwanji, 237-239, 338. 
 
 Otani, 233, 301. 
 
 Nishijin, 255, 257. 
 
 Nishimura, 268. 
 
 Niyakuoji, 235. 
 
 Nobori, 56. 
 
 No Dance, 96-98, 131, 269. 
 Northern I’acific Railroad, 358. 
 Numerals, 294. 
 
 Nunobiki, 343. 
 
 Nuns, 321, 322, 329, 367. 
 Nyubai, 23. 
 
 Obi, 63, 90, 1 19, 214, 283, 303. 
 Octroi, 223. 
 
 Odawara Hay, 35, 41, 175. 
 Odessa, 352. 
 
 Ogawa, 327. 
 
 Ogi, 281. 
 
 Oigawa, 252. 
 
 Oikoto, 214. 
 
 Oji, 134- 
 Okabe, 199. 
 
 Okuma, Count and Countess, 134. 
 Omaha, U.S.S. , 360. 
 
 Omori, 135, 136. 
 
 Oneida, U.S.S. , 139. 
 
 Oolong tea, 351. 
 
 Osaka, 14, ii2, 237, 266, 275, 
 281, 303, 313, 326, 329-340. 
 Oshima, 36. 
 
 Oshiukaido, 78. 
 
 O Suwo, 215, 363. 
 
 O Tomi Toge pass, 176, 187. 
 Otsu, 217, 218, 221. 
 
 Owari, 207-210, 302. 
 
 Oxen, 346. 
 
 Oyama, 35. 
 
 Ozen, 87. 
 
 Pacific Mail Steamship Com- 
 pany, 2, 358. 
 
 Pacific Ocean, i. 
 
 Pack-horse, 165, 188, 191. 
 Pagoda, 49, 149, 227, 228, 322, 
 338, 339- 
 
 Palaces, 125-130, 244-253, 288, 
 312, 334- 
 Paper, 134, 277. 
 
 Pappenberg, island of, 363. 
 
 Paris, 268, 288. 
 
 Parliament, 371. 
 
 Passports, 46. 
 
 Patents, 352. 
 
 Paterson, N. J., 256. 
 
 Peerage, 130. 
 
 Peking, 266, 352. 
 
 Peony, 77. 
 
 Perfumes, 274. 
 
 Perry, Commodore Matthew Cal- 
 braith, 12, 23, 32, 37, 131, 363, 
 368, 369, 373, 375. 
 
 Persimmon, 22, 136. 
 
 Photograph, 196, 216, 285, 327. 
 Picul, 257. 
 
 Pike's Peak, 181. 
 
 Pilgrims, 148, 166, 167, 176, 178, 
 182, 229, 230, 308, 310, 319, 
 338- 
 
 Plum blossoms, 31, 66, 67. 
 Poems, 33, 47, 69, 299. 
 Policeman, 21 1. 
 
 Pongee, 264. 
 
 Porcelain, 208, 209, 228, 364, 365. 
 Portuguese, 303, 363. 
 
 Pottery, 20<}, 277-279, 364, 365. 
 Press, the, 133. 
 
 Priestesses, 154, 308, 316, 319, 
 321. 
 
 Priests, 21, 49, 135, 138, 139, 154, 
 230, 237, 238, 310, 315, 319. 
 Princes, 130. 
 
 Pyramids, the, 272. 
 
 Race-course, 12, 35, 47, 5a 
 Raiden, 158, 212. 
 
 Raiha, 304. 
 
 j Railroads, 140, 189, 202, 371. 
 
 Rains, 23, 62, 182, 188, 198, 199, 
 
 I 292, 331, 332. 
 
 383 
 
Index 
 
 Raku, 299. 
 
 Rape-seed, 203. 
 
 Rats, 272, 324, 325. 
 
 Red Plain, the, 168. 
 
 Rein, J. J., 292. 
 
 Resist, 265. 
 
 Restoration, the, 24, 50, 133, 150, 
 
 247. 331. 363. 366. 
 
 Rice, 12, 238, 251, 294, 325, 326, 
 330, 332. 
 
 Richardson affair, 28, 360. 
 Rikiu, 296, 297, 299. 
 
 Riobondo, 274. 
 
 Rip Van \Yinkle, 29. 
 
 Rising Sun, Order of the, 113. 
 Ri\'er-bed, Kioto, 225, 244. 
 River fete, Tokio, 57. 
 Rokumeikwan, 86, 131. 
 Romaicising, 295. 
 
 “ Ronins, Forty-seven,” 100, 
 102, III, 222, 338. 
 
 Rose-jar, the, 209. 
 
 Rugs, 266, 336. 
 
 Sagami, 3. 
 
 Saigo, General, 135. 
 
 Saikio, 221, 245. 
 
 Sake, 74, 128, 303, 330. 
 
 Sakura, 69. 
 
 Samisen, 22, 73, 74, 89, 215, 
 223, 303, 332. 
 
 Sampan, 4. 
 
 Samurai, 24, 44, 251, 341, 342, 
 
 373- 
 
 Sandals, g. 
 
 San Francisco, 2, 3, 358. 
 
 Sanjiro, 48-50. 
 
 Sanjiusangendo, 234. 
 
 Sanjo, Prince, 73, 130. 
 
 bridge, 225, 284. 
 
 Satsuma, 28, 131, 271, 277, 279, 
 
 335. 364. 365. 
 
 Scandinavia, 272. 
 
 Schleyer, 296. 
 
 Schools, 57, 199, 243, 375. 
 Screens, 141, 279, 2S0, 327, 329. 
 Sea-weed, 40, 136. 
 
 Segaki, 139. 
 
 Segiyama, 22. 
 
 Semi, 54, 
 
 Sengakuji, 135. 
 
 Senke, 92, 296-300. 
 
 Sermon on the Mount, the, 239. 
 Servants, 23, 24. 
 
 Seta Bridge, 221. 
 
 Seto, 20S. 
 
 Shaku, 261. 
 
 Shakudo, 276. 
 
 Shampooer, 174. 
 
 Shiba, 47, 48, 78, 87. 
 
 Shibuichi, 276. 
 
 Shichi Fukujin, 271. 
 
 Shidzuoka, 131, 197, 198. 
 
 Shijo bridge, 224, 225, 283, 284. 
 Shimadzu, 130, 131. 
 
 Shinionoseki, 7, 359, 360. 
 Shinagawa, 135, 369. 
 
 Shinkaku, 251. 
 
 I Shinkoji, 342. 
 j Shinniodo, 235, 254. 
 
 Shinto, 119, 128, 150, 225, 241, 
 308-310, 313-316, 342. 
 
 miza, 102, no. 
 
 Shippo, 272. 
 
 Shirane san, 168. 
 
 Shiro, 125. 
 
 Shishigatami, 235. 
 
 Shiurokindo, 204. 
 
 Shogun, the, 44, 45, 49, 96, in, 
 112, 125, 129, 130, 131, 148- 
 150, 158, 192, 196, 197, 207, 
 221, 228, 245, 247, 249, 250, 
 
 259. 297. 331. 338, 365- 
 
 Shoji, 141. 
 
 Shojo, 212, 213, 272. 
 
 Shotoku, Taisho, 327. 
 
 Shroff, 15. 
 
 Shugakuin, 249. 
 
 Siberia, 352, 361. 
 
 Silk, 255-271. 
 
 broker, 255. 
 
 markets, 255, 266, 
 
 raw, 256, 257, 350. 
 
 worms, ig8, 256. 
 
 shops, 13, 63, 257, 25S, 268, 
 
 335- 
 
 Singapore, 26. 
 
 Soami, 250. 
 
 Social life, 25, 26, 131-133. 
 Sodanje, no. 
 
 384 
 
Index 
 
 Soroban, 14, 15. 
 
 Sosen, 51. 
 
 Soshi, 244. 
 
 “ Soul of the Far East,” by Per- 
 cival Lowell, 292. 
 
 Spaniels, 285. 
 
 Spectacle Bridge, 231. 
 Sponge-cake, 29, 303, 338. 
 Staffordshire, 208. 
 
 Stage, the, 104, 105. 
 
 Subashiri, 176, 187. 
 
 Sudare, 280. 
 
 Suehiro, 282. 
 
 Suez, I, 357. 
 
 Sugita, 31, 32. 
 
 Sumidagawa, 57. 
 
 Susan, black-eyed, 28. 
 
 Suzume, 97, 201, 316. 
 
 Swords, 275, 314, 329. 
 
 Symbols, 271, 272. 
 
 Tabako bon, 87. 
 
 Tabi, 9, 301. 
 
 Tacoma, 358. 
 
 Tai, 301. 
 
 Taiko, the, 91, 251, 296, 297, 
 334- 
 
 Tairo, 292. 
 
 Taizan, 277. 
 
 Tajima, 345. 
 
 Takada, 273. 
 
 Takara Bune, 272. 
 
 mono, 272. 
 
 Takashima, 367. 
 
 Takatsukasa, 130. 
 
 “ Tales of Old Japan,” by A. B. 
 
 Mitford, 292. 
 
 Talisman, 272. 
 
 Tan, 261. 
 
 Tanzan, 277. 
 
 Tapestry, 259. 
 
 Taro of Urashima, 29. 
 
 Tateba, 31, 165. 
 
 Tateno, Governor, 19. 
 
 Tatsu, 24, 201. 
 
 Tattoo, 354. 
 
 Tayema, 268. 
 
 Tea, 63, 91, 94, 95, 190, 199, 
 200, 286, 287, 300, 307, 320, 
 340. 350-358. 
 
 2 B 
 
 Tea-houses, 96, 102, 140, 142, 
 144, 145, 167, 173, 177, 187, 
 192, 193, 204, 222, 323-325, 
 
 332, 346. 
 
 tasters, 353, 354. 
 
 tremens, 300. 
 
 Teakwood, 335. 
 
 Teapot Hill, 228, 229. 
 Telegraphs, 23, 371. 
 
 Temple services, 21, 135, 138, 
 139, 154, 230, 237, 238, 315, 
 319, 327, 328, 339. 
 
 Tenabe Gengoro, 22. 
 
 Tennoji, 338-340. 
 
 Theatre, 15, 96-111, 224, 283- 
 
 285, 337. 
 
 Theine, 351. 
 
 Theosophy, 241. 
 
 Thor, 272. 
 
 Throne, 126, 247. 
 
 Tokaido, 7, 12, 28, 175, 189-206. 
 
 277. 
 
 Tokio, 43-135, 237, 244, 268, 
 275, 291, 294, 300, 327, 334, 
 365. 
 
 Tokugawa, 56, 96, iii, 125, 131, 
 150, 197- 249- 
 
 Tombs, 49. 157, 244, 328, 343. 
 Tooth-brushes, 167, 203. 
 
 Torii, 34, 149. 
 
 Tosa chickens, 52, 285. 
 
 Totomi, 200. 
 
 Tourists, 28. 
 
 Toyohashi, 203. 
 
 Trade, foreign, 256, 340, 350, 
 357- 
 
 Treaties, 120, 372. 
 
 Trieste, 336. 
 
 Tungchow, 353. 
 
 Turtle, 271, 339. 
 
 Tussores, 264. 
 
 Typhoon, 7, 331, 340. 
 
 UcHiWA, 281. 
 
 Uji, 286, 296, 304. 
 
 Ukata, 204, 205. 
 
 Umagayeshi, 177-179, 187. 
 
 Ume Yashiki, 69. 
 
 Unitarian, 241. 
 
 University, the Imperial, 57, 131. 
 385 
 
Index 
 
 Uraga, 37. 
 
 “ Usurper, the,” by Judith Gau- 
 tier, 334. 
 
 Utsonomiya, 140, 141. 
 
 pass, 198. 
 
 Uyeno, 47, 50, 51, 70, 78. 
 
 Vancouver, 3. 
 
 Vanity Fair, 52, 284. 
 
 Vassar College, 132. 
 
 Velvet, 261. 
 
 “Venice of Japan,” the, 331. 
 Vienna, 208, 336. 
 
 Volapuk, 296. 
 
 Volcanic eruptions, 179. 
 
 Votive offerings, 137, 158, 166, 
 229, 329, 338. 
 
 Wages, 23, 146, 205, 206, 256, 
 
 355 - 
 
 Wakamiya, 316. 
 
 Walters, Air. W. T., 51. 
 
 Waraji, 9. 
 
 Waseda, 134. 
 
 William Tell, 197. 
 
 William the Conqueror, 292. 
 Wistaria, 77, 309. 
 
 Women’s dress, 16, 63, 90, 119, 
 123, 214, 283, 303. 
 
 Wrestlers, 337. 
 
 Xavier, St. Francis, 363. 
 
 Yaami, 221, 222, 227, 292. 
 Yabashi, 221. 
 
 Yabunouchi, 92. 
 
 Yamamai, 263, 264. 
 
 Yamanaka, 192. 
 
 Yamashiro, 340. 
 
 Yamato, 268, 313. 
 
 Yanigawara, 64. 
 
 Yasaka pagoda, 227, 228. 
 Yashiki, 44, 97, 245. 
 
 Yeddo Bay, 3, 8, 35, 36. 
 Yellowstone, the, 346. 
 
 Yesso nishikis, 64, 259. 
 Yodogawa, 331. 
 
 Yokkaichi, 208, 209. 
 
 Yokohama, 2-4, 7, 36, 208, 281, 
 294. 340, 352, 353, 365. 
 Yokosuka, 3, 36. 
 
 Yoritomo, 39. 
 
 Yoshida, 235. 
 
 Yoshimasa, 250. 
 
 Yoshiwara plain, 195. 
 
 Yumoto, 162, 167-170, 173, 
 174. 
 
 Yuoki, 160. 
 
 ZiPANGU, 251. 
 
 Zukin, 16. 
 
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