Part 17

There being no hotel near Yamada’s dwelling, he secured me a room in a geisha-house, with the result that late revelry made sleep impossible. But a bathe next morning in the rushing Tonegawa, with the exciting diversion of shooting some rapids in a crazy punt, invigorated me and amused a crowd of urchins, who shouted from the bank, “We want to see the naked foreigner!” By the end of the second day I felt at home with the older generation of both families, and was shown over warehouse, mill, and granary. Having not omitted to present _miage_ on arrival, I departed in a shower of good wishes and small souvenirs. Yamada senior, who had never before (so his son declared) been willing to make the acquaintance of a foreigner, insisted on my accepting a roll of _habutai_ (white silk, resembling taffeta), while Tanaka Okusama met me at the station with a parting gift of pickles and poetry. She had made the one, her husband the other. In fact, he had added this _haikai_ to his published works:

“You, like a bird, pass, Joyous, untrammelled; Sad our farewell, when Kiri-trees fall.”

II

The holy province of Izumo should be visited in October. Then the Shintō gods and goddesses, deserting every other part of Japan, assemble at the great shrine of Kizuki under the presidency of Ōnamuji. But every year Ōnamuji must have sadder news to tell his dwindling fellow-deities. At one time his own temples on Mount Daisen were as many as two hundred and fifty; these have crumbled to a few mossy ruins. The goddess _Inada-hime_, whose lover intoxicated with _saké_ the eight-headed serpent and cut the monster in pieces, that she might become his spouse, is invoked by fewer youths and maidens desiring happy marriages. On all hands the Shintō Pantheon is being undermined by two strangely allied foes--by atheism and Christianity. Though full of sympathy for the august descendants of Izanagi and Izanami, the creator and creatress of the Japanese universe, I could not refuse the hospitality of a Japanese Christian, whose unremitting kindness will always be associated for me with the romantic beauty of Matsuë.

From my hotel, which stood on the edge of the blue Shinjiko lagoon, I was watching the little steamers puff angrily to and fro, the endless procession of passengers across the long curving bridge, and one or two old fishermen wading in the shallows, when a message arrived inviting me to take tea with Assistant-Judge Nomura at his house on Castle-hill. Happening to arrive before the other guests, I was first shown a curious collection of prints, illustrating the costumes and customs of ancient Korea, and a series of pictures of all the ironclads belonging to the Japanese navy. This mixture of old and new was very characteristic of Mr. Nomura, who admired with enthusiasm Western dress, furniture, and religion, but reverenced at the same time his own national traditions. Naturally his knowledge of the two was one-sided, and he was happily unconscious that his fine collection of Inari and Satsuma ware was simply insulted by the base intrusion of a sixpenny London saucer. Four inhabitants of Matsuë--two young lawyers, a musician, and an old painter--were announced, and the host at once took a more ceremonious tone. We all entered the tiny tea-room, nine feet square, containing four and a half mats, and were occupied for more than half an hour with _cha-no-yu_, the august tea-making, which seemed to me unnecessarily long, perhaps because it was conducted by a wizard in a grey coat and blue tie. I preferred the dainty witches of the Miyako-odori. Besides the formal ablution and handling of accessory instruments, at stated intervals a bell was rung, the room was swept, we walked from the house to the garden and back from the garden to the house with a scrupulosity that would have satisfied Hideyoshi himself. At last the august tea, thick and green and hot, was presented to each visitor, who drank with slow but noisy demonstrations of lip-homage, to testify polite satisfaction.

Then we adjourned to the sitting-room, where the musician brought out two antique Chinese objects, one bearing resemblance to a flute and the other to a violin with shaggy, semicircular bow. On these he produced, not without effort, very weird sounds, which I was obliged to eulogise as being entirely novel and remarkable, for I could not compare them with any melodies familiar to European ears. I believe the others shared my relief when a painting competition was suggested, for they could all handle a brush as easily as I a pen, and the eye is less fastidious than the ear. The first bout was in three colours, sepia, Indian black, and red, though the last was sparingly used. The designs were rapidly and lightly touched in--a hawk pouncing on a goose; a carp swimming against the stream; a frog climbing up a reed; and a terrified child, with shaven pate, running away from a temple-dancer, masked by a lion’s head. Next a batch of fans was distributed to the competitors, who speedily adorned them with fanciful arabesques, in which curled clouds played hide-and-seek with Fuji, or moonlit pines peeped out from drifted snow. We drew lots for these souvenirs of playful skill, and to me fell the picture of the child flying from the lion-mask. But at this point Mr. Nomura’s own children, two charming little girls, brought us in presents of flowers and cakes wrapped in silver paper. The rickshaws were at the door; _sayonara_ rang cordially in our ears; one of the pleasantest calls I ever made came to an end.

Curiosity prompted me to attend the service held by native Christians in an abandoned Shintō temple perverted to evangelical use. Most of the congregation belonged to the more credulous sex. Mothers, carrying their babies on their backs, sat in rows on mats, while one or two chairs were placed for foreign visitors. All joined heartily in the hymns and listened attentively to the simple prayers. Sometimes a _shōji_, or sliding shutter, was gently pushed aside, and an inquisitive face peered in on the worshippers. The missionary, a man of athletic frame, with the cold, fixed eyes of a fanatic, preached with fervour on the subject of original sin. He held the doctrine that perfection was to be realised on earth, and believed that he had personally attained it. From all accounts he was a hard-working idealist, who spared no pains to make converts, but his ascetic views must seem violently out of harmony with the Shintōist easy-going faith, which has for moral code the single maxim, “Follow your impulses and obey the Emperor.” Although not subjected to persecution, a native Christian hardly ever remains in his birthplace. The Matsuë converts whom we met had come from Hiroshima, Ōsaka, and other spots. Some estimate of the progress of Western religion among Matsuë merchants may be based on the proportion of believers in the middle school, to which all the boys of the better classes are sent. Out of about five hundred boys and sixty masters, two boys and one master profess Christianity.

Etiquette is luckily assimilated to foreign custom among Japanese Christians. When Judge Nomura returned my call, he was accompanied by his wife and little girls, who were delighted with some dolls and picture-books which I had purchased for them in London. At first O Ai San and O Dai San, diminutive damsels aged four and five respectively, sat solemnly in a corner burning fireworks--_hana-bi_, as they are called--with tied tongues and eyes fixed on the spluttering flowers of flame. But gradually they thawed, and losing all their shyness, played battledore and shuttlecock, blindman’s buff, and other games. When the babies had gone home with their nurse, the judge and his wife remained to dinner, and a lay preacher, who spoke English perfectly, proved an invaluable medium of conversation. As my guests expressed a desire to conclude the evening with hymns, we sang a great many, from which they derived spiritual pleasure, while my knowledge of their language was much enlarged. The lay-preacher had always two or three hymn-books in his pocket, English and Japanese versions being printed on opposite pages. Suddenly this pious exercise was rudely interrupted. A tipsy geisha, holding a _saké_-cup in her hand, staggered into the room and addressed some bacchanalian words to the lay preacher, who chanced to be near the door. She had escaped from a rather noisy wedding-party, which was feasting and clapping hands in the room below, while the bridal couple had retired and the _shimadai_, an emblematic group of pine and bamboo, crane and tortoise, remained for a symbolic centre of festal joy. We took this intrusion for a hint to separate, and it certainly jarred on a devotional mood. To my friends this apparition must have suggested the “scarlet woman,” whose cup is full of abominations, but I could not regard it in any other light than the opportune assertion of _la joie de vivre_, protesting against the gloomy gospel of Puritan restraint.

III

And yet the joy of living, dissociated from any principle but that of self-indulgence, is apt to produce strange types of Anglo-Saxon degeneracy. Dr. Silenus, whose hospitality and frankness are a byword in Azabu, would seem to have fallen victim to that fatal fascination which Mr. Kipling ascribes to the lands “East of Suez, where the best is like the worst; Where there ain’t no ten commandments, an’ a man can raise a thirst.” Thirst was never absent, and the decalogue rigidly banished from the epicurean establishment, which I take leave to describe as a warning and a comfort to the “unco’ guid.”

Sunday afternoon was regularly set apart for pagan revels, to which the whole neighbourhood was admitted, for the large-hearted Doctor loved to see his house full of friends and acquaintances. When you had skirted the moat which encircles the imperial palace, and climbed the steep _daimachi_, you hailed with relief a row of houses, mostly inhabited by Europeans and surrounded by similar high fencing. But, the gate once passed, all similarity between Liberty Hall and its respectable neighbours ceased. In no other courtyard would you be greeted by the sight of a hawk, an owl, a goat, and several monkeys dwelling together in unity. Lucullus, the goat, was an epicurean like his master, but less eclectic, for his diet included wood and iron and stones, nails and lighted cigars and boxes of matches. Indeed, he might still be living, a triumph of desire over digestion, had he not one day tried a dose of refined camphor, which brought death and a costly Shintō funeral.

Having penetrated the bodyguard of animals, you would enter a large room, adorned with fine bronzes and screens, which you had not leisure to examine, for so many unusual sights claimed attention. At the back would be masked dancers or musicians, rather cramped for space by reason of the motley, semicircular crowd of men, women, and children, who filled the foreground as far as a row of chairs set in the verandah for barbarian friends. Dominating all sat the master of the revels, his huge torso bare to the waist and profusely tattooed with elegant designs. As he passed the whisky to the “parasites” (for so he was accustomed to call the band of adherents who made his house their own), the genial, rotund Doctor looked the very incarnation of Ebisu or Silenus.

The first dancer on the afternoon of my arrival was Kabukei-jishi, the boy in a lion’s mask, whose figure is so familiar in Japanese streets on New Year’s Day. Kabukei, a native of Echigo, is said to have originated and given his name to this realistic dance. Though the children must have seen it often before, some of them laughed and others cried with terror, as the clever mimic crawled up to them roaring, or scratching himself, or shaking his ears. Then followed a comic scene between two peasants and a Daimyō, who was obliged to defend himself with sword and fan against the heavy hoes of his disrespectful henchmen. A medical comedy, probably inspired to some extent by Dr. Silenus, had for _motif_ a quarrel between a physician and a farmer, whose wife was expecting to give birth to a child but had no wish to complicate an old-fashioned process by new-fangled medicine. The outspoken dialogue did not shock the unsophisticated audience, for whom Nature is not swathed in conventional veils of reticence, but the actors observed the _ne coram publico_ maxim to this extent, that the birth took place in the wings, to be followed by a rather thrilling infanticide. Bloodshed is always pleasing to the playgoers of Tōkyō. The last piece to be performed was a duologue between Kitsune, the fox-god, and a greedy rustic. Kitsune carried a bag of rice, and offered a mouthful in reward for every athletic or acrobatic feat which the other should succeed in imitating. When the gilt-snouted fox had set the example of leaping or balancing with adroit agility, the sly lout would make a clumsy pretence of doing the same, and always managed to obtain the rice by chicanery. At last the god discovered that he was being tricked, and killed the peasant with a blow from his rake. Nothing seemed to amuse the Azabu children so much as the antics of these two.

On another occasion Dr. Silenus invited a large party to witness a still more interesting exhibition in his garden. If I have used the word “degeneracy” to express his repudiation of certain moral ideas to which the Anglo-Saxon race pays the compliment of formal adherence, it should yet be added that his “self-indulgence” included the laborious pleasure of teaching himself the art of sword-making. Under Japanese tuition he had attained great proficiency, and if his blades did not rank with those of Masamune and Muramasa, at least they excited the admiration and envy of experts. Between him, therefore, and those martial patriots of his adopted country who in their hearts regret the swashbuckling days of old, before barristers and deputies were minted from a foreign model, latent sympathy could not but exist. Now the _sōshi_, to whom allusion has already been made, and whose nominal profession might range from that of vagabond actor to that of political agent or bravo, have this in common--they love a life of roving independence, while owning loose allegiance to some momentary chief. As constitutional methods take deeper root among their compatriots, it becomes more difficult for them to practise an avowed calling which shall serve as a centre of organisation. In the summer of 1898 one of them hit on the brilliant idea of founding an Association for the Revival of the Noble Art of Self-defence; that is, the euphemism was closely akin to the title by which lovers of boxing in England and America glorify their taste, while the object was to promote skill in the use of lethal weapons. The Doctor, whom I regard as a thorough _rōnin_, or unattached “wave-man,” refusing to bow the knee to social or ethical Baals, became at once a subscribing member. He used to declare that this adhesion procured him privileged places at almost every public function which he attended, so potent is the freemasonry of his brothers-in-arms. At least I can certify that it procured for us a spectacle of unique and amazing skill.

The first combat was between a swordsman and a spearsman, in which I fully expected that the lighter arm must easily prevail over the cumbrous and more lengthy one. But I had reckoned without the swivel, which made the lance in dexterous keeping a formidable instrument. When the swordsman, abandoning the defensive, tried to strike down his opponent’s spear and deal a close thrust, the latter with the rapidity of lightning drew in his weapon, and shooting it out again before the other could recover his ground, drove the point home. In four bouts out of five the spear proved mightier than the sword. Then it was pitted against a more archaic compound of pickaxe and boomerang. To a small-headed axe was attached an iron ball by a long cord, with which the holder tried to entangle his adversary’s lance. He slung the ball with his right, and if successful drew a dagger with his left hand to plant the conquering blow. That many of the fencers could use either hand with equal effect was proved by the next series of encounters between two-sworded and one-sworded men. These had been very carefully matched, and the superior skill of the man who was armed with but a single sword in three cases out of seven decided the result. Like a wise _entrepreneur_, the Chief of the Sōshi had reserved his most sensational contest for the end. Female warriors are no novelty in Japan. The Emperor, even up to the time of his restoration to actual sovereignty in 1868, counted among his troops a corps of Amazons, whose training was as severe and whose prowess as remarkable as those of the _Samurai_ themselves. When a stalwart woman came forward armed with a halberd and wearing the same wide _hakama_ as her opponent, whose arm was a sword, she astonished us all by the vigour and dexterity of her onslaught. The war-cries which she uttered were very terrifying, and I am inclined to attribute her victory rather to them than to any hypocritical chivalry on the part of her adversary. I wondered if this muscular virago obeyed the Confucian ordinance, “A woman should look on her husband as if he were heaven itself, and never weary of thinking how she may yield to her husband, and thus escape celestial castigation.”

IV

I was seated in the office of that flourishing Tōkyō newspaper, _Yorodsu Chōhō_--waiting for my friend the sub-editor, whose name, Kishimoto Bunkyo, will one day be famous, when my tedium was enlivened by an apparition. In spite of the care taken to entertain foreigners in the waiting-room of that popular journal, I had been bored. The square of Brussels carpet, the presence of table and chairs, the permission to keep one’s shoes on, the literary delights afforded by Macaulay’s “Essays,” Washington Irving’s “Sketchbook,” and Mr. Stead’s “If Christ came to Chicago”--all these things failed to dispel that _ennui_, born of perpetual waiting, which only Oriental patience can endure. Suddenly entered this welcome apparition, feminine, furious. “Is there any one here who speaks English?” it asked impetuously. The old door-keeper, catching at the sound “English,” muttered the word “Kishimoto,” and climbed the stairs in quest of my friend. The apparition and myself were thus left alone, and eyed each other furtively, with embarrassment. At any other time I should have been delighted to make the acquaintance of this pretty, smart American, but an instinct warned me that her business was private and delicate. I pretended to be absorbed by the dreary violence of Mr. Stead. Kishimoto descended, alert and smiling. The apparition, thrusting a lady’s visiting-card before his eyes, did not smile, but said rapidly:

“That’s who I am. About that paragraph in yesterday’s paper; who wrote it?”

“It was our reporter, madam. He is not at the office to-day, but if you wish to make an appointment----”

“Can he speak English?”

“No, madam, but I shall be pleased to put my services at your disposal, if I can be of any use. Personally my responsibility is limited to the English column, whereas----”

“I know, I know. Well, just tell your reporter that my husband’s real mad about this, and he don’t intend to let it drop. Likely as not, he’ll be round here with a horse-whip, if your editor don’t make some kind of apology or explanation. Good-day to you.”

The apparition disappeared as suddenly as it had arrived. I looked reproachfully at Kishimoto. “Personal paragraphs?” I asked. “Are you trying to attack Americans with their own weapons? And why don’t you leave ladies alone?” He explained that Mrs. Kurumaya, the pride of Idaho, was married to a Japanese professor, and had recently come to Tōkyō with her husband. As there happened to be a German from Idaho in the same hotel, the materials of a _ménage à trois_ were too tempting to be neglected by a sharp penny-a-liner. Hence the paragraph, the scandal, and the apparition. “And what next?” I asked. “The editor will censure his informant, insert an apology, and banish the matter from his readers’ memories by fresh paragraphs of a similar character.”

Ten minutes after we had forgotten Mrs. Kurumaya and her grievances, for Kishimoto had invited me to visit his quarter of Hongō, and on the way thither we engaged in a vain effort to find the grave of the painter Hokusai. Yet the indications given by Professor Revon in his careful monograph seemed exact. We discovered the little monastery of Sekioji (divine promises) near Asakusa, and, having traversed the short avenue of cherry-trees which leads to the temple door, began our search among the black, lichen-stained tombs. In the third row we should have found a stone bearing on one side the words--

“Hokusai, of Shimōsa Province, Famous Genius, Sincere Man, Died May 10, 1849.”

and on the other a poem, which the old man of eighty composed on his death-bed, one summer evening half a century before--

“Lightly a man’s soul, Lightly a fire-fly, Passes in summer Over the plains.”

But though a young priest came to our assistance, the neglected row of undecipherable inscriptions guarded their secret, and we were obliged to give up the search.

Kishimoto could not understand the foreigner’s admiration for Hokusai, and regarded it with the same tolerant contempt as most Germans exhibited thirty years ago towards admirers of Wagner. “There is nothing noble,” he cried, “in his pictures, nothing sublime. He simply reproduced the vulgar street scenes in which he lived. Even his drawings of Fuji, the holy mountain, are defiled by grinning carpenters and ostlers.” He promised to show me specimens of what his countrymen considered far higher art when we should reach his father’s house, and in effect, when we were seated in a pretty tea-room, overlooking a large garden, he unrolled for me some fine _kakemono_ by Sesshu, Yeitoku, and Kiyonaga, which his family cherished with intense veneration. But nothing could arouse in me the enthusiasm which he evidently felt for three or four pieces of Chinese calligraphy. There was, of course, no colour in such masterpieces, no historic or anecdotic interest, for he assured me that the words themselves had no particular depth or beauty. Their sole charm consisted in the divine sureness of touch, which had traced the intricate flying characters through a maze of stroke and curve, and it seemed to my untrained intelligence that to appreciate them properly one must be a brush rather than a man.

From _kakemono_ we turned to masks, of which he had a splendid collection. Students of Japanese demonology could have told me many weird stories of the cruel, leering monsters, whose faces reflected so vividly the devilish imagination of their makers. But Kishimoto only knew one story, and that rather a pretty one, concerning Kijin, whose rank in the diabolic hierarchy I have not been able to ascertain. He had it from a Buddhist nun, his aunt, and it bears every mark of having been invented _pour les jeunes filles_.

THE STORY OF KIJIN AND O KAMMA SAN.