IT is just past five o'clock in the afternoon. Through the open door of
my little study the rising breeze of evening is beginning to disturb the
papers on my desk, and the white fire of the Japanese sun is taking that
pale amber tone which tells that the heat of the day is over. There
is not a cloud in the blue--not even one of those beautiful white
filamentary things, like ghosts of silken floss, which usually swim in
this most ethereal of earthly skies even in the driest weather.
A sudden shadow at the door. Akira, the young Buddhist student, stands
at the threshold slipping his white feet out of his sandal-thongs
preparatory to entering, and smiling like the god Jizo.
'Ah! komban, Akira.'
'To-night,' says Akira, seating himself upon the floor in the posture
of Buddha upon the Lotus, 'the Bon-ichi will be held. Perhaps you would
like to see it?'
'Oh, Akira, all things in this country I should like to see. But tell
me, I pray you; unto what may the Bon-ichi be likened?'
'The Bon-ichi,' answers Akira, 'is a market at which will be sold all
things required for the Festival of the Dead; and the Festival of the
Dead will begin to-morrow, when all the altars of the temples and all
the shrines in the homes of good Buddhists will be made beautiful.'
'Then I want to see the Bon-ichi, Akira, and I should also like to see a
Buddhist shrine--a household shrine.'
'Yes, will you come to my room?' asks Akira. 'It is not far--in the
Street of the Aged Men, beyond the Street of the Stony River, and near
to the Street Everlasting. There is a butsuma there--a household
shrine--and on the way I will tell you about the Bonku.'
So, for the first time, I learn those things--which I am now about to
write.