bicycle, but a dozen things went wrong with it, and I left it at a
shop, hoping they would steal it, and I should never see it again.
I cut fossils all day without seeing a soul to speak a word to, and
went back to the shop and found they had not stolen the bicycle, but
had put it right, so that it went quite well. I set off on it to
cross Tokio and call on Miss H----, who had a private view of some
copper-plate etchings done by a friend of hers, and very charming they
were. The roads of Tokio should be simply blood-curdling. There is no
rule for the traffic, the electric cars are the only things that keep
any kind of order, and foot-passengers and playing children simply
swarm. Fortunately there are few carts or carriages, but those few dart
about anyhow, and the horses often run away. One has simply to thread
one’s way through this stream of things. The children are particularly
trying, and take no notice of violent bells and shouts.
=May 8.= Professor _M----_ came to take me to the Faculty lunch. A
serio-comic incident happened just before we started. He came for me
to the fossil laboratory, and waited a minute while I was finishing a
stone. As he stood there, a stone, which I was heating in molten zinc,
exploded, and the zinc flew in drops all over the room, and settled
on all of us, but fortunately only on our clothes. The bright hard
drops looked quite funny on his coat and hat, and some of them wouldn’t
peel off. There must have been some internal moisture or gas in the
stone; it is the first time such a thing has happened. After lunch
Professor _S----_ took me and Professor _Y----_ to see his garden (he
lives within easy walking distance of the University), and it was a
delightful sight. I have described the house and garden before, and
now it was gay with pink roses and many different coloured azaleas.
His tiny daughter was running about with “bells on her shoes.” Little
bells were fastened on the under-side of the wooden clog, “on the same
principle,” the Professor said, “as the bell is round the neck of a
kitten--it is convenient to know where it is.”
After an hour’s rest I returned to the fossils, and at 4 bicycled off
to Baroness d’A----’s garden party,--bicycled in a white muslin frock,
which, had the people not thrown buckets of water into the roads,
would have come through scathless, but as it was, was heavily specked
with mud all up the front, and I felt all the carriage folk staring at
me. Otherwise I had a good time, and arranged some details about the
forthcoming Debate.
=May 9.=--At work all day on fossils. Dr. _M----_ came to the
laboratory about 2, and we had a long chat; he is one of the very few
Japanese who know enough of my work to be really interested.
=May 10.=--On Sunday Professor _S----_ asked me to go to see the
celebrated Buton flowers (paeonies), and I set off at 9 and met him and
his wife at Ryonokubashi at 10. We then drove to the gardens, which
lie across the river, in quite a slummy part of the town. The south
part of Tokio, across the river, corresponds in a way with the south of
London, and is distinctly its working quarter.
The paeonies were under the shade of straw mats, which roofed them
and the spectators in, and a lovely sight they were. Each flower was
really huge, about a foot across, but, as a rule, there was but one on
a plant. White, pink, crimson, and almost black, and all the shades so
beautiful and artistic, they were infinitely more pleasing than the
chrysanthemums.
In the same garden were also a number of dwarf trees--now I have bought
several at various times, and was always astonished at the cheapness
and prettiness, but here, a very (to me) inartistic one cost £4, and
the only one I really liked was £9!
After lunch we took the train, and went out of Tokio for some distance
to a place where there was a very renowned wistaria flower. The trunk
of this enormous tree was twisted and gnarled with intertwining
branches, and all together was about 12 feet in diameter. The branches
were all trained on props over bamboo, and formed a great flat roof,
over an appreciable part of an acre! The flower clusters hang so
thickly and evenly as to give the appearance of a ceiling of long
tassels. The tails seemed to be only a foot or so long, but when
measured were found to be 2 or 3, some even 3 feet 6 inches long! The
whole sight was very charming, and quite startling, but perhaps less
romantically beautiful than one had imagined it. The gardens had only
this one tree on show, and under it the people sat and walked about and
drank tea.
On returning we missed the connecting train and had an hour and a half
to wait; it was cold and began to rain. I didn’t mind, for Professor
_S----_ was very interesting, and we talked of nearly everything under
heaven and earth--but the more I see of him the less I think he is a
typical Japanese; he is an exceptional one. I was sorry for poor Mrs.
_S----_, however, who could not follow our conversation very well, and
who had no one else to talk to. We dined at a restaurant in Tokio, and
I got back home after a thirteen-hours outing, practically _tête à
tête_ with a Japanese man--and bored I had not been for a moment, and
people here say you can’t get any real companionship from the Japanese.
I say it is those people’s own faults.
=May 11.=--Torrents of rain all day, so that I did nothing but work
at the Institute--which was somewhat hampered by the absence of the
boy who runs the engine. I got home in an awfully bad temper, after
battling with everything all day--but the bright dripping green of the
trees all round me, and the peace of my little house, soon soothed me
up.
=May 12.=--Pouring rain all day again; it was so hateful ploughing
through these streets, with no side-walks and mud 6 inches deep, that
I decided not to go to-morrow, but stop at home. There was a dance at
the K----’s, and I had a good time. A charming American was there, who
smiled all the time and made one happy just to look at him. There
was also a young, fair-haired Mr. B----. His teachers must have been
very proud of him; he had the bright smile and the “good” look of a
favourite boy, and an ornament to the Y.M.C.A. I felt sure he must be a
missionary, but he turned out to be an artist, just out, and to stay a
year, painting all sorts of things, Japanese portraits among them. He
seemed much astonished when he found I had travelled alone--I am sure
his sisters never would,--and when I tried to soothe him by quoting my
French and other tours (to show I thought it an everyday sort of thing
to do), he seemed so very astonished that I drew in the rein and got
him to talk of his own character, which causes him trouble and interest.
=May 13.=--The rain cleared off, but the roads are still bad, yet by
the time I came home they were beginning to be dusty.
They dry here at a quite wonderful rate, and in the most terrible
weather one has always the consolation of knowing that when it clears
it will do so thoroughly and completely.
=May 14.=--After the day’s work I called round to see how Professor
_F----_ was, as I had heard nothing of any kind for a fortnight. I saw
him for a short time--his face was rather swollen, for they have been
injecting strychnine, but otherwise he _looked_ all right, only he
could see so little. The cure seems to make almost no progress.
As I was near, I called on the _S----s_ as a duty (and pleasure) call,
and came away with a lovely bunch of roses, the Professors, when caught
unawares like this, are always in true Japanese dress--and look so nice
in it.
In the evening was the last Cinderella--and a very nice dance it was.
=May 16.=--I stopped at home to-day--as the great Debate began at 3,
and I had to borrow chairs from several neighbours. I hope to-day to
found a Debating Society in Tokio (there is such a dearth of anything
more than dances and gossip, you at home couldn’t believe!), and have
been raking people out--I have got Miss C---- and Miss H---- to oppose
each other on the subject, “Chaperons should be abolished.” Frivolous
enough--but one must put the pill in jam here in Tokio, and I hope
gradually to get sober and instructive. The Debate was really more of a
success than I had dared to hope, and I got nearly every one to speak
by the little device of drawing numbers by lot, even Baroness d’A----
and Mrs. P----, who swore they wouldn’t. I had thought, after founding
it to-day, to leave it till the hot season passed, but people are keen
to have one in June--so it is encouraging. The use of a Japanese house
came out strikingly to-day--when I took out my sliding partitions and
made nearly my whole house one big room. The weather and the garden
behaved themselves--and mercifully everything went off well. Of course
the motion was lost, only two people wishing to abolish chaperons.
=May 18.=--A nice bright day. I bicycled home by the library and got
some books of Hearn’s; I am thinking of getting up a Debate on Lafcadio
Hearn next time, if I can; most people here knew him personally--and so
few seem to realise that he was great, and almost all run him down! So
I expect a very interesting time of it; there will be no difficulty in
getting speakers to condemn, but who is going to stand up for him!
=May 19.=--I just called in on Miss B---- on my way home, and asked
her to propose “That the picture of Japan presented in Lafcadio
Hearn’s books is totally fallacious.” She consents--I anticipate some
fun, and she is (I believe I have remarked before) quite the best
conversationalist in Tokio, and a missionary (whom Hearn detested) to
boot.
=May 20.=--Fossil cutting and examining all day. I have been arranging
the fossil slides, the series got mixed, and it is no joke to keep them
straight. Professor _Y----_ called in to see me (he is off to Europe
very soon); and invited me to “tiffin at 5” in a few days. The wording
is a little puzzling, isn’t it?
I called to inquire how Professor _F----_ is, and was glad to find him
a little better, though very little, but with no prospect of perfect
recovery.
Strawberries are beginning in the shops; it is such a treat after
having had only apples and oranges for all these months. The
temperature is delightful, like our July, and I enjoy it greatly, but
the nights are still very cool, so that I have a hot-water bottle
and the winter quilt. Things are beginning to bite me again, great
horrid things of all kinds. Spiders and centipedes come out at night,
and all sorts of creatures I never saw before; already I am rendered
unnecessarily hideous with bites, what it will be later on I don’t
know. I saw the J----s to-day, who once lived here twenty years;
they said that Japan is a country that “grows on one” till it is
heart-breaking to leave it. I feel that already, it is a pity I have
stopped so long. I don’t ever want to go now except to escape insects.
The horrid “semi” have begun to sizzle to-night. They are the things
that sit in the trees all night and make a sound as though you have
a headache; only when they stop for a second or two, you realise you
haven’t got one inside your head--but outside. Well, even in Eden
there was the serpent, and I suppose sizzling semis aren’t as bad as
serpents, at any rate their influence is less far-reaching.
=May 21.=--Fossilising all morning, and in the afternoon I was “at
home”--blessed day! These two days in the month I look forward to
hugely. A number of people came, among them Mrs. H----, a charming
woman, young Mr. _M----_, son of the man who was Dean of the University
before Professor _S----_, and Professor _S----_ himself. He came at
an interval between Mrs. G----’s call and some others, and we started
on Japanese poetry. It seems to be very subtle, so subtle, in fact,
that even such a cultivated man can’t understand it right away. Though
there is no rhyme and the form lies in the middle of syllables,
there is great ingenuity shown in finding words with double meaning
suggestive of some poetical idea. The G----s, who called also, have
been here thirty years, at least the Mrs. G---- has, and both she and
her daughter like the Japanese greatly, and are much liked by them. I
am going to get Miss G---- to oppose Miss B---- in the Debate on Hearn.
I am glad to find some one who will stand up so sincerely and heartily
for Lafcadio Hearn.
=May 22.=--After fossil-cutting walked along to the Faculty lunch with
Professor _M----_ and talked nothing particular, as usual. At 5 I went
over to Professor _Y----_ “for tiffin,” and was received in a foreign
style room, and sad it was. Though so tiny a man, he has a large
family, as all the Professors seem to have, unlike the corresponding
men in our country. A Mrs. _N----_ was there, and a Miss _X----_, a
teacher in a school. I resent very much the fact that all women school
teachers (as well as girl pupils) have to wear a special kind of skirt
(and very hideously ungraceful it is) over their kimonos, so that every
one knows them to be teachers, just as we know hospital nurses. Perhaps
it is the hideousness of the skimpy skirt, all open at both sides, that
I resent, as much as the fact that it is a uniform marking these women
out as apart from their fellows. Once, when I asked why it was all the
teachers I saw were so plain featured, I was answered by a Japanese
man, “well, if a girl is pretty, she can be married and does not need
to go in for teaching.” And we hear so much of the “reverence of the
Japanese for teachers.” It seems to me the Japan that we Europeans have
at last learned to know, and whose characteristics we have had drummed
into our ears, is already a thing of the past, and as _altmodisch_
as our early Victorian furniture, which the Japanese are picking up
as “new styles.” But though our furniture may change so fast as to
bewilder them, does our national character too change with a startling
rapidity equal to the Japanese?
The streets to-day looked unusually upset, and the reason of it is
that it is the time of universal spring cleaning,--a spring cleaning
that does not originate from the domestic tyrant, but from the main
Government, and that is inspected by the police before you have a
little yellow tab of paper pasted on your door to say that you are
clean. All the _tatami_ must be taken up and beaten, all the boards in
the kitchen floor, under which lie hidden oil cans and charcoal, shoes
or saucepans, according to the pleasure of the maids, must be taken
out and the glory holes cleaned and smothered in white disinfectant
powder; the front step of your hall, which, of course, is also a box in
disguise, is cleared of its winter _geta_ and powdered white, while the
props of your house (all Japanese houses are raised about 1½ feet
above the ground) are smothered till one thinks it has snowed. When the
policeman is satisfied that all this has been done, and then only, will
he give you the yellow ticket. It seems to me an excellent plan--one
which would be applied with advantage to some of our slums. The
smaller streets to-day were perfect markets, as from the little houses
every single thing is turned out on to the road, and the mats beaten
there. It added not a little to the thrills of bicycling, and was an
instructive illustration of the simplicity of the smallest households.
=May 23.=--After working at fossils all morning, I cycled over to
Miss B---- for lunch. She was as entertaining as usual. I often
think she is one of the best talkers I have met. After lunch she
took me to call on Mrs. _M----_, and I followed her _kuruma_ on my
bicycle. The _M----s_, of course, live in a splendid house, equally,
of course, it was “foreign style,” with signs everywhere of wealth.
The hall was like that of a hotel, and not a modern Waring furnished
hotel either, and the drawing-room filled with chairs “upholstered”
(there is no other word for it) in various brocades, with different
heavy-patterned brocade curtains hung over every door and window in
the stiff symmetrical style of last century’s low-water period. On
the lovely verandah, looking out into a splendid garden, were round
iron marble-topped tables, one was almost surprised there was no
advertisement for whisky, or at least Cerebos salt match-holders. That
was all I saw of the house to-day, except one little statue carved out
of marble, so pure and transparent that the light shone through it as
it stood in the window, among a tableful of various articles of cost.
Its lovely curves were transfigured by the light behind it, so that
they shone ethereal, and one could fancy it a fairy form coming in on a
sunbeam--I had not realised fully before how transparent white marble
is, and how suited to suggest unearthly beauty when carved in human
form. I fixed my eyes on this and forgot the pink-and-green upholstered
chairs.
The Women’s University owed much to this family at its foundation, and
they asked me if I would like to see over it, which of course I would,
so they are to take me on Friday. It will perhaps seem curious that I
have made no previous effort to see this very important Institution,
but I had my reasons, and the _M----s_ are the best possible people to
take me now; I am glad to go. I did not know before going there, but
found out afterwards, that they gave the land on which it was built,
and that Mrs. _H----_ (sister of Mrs. _M----_) was, with Marquis
Ito, one of the first people to whom President _N----_ went with his
plans fourteen years ago, and from whom he got much encouragement and
practical help.
=May 25.=--I am getting quite an expert on my bicycle. The people
in the street, too, seem to have got used to seeing me, and do not
bump into me as often as they used to! Though there are some who are
unspeakably idiotic; one to-day, for instance, walking toward me
steadily for a long way, seeing me clearly, went suddenly at a right
angle into the front wheel. The traffic here is exasperating, as
the roads are very narrow; there is no foot-path and no rule of the
road, and people dodge about like flies, while just this week Diabolo
has arrived in Tokio apparently, and is played now in the middle of
the road. It is quite startling, the suddenness of this universal
appearance of Diabolo, and it is made in a form that the poorest
children can buy for a few farthings. Yet with it all I think there is
less danger of a real accident in Tokio than in any place in England,
because nothing goes fast, no motors or hansoms come on fleet-tyred
wheels, and if one bicycles moderately it is really very safe. I have
only knocked one baby over, but I shall never forget its eyes looking
up at me through the spokes of the wheel, it looked so reproachful, but
it was entirely its own fault, and it was not hurt a bit.
=May 26.=--Why do the Japanese lie so circumstantially, and then not
even blush when they are found out? I had ordered some cards to be
printed for the Debating Society and went round to see why they did
not come. The man whom I asked went away and came back saying that the
printer foreman had sent me three or four proofs, and having received
no reply could not proceed with the work. I said I had returned a
corrected proof some time ago, and sent him back to inquire again
(knowing of old that determination generally produces the thing
you want); he returned saying my proof had not come, but if I here
corrected it the cards would be printed to-night; still I was not
satisfied, and sent him back again, and lo, he brought the 300 cards
all printed, and _with the corrections in them I had added in the proof
I returned_.
And each succeeding story was uttered with such an amount of detail and
an air of conviction!
=May 28.=--I got to the _M----s_, as arranged, at 9 o’clock, and
there found Mrs. _H----_, who wished to come with us to the Women’s
University. She was very unlike Mrs. _M----_, and dressed in European
style, but her hair was very slightly streaked with grey, and I
thought her 45--she told me she was 60. President _N----_ told me
she herself had opened a coal mine in Kyshyu twenty-five years ago,
and she was the first woman who had ever done anything of the kind
here. We drove over in their carriage, as it is a long way to the
University, and I was very agreeably surprised. I had heard a good
deal about it, particularly that it was more of a school than a
College, and not a University at all--partly this is true, but it
is already a College with the foundations of University teaching
and equipment, and particularly in chemistry, for which there are
four laboratories, strangely enough, the arrangements are excellent.
The University buildings practically amount to a village, for there
are 700 or more students in residence, and more than 1000 students
altogether, and there are numerous different subjects taught, from
chemistry to cooking, and from flower arrangement and tea-making to
law and mathematics. Law, by the way, is compulsory in the Domestic
faculty--not a bad idea, is it? There are two children’s classes and
schools, and a kindergarten, all part of the University--the idea being
that women should be brought up in touch with children. Another very
good feature is, that by far the largest number of the women graduates
go back to their homes and get married, so that nearly all the students
are studying to get the _culture_, not working for exams., so as to be
able to become teachers.
Mr. _A----_, the Dean, was with us nearly all the time, and was dressed
in Japanese ceremonial robes and a bowler hat. When he took off the
bowler, one saw that he had a fine forehead, and that his face was
altogether one of considerable beauty. His was undeniably a face with
ideals. Mr. _N----_, the President, was rather a similar type of man,
but perhaps less artistically fine. Both were very cordial, and we
had an interesting talk, for they were all-round developed men, and
one could talk to them as to an Englishman--not like so many of these
Japanese scientists, who are (or try to be) that and nothing more.
The _M----s_ then took me back to lunch, which was in European style;
the food was excellent, but with all their wealth, they had no dainty
silver on the table, whose large extent looked rather drear.
After lunch they showed me the garden, taking me to the Japanese
part, which was splendid, hilly with green groves and streams, and a
waterfall. I saw also their Japanese rooms, most beautiful, except that
they had a blue plush carpet put over the mats; there was, however,
nothing else in them but the proper appointments--and I delighted in
their quiet harmonies.
I got back to the laboratory in time to get in an afternoon’s work.
=May 30.=--Fossils all morning--and preparing microscope, etc. for my
Monday’s expedition, when I am going after cycads. Went along to tea
with Professor _F----_, who is a little better now, and from whom I
needed some information about the place I was going to.
=June 1.=--The household was up at 5 this morning, and I got off to the
station a good deal too early for the train, which is a fault on the
right side. After seven hours along the renowned old Tokkaido, where
to-day a railway runs, I landed at Yejiri, and went in a _kuruma_ about
a couple of miles farther to a very noted cycad temple. I deposited my
microscope and baggage on the temple steps, which I converted into a
temporary laboratory, and scratched myself sadly on the cycas leaves
while examining the coming fruits. The cycads are really wonderful--so
tall, and curved and branched innumerably.
After pottering around for a while, I broached the subject of stopping
all night at the temple, and soon got my way. The priest is extremely
old and frail, and looks stupid, but I don’t think he is; there is
also an old woman, whom I presume is his wife, who will do what little
cooking I shall get.
It is a charmingly situated temple, and the gardens are very sweet,
so decked with the beauties of age. It lies on the slope of a hill,
just midway between the top and the flat rice fields below us, and
is one of the most peaceful habitations it is possible to imagine.
The priest seems to spend all his time, clad like one of the poorest
peasants, working in the gardens, which are very well kept, and which,
like all true old Japanese gardens, suggest that the little details
had been planned to please a child. On tiny islands are perched minute
lanterns, and across streams over which one could step are bridges or
stepping-stones.
There are such hundreds of frogs just at present, as he walks one
would think the priest was spilling his basket of plants into the
water, there are so many splashes where he passes, but it is only the
countless frogs hopping out of his way into their native element.