The sound of tears and laughter fill the air.
For memory there is but scanty space
Nor time for any transport of despair.
But, Love, the pulse beats slow, the lips turn white
Sometimes at night!"
Perhaps when I am old and gray and wrinkled I'll be at peace. But
think of the years in between! I have been cheated of the best that
life holds for a woman, the love of a good husband, the love of her
children, and the joys of a home.
The old world shakes its finger and says "you did it yourself". But,
Mate, I was only eighteen, and I didn't know the real from the
false. I staked my all for the prize of love, and I lost. Heaven knows
I've paid the penalty, but I'd do it over again if I thought I was
right. The difference is that then I was a child and knew too little,
and now I am a woman and know too much.
Sometimes the hymn-singing and praying, and "Sistering" and
"Brothering" get on my nerves, until I almost scream, but when I
remember how heavenly good to me they are I'm all contrition. I have
even been invited to write for the Mission papers, now isn't that
sufficient glory for any sinner?
Your letters are such comforts to me! I read them over and over and
actually know parts of them by heart! Since I was a little girl I
have had a burning desire to win your approval. I remember once when
you said I was stronger than the little boy next door I sprained my
back trying to prove, it. And now when you write those lovely things
about me and tell me how good and brave I am, why I'd sprain something
worse than my back to be worthy of your approval!
But my courage doesn't always ring true, Mate, sometimes it's a brass
ring. If you want to hear of true heroism, just listen to this
story. There was a little American Missionary, who was going home to
stay after twenty years of hard service. At the request of the board
she stopped off at the Leper Colony in order to make a report. Soon
after she reached home, she discovered a small white spot on her hand,
and on consulting a physician, found it was leprosy. Without breathing
a word of it to anyone, she bade her family and friends a cheerful
good-bye, and came straight back to that Leper Colony, where she took
up her work among the outcasts. Never an outcry, never a groan, not
even a plea for sympathy! Now how is that for a soldier lady?
It is quite cold to-day and I am indulging in the luxury of a roaring
fire. You know the natives use little stoves that they carry around
with them, and call "hibachi." But cold as it is, the yard is full of
roses and the tea-plants are gorgeous. I don't wonder that the climate
gets mixed, out here. Everything else is hind part before.
What do you suppose I've been longing for all day? A good saddle
horse? I feel that a brisk canter would set me straight in a short
time. But the only horse in Hiroshima is a mule. A knock-kneed,
cross-eyed old mule that bitterly resents the insult of being hitched
to something that is a cross between a wheelbarrow and a baby
buggy. The driver stands up for the excellent reason that he has no
place to sit down! We tried this coupé once for the fun and
experience. We got the experience all right but I am not so sure about
the fun. We jolted along through the narrow streets scraping first
against one house, then against another, while our footman, oh yes we
had a footman, ran beside the thoroughbred to help him up when he
stumbled.
To-morrow we are to have company. A Salvation Army lassie comes down
from Tokio with a brass band. It is the second time in the history of
the town that the people have had a chance to hear a brass band, and
they are greatly thrilled. I must say I am a bit excited myself; Miss
Lessing says she is going to keep me in sight, for fear I will follow
the drum away. She needn't worry. I am through following anything in
this world but my own nose.
HIROSHIMA, March 25, 1902.
I am absolutely walking on air today! Just when I thought my
cherished dream of a free kindergarten would have to be given up, the
checks from home came! You were a trump to get them all interested,
and it was beautiful the way they responded. Only _why_ did you
tell Jack? He oughtn't to have sent so much. I'd send it back if I
weren't afraid of hurting him.
My head is simply spinning with plans! We are going to open the school
right away and there are hundreds of things to be done. In spite of my
home-sickness, and loneliness and longing for you loved ones, I
wouldn't come home now if I could! It is the feeling that I am needed
here, that a big work will go undone, if I don't do it, that simply
puts my little wants and desires right out of the question!
Yesterday we had a mothers' meeting, and I have not stopped laughing
over it yet! It seems that the mothers considered it proper to show
their appreciation by absolute solemnity. After tea and cake were
served they sat in funeral silence. Not a word nor a smile could we
get out of them. When I couldn't stand it another minute, I told Miss
Lessing I was going to break the ice if I went under in the effort.
By means of an interpreter, I told the mothers that we were going to
try an American amusement and would they lend their honorable
assistance? Then I called in thirty of the school girls and told each
one to ask a mother to skip. They were too polite to decline, so to
the tune of "Mr. Johnson, Turn Me Loose," the procession started.
Miss Dixon couldn't stay in the room for laughing. The old and the
young, and the fat and the thin caught the spirit of it and went
hopping and jumping around the circle in great glee. After that, old
ladies and all played "Pussy Wants a Corner," and "Drop the
Handkerchief," and they laughed and chattered like a lot of children.
They stayed four hours, and we are still picking up hair ornaments!
Up over my table I have the little picture you sent of the "Lane that
turned at last". You always said my lane, would turn, and it
_has_ turned into a broad road bordered by cherry-blossoms and
wistaria. But, Mate, you needn't think there are no more mudholes, for
there are. When I see them ahead, I climb the fence and walk around!
I am getting quite thrilled these days over the prospect of war. The
soldiers are drilling by the hundreds, and the bugles are blowing all
day. It makes little thrills run up and down my back, but Miss Lessing
says nothing will come of it, that Japan is always getting ready for a
scrap. But the Trans-Siberian Railway has refused all freight because
it is too busy bringing soldiers and supplies to Vladivostock. Now
speaking of Vladivostock reminds me of a plan that has been suggested
for next summer. Miss Dixon, the teacher who was sick, is going to
Russia and is crazy for me to go with her. It wouldn't be much more
expensive than staying in Japan, and would be tremendously
interesting. Don't mention it to anybody at home, but write me if you
approve. I wish you could have peeped into my room last night. Four
or five of the girls slipped in after the silence bell had rung, and
we sat around the fire on the floor and drank tea while I showed them
my photographs. They made such a pretty picture, with their gay gowns
and red cheeks, and they were so thrilled over all my things. The
pictures from home interested them most of all, especially the one of
you and Jack which I have framed together. At first they thought you
must be married, and when I said no, they decided that you were
lovers, so I let it go.
After they went to bed, I sat and looked at the two pictures in the
double frame and wondered how it was after all that you and Jack
_hadn't_ fallen in love with each other! You both live with your
heads in the clouds; I should think you would have bumped into each
other long before this. He told me once that you had fewer faults than
any woman he had ever known. Telling me of other people's virtues was
one of Jack's long suits.
My last minute of grace is gone, so I must say good-night. I am
getting up at five o'clock these mornings in order to get in all that
I want to do.
HIROSHIMA, May 31, 1902.
Under promise that I will not write a long letter, I am allowed to
begin one to you this morning. Miss Lessing wrote you last week that I
had been sick. The truth is I tried to do too much, and paid up for it
by staying in bed two whole weeks. Perhaps I will acquire a little
sense in the next world; I certainly haven't in this! Japan wasn't
made for restless, energetic people. If you can't learn to be lazy,
you can't last long.
I can never tell you how good Miss Lessing has been, sleeping right by
me, taking care of me and loving me like I was her own child. The
girls too, have been so good sending me gifts almost every hour in the
day. One little girl got up at prayers the other night, and, folding
her hands, said: "Oh Lord, please make the Skipping Sensei well, and
help me to keep my mouth shut so it will be quiet, for she has been
good to us and we all do love her much." Heaven knows the "Skipping
Sensei" needs all the prayers of the congregation!
Just as soon as school is over, Miss Dixon and I start for
Russia. It's a good thing that vacation is near for I am tired of
being a Missionary lady, and a school-marm, in fact I am tired of
being good.
Don't worry about me, for I am all right. I've just run down and need
a little fun to wind me up for another year.
KOBE, July 16, 1902.
Does July 16th mean anything to you? It does to me. Just one year ago
today the gates of that old Union Depot shut between me and all that
was dear to me, and I went out into the big world to fight my big
fight alone. Well, I am still fighting, Mate, and probably will be to
the end of the campaign.
As you see I am in Kobe waiting for my pass-port to go to Russia. If
there is anything you want to know about pass-ports just apply to
me. With all confidence, I sailed down to the Consulate and was met by
a pair of legs attached to a huge mustache and the funniest little
button of a head you ever saw. I think the Lord must have laughed when
he got through making that man! He was horribly bored with life in
general, and me in particular. He motioned me wearily to a chair
beside a table, and, handing me a paper, managed to sigh: "Fill in."
The questions were about like this: Who was your father? What are you
doing out of your own country? Was anybody in your family ever hung?
How many teeth have you?
I wrote rapidly until I got to "When were you born?" Button-Head was
standing by me, so I looked up at him helplessly and told him that was
one thing I _never_ could remember. He said I would have to, and
I said I couldn't. He pranced around for fifteen minutes, and I
pretended to be racking my brain.
Then he handed me a Bible, and said in a stern voice: "Swear." I told
him that I couldn't, that I never had sworn, that ladies didn't do it
in America, wouldn't he please do it for me?
About this time Miss Dixon spoiled the fun by laughing, so I had to
behave. After we had spent two hours and three dollars in that dingy
old office, we departed, but our troubles were not over. No sooner had
we reached the hotel than Button-Head appeared with more papers. "You
failed to describe yourself," he mournfully announced, handing me
another slip.
I had not had my dinner and I was cross, but I seized a pen determined
to make short work of it. How tall? Easily told. Black or white? Very
easy. Kind of chin? Round and rosy. Shape of face? Depends on time
and place. Hair? Pure gold. Eyes? Now I knew they were green but that
did not sound poetic enough so I appealed to Dixie. She thought for a
while, then said, "Not gray nor brown, I have it, they are syrup
colored!" So I put it down along with a lot of other nonsense.
Now the papers have to be sent to Tokyo for approval, then back here
again where I will have to do some more signing and swearing. Isn't
this enough to discourage people from ever going anywhere?
The news about the sailboat is great. How many of you will be up at
the Cape this summer? Is Jack going? When I think of the starlight
nights out in the boat, and the long lazy mornings on the beach, I get
absolutely faint with longing. Heretofore I haven't _dared_ to
enjoy things, and now, when I might, I am an exile heading for
Siberia! Oh, well! perhaps there will be starlight nights in Siberia,
who knows?
VLADIVOSTOCK, SIBERIA, August 16, 1902.
If I should write all I wanted to say this morning, my letter would
reach across the Pacific! I didn't believe it was possible for me ever
to have such a good time again.
When we came, we brought a letter of introduction to a Mrs. Heath. She
has a beautiful big house, and a beautiful big heart, and she took us
right into both.
The day after we arrived, I was standing on her piazza looking down
the bay, when I saw a battle-ship come sailing in under a salute of
seventeen guns from the fort. It turned out to be the "Victor," and
you never knew such rejoicing. Mrs. Heath knows all the navy people
and her house is a favorite rendezvous. Before night, we had met many
old acquaintances, among them my Nagasaki friend, "Vermont."
It has been tremendously jolly and I can't deny that I have been
outrageously frivolous for a missionary! But to save my life I can't
conjure up the ghost of a regret! And what is more, I have been
contaminating Dixie! I have kept her in such a giddy whirl that she
says I have paralysed her conscience! I have dressed her up and
trotted her along to lunches, teas and dinners, to concerts on sea and
land, and once, Oh! awful confession, I bulldozed her into going to
the theatre! The consequence is that she has gotten entirely well and
looks ten years younger. Her chief trouble was that she had surrounded
herself with a regular picket fence of creed and dogma, and was afraid
to lift her eyes for fear she would catch a glimpse through the
cracks, of the beautiful world which God meant for us to enjoy. It
gave me particular joy to pull a few palings off that picket fence!
Most of my time is spent on the water with Vermont. I don't find it
half bad out on the bewitching Uzzuri Bay when the moon is shining and
the music floats over the water, to discuss love with a fascinating
youth!
What does it matter if he is talking about "the other one"? Don't you
suppose that I am glad to know that somewhere in this wide world
there's a man that can be loyal to his sweetheart even though she is
ten thousand miles away?
I ask occasional questions and don't listen to the answers, and he
pours out his confessions and thinks I am lovely. He really is one of
the dearest fellows I ever met, and I am glad for that other girl with
all my heart.
I like several of the other men very much but they bother me with
questions. They refuse to believe that I am connected with a mission,
and consider it all as a huge joke.
I wish you could see this place. It is built in terraces up the
greenest of mountains and forms a crescent around the bay. Everybody
seems to be in uniform of some kind, and soldiers and sailors are at
every turn. The streets are a glittering panorama of strange color and
form. At night everything is ablaze, bands playing, uniforms
glittering, and flags flying. It is all just one intense thrill of
life and rhythm, and the cloven foot of my worldliness never fails to
keep time.
But when daylight comes and all the sordid ugliness is revealed,
disgust takes the place of fascination. The streets are crowded with
thousands of degraded Chinese and Koreans, who, even in their
brutality, are not as bad as the ordinary Russians.
Through this mass of poverty and degradation dash handsome carriages
filled with richly clad people. The drivers wear long blue plush
blouses with red sleeves and belt, and trousers tucked in high
boots. On their heads they wear funny little hats that look as if they
had been sat on. They generally stand up while driving and lash the
poor horses into a dead run from start to finish. Many of them are
ex-convicts and can never leave Siberia. If their cruelty to horses
is any criterion of their cruelty to their fellow men, I can't help
thinking they deserve their punishment.
I won't dare to mail this letter until I get out of Russia for they
are so cranky about their blessed old country. They would not even
let me have a little flag to send to the boys at home! I found out
to-day that a policeman comes every day to see what we have been
doing, what hours we keep, etc. In fact every movement is watched,
and one day when we returned to the hotel, we found that all our
possessions had been searched, and the police had even left their old
cigar stumps among our things! The more you see of Russia, the more
deeply you fall in love with Uncle Sam!
Several days ago Mrs. Heath gave us a tennis-tea and we had a jolly
time. The tea was served under the trees from a steaming samovar,
around which gathered representatives of many nations. There were many
unpronounceable gentlemen, and one real English Lord, who considered
Americans, "frightfully amusing."
I thought I had forgotten how to play tennis but I hadn't. That
undercut that Jack taught us won me a reputation.
It is only when I stop to think, that I realize how far I am from
home! When I wonder where you all are this minute, and what you are
doing, I feel as if I were on a visit to the planet Mars, and had no
communication whatever with the world.
Think of me, Mate, in Siberia, eating fish with a spoon, and drinking
coffee from a glass! Verily, when old Sister Fate found she could not
down me, she must have decided to play pranks with me!
My box of new clothes arrived just before I started, and I have had
use for everything. When I get on the white coat suit and the white
hat, I feel like a dream.
The weather is simply glorious, like our best October days at
home. Nothing could be more unlike than Russia and Japan! one is a
great oil painting, tragic, majestic, grand, while the other is an
exquisitely dainty water color full of sunshine and flowers.
Callers have come so I must close. Life is a very pretty game after
all, especially when you get wise enough to look on.
VLADIVOSTOCK, SIBERIA, September 1, 1902.
Just a short letter to tell you that we leave Vladivostock to-night. I
am all broken up; it has been the happiest summer that I have had for
years and I can't bear to think of it being over.
It has been so long since Peace and I have been acquainted that I
hardly yet dare look her full in the face for fear she will take
flight and leave me in utter darkness again. Even if she has not come
to live with me, she is at least my next door neighbor, and I offer
her incense that she may abide.
Now I might as well confess that if it were not for Memory there is no
telling what Peace might do! Poor old Memory! I'd like to throttle her
sometime and bury her in a deep hole. Yet she has served me many a
good turn, and often laid a restraining hand on impulse and
thought. But she is like a poor relation, always turning up at the
wrong time!
For instance, on a gorgeous moonlight night on the Uzzuri Bay when you
are out in a sampan with a pigtail who neither sees nor hears, and
your companion is clever enough to be fascinating and daring enough to
say things he "hadn't oughter," and the music and the moonlight gets
into your head, and you feel young and reckless and sentimental, then
all of a sudden Memory recalls another moonlight night when the youth
and the romance weren't merely make believe, and your mind travels
wearily over the intervening years, and you sit up straight and look
severe and put your hands behind you!
Oh! I am clinging to my ideal, Mate, never fear. I've held on to her
garments until they are tattered and torn. You introduced me to her
and I have never lost sight of her entirely.
This afternoon the Victor sailed for the Philippines. As she passed
Mrs. Heath's cottage where we had all promised to be, she dipped her
colors. I felt pretty blue for I knew my good times were on board,
and were sailing out of sight.
I am now at the hotel, trunk and boxes packed, waiting to
start. Cinderella is not going to wait for the stroke of twelve; she
has donned her sober garments and is ready to be whisked back to the
cinders on the hearth. I am glad hard work is ahead; a solid grind
seems necessary for my soul's salvation.
Farewell, vain earth! I love you not wisely but too well.
Why can't people be nice to one without being too nice? And why can't
you be horrid to people without being too horrid? Selah.
HIROSHIMA, October 10, 1902.
Dear Old Mate:
I am so dead tired to-night that I could not tell what part of me
ached the most! But the spirit moves me to unburden my soul and I feel
that I must write you. For this is one of my _dream_ nights, and
I have so many in Japan, when my old shell is too exhausted to move,
and so permits my soul to wander where it will, a dream night, when
the moon is its silveriest and biggest and I want to hug it for I know
that twelve hours before it looked down on my loved ones, and now it
comes to make more beautiful this fairy land, hiding the scars and
ugly places, touching the pine trees with silver points, and
glorifying the old Temples, till one wonders if they _could_ have
been made by hands. A night when the white robed priests are doing
honor to some "heathen idol" and must needs call his wandering
attention by the stroke of the deep toned bell, which sends its music
far across sleeping Japan, out into the wonderful sea.
I don't know what comes over me such nights as these. I don't seem to
be me at all! I can lie most of the night, wide awake, yet unconscious
of my surroundings, and dream dreams. I live through all the joyful
days of childhood, then through the sorrowful days of womanhood when I
was learning how to live, through the years of heartache and
heart-break,--and through it all, though I actually suffer, there, is
such an unspeakable lightness and buoyancy, such a lifting up, that
even pain is a pleasure. I can't explain it all, unless it is the
influence of this mysterious country, lulling and soothing, but
powerful and subtle as poison.
My dear girl you say you feel too far away to help me! Now don't you
worry about that! If you never wrote me another line, you would help
me. Just to know that you are around there, on the other side of the
earth, believing in me, loving me, and _approving_ of me, means
everything. You were right to make me come, and while it cost me my
very heart's blood, yet I am learning my lesson as you said I would.
My little ship may never again sail into the harbor of happiness, yet
there are sunny seas where soft winds blow, and even if my ship is all
by its lonesome, yet it's such a frisky craft, warranted never to
sink, no matter what the weather, that it can sail over many seas,
touch many lands, and grow rich in experience. And hid away in the
locker where no eye save mine may see, are my treasures; your love is
one, and nothing can rob me of it.
What you write me of Jack makes me very unhappy. I am not worth his
worrying over. Tell him so, Mate. If I could ever care for anybody
again in this world, it would be for him, but if an occasional
sentiment dares to spring up into my heart, I pull it up by the roots!
I would give anything to write to him, but I know it would only bring
pain to us both. Be good to him, Mate, I can't bear to think of him
being miserable.
I am so tired that I can scarcely keep the tears back. I must write no
more.
HIROSHIMA, November 14, 1902.
I have about fifteen minutes between classes, and I am going to spend
them on you. Now who do you suppose has come to the surface again?
Little Germany, who was on the steamer coming over. He wasted a great
many stamps on me for the first few months after we landed but he got
tired of playing solos. He was on his way to Thibet to enter a
monastery to study some ancient language. Heaven knows why he wants to
know anything more antique than the language he speaks! I don't
believe there is any old dusty, forgotten corner of the world that he
hasn't poked into.
Well you know the fatal magnetism I exert over fossils! They always
turn to me as naturally as needles turn to a loadstone. This
particular mummy was no exception.
I wrote him a formal stately answer, reminding him in gentle reproof
that I was a widow (God save the Mark) and that my life was dedicated
to my work. It was no use, he bombarded me with letters, with bigger
and bigger words and longer and fiercer quotations. In the last one
he threatens to come to Hiroshima!
If he does, I am going to shave my eye-brows and black my teeth! He
speaks seven languages, and yet he doesn't know the meaning of the one
word "no."
Jack used to say that if a man was persistent enough he could win a
woman in spite of the Devil. I would like to see him! I mean Jack, not
Dutchy nor the Devil.