A Lovely Sunset—An Official Letter—A “Front Horse”—Japanese Courtesy—The
Steam Ferry—Coolies Abscond—A Team of Savages—A Drove of Horses—Floral
Beauties—An Unbeaten Track—A Ghostly Dwelling—Solitude and Eeriness.
GINSAINOMA, YEZO, _August_ 17.
I AM once again in the wilds! I am sitting outside an upper room built
out almost over a lonely lake, with wooded points purpling and still
shadows deepening in the sinking sun. A number of men are dragging down
the nearest hillside the carcass of a bear which they have just
despatched with spears. There is no village, and the busy clatter of the
_cicada_ and the rustle of the forest are the only sounds which float on
the still evening air. The sunset colours are pink and green; on the
tinted water lie the waxen cups of great water-lilies, and above the
wooded heights the pointed, craggy, and altogether naked summit of the
volcano of Komono-taki flushes red in the sunset. Not the least of the
charms of the evening is that I am absolutely alone, having ridden the
eighteen miles from Hakodaté without Ito or an attendant of any kind;
have unsaddled my own horse, and by means of much politeness and a
dexterous use of Japanese substantives have secured a good room and
supper of rice, eggs, and black beans for myself and a mash of beans for
my horse, which, as it belongs to the _Kaitakushi_, and has the dignity
of iron shoes, is entitled to special consideration!
I am not yet off the “beaten track,” but my spirits are rising with the
fine weather, the drier atmosphere, and the freedom of Yezo. Yezo is to
the main island of Japan what Tipperary is to an Englishman, Barra to a
Scotchman, “away down in Texas” to a New Yorker—in the rough, little
known, and thinly-peopled; and people can locate all sorts of improbable
stories here without much fear of being found out, of which the Ainos and
the misdeeds of the ponies furnish the staple, and the queer doings of
men and dogs, and adventures with bears, wolves, and salmon, the
embroidery. Nobody comes here without meeting with something queer, and
one or two tumbles either with or from his horse. Very little is known
of the interior except that it is covered with forest matted together by
lianas, and with an undergrowth of scrub bamboo impenetrable except to
the axe, varied by swamps equally impassable, which give rise to hundreds
of rivers well stocked with fish. The glare of volcanoes is seen in
different parts of the island. The forests are the hunting-grounds of
the Ainos, who are complete savages in everything but their disposition,
which is said to be so gentle and harmless that I may go among them with
perfect safety.
Kindly interest has been excited by the first foray made by a lady into
the country of the aborigines; and Mr. Eusden, the Consul, has worked
upon the powers that be with such good effect that the Governor has
granted me a _shomon_, a sort of official letter or certificate, giving
me a right to obtain horses and coolies everywhere at the Government rate
of 6 _sen_ a _ri_, with a prior claim to accommodation at the houses kept
up for officials on their circuits, and to help and assistance from
officials generally; and the Governor has further telegraphed to the
other side of Volcano Bay desiring the authorities to give me the use of
the Government _kuruma_ as long as I need it, and to detain the steamer
to suit my convenience! With this document, which enables me to dispense
with my passport, I shall find travelling very easy, and I am very
grateful to the Consul for procuring it for me.
Here, where rice and tea have to be imported, there is a uniform charge
at the _yadoyas_ of 30 _sen_ a day, which includes three meals, whether
you eat them or not. Horses are abundant, but are small, and are not up
to heavy weights. They are entirely unshod, and, though their hoofs are
very shallow and grow into turned-up points and other singular shapes,
they go over rough ground with facility at a scrambling run of over four
miles an hour following a leader called a “front horse.” If you don’t
get a “front horse” and try to ride in front, you find that your horse
will not stir till he has another before him; and then you are perfectly
helpless, as he follows the movements of his leader without any reference
to your wishes. There are no _mago_; a man rides the “front horse” and
goes at whatever pace you please, or, if you get a “front horse,” you may
go without any one. Horses are cheap and abundant. They drive a number
of them down from the hills every morning into _corrals_ in the villages,
and keep them there till they are wanted. Because they are so cheap they
are very badly used. I have not seen one yet without a sore back,
produced by the harsh pack-saddle rubbing up and down the spine, as the
loaded animals are driven at a run. They are mostly very poor-looking.
As there was some difficulty about getting a horse for me the Consul sent
one of the _Kaitakushi_ saddle-horses, a handsome, lazy animal, which I
rarely succeeded in stimulating into a heavy gallop. Leaving Ito to
follow with the baggage, I enjoyed my solitary ride and the possibility
of choosing my own pace very much, though the choice was only between a
slow walk and the lumbering gallop aforesaid.
I met strings of horses loaded with deer hides, and overtook other
strings loaded with _saké_ and manufactured goods and in each case had a
fight with my sociably inclined animal. In two villages I was interested
to see that the small shops contained lucifer matches, cotton umbrellas,
boots, brushes, clocks, slates, and pencils, engravings in frames,
kerosene lamps, {218} and red and green blankets, all but the last, which
are unmistakable British “shoddy,” being Japanese imitations of foreign
manufactured goods, more or less cleverly executed. The road goes up
hill for fifteen miles, and, after passing Nanai, a trim Europeanised
village in the midst of fine crops, one of the places at which the
Government is making acclimatisation and other agricultural experiments,
it fairly enters the mountains, and from the top of a steep hill there is
a glorious view of Hakodaté Head, looking like an island in the deep blue
sea, and from the top of a higher hill, looking northward, a magnificent
view of the volcano with its bare, pink summit rising above three lovely
lakes densely wooded. These are the flushed scaurs and outbreaks of bare
rock for which I sighed amidst the smothering greenery of the main
island, and the silver gleam of the lakes takes away the blindness from
the face of nature. It was delicious to descend to the water’s edge in
the dewy silence amidst balsamic odours, to find not a clattering grey
village with its monotony, but a single, irregularly-built house, with
lovely surroundings.
It is a most displeasing road for most of the way; sides with deep
corrugations, and in the middle a high causeway of earth, whose height is
being added to by hundreds of creels of earth brought on ponies’ backs.
It is supposed that carriages and waggons will use this causeway, but a
shying horse or a bad driver would overturn them. As it is at present
the road is only passable for pack-horses, owing to the number of broken
bridges. I passed strings of horses laden with _saké_ going into the
interior. The people of Yezo drink freely, and the poor Ainos
outrageously. On the road I dismounted to rest myself by walking up
hill, and, the saddle being loosely girthed, the gear behind it dragged
it round and under the body of the horse, and it was too heavy for me to
lift on his back again. When I had led him for some time two Japanese
with a string of pack-horses loaded with deer-hides met me, and not only
put the saddle on again, but held the stirrup while I remounted, and
bowed politely when I went away. Who could help liking such a courteous
and kindly people?
* * * * *
MORI, VOLCANO BAY, _Monday_.
Even Ginsainoma was not Paradise after dark, and I was actually driven to
bed early by the number of mosquitoes. Ito is in an excellent humour on
this tour. Like me, he likes the freedom of the _Hokkaidô_. He is much
more polite and agreeable also, and very proud of the Governor’s
_shomon_, with which he swaggers into hotels and Transport Offices. I
never get on so well as when he arranges for me. Saturday was grey and
lifeless, and the ride of seven miles here along a sandy road through
monotonous forest and swamp, with the volcano on one side and low wooded
hills on the other, was wearisome and fatiguing. I saw five large snakes
all in a heap, and a number more twisting through the grass. There are
no villages, but several very poor tea-houses, and on the other side of
the road long sheds with troughs hollowed like canoes out of the trunks
of trees, containing horse food. Here nobody walks, and the men ride at
a quick run, sitting on the tops of their pack-saddles with their legs
crossed above their horses’ necks, and wearing large hats like
coal-scuttle bonnets. The horses are infested with ticks, hundreds upon
one animal sometimes, and occasionally they become so mad from the
irritation that they throw themselves suddenly on the ground, and roll
over load and rider. I saw this done twice. The ticks often transfer
themselves to the riders.
Mori is a large, ramshackle village, near the southern point of Volcano
Bay—a wild, dreary-looking place on a sandy shore, with a number of
_jôrôyas_ and disreputable characters. Several of the yadoyas are not
respectable, but I rather like this one, and it has a very fine view of
the volcano, which forms one point of the bay. Mori has no anchorage,
though it has an unfinished pier 345 feet long. The steam ferry across
the mouth of the bay is here, and there is a very difficult bridle-track
running for nearly 100 miles round the bay besides, and a road into the
interior. But it is a forlorn, decayed place. Last night the inn was
very noisy, as some travellers in the next room to mine hired _geishas_,
who played, sang, and danced till two in the morning, and the whole party
imbibed _saké_ freely. In this comparatively northern latitude the
summer is already waning. The seeds of the blossoms which were in their
glory when I arrived are ripe, and here and there a tinge of yellow on a
hillside, or a scarlet spray of maple, heralds the glories and the
coolness of autumn.
* * * * *