the treats of Tokio to be entertained at the Maple Club. My hosts were,
of course, all Japanese, the University Professors, among them were a
few Japanese ladies, one of whom I knew pretty well, the daughter of
Baron _H----_. I was the only foreigner.
The rooms are splendidly large, about 100 mats when all opened out. It
took me quite a long time to count up the mats, for I am rather stupid
at it. In an ordinary room one can estimate immediately whether it
is an 8 or 10 mat room, by the way they are placed, and without any
counting. We were seated all round the edge of the end room, I in front
of the _tokonomo_, as the chief guest. It left a large space in the
middle to start with, but very soon the maids began to bring dishes of
things to eat, and every guest had the same placed before him on the
ground; as dish after dish was placed in front of us all, each in the
same relative position before every guest, there grew up a symmetrical
border pattern all round the room, which slowly encroached on the
centre.
It made all moving about very difficult, really impossible for one
with skirts, which most of us had, as a number of the men came in
_hakama_ (stiff silk divided skirts worn by men when dressed for
ceremony). Moving about would not have been at all out of place, as
the feeding was very intermittent, and it was only towards the very
end of the evening that they brought the rice. While we were eating,
a kind of superior geisha danced; three girls dressed in ancient-time
costumes performed an old well-known dance supposed to bring good
luck. Afterwards they brought in a red-arched bridge and some flowers,
and did the butterfly dance--two red-and-white and two white, in such
lovely embroidered dresses with butterfly wings on their backs, which
they opened and shut. The whole effect was charmingly pretty. They
said they were the same girls who waited on us earlier, but I did not
recognise them. All the rooms and dishes and lacquer were ornamented
with maple leaves, and they brought sweet cakes in the form of coloured
maple leaves, which we ate before dinner and through the evening.
Professor _S----_ made a speech which _really_ made me blush. He, in
the goodness of his heart, may have meant what he said, but I can’t
believe it voiced the views of any of the others. Then they all
_banzaied_, and drank my health. Of course, I had to make a reply
speech--after one of the men who had come to the lectures thanked
me,--and read a poem he had made about me--it is a thousand times
harder to make an “after-dinner-return-thanks” speech than a long
scientific lecture. I did it somehow. Later, I proposed the health of
the future of Japan, amid hearty _banzais_--but always feel a miserable
failure at such things.
Baron _K----_ sat next me--he had just returned to Tokio, because
to-morrow the great Sven Hedin is going to arrive, and he is on the
reception committee. The dinner began at 5.30 and I went at 9.30,
though I could have enjoyed it still longer, for the border of dishes
had begun to melt, and we could move about a little. There is a
beautiful garden, too, with a view of the sea in day-time, the Club
being situated on the crest of the hill above Shiba Park. The whole
building and atmosphere of the place is very charming, and I enjoyed
the evening greatly.
I was shopping in the _Ginza_--the so-called “Regent Street” of Tokio.
I need hardly say that the name is given by the Japanese. Paper was one
of the things I needed. It is curious, in this land where so much is
made of paper, how very difficult it is to get anything like our strong
brown paper for parcels, or our letter paper, or our manuscript paper.
The native sheets are unglazed, and though tough in one way are useless
for parcels unless one gets oil paper, and even then the sheets are
very small and are pasted together.
=November 16.=--Sven Hedin lectured to-day at the University, and I
had been asked to tea previously to meet him before it. He is rather
short, but sturdy, and very bronzed and rosy. His face is narrow, his
eyes close together, and looking still closer, as he is evidently
short-sighted, and has an exceptionally deep vertical groove between
them. He gave me the impression of being a genial, friendly, hardy,
_pushful_, but not a great man. The only other lady there was
Madame G----, the mother of the French Ambassador, whom I think I
have mentioned before. She was very gracious, as she always is, but
cannot speak a word of anything but French. We all walked over to
the Lecture Hall from the Goten--a slow and solemn procession. About
the only people who spoke were Hedin and Madame G----, a few people
said a sentence or two to me, but even the genial Dean seemed to be
overpowered by the funereal solemnity of the march. I had my cycle,
and the French Ambassador helped me to haul it up the steps! His only
remark was, “Très moderne,” which was very moderate of him. In the
lecture I was placed in the front row, between Madame G---- and Baron
_K----_, and got into nice hot water! The poor lady couldn’t understand
a word of the lecture, and Hedin often said things to make us laugh,
and she could not join in, so now and then I translated a word or two
for her. This upset Baron _K----_, who nudged me violently from the
other side, so I had to stop, but then I hurt the lady, for I didn’t
dare answer her further questions. After the lecture, when Hedin said
he knew we were all interested, because no one spoke a word, and that
was the sure test of interest, I felt worse and worse!
Hedin was received with tremendous applause, and spoke for two hours or
more. His account was most interesting, though once or twice we felt
he “drew the long bow.” His English was fluent, but amusing--“Here
was I catched”--“There I did a beautiful discovery”--“We took camels
laden with ice” (pronounced “eyes”)--so that I wondered quite a while
what on earth “eyes” were for, and I worked up a little theory that
they were part of the devotional paraphernalia of the Lamas before he
said that they melted the “eyes” to give water in the desert. There
is no need to give an account of his lecture--it has already appeared
in _Harper’s_, and he is writing a book. He is not at all shy about
his work, and is very clever at “buttering” the Japanese, so will be
popular here. The students were very quiet while he spoke, and seemed
to follow all his jokes.
=November 17.=--After fossils all day, I went to Hedin’s second lecture
at the University. Several of the American Legation people and some
ladies came this time, and he lectured for more than two and a half
hours! Yesterday he tried to draw a tadpole on the board, and failed
miserably, showing complete ignorance of its shape and of how to draw,
but to-day there were many excellent sketches of the country and people
given as slides on a screen. I did not get home and begin dinner until
8.30, and the lecture began at 4.30. He was cheered splendidly after
his lecture; the papers are full of him and his doings. I thought I
would escape Baron _K----_ this time, and got in a filled row behind
the American Ambassador, but some people moved along--in came Baron
_K----_ and sat down by me! However, as I had no one to talk to to-day,
I behaved quite like a model schoolgirl, and took off my hat when the
views came on without being asked, so perhaps I have reinstated myself
in his eyes.
=November 23.=--A national holiday, so the Institute was locked, and I
had, perforce, to take a holiday. It blew a perfect hurricane all day,
and I was thankful to be able to stay at home. The dead leaves whirled
into the garden, but the sky was brilliant, and the crimson maple trees
glowed in the sunshine. My little house was protected, and I sat all
day on a wide-open verandah. The day passed very peacefully and swiftly
and I did some sewing for my clothes, that, even with an ideal maid,
requires one’s own attention. At 4.30 the sun left the house, and the
cold descended on me.
=November 24.=--From an early hour preparations were made to have
a Botanical Demonstration for Sven Hedin. _Ginkgo_ and cycas
spermatozoids were provided, yeast of the native wine, fossil slides
under the microscope--all in working order. But the poor man is being
rushed all over Tokio to such an extent that but a short time was
available for each thing. He was cordial and nice, and professed to
like the fossils, and seemed fairly intelligently interested, and made
every one feel pleased with him.
He lunched in the festival rooms at the foot of the garden, and when
he had gone Professor _S----_ sang a Te Deum, and Professor _K----_
came back and looked at the fossils again, and with Professor _F----_
we had a merry tea-party. After the day was done I called in at the
Embassy on the Z----s, who returned recently, and found them at home
with a few guests. It amuses me very much to note the conversations in
the different Tokio sets. The continual cry among the diplomats is,
“There are _no_ women in Tokio!” “So few women, we can’t give dinners,”
etc. etc. Up the old cry came again to-day. But in the houses of the
permanent residents, the clergy, missionaries, University professors,
etc., the cry is, “There are so many, too many, girls, so difficult to
get men for the dances.” Professedly the two sets mix, but practically
they don’t to any real extent. But the tactless bad manners of the
diplomats, who will announce to the ordinary people in Tokio that there
are no women in Tokio, while those same ordinary people know that there
are, and that the diplomats know that there are, is very amusing to
one outside it all. One of my secret seldom-expressed ambitions, even
as a girl at College, was to be an Ambassadress. Who would believe it?
But now I am only too thankful that I know what a life it is, and will
never need to fear that I drop into it dazzled and unawares. It is an
endless round of calling and dining: they profess to complain of it
themselves, but take little interest in anything else. Some one said to
me, “The diplomats have no interest but themselves, and no subject of
conversation but themselves,” and it really isn’t far from the truth.
=November 25.=--After working till it was dark, and worrying the
laboratory attendants (for, nominally, we should all clear off at 4
now, but I can’t get out of the habit of working later, particularly
now that there is so much to do), I called on Mrs. _N----_. She is the
American wife of a Japanese journalist--a writer whose articles I have
noticed. We started a correspondence, and she came to see me, but I
was out. It was no easy job to find the house, for she had recently
moved, so I went to the old house, but as it led to a little incident
which illustrates the courtesy of the nice Japanese, I will relate it.
I went to the house called No. 90, but, as I have remarked before,
there may be twenty houses of the same number. Of course it was the
wrong one, but they told me the _N----s_ had left the house, and gone
to Kamakura. The little lady of the house at which I inquired sent her
maid to fetch the address, and asked me to sit down while she went.
Then, with gentle voice, she asked all the polite questions--where I
lived? how long I had been in the country? what was my native land? All
capped by compliments on my Japanese. She fetched a book of picture
post cards to entertain me, and when her maid returned, sent her again
to make sure if Mrs. _N----_ was not living in the neighbourhood. When
she found that she was, the lady herself came with me a little way to
show me the road to follow, as if I had been an honoured guest.
As at last the gate was reached, a young lad came out in the dusk,
and of him I inquired if it was really the house. He too had a soft
voice and a courteous manner, and helped me to open the gate. After
I had conversed with Mrs. _N----_ a little while, I learned that he
was Lafcadio Hearn’s eldest son, the one he loved so, and wrote of so
sweetly in many of his letters.
Mrs. _N----_ was dressed in grey: perhaps it was the shadow of the
lamplight, but I received the impression that her life was in grey
shadows. Her little son, however, was a bright contrast--round eyes,
rosy cheeks, with a woollen cap with a long point and a dangling
tassel--he was like a pixy. He was only four years old, but acted
as interpreter between his mother and the maid. There was also the
merriest kitten I ever saw--round, soft, and tailless, with a scatter
of claws and a jump like a grasshopper, as it dashed after the shadow
of the tail it never had. The grey woman spoke with such a sad lifeless
voice--slowly, as though it were rather troublesome to have to speak at
all, but not in unfriendly fashion. I heard much of the Hearns, as Mr.
_N----_ is a very intimate friend of the family, and Mrs. _N----_ has
come close to the eldest lad, and teaches him.
I heard from her what I have heard from many people, that Mrs. Hearn
can neither speak nor write a single word of English. That baby English
at the end of the _Life and Letters_ is either a translation or a
concoction.
There are many letters of Hearn’s to his wife in childish Japanese,
that, since the appearance of Gould’s atrocious book, Mrs. Hearn has
placed in Mr. _N----’s_ hands for publication, though before that she
had not wished to make them public.
=November 27.=--After the morning’s work, I went to the Goten for
the Faculty lunch. Professor _T----_ took me from there to see the
Anthropological Department of the University. They have a very
considerable space, and lots of specimens of all kinds, though I did
not see many European ones. The stone implements naturally interested
me most. There are extraordinary numbers of arrowheads, and a good many
celts of rough polished stone. It appears that there are no palaeoliths
in the country; it is certainly true that none have been found, but
that does not satisfy me that palaeolithic man did not live in Japan.
Shell mounds of late Neolithic age seem to be the chief _fundorts_
for the tools. In many cases earthenware, beads, and such like are
found with them. The arrowheads are made of flint, rather more opaque
and with a duller patina than English flint. But many of them are of
obsidian, some of which are beautifully clear. There are also agate
and chert ones, and one perfect gem of pure quartz. Their shapes are
much like those common in Scotland, but a few were a little unusual
with particularly fine edges, and some were very minute. The arrowheads
rather preponderated, but I was more struck by the scrapers, which were
particularly beautiful, and of a type I have not discovered anywhere
before. There were many variations among the scrapers, the top edge
being beautifully chipped; it was evident that a thong had kept them in
a handle. Of the type composed of a straight single flake, so common at
home, I saw very few.
Professor _T----_ has made the best arrangement for keeping the
specimens I have ever seen--small _tin_ boxes, with glass tops, and
fastened by a tight ring clasp. The specimens, placed on cotton-wool
in it, are immovable when the lid is shut, and the boxes can be placed
in any position, but directly they are open they are free, and can be
handled, unlike those sewn on to the irritating museum cards.
=December 5.=--At the Institute all day. I don’t at all approve of this
Saturday work, but am too busy to feel justified in taking a single day
off, as I can only work in the Institute; even writing for this work I
can’t do at home, because I need the specimens and books at my hand.
=December 6.=--Lovely brilliant sunshine, but a heavy wind, so I am
spending the day lying on a _futon_ on the _engawa_ (open verandah
all along the house), in perfect shelter, for the ∠ shape of the
house keeps off all the wind and cuts off none of the sun, and I am
lying in a pink cotton kimono with my hair down, and can fancy myself
on an August beach! but I know directly the sun goes in, Jack Frost
will pop out, and in my thickest padded clothes I shall shiver. The
sunshine is everything here--no wonder they put the sun and nothing
else on their flag. The sky is more blue than our August heaven--and
although dead leaves are whirling, the cryptomerias are green and the
maples blood-red, while my rose bush has flawless leaves, with crimson
petioles. Would it were always November in Japan!
=December 11.=--I have been too busy to write all these days, and as
it happened, there has really been nothing worth recording except my
discontent with the artisans and trades-people, which had perhaps
better be left untold. To-day I lunched at the Goten and met Baron
_M----_, last year the Minister of Education. He was very friendly and
“made conversation” in quite a European and un-Japanese style, though
I thought him stiff last year.
In the evening we had the second dinner of the University of London
Union. Viscount _I----_ was there, the first Japanese to come to London
to study, and a very entertaining brusque old man he is! Count _H----_,
recently Ambassador to England, took me in, and there were sixteen of
us altogether, seven foreigners and nine Japanese. It was quite a jolly
dinner.
Count _H----_ proposed the toast “The University,” and later on
Professor _S----_ proposed the toast “M. C. S.,” which they all stood
and drank with _banzai_, so I have had my health drank by an Ambassador
and a Viscount. But one has to pay for these delights--and the price
is heavy--an after-dinner-return-thanks speech! Now I can lecture
without feeling quite a fool, and I can speak at Debates, but when it
comes to after-dinner speeches I am done for. I don’t know why I remain
so stupid over it; this time in the return-thanks speech I entirely
forgot the thanks! After dinner there was some business, and we elected
Professor L---- to the Committee. Then various of us told stories or
gave recitations, and we had a little laughter. I walked my bicycle
back with Professor L---- to the broad road, and we discussed Dante,
Milton, and other great ones on the way, and I am much relieved to find
he doesn’t approve of the translation of Dante I have been reading.
I began to fear I must be a monster, as I couldn’t feel the expected
respect for Dante.
I then mounted my iron steed--which was champing its bit, a habit
it has lately, and I can’t break it off with any amount of oil--and
rode through the silent streets with an undertoned caroling. There is
something very exhilarating about a ride under brilliant stars, through
silent roads where silhouettes of pine trees cut the sky--after a good
dinner and jolly company.
=December 12.=--Went over to Oyeno Park to see the Imperial Museum.
It is really very fine indeed, a much more extensive and beautiful
collection than I had expected, particularly of lacquer, _kakemonos_,
and costumes of old Japan. Their Japanese collections were magnificent.
But as I expect they are described by a thousand other pens, I won’t
repeat. Suffice it to say that we had planned to go out to lunch at 1,
though the usual University time is 12, and when we thought to look at
a watch it was half-past two! and we were very cold as well as hungry.
There are nice gardens round the Museum, which lie in the Park, and it
was a very pleasant morning altogether.
=December 13.=--It has been a brilliant day with glowing sun, and at
one Mrs. _N----_ and the Brownie son of hers came to lunch. The Brownie
looked and acted splendidly, and was a pleasure, and his eyes twinkled
a keen appreciation rare in men of four years old when, after warning
him to be good and not to spill anything, I tipped the pheasant’s
bread-crumbs into my own lap, and he got through the meal without
a mishap of any sort. Almost immediately after lunch we went over
to--Where do you think?--Lafcadio Hearn’s house, to see his wife and
family! A rare privilege, for the sanctum is unusually well guarded.
But Mrs. _N----’s_ friendship has won me the way in, for, as I said,
the eldest boy learns English from her and is devoted to her.
The house is some way out of town, in pure Japanese style, with
a Japanese name on the lamp, for you will remember Hearn became
a Japanese and took a Japanese name, which is written in Chinese
characters over his door. “Koizumi,” we pronounce it.
There is a nice garden, visible partly from the entrance, where was
the children’s swing. As we entered we passed along an _engawa_
(verandah) bounding a tiny internal square of garden on our way to the
reception-room. This was in the purest Japanese style, well built,
with pretty woodwork, a thing one learns to notice in this country. I
immediately observed the _kakemono_, which was exceptionally beautiful,
tall peaks of bare rock pillars standing up against a grey sky, where a
moon half shone through a band of cloud. A picture that one could never
forget and yet would ever wish to see instead of merely remembering. I
remarked on it to Mrs. Hearn, who told me that “Lafcadio had very good
taste in _kakemonos_,” and always bought only what pleased him exactly.
Wise man! when he had the cash! There was also a bronze in the room,
the bent stalk of a fading lotus leaf with the collapsed blade of the
leaf, and though there sounds no beauty in that, the bronze throbbed
with it. Mrs. Hearn was very friendly: less shy and quiet than most
Japanese women, she was yet distinctly Japanese in her shyness and
quietness. Without beauty, she pleased.
She and the children were all in usual Japanese costume, and the only
“foreign” things in the room were ourselves and the cakes and cups of
tea she brought us. I inquired if she liked foreign food, and she told
me that she did, _very_ much, and that “Lafcadio” always ate it, for
though he liked all the things to be pure Japanese, and would have
nothing he could help that was not, Japanese food upset him, and he
always had foreign food, but that now she never prepared it. We chatted
about many things, and she spoke freely of Hearn, of whom I did not
dare at first to ask any questions till she had spoken voluntarily so
much, to show that she liked to speak of him.
After the tea and cakes we went to Hearn’s study, and got a sight of
the real Japanese garden at the back of the house. The study was lined
with low book-shelves filled with many charming volumes in French and
English. There was a very high table made specially for him, for his
extremely short sight, and the famous pipe box, with dozens of long
tiny-bowled Japanese pipes.
The children were with us freely, and also a friend, a Mr. ----, who
was the first student Hearn had in Japan, and who has remained faithful
through everything, and now acts as adviser and friend of the family,
and lives in part of the house. He was bright and intellectual-looking,
beyond the average, and speaks excellent English.
Mrs. Hearn _insisted_ on us staying to a meal, which we could not avoid
doing without positive rudeness, though we had only expected afternoon
tea. It was a “first-class” Japanese meal, with nearly all the things
I like (sometimes the things are quite uneatable, as, for example, the
“sea-cucumbers” in a raw salad, which are also first-class things), and
I enjoyed it, but I got home at 8 instead of 5 as I expected.
The children were with us most of the evening, showing Brownie
picture-books, of which they had a fine stock. Hearn evidently liked
Andrew Lang’s fairy books, for they were nearly all there.
In his study, where we had supper, was the little family shrine, built
rather like a miniature temple of plain wood; within was Hearn’s
photo, and before it burnt a tiny lamp and stood dainty vases of small
flowers. According to Japanese ideas, the spirit of the departed
inhabits this dwelling and needs the love and attention of his kindred,
and takes part in their life. Is Christianity more consoling to the
bereaved than this? From the window by the shrine could be seen the
grove of the tall bamboo Hearn loved, and in the room floated one or
two of the mosquitoes with which he had such sympathy.