CHAPTER V.

TO THE LAND OF THE RISING SUN.

On Wednesday, September 9th, 1891, we embarked on board the Pacific s.s. _Empress of Japan_. We congratulate ourselves upon having a roomy cabin exactly amidships on the main deck, and the unprecedented luxury of two drawers and two cupboards. Otherwise our voyage does not promise well. The C.P.R. thoroughly understands its opportunities, and their putting on three new steamships, the _Empresses of Japan_, _India_, and _China_, is justified by the large number of saloon passengers. Thirty passengers have been their average up to the last voyage, when it was sixty, and this time it is 130. We hope that the resources of the ship will not break down under this strain, but consider it doubtful. The stewards are all Chinese, and excellent they appear, especially our table steward, who boasted the aristocratic name of "Guy."

It was a miserable day, the rain coming down in torrents, and under the wet awnings we dawdled about until the mails, five hours late, arrived. At six o'clock we left the wharf and went "forward" to see this ship of 4000 tons pass through the confined channel of "The Narrows." We could almost have touched the overhanging branches of the trees in the park, so closely did the ship hug the bank. At midnight we stopped opposite to Victoria to take on board some more passengers. They were in a sorry plight, for they had been sitting on an open barge in pitch darkness, and in pouring rain, for six hours.

The next day was cold, gloomy, and rough. Scarcely a soul but was sick and sorry. The usual whale excited but a feeble interest along the row of deck chairs, occupied by people in varying stages of _malaise_. We must expect bad weather. In truth we had a miserably cold cheerless voyage across this Northern Pacific Ocean, and it was such a contrast to our bright and sunny passage across the South Pacific, from San Francisco to Auckand, six years ago. The ship takes a northerly course until we get to the mouth of the Behring Sea. Here we had a miserable Sunday. Such an angry grey sea, crested with white horses, seething and boiling around us. It was abominably rough. Everybody was sea-sick again, and, to complete the tale of woe, there was a dense sea-fog, the decks dripping with this clammy moisture and from the spray, as the _Empress's_ nose was buried in the ocean's waves and, quivering from stem to stern, she rose and shook herself. The discordant shriek of the fog-horn was heard all day. Everybody agrees that life on board ship is bearable if you can be on deck, some even may go so far as to enjoy it, though I cannot say that we belong to that number, but when, as on this occasion, that refuge was denied to us, we were indeed miserable. We had service in the saloon, the little remnant able to appear, and all joined in those familiar prayers, that seem to bind us together on the stormy ocean as "one family in heaven and earth." The Bishop of Exeter, who, with his son, the Bishop of Japan, is on board, preached the sermon. Weary of being knocked about at the mercy of the waves, there was not a soul on board but was thankful when night came, and we sought such rest as we could find in our berths.

We shall have a Wednesday missing all our lives, that of Wednesday, September 17th, and we have lost a whole day, besides sundry and many half-hours by the putting back of the ship's clock. We are now just half-way round the world from the Greenwich meridian.

The next day we saw one island of the Aleutian group, and the "early birds" saw a snow-cone on it. These islands extend for many miles at the entrance to the Behring Sea, and we discover that in the event of a shipwreck our boats have orders to steer for this island. There are a number of missionaries, from thirty to forty, on board, who, with their wives and numerous families are bound for China. Some of them are very intolerant, as was shown when the officers got up a dance, and there was some question as to where the piano would come from: "Oh!" said one, "the devil will be sure to provide that."

The last two days we experience a sudden change from the intense cold. We awake one morning to find a tropical downpour, accompanied by a damp heat that enervates everybody, and this is accompanied by the tail end of a typhoon, and a grand sea. All ports are closed, the heat below is terrific, and the ship labours and rolls heavily. And thus ends a most disagreeable and lonely voyage, for we have not seen a single sail since leaving Vancouver.

There is no sensation in the world more delightful than landing in a new country, and especially when it is in such a different corner of the world as Japan.

Our expectations are vague and enthusiastic, but, alas! the approach to Yokohama through the beautiful channel of islands is lost to us. We are on deck at 5 a.m., only to see the lights of the numerous lighthouses on the coast extinguished, and then blotted out in blinding mists of rain. Fugi, the sacred mountain, whose cone, dominating the whole island, we had been taught to watch for in our first view of Japan, is lost to us. Sullen clouds and the gloomiest grey sky hang over Yokohama.

The departure from the _Empress of Japan_ is a scene of more than usual confusion, but we get safely down the one gangway, thronged with passengers and their luggage, and into the steam-launch sent for us by the Government, and are soon speeding along the pretty Bund to the Grand Hotel. The first morning on shore after a long voyage is always a harassing one. There are letters to be posted, the money of the country to be obtained, departure of the next steamer to be ascertained, and here in Japan, above all, passports to be seen about, for you cannot leave the Treaty Ports without one. We afterwards found that in an incredibly short space after arriving in any town, the police always came to inquire for a passport. Then we had to engage a guide, without which you are assured you cannot travel in Japan. I may at once say that, though we had an excellent guide, we found him an unnecessary nuisance, and parted with him in a few days. In going into the interior of the country you require one to cook and arrange, but keeping to the more beaten tracks you can comfortably manage without.

Of course we have spent the whole of our first day in Japan in jinrikishas. Everyone does so. Nor can we resist a visit to the curio shops, though we harden ourselves against temptations, knowing that we shall have but too many opportunities to spend in the future. We were glad of this afterwards, for we heard that the curio dealers, on learning the large number of passengers leaving Vancouver on the _Empress of Japan_, had met together and by agreement raised their prices. In the afternoon we went for a drive round the Bluff, or European Settlement. Yokohama is a treaty port, and at these ports, which were first opened by the efforts of Commodore Perry to foreigners in 1868, a concession of land was allotted to the Europeans, where alone they are allowed to reside. And very charming houses they have built here, coloured red and green, or grey, and buff, with well-kept roads and pretty gardens, fenced in with bamboo hedges. We drive round by the racecourse, with its grand stand and white railings just like our Epsom course. The Mikado visits Yokohama once a year to come to the races, and we see his private box on the top of the stand. Then home by the sea-shore and across a plain of rice fields, descending through the Settlement once more.

Yokohama is a cosmopolitan place and enjoys the glamour of being the landing-place in a new country and the first sight of a new nation, hut it contains nothing of interest. Along the Bund or sea wall is a row of grey verandahed houses, looking very Eastern amongst their palm trees. Behind the sea front there are two or three streets, chiefly containing curio shops, interspersed with many grey walled godowns with their forbidding barred and shuttered windows. People stay at Yokohama, some because the hotel is comfortable, some, like the American ladies, who, though bringing large boxes of dresses, are so fascinated by the Chinese tailors' prices, that they stay to have more made, others again to haunt the curio shops, and really the selection of articles made with a view to the wants of the ordinary traveller is so good, that you can scarcely do better, we determined afterwards, than shop at Yokohama. Others again are so foolish as to be marked for life, by employing the services of Hori-Chigo, whose advertisement runs thus: "The celebrated Tattooer, patronized by T.R.H. Princes Albert Victor and George, and known all over the world for his fine and artistic work. Designs and samples can be seen at the Tattooing Rooms."

_Thursday, September 24th._--Such a glorious day, and we took a sudden determination to go at once to Tokio, a short hour's journey. We found, on arriving at the station, our luggage surrounded by a group of the smallest of porters in neat blue uniforms, and caps with yellow bands, dubiously surveying my large basket, which was ultimately transported by the help of all. The railways in Japan were built by English engineers, and worked by them, until the Japanese learnt to do it for themselves. They are perfectly English, and the names of stations, directions, even the mile posts are written in both languages. The fares are extraordinarily cheap, and the third-class crowded, whilst the one first-class carriage on each train is almost exclusively used by Europeans. There are newspapers in the waiting-rooms; they have the French system of locking you in the latter until shortly before the arrival of the train; and the American check system for luggage. There was a funny little toy train waiting for us on the very narrow gauge, drawn by a tiny black and yellow engine. The long carriages with their seats lengthways have as many as twenty-two windows, and they are lined with Lincrusta-Walton paper. There is a wooden tray with a tea-pot filled with hot water, and glasses for the tea, which the Japanese are always drinking. When we stop at the stations there is such a cheerful chorus of clicking high-heeled clogs, as the men and the little ladies, with their smiling brown babies on their bent backs, tippet and shuffle along.

The short run between Tokio and Yokohama is perfectly flat, with nothing but rice fields, or if there is a little eminence it is crowned by the dwarf forestry, which is the peculiar feature of Japanese scenery.

Tokio or Tokyo, is the official capital of Japan. It is the old Yedo of our schoolroom geography. The Minister of Foreign Affairs had sent his secretary to meet us at the station, with a carriage similar to an English victoria, drawn by pretty thick-set black Japanese ponies, and with the Indian custom of a running sayce, who jumps off and clears the way at the corners. To the right of the broad canal, along which we are driving, we see a grand structure, which we suppose to be an official building at least, and are surprised when we are told that it is the Imperial Hotel. It is as palatial inside, with its broad staircase and passages, and marble dining hall, and its crowds of obsequious servants, who, hands on knees, slide down in deep bows at every corner, and that drawing in of the breath like a gentle gasp, which in Japan is a sign of great respect. The government have shown much enterprise in assisting to build several of these large hotels by grants of lands and subsidies, thus encouraging foreign travellers to come and stay. They serve also as places where imperial guests, like the Duke and Duchess of Connaught (who stayed here), and the Czarewitch, can be entertained, as the palaces, owing to their complete absence of furniture, according to the custom of the country, cannot be rendered habitable for the reception of Europeans.

Tokio, beautiful Tokio, with its multitudinous little brown-eaved houses, crowded in lowly company together, its broad moats, with the green water, over which the mists gather at night and disperse in the early morning sun, its great walls, formed of blocks of stone piled up obliquely without the aid of mortar that guard the Shogun's Castle, and the pale-blue grey skies, with the clear bright atmosphere, which lends such a charm and softness to the picturesque scenes around. The charm of Tokio is undefinable. It is so subtle as only to be felt. But wherever you go, you will be always coming back to those miles of solid masonry and those moats with their grassy banks, with a single row of twisted dragon-shaped fir trees at the top--trees, that like all else in Japan, are dwarfed, and where perhaps two or three solemn rooks will perch and caw hoarsely, or even a red-legged stork, with outstretched wings, will flap idly across.

I shall never forget the delight of our first drive in Tokio. It was enough to be drawn swiftly and silently along in the midst of those broad white roads, shaded by avenues of graceful willows, and see all the strangely fascinating life of every-day Japan passing swiftly by, without going to see anything in particular. For the motion of these jinrikishas, the only practicable mode of progression in Japan, is delightfully easy and pleasant. The coolies in their dark blue cotton breeches and loose jacket and large mushroom-shaped hats, go at an easy trot of six miles an hour, and they will do forty miles in one day. This patient, toiling, perspiring race never seem to tire, and their bare brown legs, with their large muscular development, with sinews and veins standing out, and their high regular action, trot as steadily as the rough docile ponies. Their feet are bare, or covered with a straw sandal, kept on by a ribbon passed round the great toe. We see many shops hung with hundreds of these sandals. Their cost is infinitesimally small, but the roads are strewn with cast-off ones, for they only last for a few journeys.

We are driving along by the Inner Moat; for there are three separate moats surrounding the Castle, and then crossing over a bridge we pass under an ancient stone gateway, and find ourselves, between this and another one, equally massive and with iron-plated doors studded with nails. We are shut in by these curious walls of obsolete masonry. Huge blocks of granite are piled up obliquely, one resting on the other for support, without being filled in by earth or mortar. They are broader at the base, slope inwards, and stand by their own weight. Again and again we came upon these Titanic walls in the ancient buildings of Japan, and never ceased wondering how they were first placed in position and then held so, for centuries. Passing through the second archway, we are in a great open space, and above us are the white walls and brown crinkled roofs of the Mikado's palace. There is the grey stone bridge lighted by clusters of electric lamps, across which the 121st Mikado and the successor of the Shoguns passes to the palace, around which linger mysteries leaving the imagination free to picture the interior, for it is invisible to everyone. The authors of that delightful "Social Departure," it is true, saw it, but they dare not record how the permission was obtained. It is said that Mr. Liberty was the last to see this enchanted abode, but then his visit was from a professional view, to give his opinion on the decorations, as one of the great æsthetic decorators of the day.

The office of the Imperial Household, whither we were bound to call on Monsieur Nagasaki, the Emperor's Master of the Ceremonies, lies under the Imperial Palace. The sentry at the gateway stopped us, but after some parleying we were allowed to proceed on foot, as none but titled Japanese are allowed to pass in a jinrikisha. The officer who accompanied us was typical of the politeness which is the pleasantest feature of the Japanese, and requested a souvenir of our visit in a visiting card. In coming away we passed the Minister of Justice in a victoria, with a jinrikisha roped behind, containing his detective.

Tokio is one of the ten largest cities in the world, and with its population of 1,400,000 spread out over an extended area, the distances are great. It has tramways, drawn by the diminutive ponies, and an ear-piercing horn heralds an antique omnibus in the principal thoroughfares. It has electric light, gas, and telephones. Nor is it wanting in handsome public buildings and offices like the Admiralty, the Ministry for Foreign and Home Affairs. The Houses of Parliament are a skeleton of poles, for, just completed last year, they were burnt down immediately and are now rebuilding. We are passing an enclosure with rows of white-washed buildings, little barracks, suited to the little soldiers we see marching bravely along in the streets, and crowned with the sixteen-petalled chrysanthemum, the royal insignia, which is everywhere and on everything.

Before the afternoon light fails we visit the temples at Shiba Park, the park being a grove of trees under which picturesque groups of children and nurses wander, or ladies stroll about, with their jinrikishas following them.

The entrance to this succession of mortuary chapels, where the remains of the 7th and 9th Shoguns are buried, is by a gorgeous gate of red and green and gold--a gate such as we grew to be familiar with, in the ceaseless succession of temples in Japan, for all these Buddhist shrines have a wearisome sameness in common, however beautiful they may individually be. There is a quiet court inside, filled with rows of stone pillars, with a circular pagoda with open holes at the top. They are lanterns offered as a mark of respect by the Daimyos or great nobles to their master. Every August, from the 12th to the 16th, lights are kept burning there to entice the spirits to return during their time of wandering, and not to journey by mistake to hell. Another stone court with more lanterns, and a pagoda-erection to a Minister of War, whither, should a war occur, they hope his spirit would return to watch over it and bring them luck.

We approach the Temple, with its black roof of crenellated copper, and the overhanging eaves, from each up-curved point of which hangs a tinkling bronze bell, and we can see that this sombre outside is only a wooden shell to preserve the gilding and brilliant colours of the exterior.

Our feet are bound up in cotton shoes, and we enter by a side door into an exquisite little sanctum, where the roof is all of lacquer, inlaid with mother-of-pearl, and the panels on the walls are carved in marvellous _repoussé_ work, with flowers and animals. A softened light comes through the open door, and the gold and red and blue and green, melt into a harmony of rich colouring, whilst the petal of each flower, the stalk of every leaf, the plumage on the wings of the birds, stand out in startling relief; and these panels represent storks, with their long red legs, doves with their silver-grey plumage, parrots with red and green tails, and peacocks with fan-spread tails. Or there are such flowers as the sacred lotus, the emblem of Buddhism, the chrysanthemum and the pink peony. One panel of exceptional beauty, is an exquisite spray of tiger lilies, carved in high relief. Tradition says that this was so greatly esteemed by the Shogun, and that the two nails we see were used to hang a cover over it, that no one should see it but himself. The priest throws open the golden trellis-work of a shrine, and shows us three memorial tablets with the Shogun's names inscribed on them. Around it there is a collection of china vases, paper lanterns, and lacquer stands. Passing behind the screen formed of bamboo bound with silken cords, we come to a square room covered as usual with matting, and with the same florid decoration, where there is a row of lacquer boxes each tied up with a cord. They contain the Buddhist books, and are used for the daily prayers.

Through a grove of glossy-leaved camellias we pass, and mount up some flights of ancient steps to another temple. This is the Praying Room in front of the Shogun's Tomb, and is only entered by the Mikado and Archbishop, when they come to worship the great departed on the day of his decease. We pass behind this, and ascend yet more moss-grown steps, to the tomb of the Great Shogun, which is surmounted by a bronze urn, and enclosed within stone parapets and iron railings. The tomb bears the three-leaved asarum, which is the crest of the House, and is seen on many buildings of the date of that dynasty. Since the fall of the Shoguns--or military usurpers of executive power--and the re-establishment to the Imperial City of the present dynasty of Mikados, it has been replaced by the Imperial Chrysanthemum. All is so quiet and solemn here, and the memorial above the tomb is so simple, as compared with the magnificence that goes before, that as Mitford says, "The sermon may have been preached by design, or it may have been by accident, but the lesson is there." The 9th, 12th and 14th Shoguns are buried at Shiba, and their three temples, their three praying rooms, and their three bronze urns, stand in precisely similar lines with the one we are at present by.

In the evening we take jinrikishas and go into the native quarters. If Tokio is charming in daylight, it is simply a fairyland at night. There are no lamps, save for a few electric beacons, that send out their far-reaching flashes over all the city, but the streets are lighted by innumerable pendulous drops of light, that dance and quiver and dart about, and cross and disappear quickly round corners. They are the paper lanterns which hang from the shafts of hundreds of jinrikishas, or are carried by pedestrians, for everyone in Japan carries his own lantern after dark; and some are pale pink and others red or blue. Now their soft light is reflected on the waters of the moat, or glides quickly and noiselessly round the stone ramparts and reappears like glow-worms on the other side. Now we pass the crimson light streaming out of the little box-like police station, or the barrow of the street vendor with the bulb of light shining mysteriously from behind his hanging curtains. Soft even light falls across the street from the windows of opaque paper, and we can trace the shadows crossing them. Then as we stealthily fly past, we see the dark interior of a shop lighted by a single lamp, under which squats a Rembrandt-like figure, intently working, for in these busy human hives late at night and early morning sees them still at work, or again the leaping flames of fire in the centre of the floor light up a family group. Then there is the street vendor, with his flaring torches, and his wares spread out against a wall. There is a festival held in some particular street, lighted with lunging designs of crimson paper lanterns, slung from bamboo poles, to the god of writing. Then as we return home through the dark quiet alleys, we hear the frequent and melancholy sound of the bamboo flute of the blind shampooer, as he feels his way, stick in hand, along the street. He sounds but two notes, but they have the wail of a world of sorrow in them, that goes to the heart.

Early the next morning we climbed up some steps and passed into the lovely groves of Ueno Park. The evergreen trees are still here, but the avenue of cherry trees is bare and leafless, "which presents a uniquely beautiful sight during the blossom season, when the air seems to be filled with pink clouds," and you can scarcely pass under the trees for the showers of falling blossoms. A little farther on there is a sheet of water covered with flat green leaves, which three weeks ago was a mass of pink and white lotus bloom. The blossoming of the cherry, plum, lotus or chrysanthemum are looked upon by the Japanese as national festivals. In fact they are their only holidays, for they have no Sunday or day of rest. The Japanese may be said to have little or no religion. The upper classes never worship at all, and the lower orders are either Buddhists or Shintoists (Shintoism being the worship of many gods), but they practically only go to the temples to offer prayers, accompanied by money to the gods, if they have any special request to make, such as for a good harvest, or recovery from sickness.

There are many little tea-houses at Ueno Park, and waiting damsels smile in a friendly manner and beckon us in, but we cross the road and leave this pleasant corner of the park, where the simple people come to drink tea and amuse themselves, and pass under one of those solemn archways hewn out of single blocks of stone, a torii or bird's rest. They are such grand yet simple monuments of a dead past, and are found at the entrance to all the temples in Japan. We wander up the stone-paved avenue, through the solemn illness of the great cryptomeria avenue, towards the Buddhist Temple at the end. This Temple, with its neighbouring pagoda, is more than usually brilliant, being recently restored, but the charm lies in its surroundings--in the quiet fir groves, and the clumps of camellia trees, in the pink blossoms of the monkey tree, and the solemn cawing of the rooks, in the click-click of the wooden sandals of the dear little waddling ladies as they saunter along the pavement, with their close-shaven children by their sides, so exactly like the Japanese dolls we know at home. But in the centre of this peaceful scene is a switchback railway, whose noisy clatter profanes the stillness, but of which the Japanese are truly proud. We pass a fortune stone. It is old and chipped, covered with hieroglyphics and bespattered with dirty pellets of paper, which are chewed first into a pulp and then thrown at it. If they adhere, it is considered a lucky omen.

After quickly passing through the Museum, a white Moorish building erected for the Exhibition, and which is as dull as museums usually are, we had one of those fascinating drives through the streets to the shop of the most celebrated cloisonné maker in Japan, and by special appointment to the Mikado. There was nothing exposed in the shop front, but leading us to the inmost recesses at the back, one by one with reverent care, each article was produced from its wooden case and foldings of crêpe and cotton wool, and placed with justifiable pride before us, for this prince of designers, Namikawa, is the greatest living artist in Japan, and exists only for the production of the masterpieces of his art. The exceeding tenderness of the pale grey, darkening into lilac, forming the background for a cock whose plumage, faithfully delineated, is shown by the outline of every feather, the rose pink, the translucent yellow--it is impossible to convey the delicate tones of colour, or the life-like drawing of his plaques and vases.

We subsequently saw the many processes through which cloisonné passes, and it is not until you have seen the skill and delicate workmanship required, that you really begin to appreciate cloisonné. And the same may be said about lacquer, which requires knowing to be fully understood. First the vase must be fashioned in copper, then the designer must delineate from memory some intricate design of flowers or birds or landscape. This again has to be reproduced in tiny pieces of wire, pinched and twisted deftly into shape and soldered on to the copper. The interstices of the wire are filled in with the brilliant colours that we see in the saucers by the side of the workers, and the mixing of these is the secret which ensures success. Five times the colours are "filled," and five times burnt in the kilns, and then the polisher with his different coarsenesses of stones polishes it into a burnished and chaste work of art.

Apart from temples, there is not much to see at Tokio, but it is the streets which fascinate you so completely, that waking and sleeping you dream of these, and you want to be always out and amongst the bright life that flows through them. To get any idea of Japan you must always remember that everything is so ridiculously small. Life here is in miniature. Everything is lilliputian; beginning with the little houses, continuing with the little men and women and their tiny children, and ending with the little ponies, for there are no horses in Japan. And so to imagine a Japanese street, you must picture to yourself rows of little brown houses, many of only one storey, with large overhanging eaves. The interior is wide open and only raised one step from the street, and you look across the brightly burnished floor through the opening of the paper sliding screens, which are thrown back in the daytime, and catch pretty glimpses of the home life in the back yard. Many of the shops are hung with funereal-looking purple and black hangings, inscribed with white hieroglyphics giving the names and nature of their wares. You recognize the chemist's shop by the gold tablets setting forth the details of the pharmacopœia within. There are barbers' shops, with a half-shaven customer with upturned chin seated in the chair; drapers' with samples of bright-coloured stuffs hung round a revolving wheel outside; toy-shops where are sold those paper kites and tiniest of shuttlecocks, or hobgoblin horses and animals of impossible shape and size, with which the children play in the street. There are others hung with nothing but strings of straw sandals, or wooden clogs; grain shops where the clean white green and red seeds are sorted into baskets of samples. Here is one for the sale of saké, the brandy of Japan, piled up with huge barrels, and with those tapering blue and white bottles which we are accustomed to use for flower-vases, but which are really manufactured to hold this popular beverage. And then the china shops; they are an incessant delight, with their hundreds of dear little common blue and white rice bowls, their artistic tea-pots of pale green ware with a spray of apple blossom, their hibachis, or china flower-pots of deep blue, green or bronze ware, which are used for the hot ashes to light the pipe with, and are found on the floor of all tea-houses. Again, we must look at this stationer's, where that soft crinkled tissue paper is sold, and the brushes with which the Japanese write so swiftly and deftly, that the ink is absorbed without blotting into the paper. In Japan they do everything upside down. The horses stand with their tails in their mangers and their heads where their tails should be. Locks revolve contrariwise, and the carpenters plane towards, instead of away from the person. So with writing; they write from the bottom of the page to the top, and from right to left, and the number of their characters is appalling. You must know from 3000 to 4000 characters to write Japanese at all, and an educated man will require some 6000; and the disappointing thing is that when a foreigner has mastered this, the literature opened up to him offers no reward for his labour, as it practically does not as yet exist.

See this fruit shop, where bunches of pale grey-green water-grapes, brown pears, and plentiful supplies of green figs are spread temptingly out, interspersed with bunches of those luscious orange persimmons that melt in the mouth, and taste like a ripe apricot; this umbrella emporium, where paper umbrellas, oiled to make them waterproof, are open inviting inspection; a tea-shop, where the tea is kept in gigantic jars striped purple and green; a greengrocer's, with oblong sweet potatoes in their pink skins, and turnips of abnormal length; a basket shop, where bamboo baskets of every shape and size are to be had; or a fishmonger's, where the delicate pink and rainbow scaled fish, are exposed daintily for sale on bright blue and green china dishes. Nor must I forget the confectioners' shops, where from a tiny oven heated by charcoal, we see the most attractive little pink, green, chocolate and white sugared cakes turned out and placed in alternate rows on trays. It is most amusing to see the extreme economy of the heating arrangements. Four tiny pieces of charcoal, turned over and husbanded together by a pair of iron tongs, suffice to cook a meal. The Government do not allow shops to sell European and Japanese goods together, so that now and again you pass one full of Manchester atrocities, gaudy stuffs, ill-shaped English umbrellas, cheap lamps, boots, hats, and underclothing, which you turn away from, to seek once more the tasteful display of the native stores.

And what a medley of scenes there are, and what a flow of life confined in these narrow streets with their one-storeyed houses. Coolies harnessed by ropes to drays full of rice, answering one another with their musical patient cry of Huydah-Houdah; itinerant vendors with bamboo poles slung across the shoulder, and suspended trays filled with every imaginable variety of article; Buddhist priests with their shaven heads, and white dresses with flowing sleeves, covered with black crêpe.

Mingling with the crowd of dear little men and women in their graceful flapping kimonos, are the little girl "mothers," who at the age of ten bend their backs and have a baby brother or sister tied on. Happy babies they are, brown and contented, as are their scantily-clothed kindred, who obey an instinct of nature in making mud pies and dust castles by the roadside. Here is a closed van on wheels, painted black, being drawn by policemen. It is a "Maria" with a prisoner peering out between the bars.

Every now and again we meet a funeral. The coffin is a square deal box, slung on bamboo poles, for the deceased has been placed in it in a sitting posture with the knees up to the chin. It is only another form of the economy of material, that forms such an especial feature in all things Japanese. However, this people understood long before we did, the use of lovely wreaths of coloured flowers, to mitigate the gloom of mourning, and the coffin is hung with them. Ancestor-worship takes a prominent part in Japanese religion, and now we understand at last the use of those elaborate gold and lacquer cabinets, with outer and inner folding doors, that you so often see in England. These cabinets are intended as the shrines where the little golden memorial tablets, in the form of small gravestones, and engraved with the name of the deceased, are kept at home. The deceased is always given a posthumous name, as, not believing in the immortality of the soul, but rather in its transmigration into an animal, they say that he has ceased to exist altogether, and has changed his state and lives under a new name. These memorial cabinets are found in all the houses of the upper classes.

The pictures that we know of these little Japanese ladies are the most faithful reproductions. Wrapped tightly round in their kimonos, with the bunch of the obi formed by its folding over at the back, their figures take the graceful bend and curve we see pourtrayed. The loose flowing sleeves, and the soft folds around the neck, and open at the throat, are so pretty. Their underclothing consists of several loose garments of crêpe, which is the material exclusively used by the upper classes, and their hips are so tightly bound that no European woman could stand it. They treat their hips as we do our waists, their object being to be perfectly straight. When this was explained to me, I understood how it was that an extra breadth is put into the kimonos bought by Europeans. It is curious that, though the Japanese bathe so frequently, they are not particular as to changing their underclothing. The women wear white stockings with a pocket for the great toe, and "getas" formed of a sole of wood, perched on two high clogs of the same, and kept on by a leash. Thus, when they enter a house, they leave their clogs at the door, and go about on the spotless matting in their stockings. As they sit and eat off the floors, they cannot allow the dirt of outside boots to be brought in, and all Japanese houses are scrupulously clean.

The kimonos of ladies are made in delicate quiet-toned stuffs of pale grey or fawn colour; but simple as some of them appear, the stuffs of which they are made are so costly that, even unembroidered, they will cost as much as 300 dollars. And then their obis, those broad sashes of the richest brocades and satins--on them they lavish all their pride and money, and they often descend as heirlooms in a family. The dressing of their hair is one long-continued source of admiration; it is such black glossy hair, and the coils are so immaculately smooth. There are but two styles of headdress for the whole country--one for the married ladies, and one for the single; and so you can always distinguish their state in life at a glance. The married women have it dressed in a single extended roll, with inlaid combs and coral-headed pins placed round; whilst the unmarried ladies wear their hair divided by a silk or gauze ribbon into two flat coils placed on either side of the head, and have still more decoration in the way of glass bead pins. And as to the little girls, they are the counterpart of their mothers, and from the earliest ages wear theirs in a similar manner. It used to be the custom for married women to have their teeth blackened, to prevent their receiving admiration from men other than their husbands; but this is dying out, and you now only see old married women in country districts following this obsolete fashion. No Japanese woman ever walks. She shuffles, she scuffles, she tippets along, balancing on her high-heeled getas; but step out the necessary stride for a walk, no, they cannot do that, for their kimonos are so narrow that they cannot move otherwise than with their knees knocking together. They are not pretty, these meek, gentle-looking, brown-skinned creatures, yet their sweet deprecating manners are very attractive. They are excellent mothers; more excellent wives, in their complete subjection and utter want of initiative. The sum total of their education is implicit reverence and obedience, first to parents, subsequently to husbands; and at the Peeress' school at Tokio, we are told that they are so afraid that the modern education given there to the daughters of the nobles will militate against this ideal, that particular lectures are given on the subject.

The men, so long as they wear the native dress, are dark, pleasant-looking little men; but when you see them, as you frequently do now, with a kimono surmounted by a brown or black pot-hat, a solar topee, or even a tweed stalking-cap, they are positively evil and unpleasant to look at.

Viscount Okabé, so long Minister in London, took us for a drive in the afternoon, and then we had time, before a pleasant dinner with Mr. and Mrs. Fraser at the British Legation, to go to the Theatre.

The corridor is covered with piles of sandles and umbrellas, whilst from the adjoining kitchens come savoury and nauseous smells. The floor of the Theatre slopes upwards from the stage, and is divided into square compartments, neatly matted, and intended for family boxes. The galleries are divided in the same way. And here groups of ladies and gentlemen are encamped for the whole day, for a Japanese theatre begins at 9 a.m. and lasts for ten hours; nor is this all, for the same piece may be continued from day to day, and last for six weeks. It is now five in the afternoon, and yet the audience maintain a deep interest and breathless gaze on the stage.

This is the outline of the story. The lank, die-away lady we see trailing across the stage has retired to a wood, with a rill of crystal water, to live in a temple, there, to mourn the death of her father in a war. The young man who was (unknown to her) his murderer, passes casually along and she falls in love with him. This love-making, in the drawling nasal accents, and its tediously slow movements, is most unreal, and as they drink the loving cup of saké together, the father's disapproving spirit, in a rushing flame of fire, blazes up from the temple. Darkness drowns the applause, and warriors rush on the scene and begin to fight the maiden, who mesmerizes them, until one by one they fall at her feet.

The orchestra is represented by five musicians, perched up on a rock. I may say at once that, artistic as is the nature of the Japanese, their idea of music is absolutely _nil_. It consists of a series of grunts and groans, or of nasal notes in a bass key, or of falsetto in a high one.

But the interest lies to us in the audience, who, in the interval of twenty minutes, eat their evening meal. Some have brought their food with them, and nearly all their own china tea-pots, for a constant supply of tea. Others buy theirs, and are provided with a succession of little wooden bowls piled on each other, and for which they have to pay the usual theatre price of ten cents, or double the ordinary one. In each box there is a hibachi, or china bowl full of hot ashes, where they light their pipes, for men and women are continually smoking, and their pipes have the smallest bowl, the size of a thimble--two whiffs and it is empty again; but it is sufficient for their modest wants.

_September 26th._--I am writing in the most delightful real Japanese house, far away in the midst of these beautiful mountains of Nikko.

The thin wooden frame of the house is covered with luminous parchment paper, and these are the walls that divide us from the outside world. They are not permanent ones, for they slide back one behind the other, a succession of paper screens, until the house is open to the street and there is only the shell of a habitation left in the roof, and one paper wall behind. The second-floor storey (if there is one) is marked by a long balcony running completely round, and here in cupboards at either end are kept the wooden shutters that slide into grooves and close in the balconies, in winter and at night, and give to all the houses the dull appearance of a blank wooden wall at sundown. Inside, the roof and floors are of white wood, and the latter is covered with spotless matting; but I am glad to say that there are European concessions here, in the shape of a table, chair, and washstand and bed, on which is laid a clean starched kimono to go to the bath in. In a Japanese house we should find no furniture at all. Their rooms are absolutely bare; they eat, sit and sleep on the floor, and from out of a cupboard in a recess will come the "futons," or thick wadded quilts, and the square piece of wood with a hollow for the neck, where a soft wad of paper is inserted, and which is used for a pillow by the ladies to save their elaborate headdress from getting deranged. As they cannot dress their hair themselves, it is only done occasionally, and must thus be considered even when sleeping.

The construction of these houses is so delightfully simple, for, excepting the polished ladder which leads upstairs, there is no plan of the rooms. They are made larger or smaller, more or less, according to the want of the hour, by means of those successions of sliding screens, and a little pushing and sliding will make the large room you are using, into five or six smaller ones in a second. These tea-houses are charming in their compact simplicity, their faultless cleanliness, and particular neatness.

It was at four o'clock this afternoon that we arrived at Nikko, and drove from the station through the end of the great cryptomeria avenue, past the village, until the jinrikisha was suddenly shot round a corner, down a narrow passage, and stopped at the courtyard step of the Suzuki Hotel. Here quite a little crowd of bowing attendants received us with many deep salaams, and sucking-in of breath; one relieved me of an umbrella, another of a cloak, and another of a book, and went before us, encouraging us with graceful gesticulations and faces wreathed in smiles to enter the house, impressing us in an indescribably charming manner that we were showing them but too much honour in doing so. Of course we drank tea--it is the first ceremony on entering any Japanese house; and then came the second one--the solemn ceremony of the bath.

Bathing is the passion and pastime of the Japanese, and they bathe as often as two or three times a day. In all towns there are public baths, where, in the evening, the population meet to gossip and take a bath for the modest price of two cents. Not long ago men and women in a state of nature bathed together, but Government has forbidden this now. However, we visited one where a wall separated the bath, but still left the entrance to both open to the public view. In villages there will be a tub or barrel outside every door, and one evening we saw a man preparing his bath, with a fire kindling under the zinc bottom of his tub. They take their baths as hot as 110° Fahrenheit, and for some unexplained reason foreigners find that cold or lukewarm baths are unsuited to the climate, and adopt the native temperature. The rule at hotels is that the first arrival is entitled to the first use of the bath.

To take up the thread of the story, we left Tokio at eleven this morning, the Foreign Office sending a carriage to take us to Ueno station.

Through groves of cryptomeria, maple, fir, willow, wild cherry and Spanish chestnuts we travel. Past great clumps of bamboo, which to see only is to be able to picture the mighty growth of their graceful, feathery foliage; by picturesque villages, with their angular brown thatched roofs crowding low down over their mud-wattled walls, nestling amongst banyon groves interspersed with persimmon trees, bare of leaves but laden with bunches of golden fruit. Then we emerge on to the open country, where the cultivation is so exquisitely neat that it resembles a succession of kitchen gardens. There are no hedges, and no grass, but the whole land is taken up by small patches of onions, turnips, maize, millet, sweet potatoes, and the broad caladium-like leaf of another species of potatoes, whose English equivalent to the Japanese name I failed to discover. These alternate with rice fields, where the bright yellow tells of the ripening and bursting of the grain. The soil is rich and black, and labour is done by hand-spade, but the absence of pasture strikes us. However, there are few cows or oxen, and no sheep, numberless experiments failing to rear them; and the ponies live on chopped straw, beans and the refuse of grain.

An hour before reaching Nikko we pass into the mountains. It is such a picturesque, well-wooded range, this Nikko chain of mountains, and they all bear that peculiar Japanese characteristic of rising straight out of the plain, ending with sharp three-sided cones, and like all else in this country, though lofty, they are on a small scale, toy mountains that seem to fit in with the miniature picture.

We had time after our arrival at Nikko, and before dusk, to pass through the village, across the wonderful red lacquer bridge, and following a grass path to come to a Waterfall. On the rock opposite is inscribed the word Hammôn, and the legend goes, that as no one could, as we see, possibly cross the fall to write it, an artist threw his pen at the rock and it inscribed this Sanskrit word. And now in the growing twilight we pass along under the shadow of a row of mutilated grey idols, each squatted on his pedestal with crossed hands, looking over the stream. I counted 120 figures, but no two people have ever been known to make the same number. At the head of this solemn avenue of gods there is a larger one facing the others. They are supposed to be the Judges before whom the spirits of the departed pass, and are judged whether they shall go to heaven or hell; and hence they are covered with many paper labels, the prayers of relatives for the deceased, that grace may be granted them by the gods. It is a solemn tribunal, with its presiding judge, and each face is different in expression, and yet they are such mobile, expressionless faces, as if to represent a dispassionate and unbiassed judgment.

After dinner we adjourned into an empty room, when a man appeared with a card, and before we could look round the whole room was full of merchants producing out of their cotton bundles, beautiful carved ivories, bronzes, silver, china, lacquer, and furs, for Nikko produces excellent ones. They are so persuasive, and ingratiate their wares all round into your hands, that it is with difficulty we escape; and making our airy chambers a little less so by having the shutters run out of their cupboard, we are soothed to sleep by the wailing sounds of the samisen, that comes from the brightly-lighted little tea-house on the opposite hill.

It is amusing the next morning to dress with the wall of the room thrown back, and to hear the constant shuffle of sandals, or the clatter of the clogs as these little men and women in their flapping draperies cross the yard; and this courtyard is so characteristic. It is but a few square feet in dimensions, yet there is a dragon-shaped fir-tree in the centre, whose outstretched arms are supported by bamboo poles, which form a little arbour with a seat in it; then there is a stone lantern and a bronze stork, a lamp-post and a wandering paved pathway, that gives a great idea of distance.

We go directly after breakfast to the Temples to see the tombs of the Shoguns. They are three hundred years old, and as beautiful as carving, colour and design can make them. We ascend up a winding flight of stone steps through the gloom of a magnificent avenue of cryptomerias. They are tremendously tall, impressive trees, with their moss-grown trunks and stems, and these steps wind through their midst, a fit leading up to the great mausoleums. Passing the courts of a monastery, we are first shown a Buddhist temple where, hidden behind the silk-bound bamboo blinds, there are three colossal gold Buddhas seated cross-legged on lotus leaves. In the mysterious gloom, they look solemnly and indifferently into space. On the platform by this temple there is suspended a big bronze bell, which is sounded by a pole propelled against the side. As we stand there it gives forth its sonorous musical toll, and at every hour of the day its sweet and solemn note echoes over the valley. Then, seated in a semicircle, the priests of Buddha begin to chant the morning orisons, droning in a nasal tone, and with the accompanying tom-tom of a drum. We leave them to pass on to the tomb of the great warrior Shogun, Yeyásu.

The wide road, bordered by those walls of mortarless blocks of stone, leads up to the flight of steps and an elaborate Sammon or gateway, the entrance to the first temple. There are a number of wooden tablets outside, on which are inscribed the names of the subscribers to the fabric of the temple. The inner court is full of interest, for you must imagine that all the buildings it contains are covered with decorations and paintings. One of the storehouses where pictures, furniture, and other articles belonging to Yeyásu are kept, has carvings in relief of elephants, in which the joints of the hind legs are turned in the wrong direction. There is the tree which the Shogun carried about in his palanquin with him when it was still small enough to travel in a flowerpot, and the stable for the sacred white pony, kept for the use of the god; over which is a very clever group of three monkeys, representing the three countries of India, China, and Japan. One monkey shows he is blind by covering his eyes with his hand, another deaf by stopping his ears, and a third dumb by closing his mouth. The one signifies that you must see no evil; the other that you must hear no evil; the last that you must speak no evil.

The water cistern, hung round as is usual in these temples with coloured rags, is formed of a single block of granite, so evenly cut that the water flowing over it is a glassy, imperceptible surface. Next to it is a library, where through the grating we see a revolving book-case made of lacquer with gilt columns, containing a complete collection of the Buddhist scriptures.

And now we come to the exquisitely beautiful gate of the Yomeimon, with its graceful arabesques founded upon the peony pattern, its niches and columns, its golden clawed dragons and groups of Chinese sages, which leads into the inner court of the temple. Surrounded by open trellis-work screens, we pass up several flights of steps, and take off our boots by the huge bronze money-box waiting for offerings. The interior is filled with a dim light, but you are in the midst of a place so rich in subdued soft colour, so embroidered in elaborate designs and harmonizing tones, that it is some minutes before you can at all appreciate the full beauty. The ceiling is formed of squares divided by ribs of black lacquer and enamelled in peacock blue and green; there are gilt carved screens, where perch birds of paradise, doves, parrots, ducks, peacocks; others where the asarum or peony, the royal flower, the lily, and the lotus, are carved in high relief. And the ante-chambers on either side are equally perfect; in one there is a carved and painted ceiling with an angel surrounded by a chrysanthemum, and some boldly executed eagles; in another, pictures of unicorns on a gold ground, and some phœnixes.

In an adjoining temple a woman in scarlet and white draperies performed a sacred dance. It is a slow and graceful movement; the bells in her hand keep rhythmical time, while she amuses and charms away the evil spirit from the dead Shogun. We have now a long pilgrimage to perform, up to the platform on high, where rests the body of Yeyásu. The ancient stone stairs, the balustrade and columns, are clothed in the most vivid green moss, whilst the cryptomerias form a dark archway above. There is complete silence around. The place is damp and deserted. We might, from their moss-grown appearance, be the first to tread these steps for a thousand years, and slowly mounting them, we feel we are breaking the spell that has hung over them, as we find ourselves on the stone terrace at the top. Here there is a praying temple, and we pass round to the tomb at the back. It is a simple bronze urn, shaped like a small pagoda, with a stone table in front, on which is placed a bronze stork with a candle in its mouth, an incense burner, and a vase of artificial lotus flowers. Such is the end of all greatness.

Returning home, we took jinrikishas for the mountain expedition to Lake Chữzenji. For some miles we travel by the side of the river's bed and between the mountains, meeting many pack-ponies laden with merchandise, shod like the men with straw sandals. It looks rainy, and the men have donned their waterproof coats, and these consist of a straw mantle formed like a thatch; when you see a fisherman standing in the water with his legs immersed, and only this thatch above, it produces the most comical effect of a floating haystack. As we begin climbing the mountain road, we see many strange and beautiful new shrubs, flowers, and trailing creepers growing amongst the rocks. Soon a tea-house comes in sight, with the front entirely open, and pretty sliding screens of blue paper. Cushions are placed on the floor and tea brought by a welcome-smiling damsel. It is pale, straw-coloured tea made from the young undried shoot of the tea-plant, and it is not allowed to infuse, but is poured straight into the tiny handleless cups, with two or three leaves at the bottom, and served on a lacquer tray with pink and white sweetmeats. But how artistic is the design on the common bronze kettle hanging over the open fire in the centre of the room, and kept always boiling for tea to be quickly made; how delicate the pale blue colour of the thin eggshell cups, with the spray of cherry blossom. It is one of the many charms of Japan, that art is brought to use in all the appurtenances of daily life.

The ascent to Chữzenji, right into the heart of the mountains, is perfectly lovely. I have never seen grander or more charming scenery. When we rest for a minute at one of the many tea-houses, there is such a splendid view of two cascades flowing down a rocky precipice. It is the meeting-place of several valleys, and the joining of several mountain spurs, and there is an open park-like space, which looks so green and smiling amid these rugged fastnesses. There is a movement in those bushes in the valley! It is a troop of monkeys jumping from branch to branch; for Japan is a strange mixture of tropical and hardy growths. You find the flowers and plants of north latitudes growing beside the palms and fruits of the tropics. The ascent becomes more and more trying, though this good, new road was hurried over, to be finished for the visit of the Czarewitch last year, which never took place, owing to his attempted assassination by a fanatic near Kyoto.

Clouds came down as we reached the pretty fall at the summit, so we only heard its roar, dulled by the thick mist; but they cleared away again, as we came to the shores of the lake, 4375 feet above the sea. The deserted houses in the village are used by the pilgrims who come here in August. We rested on the balcony of a tea-house overhanging the lake, and then the descent was accomplished in one unbroken run, one coolie acting as a drag behind, whilst the other in the shafts steadied the jinrikisha round the sharp curves.

_September 28th._--We spent a long morning amongst the Tombs again, and we shall carry away with us such a vision of picturesquely pointed black roofs, outlined in gold and red, and graceful bamboo groves, of moss-grown flights of steps under the shadow of stately avenues of cryptomerias, of ancient stone walls with a vista leading to massive torii. We shall dream of the many solemn rows of stone lanterns, of gateways bright with rainbow hues and guarded by dragon monsters, of the bronze urns hidden away up on those quiet nooks in the mountains, and above all of the enchanted atmosphere, the deep stillness, the solemn peace that rests over these shrines of the dead.

We waited on the steps of the temple to hear the big bronze bell slowly send out its voice once more at midday across the valley, and then came home.

On our return journey to Tokio in the afternoon we took jinrikishas to Imaicho, the station beyond Nikko, so as to drive five miles through the magnificent cryptomeria grove that runs parallel with the railway. The avenue extends for fifty miles, and was used by the envoy of the Mikado when he sent to offer presents at the tomb of Yeyásu. These cryptomerias are grand trees, with their stately trunks shooting up in regular lines, whilst their long branches only grow from their summits, and intertwining make a dim twilight below.

On arriving at Tokio, we had a drive through the fairyland of its glimmering streets.