I blushed as if I had committed a heavy crime.
I hoped I had not.
I put my new spectacles on my nose, as soon as I returned to my room.
Very well they stayed. Mother Nature was specially kind to me.
But what a depression—also what torture—I felt from their clutch!
I was pleased, however, seeing myself somewhat scholarly.
Aren’t spectacles an emblem of wisdom?
The first requirement to be a critic should be spectacles. The second is
a pessimistic smile, of course.
My mirror told me that I looked quite modern.
“Book!” I exclaimed.
I must see what effect I could produce with a book on my lap.
I leaped from the chair to fetch one.
My spectacles dropped from my honourable nose on to the hearthstone. My
nose was exceedingly stupid.
Alas, and alas!
The spectacles were crushed to pieces.
I was broken also.
I buried my face in the pillow for some time.
Then I said: “I’m not short in my sight. I have no use for them except
for fun.”
I wiped my disturbed eyes with a handkerchief. My finger felt the rude
marks printed on both sides of my nose.
Dec. 1st—I bought a Louisiana lottery ticket through Annie.
Like any other domestic girl, she has no key to her mouth. She is like a
sentence that has forgotten to add the period.
I begged all sorts of gods to drop the capital prize on me.
Thirty thousand dollars! Think!
How shall I manage with them when I have won?
2nd—If I were a painter!
My eyes were fixed upon the dying sun. Its solemnity was like the
passing of a mighty king.
Some time glided by.
My thought was pursuing the sun.
The twilight!
Oh, twilight pacifying me as with the odour from a magical palace!
Hush!
The melody of a piano effused from my neighbour.
The best thing in the world is to play music. The very best is to listen
to the profuse melody evoked by a master.
Was it a superb execution?
My soul was dissolved, anyhow, in the rapture.
I left my uncle’s room where I saw the grand sun pass away.
I put me in my bed, because my visionary mood was not to be stirred for
the world, and because I wished to dream a romance without the delay of
a moment.
But I could not slumber.
And I missed my dinner.
I petitioned my uncle to step out into the street for my beloved
chestnuts.
Dear Italian chestnut vendor!
I never pass by without buying.
3rd—We start to-morrow for Los Angeles of Southern California.
Mr. and Mrs. Schuyler have invited us to spend some weeks with them.
The gentleman was the former consul at Yokohama. My uncle is his
intimate friend.
My new trunk was brought in from the store.
It bears my name in Roman of commanding type.
I stared at the characters as upon an ancient writing whose meaning
could only be imagined.
“Doesn’t ‘Miss Morning Glory’ suggest that the owner is a charming young
lady?”
My little smile smiled, as I thought that it would, of course.
A new trunk, I am sorry to say, lacks a historical look. An old one is
more gratifying, like old brocade or an old ring.
Au revoir, my Ada!
South-bound train, 4th—I was lavish of my art of “bothering.”
My poor uncle—my eternally “poor uncle” was the victim. I wanted some
diversion at any price.
His face scowled as I bored him with my successive questions.
I thought his irritated face fascinating.
When I presented another question, he was droning a genteel snore.
I twisted an edge of a newspaper into a roll. I thrust it into his nose.
There was no doubt about his starting.
“Bikkurishita!” he exclaimed.
Then he begged to be allowed some chance to rest.
This is a “bad year for cucumbers” for him. He made a mistake in
accompanying me on Meriken Kenbutsu.
Honestly I have to behave nicely.
My opening question to Uncle was: “What’s the derivation of ‘damn’?”
“Imperialism” was my last.
I have a high regard for the people dignified by using the capital “I”
for the personal pronoun.
But if I were the President I should not wish to be addressed with that
hackneyed, unromantic “Mr.”
The cartoonists making sport of the President shock me.
How big-hearted the President is!
Those “devils” would be beheaded in the Orient.
Los Angeles, 5th—No one bangs the door at Schuyler’s.
The servants drop their eyes meekly before they speak.
A well-bred atmosphere circulates.
A woman over forty-five is nothing if she isn’t motherly enough to let
one feel at home. Mrs. Schuyler’s silence is a smile. I loved her from
my first glance. I thought I could ask her to wash my hair some sunny
day. I could fancy how pleasant it would be to immerse myself in her
chat—such sort of talk as an old-bonneted “how to keep house”—while I
was drying my hair in the indolence of a sea-nymph. Modern topic is like
black coffee, it is too stimulating. There is nothing dearer than a
domestic subject.
I have no hesitation in accepting her as my Meriken mother.
I am positive I would feel more comfortable if I had one in this
country.
How good-naturedly she was fattened!
A somewhat stout woman looks so proper for a mother.
I wished I could lean on her plump shoulder from the back in Japanese
girl’s way, and play with her hair, and ask a few innocent questions
like “What have I to eat for dinner?”
She talked about the Japanese woman, principally praising her shapely
mouth.
I felt conceitedly, because I was given one classical little mouth, if I
had nothing else to be noticed.
Mr. Schuyler grasped my hand ever so hard. My hand was buried in his
palm. His manner was courteously boyish.
His body is erect like a redwood.
Such an old gentleman gives me the impression of another race from the
divine realm of everlasting youth. A Jap after fifty is capped with
“retired.”
But the work of the American gentleman is only finished when he dies.
Great Meriken Jin!
Mr. Schuyler shows more civility to his servants than to his wife.
Here I can study the typical household of America’s best caste.
6th—“Anata donata?”
I rubbed my dreamy eyes, scanning my room.
Who was the Japanese speaker?
I crept to the door, and opened it slightly.
Not a soul was there.
I heard the trivial clatter of the kitchen stepping up.
I dipped into my bed again. I smiled sceptically, thinking that I must
have been dreaming.
“Gokigen ikaga?”
I was addressed again by the same voice.
I said that there was positively some mischief in my room.
I leaped down from the bed.
I inspected my slippers. I made sure there was nothing strange under the
pictures on the wall. I tugged at the drawers. I tumbled every blanket.
I pried in the pitcher.
I sat on the bed wrapped in fog.
The blind rustled.
The sunbeams crawled in marvellously.
Then I was frightened by another speech, “Nihonjin desu.”
I declared that it flew in from the outside.
I rolled up the blind.
Oya, oya! There was a parrot perching in a cage by my window!
He adjusted his showy coat first, and then sent me his inquisitive eyes.
“Anata donata?” he repeated.
“Morning Glory is my insignificant name, sir,” I replied.
A trifling toss of his head showed his satisfaction in my name. I
thought he was trying to set me at ease with his smile.
“Gokigen ikaga?”
“I feel splendidly, thank you, Mr. Parrot!” I said.
Then pressing his head backward he looked haughtily at me with fixed
eyes, and announced:
“Nihonjin desu.”
“I’m also a Jap,” I muttered.
He was the most profound Japanese scholar, Mrs. Schuyler said, in all
Los Angeles. Mr. Schuyler Jr. brought him from Kobe last spring.
I told her the incident of this morning.
She laughed, she said she expected it.
Bad Mother Schuyler!
17th—Dear Baby! Kawaii koto!
I hugged the baby of Mrs. Schuyler Jr. and kissed it.
Her husband is away in Japan for the tea business.
It was the darling baby, I thank the gods, who received my first kiss.
It’s heavenly to stamp love with a kiss. Lips are the portal of the
human heart.
Kiss is sweet.
I say that it marks an epoch in the spiritual evolution of the Japanese
when they learn what a kiss is—but not how to kiss.
The baby crawled like a sportive crab. It orationed. It! I felt sorry
that “It” would soon be changed to “He” or “She.” It caught sight of a
piece of burnt match in the course of its expedition. It turned its way
and clinched it with its fingers. It hastened to the mother to exhibit
it, and waited patiently with its great game for Mamma’s praise.
I nearly cried in my excitement at such a pathetic revelation.
Lovely thing!
The baby had blue eyes.
My preference wasn’t for blue eyes. I often snapped at them, saying that
they were like a dead fish’s eyes.
But how long can I keep up my ill-will, when I look with delight upon
the blueness in water, sky and mountain?
Isn’t it precious to see the blue pictures on china?
A blue pencil is just the thing to mark on the margin of a pleasing
book.
Blue is a poetical hue.
Robert Burns was blue-eyed.
I recalled the first American I met in Tokio, who seriously questioned
whether it was a fact that Japs butcher a blue-eyed baby.
Bakabakashii wa!
Japan has no blue eye.
And Japanese are worshippers of any sort of baby.
If American babies were like Chinese girls!
I would pile up all my coins to buy one.
Meriken baby understood how to smile before how to cry. It is a lady or
gentleman already.
I will serve as baby’s nurse if I must support myself.
It’s a high task to be useful to the baby, and watch its growth as a
silent astronomer watches the stars.
I wish I could roll the baby’s carriage day after day.
How sweetly the world would be turning then!
Shall I hire Schuyler’s baby for one day?
8th—Is there any more gratifying word than dinner?
I had a “hipp goo’” dinner. (Permit a Chinese-English expression for
once.)
Its inviting heaviness was like an honourable poem by Milton.
Schuyler’s house has a Miltonic presence.
Electric light is too imposing.
Candelabra are like a moon whose beams are a lenitive song.
The nude shoulders of Mrs. Schuyler, Jr., crimsoned in the rays from the
candelabra.
The exposure of some part of the skin is the highest order of art. How
to show it is just as serious a study as how to clothe it.
If I had such supreme shoulders as hers, I would not pause before
displaying them.
What falling shoulders are mine!
The slope of the shoulders is prized in Japan. Amerikey is another
country, you know.
I appeared at the dinner in my native gown.
The things on the table had a high-toned excellence.
I will not forget to have my initials engraved if I happen to buy any
silver.
Coffee was served. I felt that an old age had returned, when eating was
only a dissipation.
I’m growing to love Meriken food.
I am glad that I don’t see any musty pudding at Schuylers’, a sight that
makes me ten years older.
And another thing I hate is the smell of cabbage.
How pleased I was to see a “chabu chabu” of shallow water in my finger
bowl! Just a glimpse of water is tasty.
Our taciturn butler retired from the dining-room with graceful dignity.
The butler has ceased to be a common servant. He has advanced, I
suppose, to the rank of an ornament of the Meriken household.
The sister of Mother Schuyler and her husband dined with us.
The funniest thing about her was that she kept a few long hairs on her
cheek. They grew from a mole.
It may be good luck to preserve them.
Her husband was surprised when he heard that we do not use knife and
fork at home.
Bamboo chop-sticks! How dear!
9th—I have no belief in the earring.
It is a savage mode, like the deformed feet of the Chinese woman.
But why did the Meriken lady discard her veil?
Her face behind the veil would appear like a rose through the Spring
mist. It is a charming thing as ever was fashioned for woman.
I have seen no lady with a veil in this town.
I suppose the Los Angeles women confide in their faces.
They strew more liberty in their grace than the San Franciscans.
Their beauty is informal.
The city is enchanting.
I am pleased that I am not shown here so many a “To Let” as in Frisco.
Even the barefooted Arabs, those street sparrows, are quite a picture.
10th—I promised Mrs. Schuyler, Jr., good care of her baby for half an
hour.
I carried it firm on my arms.
I jogged out to the garden.
The baby faced toward me and said:
“Bu, bu! Bu, bu, bu!”
I felt grateful, thinking that it counted me among its friends.
I laid its head on my breast.
I sang a little Japanese lullaby:
“Nenneko, nenneko,
Nennekoyo!
Oraga akanbowa
Itsudekita?
Sangatsu sakurano
Sakutokini!
Doride okawoga.
Sakurairo.”
(Sleep, sleep, sleep! When was our baby made? Third month, when the
cherry blossoms. So the honourable face of our child is cherry-blossom
coloured.)
The breezes billed and cooed upon the grasses. An imperial palm cast its
rich shadow.
The affectionate sunlight made me think of a “little Spring” of the
Japanese September. Everything inclined to a siesta in the yellow air.
A tropical touch is the touch of passion.
Can you fancy this is the month of December?
I cannot.
After I put the baby to its nurse, I paced around a bronze statue upon
the lawn, losing myself in Greek beauty.
Then I snatched a rose.
I pressed it to my nose-tip.
12th—Where’s my painstaking description of Echo Mountain?
I made a pleasant trip there yesterday with Schuyler’s party.
I lost my writing penned last night.
Such a heedless tomboy!
I idled, watching a spider from my window. It was framing a net amid the
garden trees. An awfully dignified tom cat glared from under a bush. I
was sorry no game came upon the scene to his honour. My profound
Japanese scholar was not discouraged by the lack of an audience. He was
busy presenting his polite “Gokigen ikaga?”
Then I found what I did with my yesterday’s diary.
Areda mono!
I wiped my oily hands with it and buried it in a trash basket.
I fixed my hair this morning.
Morning Glory San, you have to keep your Nikki in a safe!
Great Carlyle wrote his “French Revolution” twice.
I wish I had been given a slice of his persistency.
13th—A Bishop visited and lunched with us.
Bishop! How I desired to meet one!
It had been my fancy, ever since I read of the venerable Bishop who
threw out candle-sticks to Jean Valjean in Hugo’s book.
His name was Myriel.
What is my friend’s name? After a man reaches the bishop’s see, his own
name should retire from actual service. People call him “Bishop!
Bishop!” as if it were a nickname.
My bishop had a holy face.
“Who is this good man who is staring at me?” I said to myself at first
sight, as Napoleon said when he saw Myriel.
A young churchman is unnatural.
The customarily pessimistic face of the Japanese priest causes aversion.
I got what I wanted in my new friend.
If I were his daughter, I would comb his silken hair before he goes to
church on Sunday.
I was glad he was not thin.
Ho, ho, ho! He ate meat like anybody else.
He would seem holier if he merely bit a crust of bread, and sipped three
spoonfuls of tea.
After luncheon we strolled through the garden arm in arm.
Not a bit I blushed. I was as completely at ease with him as with my
papa.
He told me of the beauty of Christ. His soft, deep voice was as from a
far-away forest.
I plucked a few stems of violets. I fitted them to his buttonhole.
Such a little thing pleased him immensely.
Dear, simple Bishop!
I digested what he spoke. I declared that Christianity was the sun,
while Buddhism was the moon.
The sun is day and life, and the moon night and rest.
How can we live without the sun? The moon is poetry.
14th—The sky became low, its colour frowning gray.
The winds snarled.
December was suddenly calling us.
We sat by a snug fire at evening.
Its yellow flame suggested a preacher uplifting his hands in prayer. The
fire flickered in jollity.
“Pachi, pachi, pachi!”
The parlour was not lighted.
The pictures on the wall were impressive in the firelight.
Any woman looks charming at night and by the fireside. I felt happy
imagining that I must appear lovely.
The fireplace is so dear, like mamma’s lap.
Mr. Schuyler brought a chess-board and challenged.
I offered me for a fight.
I used to play American chess with a Meriken missionary who lived in my
neighbourhood. I thought it fun to beat an old man.
“Namu Tenshoko Daijingu!” I repeated.
The gentleman asked what I muttered.
“Never mind! Only a little spell!” I replied in the lightest fashion.
The chess-board was placed between us.
“Mr. Schuyler, can you sacrifice anything for the game?”
“Whatever you please, my little woman!”
“Well!”
“Well, then!”
“Suppose you make Mrs. Schuyler your stake! My uncle will be mine.”
“Ha, ha! Very well!”
He was a tactician. I fought hard.
Alas, my game was lost!
My second stake was myself.
“It means that I may marry you, doesn’t it?”
“As you please, sir!”
Iyani natta!
He was far superior.
Oya, oya, I was a loser again!
I looked sadly on my uncle, and said:
“Uncle, you cannot return home! We are the property of Mr. Schuyler.
Isn’t it really too bad?”
15th—Shall I make a little kimono for Schuyler’s baby?
It would be a souvenir of my visit.
The crape kept in the Jap stores of this town isn’t appropriate for a
baby’s “bebe.” My flower-dyed under-kimono should be utilized.
I opened my trunk.
Mother Schuyler brought in a young lady. She was her niece, that is to
say the daughter of Mrs. Ellis. Mrs. Ellis is the one with the long hair
on her cheek.
I told them of my new drift.
They were surprised at my determination.
Miss Olive applied to be my pupil in Japanese sewing.
What a southern name! Olive perfectly fits for a girl born in the
passionate breeze.
Her “Is that so?” or “Don’t you?” fluttered affectionately like golden
sunshine.
Mrs. Schuyler bade her servant to move in the machine.
I objected.
Machine-clicking is not Oriental. The “bebe” has to be done in pure
Japanese.
16th—I found a hammock on the veranda.
It is the thing for summer, of course.
I never laid me in it before in my life.
I thought that I would see how I would feel.
I hanged it.
I romped in it.
It was delightful. I fancied that we—I and who?—hammocked among the
summer breezes. Then a star appeared. He said, “How beautiful the star
is!”
What did I fancy next?
Oh, never mind!
I tossed my feet. The skirt fluttered. My new satin slippers—number one
and a half—were all seen. I drew up my skirt a little, and made a whole
show of my honourable legs.
I prayed that somebody would pass by to fling an adoring glance at them.
No one roamed along. I scorned my frivolity.
The Bible by me wasn’t open at all.
I decided to read it to-day, although religion isn’t so becoming.
My Bishop sent it this morning. Dear old Bishop! He thought me quite a
docile “nenne.”
I stretched my body in the hammock.
Alas, ma!
My hana kanzashi with the butterflies was caught by the meshes. The
wings of one butterfly were tortured. Yes, I had put a Japanese pin on
my hair this morning.
I hoped I could pay a bit more attention to my head all the time.
I was sad for a while.
17th—Good Annie wrote me from Mrs. Willis’.
What a scrawl!
But woman’s bad grammar and infirm penmanship are pathetic, don’t you
think so?
It might look better on a thin blue tablet.
But poor Annie chose such thick smooth paper.
Oya! What?
A five-dollar check?
My goodness, I had forgotten all about my lottery! Even the ticket I
have lost. It drew out five dollars.
Why not thirty thousand dollars?
It was better than a blank, anyway, I said philosophically.
Now let me send a little present to my home!
A little thing is a deal sweeter.
I ordered fourteen packets of N. Y. Central Park lawn seed from a
nursery.
New York Central Park!
Doesn’t it sound grand?
And other flower seeds also.
The dwarf sweet pea is named “Cupid.”
It will be no wonder if my father mistakes it for a kibisho.
Cupid is a handsome boy, not a bullfrog-looking teapot, funny papa!
He is garden crazy. I can imagine how conceited he will be showing
around his western sea flowers when they are in bloom.
I asked my uncle to translate the directions.
Isn’t it handy to keep a secretary?
I’ll not miss signing my name on the translation.
My daddy may think it was done by myself.
Woman is a snob.
Now what for mamma?
18th—Mother Schuyler took me to her church.
Such a heathen me!
I felt that I was “sitting on needles,” when I slipped into the Meriken
church without glancing at even one page of the Bible. It was as risky a
venture as to face an examination before fitting.
The service hadn’t begun.
Many ladies were introduced to me by Mrs. Schuyler.
They talked about—what?—anything but religion.
I was fanned continually by an offensive odor. Some one had left her
perfume at home.
Honourable arm-pit smell!
Amerikey cultivates many a disagreeable sort of thing, doubtless.
The ladies seemed to regard the church as another drawing parlor.
My mind was calmed within ten minutes.
Ureshiya!
The Meriken church is not a difficult place at all.
A Japanese church is ever so sad-faced. No woman under thirty is seen
there. I laughed at the thought of an “incense-smelling” young girl.
Isn’t it strange that Meriken girls love the church?
Is it because they cannot marry without it?
Sunday amusement doesn’t begin before noon. What would girls do if there
were no church where they could burst into song?
How classically the bald head of the minister shone!
There is nothing more pleasing than a sweeping sermon on a bright day.
But my mind strayed, wondering why all those ladies were so homely.
I snatched my hat off, wishing to be different from the rest.
I fancied the reason why their hats were eternally glued to their heads
was because their hair was never in first-rate order for exhibition.
Many years ago I used to steal into a Buddha temple, being a little
“otenba,” and tap an idol’s shoulder, saying: “How are you getting
along, Hotoke Sama?”
Not one idol here!
No incense!
How uninteresting!
How silly I was inventing some clever thing for the occasion when I
should be forced to confess! The church was not Catholic.
When we returned home, Mrs. Schuyler asked me what was the text.
“Let me see——”
I made as if I had been a listener to the sermon.
“Dear Mrs. Schuyler, what was it?” I exclaimed as if I had accidentally
forgotten.
19th—Miss Olive offered to show me how to play golf.
I went to her home at Pasadena.
Pasadena is a luxurious Winter resort of cheerful aspect.
Its water is blessed.
Even the street cars run like a well-bred gentleman. The dog never
growls around. It only wags its tail. No beggars.
America’s outdoor diversion demands a great deal of strength.
What an imbecile “anego!”
After fifteen minutes I found two bean-like blisters on each palm.
I gave up the game.
I bought a golf outfit, nevertheless, in a store on my way home. The
sight of a lady carrying it once stamped itself on my mind as so
charming.
What attire would be becoming to me?
I said that my waist should be of deep red wool. Skirt? It must also be
of wool, of course, with a large checkerboard pattern. Silk isn’t
gamesome, is it? And the hat should be a mouse-coloured felt, which must
be thrust carelessly by my big gold pin with a coral head.
I well-nigh decided to dye my hair red.
What will my uncle say?
20th—Schuyler’s cook wasn’t acquainted with the art of rice-cooking.
Mother Schuyler said explanatorily that she had never tasted properly
cooked rice since the day at Yokohama.
The rice was pasty.
I thought I would boil the rice according to Japanese prescription for
to-day’s dinner.
I stepped down to the kitchen.
I put three cupfuls of rice in a saucepan, and dipped my hand in it, and
supplied water as much as to my wrist.
I placed it on the splendid fire till the agitated water pushed up the
lid. Then I moved it on to a gentle fire. The cooking was done after
twenty minutes.
I was honoured by everybody at the dinner. The rice was singularly fine.
The grains kept their own perfect shapes.
After the dinner I approached Mrs. Schuyler with ink and paper.
“Will you write your recommendation of my rice-cooking?” I said.
She gazed at me questioningly.
“What a funny girl! What shall I say?”
Then I dictated solemnly thus:
“_To whom it may concern:_
“I highly recommend Miss Morning Glory with her honourable art
of rice-cooking. Her method is Japanese, that is to say, the
best in the world.
MRS. SCHUYLER”
21st:—Without a nephew Mother Schuyler wouldn’t be a complete old dear.
She has one fortunately.
Olive San told me a whole lot about her great brother.
He is a promising artist.
Artist?
Doesn’t an artist affect boorish hair? I was anxious to know how his
hair was, because I hated anything long except a frock-coat.
Miss Olive declared him one handsome boy. (I thought how ridiculous is
the American girl to praise her brother. It is Japanese etiquette to
undervalue one’s relatives in describing them.)