Part 7

“You should belong to some higher class. Take this slip to the principal!” the teacher said. “You have an imagination.” She wiped her spectacles slowly.

I left the room remarking, “Because I am a Japanese.”

I slipped away from the school altogether.

“One experience is plenty,” I declared.

26th—I went to Mission Street to call on Madge.

From both sides of the street peeped the famous Jewish noses. The second-hand clothing shops parade. How droll to see those noses shrivelling like a lobster!

Madge’s father owns a despicable restaurant with only four eating tables. Mamma cooks, while she sits on the counter.

When I appeared, she shot out, greeting me: “Hello, Morning Glory!”

“Awfully glad to see you! I have come to help you, haven’t I?”

I was ready to strip off my jacket and wind myself in her apron.

Her papa was dumbfounded by my sudden action.

The outside board with the bill of fare was scraped out by this morning’s rain. It looked as miserable as an Italian vegetable wagon under the rain.

My first work was to rewrite it.

I saw a Jew at a neighbouring door striving with one about the value of pants. A shoemaker’s “pan, pan” hammered on my head from the opposite house.

Mission Street is the street of horse-dung.

When my job was over, an honourable Mr. Wagon Driver leaped in, bidding me serve some soup.

I ran into the kitchen to fetch it.

I spilled it on the table.

“That’s all right, honey!” he said in patronising aloofness, and pierced my face with his gummy red eyes.

O Kowaya! Shocking!

I put one five-dollar piece of gold on Madge’s palm when I left her.

Because her shoes were heelless.

Pity the musume!

27th—I bought one book, being captivated by its title. Isn’t “When Knighthood was in Flower” beautifully chivalrous?

I have remarked that every Imperial cruiser anchors at an isle close by Loo Choo, just on account of the enticement in the name “Come and See.”

I found in my trunk an introduction to Miss Rose by my professor friend of Tokio ’versity.

Miss Rose?

My imagination started to move like a watch. I fancied she should be nineteen, since she was a Miss. No Rose girl can be homely.

I went to see her.

Alas!

She was a lady like a beer-barrel. Her finger-nails were black.

I left her like a miner stepping out of a gold mountain with empty hands.

I wonder why the mayor didn’t object to letting an ugly woman be crowned with a pretty name.

Fifty-years-old Miss Rose!

Now I fear to read Mr. Major’s book.

28th—The following is my letter to Mr. Oscar:

“OSCAR SAN! ELLIS SAN!

“I never liked your profession, simply because it is too beautiful.

“I don’t see why you cannot transfer to some other business.

“I have been ever so much fascinated with odd sorts of manual work. If I were a gentleman, I would very likely pursue the calling of grave-digger or sea-diver.

“Yesterday I passed by some labourers breaking massive stones. They lifted their hammers (O Oscar, look at their muscles!) and knocked them down to the sound of ‘Sara bagun!’ They jerked the ‘sara bagun,’ Oscar. Does it mean ‘ready?’ Mrs. Willis’ Century dictionary must be imperfect, since it does not contain such a word. Am I mis-spelling?

“Suppose I marry one of those!

“He will return home awfully tired. He will naturally doze after dinner. When his smoking pipe has slipped from his lips and burned my best tablecloth, isn’t it possible that I will be mad?... I startled him, pulling his hair ever so hard. Now you must think that he grew mad also. He seized my arm, and beat me. O Oscar, he beat me surely!... Then he will repent his conduct, and kneel by my side, begging my forgiveness. He will say, ‘My dear sweet wife—’

“Do you know how interesting it is to be beaten by a husband?

“I well-nigh fixed my mind never to affiance with a man too genteel to hit me.

“Woman is a revolting little bit of thing.

“If you say ‘Yes,’ I am quite ready to slam my ‘No!’

“Oscar San!

“I am afraid that you are too amiable.

“What you have to do for your next missive is to collect every kind of dreadful adjectives from your dictionary, and throw them in.

“You know what to do when I get angry, don’t you?

“Ellis San!

“You are too handsome.

“I am fond of a comely face as anybody else.

“But I fancy often how it would be if I fell in love with a deformity.

“People would laugh at me doubtless. But how dramatic it would be when I proclaimed, ‘Because I love him!’

“What a romantic phrase that is!

“Can’t you deform yourself?

“Sayonara,

“With a thousand bows,

“M. G.

“P.S.—My letter never finishes without a P.S.

“Isn’t that awful?

“My uncle asked me whom I was corresponding with. I mentioned ‘Olive.’

“Old man is jealous always.

“So you got to counterfeit your sister’s penmanship for your envelope.”

29th—I drank the last drop of my coffee.

“Oji San, when shall we go to New York?” I said, pillowing my face on my hands on the breakfast table.

“As soon as spring begins to flicker in the East, my little woman! It’s snow and snow there at present.”

“I love snow, Uncle.”

“Old gentleman can’t bear tyrannical cold, Morning Glory.”

“Don’t you notice how tired I am of Frisco? Aren’t you tired?”

“Yes—frankly!”

“Why don’t you then contrive some novel diversion to pass a month?”

“I’ve a fancy, but——”

“What is it?”

“It may not strike you as romantic.”

“Tell me!”

“I am known to one poet who dreams and erects a stone wall on the hillside. He is unlike another. His garden and cottage are open to everybody. I ever incline to loaf in an irregular puff of odour from his acacia trees. If you lean towards a poetical life, I have no hesitation in seeing him to make an arrangement.”

“Great Uncle, it’s romantic! Is he married?”

“Why?”

“Because a poet is not one woman’s property, but universal. My ideal poet is melancholy. Fat poet is ridiculous. Happy poet isn’t of the highest order. Tennyson? I wish his life had been more hard up. I suppose your friend-poet won’t mind if I sleep all day. Is he particular about the dinner time? Does he look up to the stars every night? Does he wash his shirt once in a while?”

“Stop!”

Then I asked respectably:

“Is the sight from there beautiful?”

“Wonderful! The only place where you can breathe the air of divinity!”

“Very well, Uncle. We will settle there, and hasten to become poets.”

“It wouldn’t be a bad idea, I say, to start again with your honourable ‘Lotos Eaters!’”

“‘Paradise Lost’ shall be my next subject.”

“If nobody publishes it?”

“I will present it solemnly to our Empress. She is a poetess, you know.”

My uncle went to see Mr. Poet.

30th—Uncle said that the poet said: “You are welcome, sir. The cottage for your young lady lies by one willow tree. The waters, the air, the grand view, are God’s. It costs a wee bit of money to provide the best coffee. I tell you that my claret is superb. You shall be my guest as long as you please. Present my love to Miss Morning Glory! Everything will be ready when you come.”

“Isn’t he adorable?” I ejaculated.

I stirred my trunk, and sifted out the things needful for my adventure.

31st—To-morrow!

THE HEIGHTS, Feb. 1st

Let me recline heart-to-heart on the breast of Mother Nature! Let me retreat to a hillside not far from the city, yet verily near to God! Let me go to my poet abode!

We abandoned the Fruitvale car at the hill-foot.

My uncle picked out our destination from the speckles in the distance.

The breeze (how heavenly is a country breeze!) enticed my soul—a Jap girl also is provided with some soul—into “Far-Beyond.”

“I feel myself another girl, Uncle.”

“How?”

“I’m a poet already. The poet without poem is greater, don’t you know?”

We climbed the hill slowly. Every step enlarged the spectacle.

When we attained to one wildly well-kept garden, the whole bay of the Golden Gate stretched before us. A thousand villages knelt humbly like vassals.

I saw a tiny gate with the sign:

“Fruit Grower.”

An old gentleman appeared from a cottage, singing.

“Ah, take the Cash, and let the Credit go, Nor heed the rumble of a distant Drum!”

“Poet!” Uncle whispered.

Let me now examine him!

What lengthy hair he wore!

It didn’t annoy me, however, because he stamped himself on my mind as if he were an ancient statue. I imagined him a type of mediæval squire. I thought of him truly as one metamorphosed from the frontispiece of a wholly forgotten volume in a cobwebbed recess of a library.

His courteous voice was simply dignified.

“Nature never hurries. God commands you every happiness and all repose. Here’s your little home, my gentle lady! I am at your service any time. I hope you will find it comfortable.”

He set me at the “Willow Cottage.”

He slipped gracefully away.

There was some time before I heard his “kotsu kotsu” on my door.

I opened it.

“Greeting from the host!” Mr. Heine offered me a tuft of brisk roses.

Heine was the poet’s name.

How loving!

I buried myself in the thought of straying to a fairy isle, and being accepted romantically by the dwellers.

I suspected that I was dreaming.

“Arcadia!” I exclaimed, when the poet announced that supper would be prepared within half an hour.

I spied him through the window, gathering the loppings of trees and leaves. He made a camp-fire. Its soft smoke surged into the sky. Oh, smell it!

How fascinating is the Poet’s life!

I ran out, crying:

“Pray, make me useful!”

2nd—Dream and reality are not marked here by different badges. They waltz round. Dear poet home!

Was it in my dream that I heard the tinkle of bells?

I thought something was going on.

I parted from the bed. I pushed out my face from the window.

Look at the procession of cows!

I have read much of them, but I admit that it was my first occasion to admire them. I am a trivial Jap, only acquainted with cherry blossoms and lanterns. How I wished to knot the bells round my waist, and whisk down the path by the violets!

“Lover’s lane!”

It should be the title for that path, I thought, if I were Mr. Poet.

I finished my toilet. I leaped out upon the grasses smiling up to the sunlight.

I congratulated myself on my new life.

Then I found my uncle sitting by the camp-fire.

“Ohayo!” I said, filling the seat on another side.

I remember one Japanese essay, “The Poetry of a Tea Kettle.” Indeed! The kettle was a singer. Its melody was far-reaching. It was like a harp of pine leaves fingered by the zephyr.

I faced up, and saw my poet moving down from the lily pond. Two frogs in his hand.

“Frogs?” I cried.

“They will complete our table. How did you sleep, my lady?”

“Splendid!”

“Do you love the country?”

“I begin to taste a greater joy in Nature.”

“I’m happy to hear it, my dear. My life is like the life of a bird. I awake when the sun rises. I lay me in the bed at the bird’s dipping into its nest. God made the night for keeping quiet. That is better than prayer itself. I light neither lamp nor candle. I presume that every young lady has certain secret work at night. Let me offer you a few candles!”

We ate breakfast from the table by the fire.

Frogs supplied a special dish.

I couldn’t touch it, thinking of the songs of frogs that I had heard all the night long.

Such a song! It was the muddy-booted song of the countryside. No valuable quality in it, of course. But I should say that they tried the best they could.

Poor Messrs. Frog!

I fancied the leg in my dish was that of one who volunteered to sing my lullaby.

I almost cried in grief.

The poet was ready to wash the dishes. I was quick to snatch his job. My uncle wiped them.

Stupid uncle!

He broke two dishes.

I collected the bones of the frogs, and buried them. On the stone above them I wrote with a pencil:

“Tomb of Unknown Singers.”

What time was it when we were done with our breakfast?

I couldn’t tell.

The first thing I did yesterday was to stop the tick-tack of my watch, and hide it in the lowest drawer.

The watch is a nuisance since I am thrown in THE GARDEN OF ETERNITY.

3rd—I searched for a pen and ink in my Willow Cottage.

Nothing like those.

Foxy Poet!

He hid them from view, I fancied, in the opinion that playing with them for a girl is more jeopardous than swallowing needles.

I say that letter-writing—particularly a decent love letter, if there is one—isn’t half so grave a crime as rhyming.

I was spraying some water on a rose by the gate, when I caught sight of a white quill by my shoes.

“This will serve me perfectly,” I said.

I had not one thing with any tooth except my comb. (Comb? Luckily I have not lost it Ara, ma, my hairpins! Five of them vanished from my head while I was springing amid the rocks. By and by the stems of acacia leaves shall be used in their places. Don’t you know this is quite a remote spot from civilisation?) A kitchen knife shaped my quill as a pen.

Now only ink!

I begged Uncle to run down three miles to fetch one bottle.

4th—We went to “breathe the song of the forest.”

The forest laces the poet’s canyon.

(By the way, poet’s ground spreads over one hundred and fifty acres. Does he pay taxes?)

We climbed the “Road to the Milky Way.” I beseech your forgiveness, it was merely the name I wished for the path to the poet’s hilltop. I felt as if I were hurrying to the “Sermon on the Mount.” You would hardly believe Morning Glory if she said that sublimity vibrated in her soul, because she was just a little Oriental. How grand! We faced toward the Gate of the Pacific Ocean. We were still. Why? Because we were thinking the same thing.

We traversed the poet’s graveyard.

How romantic to put up a tombstone while living!

How romantic to lie in the ecstasy of a marvellous view! We could be nearer the stars here.

We stepped down to the canyon.

The poet said solemnly:

“Lady and gentleman, this is a holy place where you can pray heartily.”

My uncle started to drone Bryant’s hymn:

“The groves were God’s first temples.”

“Did you ever read Thanatopsis, my dear?” Mr. Heine asked.

“Yes, sir!”

“It’s a noble piece. So many thousand Asiatics converted every year to the English alphabet. Wonderful!” he soliloquised.

We seated ourselves by a brook.

“Such a lesson in Nature! We endeavour to transcribe, but fail,” he sighed, looking on the trees.

Then he turned to me questioning:

“Do you hear the silent song of the forest?”

I nodded.

“Silence! Silence!” he muttered.

We walked among the trees. We came back to the same hilltop, when the large red ball of the sun sank heavily from the Gate.

“Bye-bye!” I shook my handkerchief.

The playful breeze carried it away. It glimmered like a silvery inspiration. Who knows how far it sailed?

I thought a huge statue of the Muse bidding sayonara to the dying sun would be the fitting ornamentation for these Heights. Countless numbers of people would look upon it from the valley. It would be a salvation, if they could bind themselves with Poesy by its noble figure. There was no question it would be more effective than a thousand pages of poem.

“I have no coin to build it,” the poet said, in dear openness.

“Let me present it by and by!”

“When?

“When? It must be after I get married to a rich philanthropist.”

We laughed.

We rolled down the hill in the purple fragrance of evening. The evening was sweet like a legend.

5th—I wrote a letter to the artist:

“MY SWEET OSCAR:

“You will love no more your Morning Glory, I am certain, when you are informed how she looks nowadays.

“She inclines against a willow trunk by her cottage. Were you ever acquainted with the great repose of a poetess? Her eyes flash in divine sarcasm. She will shoot them down to the mortal domain (she lives on the mountain), while she murmurs in tragical accents: ‘I pity you, ant-mortals!’

“Isn’t she shocking?

“Oscar, I have withdrawn to the Heights, and am prying into the Incomprehensible of Nature with Mr. Heine.

“He is unique.

“I take it upon me to say that he is a great poet. Because, in the first place, he never asked me yet, ‘Do poems pay in Japan?’

“It’s such a trying work for an old man like him to pose as a poet all the time.

“Poet is a sensitive creation. He fancies, I think, the whole world is staring at him. Poor Poet! He keeps up, and tries to be picturesque as he can.

“I am grieved to state, however, that his picturesqueness frequently drops into silliness.

“The absurd thing is that even my uncle takes a part in his farce.

“We had no meat to bite yesterday.

“The poet had no shot left for his gun.

“What did he plan, do you imagine?

“He went up the hill, shouldering his pick. My uncle retainered him with a spade.

“‘We will soon bring back a squirrel which we will dig out, Miss Morning Glory,’ the poet said.

“Could you ever suppose, Oscar, that any animal except an invalid (an animal who has four feet at that, instead of two like my venerable gentlemen) could permit itself to be so slow like them?

“I laughed till my side ached.

“Funny old men!

“Every sort of sweat fell from their brows when they dragged their fatigued feet home not accompanied by even one inch of any animal tail.

“‘I have never heard yet, Mr. Poet, of a squirrel turned to turnip,’ I gibed.

“I dread old age, because it makes woman inquisitive, and man silly. Inquisitiveness is tasteless like wax, while silliness is helpless, like a fish on the sand.

“I fear you are silly already, when you say that you sat up late looking at my picture.

“Sat up late?

“What will you do if your mamma thinks you can’t sleep from hard drink when you yawn continually at the table?

“Please, don’t do it again!

“Step to your bed at half-past six as I do!

“Are you sure that my picture approved your act?

“I guess it shrugged its shoulders from contempt, the delicious moment of blushing being passed.

“If my picture is so precious, I advise you to alter it to ashes. You will take two spoonfuls of the ashes every morning. I am sure, then, your soul will be saved.

“O my darling, I love you!

“I am your

“LITTLE JAP GIRL

“P.S.—This letter was written by my duck-quill. My new invention, you know.

“My handwriting is clumsy enough, I suppose, to sell as high as any ancient author’s autograph.

“Sayonara!”

6th—O poppy, beloved harbinger of California spring!

I “hung on the honourable eyes” of a poppy by my door. Its quaking cup burnt in love (for a meadow-lark perhaps).

“Let me feed you, my new friend!” I said, and brought out a cupful of water.

I moistened it.

A golden flake of the sun-ray came down to it. It smiled, daintily thanking me for my humble treat.

I stared at it, slowly fabricating a fable of its love affair, when the breeze sent me a dreamy song.

The song was old-fashioned, like the afternoon snore of a water-wheel.

I plunged into the song, not knowing who was the singer.

“Ara, ara, Grandmamma’s song!” I exclaimed.

She is the aged mother of our poet. She is within the rim of ninety. I suspected her of having discovered the “Elixir for Preserving Eternal Girlhood.” You cannot help esteeming her a philosopher when you are told that she has visited San Francisco only twice in ten years. I have no bit of doubt that she would die if you were to rob her of the sight of her flower garden and one stout scrap-book about her son’s poems. They work a miracle. What a mystery is human life!

I say that I’m touched by superstition.

I have read of a villainous fox who masquerades in the shape of an old woman.

My wretched fantasy about Mrs. Heine passed, when I heard that no fox resided in the hill.

She is such a dear grandma.

She has no hostile grimace against age. She welcomes it. Her wrinkles are all her beauty. Natural ripening in age is but another form of girlhood.

She is happy as a sparrow.

(Sparrow never forgets, it is said in Nippon, to dance in its hundredth year.)

She hoes round her garden. Her vanity is to make her table rich with her own potatoes and roses.

She lives alone by herself in a cottage some hundred steps from mine.

Did you ever taste her cooking?

“Good morning, Mrs. Heine!” I said.

“Come in!”

She showed herself, extending her large hands. They were damp. I thought she was employing herself in washing.

Is there any sweeter occupation than service to an old lady?

“Let me help you!”

I carried out a bucket to a spring in the backyard.

I brimmed it with the waters. It was so weighty. A naughty stone bounced under my heel. I was thrown down like a toy.

Alas!

My bucket was upset over my skirt.

I had made myself a specimen of misery. “O grandma, it’s raining awfully outside!” I cried.

7th—To-day I was the _chef_, while my uncle was second cook.

I placed a heroic iron pot over the camp-fire I dropped a lump of beef in, and afterward the mass of potatoes, carrots, and onions. Mr. Poet’s directions were that they should boil for two hours.

Mr. Heine intruded, saying that he would like to season them himself.

“Longfellow, Lowell—they all loved high seasoning as I,” he said, snatching a pepper-box from my hand.

He kept tapping the bottom of the box, when the cover fell into the pot.

Oya!

The red pepper garmented the whole thing.

“Go, Mr. Poet! Why don’t you mind your own business? You are butler to-day.” I spoke in rough sweetness, and drove him away.

He began to place a linen cloth on the table, while I dipped up all the pepper. He picked up one dozen pebbles to weight the tablecloth. The first thing he put on the table was his claret bottle. How could he lose it from sight! When he said that everything was in place, he had forgotten the knives and forks. Dear old poet!

We sat at the table under the wild rose bushes.

Mr. Heine read aloud the following menu:

“PERFUME OF OMAR’S ROSE WATER OF JORDAN RIVER MOTHER LOVE BROTH MEAT OF WISDOM POTATOES OF SIMPLICITY PASSION CARROT ONION OF WIT DREAM COFFEE.

DESSERT

TYPICAL TOKIO SMILE OF MISS MORNING GLORY.”

My grandmamma was our guest.

“Mother, you talk too much always. Remember, this is a sacred service. Silence helps your digestion. Eat slowly, think something higher, and be content!” Poet said.

We smelled the “Perfume of Omar’s Rose,” and wet our lips with the “Water of Jordan River.”

The broth was served.

Everybody choked with its pungent fire.

Poor Mrs. Heine!

She was showering her tear-beans.

“This is perfectly seasoned. Send up your bowl again, ladies and gentlemen!”

Mr. Poet’s performance was beautifully buffoonish.

We finished our meat and vegetables.

I smiled lightly, and said: “Are you ready for the Tokio smile?”

“Just ten minutes yet, my dear!” The poet smoothed such a lengthy gray beard.

I winked to Grandma. We looked upon him slyly.

8th—The poet was hoeing in his vegetable garden.

His attire was theatrical.

His red crape sash laxly surrounding his trousers lacked, I am sorry to say, a large Japanese tobacco bag. The cap with gay ribbons was like one of Li Hung Chang’s. His back carried a bearskin, inside of which some slovenly yellow silk flapped down.

How tall he was!

“Please, don’t dig over there, Mr. Heine, because I buried my poem there,” I said.

“What poem, my lady?” he asked.

“The poem to be read at the unveiling of my statue of the Muse on your mountain top, which may occur possibly within five years. The opening lines sound thus:

‘Victor of Life and Song, O Muse of golden grace!’”

“That’s great! Why did you bury it?”