CHAPTER XV

_I Acquire Vanity--I Meet a Wise Man--The Distaste for

Boasting--Imperial Traditions--The First Ambassadors and

Consequent Embarrassments--Trappings of Rank--I Display My

Knowledge--And Come a Cropper--The Beauties of Calm_

The garden theory of my friend the art collector, so Japanese in its

completeness, charmed and satisfied me.

"Now," I thought to myself, "I _know_."

Thenceforward I looked at gardens not with the unenlightened enthusiasm

of the casual amateur, but with a critic's eye. Here and there I would

make a mental reservation, saying to myself that the man who made this

garden had missed something in one respect or another; that the one

great principle, the volcanic principle, had not been fully carried out.

So time went on until presently I found myself in Kyoto, the cultivated

city of Japan, seated at a table (upon which were glasses and a bottle)

beside one of the most interesting Japanese I had met, a man of ripe age

and experience and of a philosophical turn of mind. He loved the

history, the legends and the psychology of his native land, and enjoyed

sifting them through the interpretative screen of his own intelligence.

I listened to him with eager interest.

"To boast," said he, "is, according to our point of view, one of the

cardinal sins. We so detest boasting that we go to the other extreme,

depreciating anything or anybody connected with ourselves. Thus, when

some one says to me, 'Your brother has amassed a fortune; he must be a

man of great ability,' I will reply: 'He is not so very able. Perhaps he

is only lucky.' As a matter of fact, it happens that my brother is a man

of exceptional ability. But I must not say so; it is not good form for

me to praise his qualities.

"In speaking of our wives and children we do the same. We say, 'my poor

wife,' or, 'my insignificant wife,' although she may fulfil our ideal of

everything a woman should be.

"Also the reverse of this proposition is true. We sometimes signify our

disapproval or dislike of some one by speaking of him in terms of too

high praise.

"Among ourselves we fully understand these things. It is merely a code

we follow. But I fear that this practice sometimes causes foreigners to

misunderstand us. Being themselves accustomed to speak literally, they

are inclined to take us so. Also, they are not likely to realize that we

are most critical of those for whom we have profound regard. Why should

we waste our time or our critical consideration upon persons who mean

nothing to us or whom we dislike?

"Yet, after all," he continued, with a little twinkle in his eye, "human

nature is much the same the world over. There was an American here in

Kyoto once who used to forbid his wife and sister to smoke cigarettes,

but I observed that he was quick to pass his cigarette-case to other

ladies."

He drifted on to a further discussion of differences between the point

of view of Japan and that of the Occident.

"For twenty-five centuries," said he, "our emperors never lived behind a

fortification. There was no need of it. The present imperial palace at

Tokyo is, to be sure, protected by a moat and great stone walls, but

that was originally built for shoguns, and was taken over by the

Imperial House only at the time of the Restoration.

"Our old Japanese idea is that the Emperor is the father of his people.

There is a certain reverence, yet a certain democracy, too, in our

feeling on this subject. We who have the old ideas regret that the

Emperor now appears in a military or naval uniform. It is too much like

the European way, too much like abandoning the feeling that he is the

head of the family. For a uniform seems to make him only a part of the

army or the navy.

"But we had to modify our customs to suit those of other nations.

Ambassadors began to come from foreign lands. The Emperor did not wish

to see them, but was obliged to do so because they represented great

powers to whom we could not say no.

"At first, when the Emperor received ambassadors, he wore his ancient

imperial robes and was seated upon cushions, Japanese fashion. But the

ambassadors were arrayed in brilliant uniforms covered with decorations,

and in accordance with their home customs they _stood_ in the imperial

presence. They would stand before a European king or an American

president. Therefore it seemed to them respectful to stand before our

Emperor.

"But, according to our customs, that is the worst thing that can happen.

We must always be lower than the Emperor; we must not even look from a

second-story window when he drives by. The Emperor's audience-room was

so constructed that he sat in an elevated place at the head of a flight

of steps. But even so, one never entered his presence standing fully

erect. The idea of deference was visibly indicated by a stooping

position, and as one ascended the steps toward the Imperial Person, one

bent over more and more, until, on reaching the plane on which the

Emperor was seated, one knelt, with bowed head, so as still to be below

him.

"A foreigner, on the other hand, wishing to show proper respect to an

exalted personage, would make a bow from the waist and then assume a

stiffly erect attitude, almost like a soldier standing at attention. Can

you imagine an Occidental admiral or general, with his tight uniform,

heavy braid, and sword, approaching any one upon his hands and knees? It

would be foreign to his nature and training, not to say ruinous to his

costume.[2]

[2] An extremely interesting account of the first audience

given by the Emperor to a foreign ambassador is contained in

"Memories," by the late Lord Redesdale, who was present.

Lord Redesdale was then Mr. Mitford, and was engaged in

preparing a volume which later became widely known under the

title "Tales of Old Japan."

"Moreover, the important foreigners who came to Japan at the beginning

of the period of transition were gorgeous with gold lace and jewelled

decorations. Up to that time we had no decorations and no modern

uniforms and trappings of rank. Even our Emperor, in his magnificent

robes, was not adorned with gold braid, and no jewels flashed from his

breast.

"Naturally, then, we had to change. We created new orders of nobility;

decorations were devised, uniforms were designed, all according to the

European plan. In the old days we had shogun, daimyo, and samurai. Now

we have princes of the blood, princes not of the blood, marquises,

counts, viscounts, and barons. We have decorations to shine with foreign

decorations. We have field-marshals and admirals to meet the foreign

field-marshals and admirals."

He sighed, and looked through the open window to the garden shimmering

in moonlight.

"Sometimes," he said, reflectively, "it seems to me that the only place

where the spirit of Old Japan can feel at home is when it wanders

through our ancient gardens. They are unchanged."

He paused, still gazing through the open window, then went on:

"That is another thing I must talk to you about. We Japanese have a

profound feeling about gardens. The structure of a garden is a matter of

the first importance. You must see some of our gardens."

"I have done so already," I replied. "I have taken pains to visit many

of them, and I----"

"But," he interrupted, "I am not speaking entirely of vision in the

sense of sight. One must have understanding of these things. I am

talking of the basic principles upon which every garden should be made."

"That is just what I am talking about," I returned, enthusiastically.

"It happens that I have made quite a study of your theory of gardens."

[Illustration: A tea-house garden, Tokyo.--"The artist in

landscape gardening should go for his themes to places of

volcanic origin."]

I must own that I did not speak without a certain complacency. I had the

comfortable feeling that always comes to one who hears a subject

broached and feels himself well equipped to discuss it.

"That is very gratifying," said the philosopher, politely.

It was indeed very gratifying. My memory was good. I casually mentioned

the four periods of Japanese landscape gardening, making easy references

to the Emperor Shomu, the scenery near the mouth of the Yangtse River,

and the Chinese master Shunsui. Then I began to file my bill of

particulars.

"Of course," I said, "the one great secret of the art is to apply the

volcanic principle. One should go for themes to places of volcanic

origin--places like Lake Chuzenji and Nikko, places where lakes, formed

in the beds of extinct volcanoes, overflow, making beautiful waterfalls

and torrents which rush through rocky valleys. There, of course, is the

basis for your entire garden composition."

He sat staring at me. His eyes shone. Evidently I was making a deep

impression on him.

"Of course," I resumed, "volcanic explosions throw rich soil into----"

"Stop!" he cried, half rising from his chair. "Who gave you those

theories? Where did you learn all this?"

"In Tokyo," I answered proudly, "I happened to meet----"

"Never mind whom you met," he broke in, his voice trembling with

intensity. "These things you have been saying are terrible--terrible!

Such ideas are ruining art and beauty in Japan. A garden of that kind is

an abomination."

I sat stunned while he stood over me.

"The thing above all others to keep away from," he continued,

vehemently, "is anything volcanic. That should be apparent to any

one--any one! The very cause of volcanic structure is violence. It is

the embodiment of turmoil, unrest." He made a wild gesture with his

arms. "A volcano blows up, it explodes--_bang!_ It throws everything

about helter-skelter. It is horrible. That is a garden for a madhouse or

the palace of a _narikin_--a new millionaire."

"But don't you think----"

"If one thing is more essential than another in a garden," he went on,

ignoring my effort to interrupt, "it is peace, tranquillity, an

atmosphere conducive to meditation. Fancy a cultivated gentleman, a

philosopher, trying to meditate among volcanoes, waterfalls, and roaring

torrents! A garden should have no waterfalls. Water, if it is there at

all, should flow as placidly as philosophic thought. There should be no

fish darting about, no noisy splashing fountains, no gaudy peonies, or

other striking and distracting things. The purpose of a garden should

not be display. Its proper purpose is not to excite the beholder, but to

fill him with a rich contentment. A garden should be a bathing-place for

the soul. And one no more wishes to plunge the soul than the body into a

roaring torrent. No; there is in life already too much stress and

turmoil. The soul cries out for repose. One must lave it in a crystal

pool, healing and refreshing."

He paused, short of breath.

"But don't you think----"

"Say no more! It is late. I must go home."

I walked with him to the garden gate. A new moon hanging in a sky of

blue and silver was reflected in a still pool, its margins soft with the

dark, cloud-like forms of shrubbery. Near the gate some calla lilies

stood like graceful, silent ghosts. The night air was fragrant with the

scent of rich, damp soil and growing things.

"But don't you think," I pleaded as I opened the gate to let him pass,

"that there is, after all, something poetic in the volcanic conception

of a garden?"

"No, no," he cried. "Poetic? No. Good night. Good night. I do not

understand this new Japan. There is no repose any more. It is all

volcanoes, all exploding. It is the beauties of calm that we are losing.

Calm! Yes, that is it, calm! calm! calm!"

His agitated voice, shouting, "Calm! calm! calm!" came back to me as

like a typhoon he whirled off into the darkness, leaving me in the sweet

quiet of the garden--to meditate.

PART III

CHAPTER XVI

_The "Connecticut Yankee" in Old Japan--Commodore Perry--The

Elder Statesmen--Marquis Okuma--Self-made Men--Viscount

Shibusawa--The Power of the Daimyo--Samurai Privileges,

Including That of Suicide--Education in Old Japan--Jigoro Kano

and Jiudo--The Farewell Letter of a Patriot--Kodokwan and

Butokukai--The Old Military Virtues--General Nogi--His Death

With Countess Nogi_

Despite the convulsions, overturnings, and transitions through which so

many nations have lately been passing, Japan still holds the world's

record for swift and stupendous change. The thing that happened to Japan

staggers the imagination. History affords no parallel. The nearest

parallel is to be found in the fiction of a great imaginative writer. An

American or a European going to Japan at approximately the time of the

Imperial Restoration of 1868, found himself, in effect, dropped back

through the centuries after the manner of Mark Twain's "Connecticut

Yankee"; and the Japanese who lived through the transition which then

began, met an experience like that pictured in Mark Twain's fantasy as

having befallen the people of King Arthur's Court when modern knowledge

was suddenly visited upon them.

The true story of Japan, however, surpasses in its wonder the invention

of Mark Twain; for whereas the facts of history compelled the author of

"A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court" to let ancient Britain

backslide into her semi-barbarism after the disappearance of the

Connecticut Yankee, Japan not only changed completely but held her gains

and continued to progress.

The beginning of the period of transition is customarily dated from the

year 1853, when Commodore Perry first arrived, or from 1854, when he

negotiated his treaty; but though that treaty did open the door through

which the spirit of change was soon to enter, the actual modernizing of

the nation did not start until 1868, when Yoshinobu Tokugawa, fifteenth

of his line, and last shogun to govern Japan, relinquished his power to

the Emperor.

Men able to remember the events of the Restoration are about as rare in

Japan as are those who, in this country, remember the impeachment of

Andrew Johnson, which occurred in the same year; and men who played

important parts in the Restoration are of course rarer still--as rare,

say, as Americans who played important parts in the Civil War. As for

Japanese who can recall Perry's visit, they would correspond in years to

those who, with us, can recollect the beginning of the struggle for Free

Soil in Kansas. In neither land, alas, is there more than a handful of

such old folk left.

It so happens, however, that in Japan several very remarkable men have

survived to great age.

The three most powerful figures in politics at the time of my visit were

the octogenarian noblemen known as the Genro, or Elder Statesmen: Field

Marshal Prince Yamagata, Marquis Matsukata, and Marquis Okuma. Prince

Yamagata, as a soldier, took an active part in the civil warfare

attending the Restoration. Both he and Marquis Okuma were born in

1838--that is to say seven years before Texas was admitted to the Union

as the twenty-eighth state. Marquis Matsukata was born in 1840.

Of these venerable statesmen, Prince Yamagata and Marquis Matsukata

figured, I found, as great unseen influences; but Marquis Okuma, while

perhaps not actually more active than his colleagues of the Genro,

appeared frequently before the public, and was more of a popular idol,

being often referred to as Japan's "Grand Old Man." In politics he had

long been known as a great fighter and an artful tactician; also he was

sympathetically regarded by reason of his having been, many years ago,

the victim of a bomb outrage in which he lost a leg.

I knew of his having been thus crippled, but through some trick of

memory failed to recall the fact when, one day, I found myself a member

of a small party of Americans received by the Marquis at his house. We

were with him for something more than an hour; perhaps two hours. During

that time he stood and made an address, moved about the room, and even

stepped out to the garden, yet I was not once reminded of his physical

handicap. I have never seen a person so seriously maimed who, in his

movements, revealed it so little. And that at eighty-three years of age!

I should have guessed him twenty years younger. Lean, tall, wiry, alert,

with close-cropped white hair and snapping black eyes, he appeared to be

at the very apex of his powers.

That he was versatile I knew. All three of the Genro have at various

times been Prime Minister, and have held other high offices under the

Government, but Marquis Okuma's positions have been extremely varied,

calling for the display of a wide range of knowledge and of talents. I

was told that he had organized the Nationalist Party, published a

magazine, edited a number of important literary and historical works,

founded and presided over Waseda University, and had long been famed as

a horticulturist.

It was a curious thing to hear him speak in a language I could not

understand, yet to feel so strongly his gift for swaying men with

oratory.

The experience reminded me of that of a newspaper man I know, who

accompanied William Jennings Bryan on one of his political speech-making

tours long ago.

"I was a dyed-in-the-wool Republican," he told me, in recounting the

experience, "and did not believe in Bryan or his measures, yet I

continually found myself carried away by his oratory. While he was

speaking he made me believe in things I _didn't_ believe in. I would

want to applaud and cheer him like the rest of the audience.

"Afterwards I would go back to the train and sober up. I wanted to kick

myself for letting him twist me around his finger like that. But the

next time I heard him the same thing would happen. It wasn't what he

said; it was his voice and phrasing and his magnetism."

I have no doubt that a Japanese unacquainted with English would sense

Bryan's elocutionary power precisely as I did that of Marquis Okuma;

indeed I am not sure that a foreigner, unfamiliar with the language of

the orator, is not in a sense the auditor who can best measure his

power.

Marquis Okuma's features indicated extraordinary pugnacity, yet I should

say that his pugnacity was under perfect control. He could exhibit both

passion and icy coolness, and I believe he could turn on either at will,

as one turns on hot or cold water. If he was William Jennings Bryan he

was also Henry Cabot Lodge.

* * * * *

It is worth remarking that these Elder Statesmen are without exception

self-made men. None of them was born with a title; all were members of

modest samurai families; all rose through ability.

In this respect, as in many others, comparisons between the governmental

system of Imperial Japan and that of Imperial Germany that was, do not

hold. Japan is not governed by a hereditary ruling class. The government

service is open to all men, under a system of competitive examinations,

and promotion does not go by family or favour, but is in almost all

cases a recognition of ability exhibited in minor offices. Young men in

the consular service are in line for ambassadorships and may reasonably

hope, if they exhibit great talents, ultimately to reach the highest

offices.

It would seem, moreover, that in Japan as in some other lands,

aristocratic and wealthy families do not, as a rule, produce the

strongest men. Thus I was informed that, of the entire cabinet of Prime

Minister Hara, but one member was a man of noble family, that one having

been Count Oki, Minister of Justice. And even Count Oki was only of the

second generation of nobility.

In the business world the same rule applies. The titled business men of

Japan have risen, practically without exception, from humble beginnings.

I was told that one of them, whom I met, had begun life as a pedlar, and

was proud of it. Looking up another business genius in the national

"Who's Who," I find the following statement, which may be assumed to

have been furnished by the gentleman to whom it refers:

Arrived in Tokyo in '71, with empty purse; proceeded to

Yokohama, supporting himself by hawking cheap viands.

If the honorary title, "Grand Old Man of Japan," had not already been

conferred, and I had been invited to make nominations, I should have

gone outside the realm of politics and cast my vote for Viscount Eiichi

Shibusawa.

Had the Viscount been, at the time of the Restoration, a member of one

of the great clans responsible for the return of the reins of government

to Imperial hands, his career might have resembled more closely the

careers of the three old nobles of the Genro. But whereas Prince

Yamagata, Marquis Matsukata, and Marquis Okuma were respectively men of

Choshu, Satsuma, and Saga--clans that cast their lot with the coalition

that returned the Emperor to power--Viscount Shibusawa was on the other

side, having been a retainer of the last shogun.

The spoils went, naturally enough, to the victors. Strong men belonging

to the clans which had supported the Imperial House became the strong

men of the centralized government. Even to-day, when clans, as such, no

longer exist, the old clan sentiment survives, with the result that men

of Satsuma and Choshu origin are most influential in politics. The

militaristic tendency sometimes noticed in the action of the Japanese

Government is said to be largely due to this fact, for the clan of

Satsuma was in the old days notorious for its warlike inclinations, and

there is evidence to show that those inclinations have, to some extent

survived. Naval officers are to-day drawn largely from old Satsuma

families, while Choshu furnishes many officers to the army.

At twenty-seven years of age, Viscount Shibusawa had by his ability

become vice-minister of the Shogun's treasury. Naturally, then, after

the fall of the shogunate, he went in for finance. He founded the First

Bank of Japan--literally the first modern bank started there--and,

prospering greatly became a man of large affairs. Repeatedly he was

offered the portfolio of Finance under the Government, but always

refused it. A few years ago he retired from active business, and as has

already been mentioned, gave his time thereafter to all manner of good

works.

When I met him he was nearing his eighty-second birthday. He distinctly

remembered Perry's arrival in Japan and the events that followed. I

wished to get the story of a representative man who had seen these

things, and therefore asked him to grant me an interview. This he was so

kind as to do, allowing me the better part of two days--for interviewing

through an interpreter, even though he be the best of interpreters, is

slow work.

We talked in a pretty brick bungalow in the Viscount's garden. Outside

the door was an English rose-garden, with bushes trained to the shape of

trees.

Prior to that time I had always seen the Viscount wearing a frock coat

or a dress suit, but here at home, on a day free from formalities, he

was clad in the silken robes that Japanese gentlemen put on for

comfort--though they might well put them on for elegance, too.

Short, stocky, energetic, with a strong neck and large round

head, the face seamed with deep wrinkles, he was one of the most

extraordinary-looking men I had ever met. He radiated force, courage,

honesty. I knew a Sioux chief, long ago, who had a face like that, even

to the colour, and to the deep wrinkles of humour about the mouth and

eyes. Nor, in either case, did the promise of those wrinkles fail.

When, having likened Viscount Shibusawa to an Indian chief, I also liken

him to a barrel-bodied, square-jawed, weather-beaten old British squire

of the perfect John Bull type, I may overtax the reader's imagination;

yet there was in him as much of the one as of the other.

He was born in the country, coming of a good but not aristocratic

family. The Japan of his youth and early manhood was divided into some

two hundred and fifty or three hundred feudal districts, each ruled by a

daimyo, or chieftain, having his castles, his court, his concubines, his

retainers--among the latter soldiers in armour, equipped with swords,

spears or bows and arrows, and wearing hideous masks calculated to

terrify the foe.

These chiefs had absolute power over the people and lands in their

domains. They could make laws, issue paper money, levy taxes, impose

labour and punishment on the people, or arbitrarily take from them

property or life itself.

It was a land without railroads, without steam power, without

window-glass; a land in which nobles journeyed by the highroads in

magnificent processions, surrounded by their soldiers, mounted and

afoot, their lacquered palanquins, their coolie bearers; a land in

which, when great lords passed, humble citizens fell to their knees and

touched their foreheads to the ground; a land of duels, feuds,

vendettas, clan wars; a land in which the samurai, or gentry, alone were

allowed to wear swords, and in which one of the privileges most highly

prized by the samurai was that of dying by his own hand, if condemned to

death, instead of by the hand of the executioner. Involved with the

privilege of _hara-kiri_, or _seppuku_, was a property right. The

property of a man beheaded by the executioner was confiscated, whereas

one committing hara-kiri could leave his estate to his family.

The education of young men varied in those times according to rank.

Youths of the aristocracy were instructed in the Chinese classics, which

in Japan take the place of Latin and Greek with us. Medicine and

astronomy were also taught. The sons of lesser samurai received a

training calculated to fit them for practical affairs. All those

entitled to wear swords studied swordsmanship, and the process by which

they learned it was sometimes severe, for it was the custom of masters

to attack the pupil suddenly from behind, or even when he was asleep at

night, on the theory that he should be ready at all times to defend

himself. A samurai found killed with his sword completely sheathed was

disgraced. At least two inches of the blade must show in proof that the

dead man had attempted a defence. Jiu-jutsu was also taught to many

samurai youths, and in this, as in swordsmanship, it was the practice of

instructors to make surprise attacks upon their pupils.

Viscount Shibusawa's recollections of old days, as he recounted them to

me, will make a separate chapter, but before that chapter is begun, let

me mention several points of samurai tradition--among them jiu-jutsu,

and the more advanced art or science of jiudo, developed by my friend

Mr. Jigoro Kano.

As after the Restoration the craze for all things American and European

spread through Japan, the old arts of jiu-jutsu, which for more than

three centuries had been practised by samurai, fell into disuse. Before

that time there had been many different schools of jiu-jutsu, teaching a

variety of systems, but as the old masters of the art became

superannuated no followers were arising to take their places.

In 1878, when Mr. Kano took up the study of jiu-jutsu, he saw that,

through lack of interest, many of the fine points of the art were likely

to be lost. In order to preserve as much of it as he could, he went to

great pains to make himself proficient, not merely in one system of

jiu-jutsu, but in several systems as taught by the several great masters

then alive.

His first interest in jiu-jutsu arose through the fact that he had been

a weak child and wished to make himself a strong man. I was reminded of

Theodore Roosevelt's sickly childhood when Mr. Kano told me that; and it

is interesting to recall that it was President Roosevelt who first

caused jiu-jutsu to be widely talked of in the United States, and that

he studied it, while in the White House, under one of Mr. Kano's pupils.

Also I was interested to hear from Mr. Kano that, as a young man, he

gave an exhibition of jiu-jutsu before General Grant, at Viscount

Shibusawa's house in Tokyo.

Far from being a professional athlete, Mr. Kano is a gentleman of

samurai family, a graduate of the Literary College of the Imperial

University, a linguist, a traveller, an educator of high reputation, the

holder of several decorations. Among other offices he has been head

master of the Peers' School in Tokyo.

As the reader is doubtless aware, the theory of jiu-jutsu was to defeat

the adversary, not by pitting force against force, but by yielding

before the opponent's onslaughts in such a way as to turn his strength

against him.

Jiudo, which means "the way or doctrine of yielding," is a combination,

created by Mr. Kano, of all systems of jiu-jutsu interwoven with a plan

of mental, moral, and physical training, calculated to elevate the art

above any mere consideration of combat alone--although that side is by

no means neglected.

Innumerable stories, exciting or amusing, might be told of the heroic

adventures of celebrated jiudoists, but I know of nothing which sheds

more light upon Mr. Kano's teachings, in their moral aspect, than does a

letter written to him by Commander Yuasa of the Japanese Navy, a former

pupil of the Kodokwan, the school of jiudo established by Mr. Kano in

Tokyo. The letter was written by Commander Yuasa when he was about to

take the steamer _Sagami Maru_ and sink her at the harbour entrance in

the third blockading expedition at Port Arthur. The following are

extracts from it:

We shall do all that human power can, and leave the rest to

Heaven. Thus we can calmly ride to certain death. I am happy to

say that among the members of this forlorn hope are three of

your former pupils: Commander Hirose, Lieutenant Commander

Honda, and myself. May this fact redound to the credit of the

Kodokwan.

Though I greatly regret that while living I could not do justice

to the kindness you have shown me, still please accept as an

expression of my gratitude the fact that I lay down my life for

the sake of our country, as you have so kindly taught us, in

time of peace, to be ready to do.

The writer of this letter was lost, as was also Commander Hirose, one of

the brother officers he mentions. The other, Lieutenant Commander Honda,

was wounded by a shell, but was rescued and lived to tell the tale.

Foreigners visiting Japan and wishing to see jiudo demonstrated, are

welcome at the Kodokwan, where, if notice is given, an interpreter is

provided. There are now some twenty thousand practitioners of jiudo who

look to the Kodokwan as headquarters and to Mr. Kano as their master.

Another place where jiudo may be witnessed is at the

Butokukai--Association for the Inculcation of the Military Virtues--in

Kyoto. The latter is a private organization, like an athletic club, with

a fine temple-like building, and many branch establishments throughout

the country. It has some two hundred thousand members, of which several

thousands are active.

The primary idea of this organization is to keep alive certain old

Japanese military arts, such as jiudo, archery, fencing, the use of

lances and spears, and the employment of the curious lance-like

_naginata_, which, with its curved blade and long handle, was used only

by women.

Contests between men armed with dummy swords and women using wooden

naginata are sometimes to be witnessed at the Butokukai, and are

extremely interesting as recalling the days when the women of Old Japan

fought beside their men, using the naginata as an offensive weapon, and

a short dagger, worn in the fold of the obi, as a defensive weapon

corresponding to the shorter of the two swords that men used to wear.

Samurai women were taught to defend themselves with the dagger, and to

use it for suicide if in fear of defeat and dishonour. Families in which

the samurai tradition is sedulously maintained still make it a custom to

present their daughters, at the time of marriage, with daggers of this

type, though such weapons are now recognized merely as emblems of a

spirit to be preserved.

* * * * *

The great modern samurai hero of Japan was General Count Nogi, the hero

of Port Arthur, in memory of whom a shrine was recently dedicated in

Tokyo.

This shrine stands in the grounds behind the simple house in Tokyo where

Count and Countess Nogi lived, and where they died together by their own

hands. Nogi is canonized in Japan, and his house is held a sacred place,

and is visited by thousands of persons each year.

The theory upon which self-destruction is practised according to the old

samurai tradition, and is widely approved in certain circumstances, is

one of the things that baffles the Occidental mind.

I therefore asked Viscount Kentaro Kaneko, who knew General Nogi, to

tell me the story of his death, and to explain to me how he came to

commit seppuku.

[Illustration: Viscount Kentaro Kaneko (Harvard '78), Privy

Councilor to the Emperor, President of the America-Japan Society

of Tokyo, and friend of President Roosevelt]

"When Nogi was given command at Port Arthur," said the Viscount, "his

two sons were officers under him. He told his wife to prepare three

coffins, and to hold no funeral services until all three were ready to

be buried together.

"In the assault on Port Arthur some thirty thousand Japanese soldiers

gave up their lives. This sacrifice of life was at first much criticized

in Japan, but public sentiment changed in face of the fact that the

General lost both his sons. He returned to Japan a victor, it is true,

but a most unhappy man. Always in his mind were thoughts of the families

of the thirty thousand brave young men it had been necessary to

sacrifice. He did not want to be acclaimed in the streets, but to be let

alone. He went about in an old uniform and tried to be as inconspicuous

as possible.

"One day at an audience with the Emperor Meiji, Nogi said to him as he

was leaving, something to the effect that he should never see him again.

"The Emperor, gathering that Nogi was contemplating seppuku, called him

back.

"'Nogi,' he said, 'I still have need of you. I want your life.'

"So the General did not carry out his plan at that time, but lived on,

as the Emperor had ordered him to do, becoming president of the school

at which the sons of nobles are educated.

"All through the years, however, he was haunted by the memory of the

thirty thousand soldiers he had been compelled to send to their death.

"When the Emperor Meiji died, Nogi was one of the guard of honour, made

up of peers, who in rotation watched at the Imperial bier for forty days

and forty nights.

"Then came the state funeral. On the day of the funeral Nogi wrote a

poem which declared in effect, 'I shall follow in the footsteps of Your

Majesty.' This poem he showed to Prince Yamagata, who took it to mean

merely that Nogi would be in the procession following the Imperial

remains to the grave.

"But when the guns announced the departure of the funeral cortège from

the palace, Nogi was not there. Like the samurai of old, he desired to

follow his dead master into the beyond. At the sound of the guns he took

his short sword and committed seppuku, while in the next room Countess

Nogi, his devoted wife, dressed all in white, cut the arteries of her

neck. Thus the two died together, for the sake of the Emperor and the

thirty thousand soldiers who had sacrificed their lives."

* * * * *

At no point is the outlook of the Oriental more completely at odds with

that of the Occidental, than in the view it takes of suicide.

Whereas with us suicide is condemned as cowardly, being resorted to as a

means of escape from the hardships of life, there will oftentimes be

something highly heroic in a Japanese suicide. Unhappiness, it is true,

does drive some Japanese to self-destruction, but in many other cases

the suicide represents something more in the nature of a self-inflicted

punishment for failure of some kind. Thus it is with the schoolboys who

sometimes kill themselves because they have failed in their

examinations. Likewise, while in Japan I heard of two railroad gatemen

who had, by failing to close their gate when a train was coming, been

responsible for the death of a man travelling in a ricksha. A few days

after this accident both these gatemen suicided by throwing themselves

beneath a train. For their neglect they paid voluntarily with their

lives.

"And," said the Viscount, "we had in the old days another sort of

suicide, examples of which sometimes occur even to this day. When a man

believed profoundly in something, and was unable to attract attention to

the thing in which he believed, he would sometimes commit seppuku as a

means of drawing notice to it. He would leave a paper setting forth his

beliefs, and people would give it attention, feeling that if a man was

willing to die in order to emphasize a point, his message was worth

considering."

The Viscount paused. Then rather reflectively he added: "It is as though

he were to underscore his protest--in red."

CHAPTER XVII

_The Old-time Anti-Foreign Sentiment--Prince Yoshinobu

Tokugawa--Emperor and Shogun--Prince Yoshinobu becomes

Shogun--His Highness, Akitaké, Goes to France--Humorous

Episodes--The Defeat of Prince Yoshinobu's Army--Various

Explanations--The Restoration of the Emperor--Prince Yoshinobu's

Retirement--The Viscount's Theory--Prince Keikyu Tokugawa--A

Roosevelt Anecdote--Swords and Watchchain_

"I was a boy of fourteen," said Viscount Shibusawa "when your Commodore

Perry came to Japan. At that time, and for a considerable period

afterwards, I was 'anti-foreigner'--that is, I was opposed to the

abandonment of our old Japanese isolation, and to the opening of

relations with foreign powers.

"The majority of thoughtful men felt as I did. Our trouble with the

Jesuits, in the latter part of the sixteenth and early part of the

seventeenth century came about through a fear which grew up amongst us

that the Jesuits were trying to get political control of Japan. This

fear brought about their expulsion from the country, as well as some

persecution of themselves and their converts, and it was then that our

policy of isolation began. More lately we had seen the Opium War in

China, and that had added to our conviction that foreign powers were

merely seeking territory, and that they were utterly unscrupulous.

"When I reached the age of twenty-five, I became a retainer of Yoshinobu

Tokugawa, a powerful prince, kinsman of Iyemochi Tokugawa, who was then

Shogun. Not being of noble family, I did not belong to Prince

Yoshinobu's intimate circle, but was a member of what might be termed

the middle group at his court.

"He was then acting as intermediary between the Shogun and the Imperial

Court at Kyoto--for though the Shogun ruled the land, as shoguns had for

centuries, there was maintained a fiction that he did so by imperial

consent.

"When Iyemochi died, the powerful daimyos nominated my lord, Prince

Yoshinobu, to succeed him. I was opposed to his accepting the office,

for the country was then in a very unsettled condition, and I felt sure

that the next shogun, whoever he might be, would have serious

difficulties to encounter; especially with the important question of

foreign relations to the fore, and with such powerful lords as those of

Satsuma, Choshu, Tosa, and Hizan becoming increasingly hostile to the

shogunate and increasingly favourable to the Imperial House.

"The fact that Prince Yoshinobu had acted as intermediary between his

kinsman, the fourteenth Shogun, and the Imperial Court at Kyoto, made it

a delicate matter for him later to accept the shogunate. Moreover,

though he belonged to the Tokugawa family, his branch of the family, the

Mito branch, had continually insisted upon Imperial supremacy in Japan.

However, circumstances compelled him to accept the office. I was greatly

disappointed when he did so.

"This occurred two years after I became his retainer. I was now

vice-minister of his treasury, with the additional duties of keeping

track of all modern innovations and supervising the new-style military

drill, with rifles, which we were then taking up.

"Shortly after becoming Shogun, Yoshinobu decided to send his brother,

Akitaké, to France to be educated, and he appointed me a member of the

entourage that was to accompany the young man. I was then twenty-seven

years old.

"We sailed in January 1867--a party of twenty-five, among whom were a

doctor, an officer who went to study artillery, and various others

besides Akitaké's seven personal attendants.

"For international purposes the Shogun was now called Tycoon, for the

word 'shogun,' meaning 'generalissimo,' carried with it no connotation

of rulership; whereas 'tycoon' means 'great prince'--and of course it

seemed proper enough for a great prince to treat with foreign powers. As

brother of the Tycoon, Akitaké received, in Europe, the title

'Highness'.

"Matters looked very ominous for the shogunate at the time we left

Japan, but I felt that the best thing for me to do was to go abroad and

learn all I could, with a view to being better able to serve my country

when I should return.

"The members of our party wore the Japanese costume, including topknots

and two swords. I, however, devised a special elegance for myself. I

heard that the governor of Saigon, where our ship was to stop, intended

to welcome our party officially, so I had a dress coat made." The

Viscount shook with laughter as he recalled the episode. "It wasn't a

dress suit--just the coat. And when we got to Saigon I wore that coat

over my Japanese silks, in the daytime.

"Our lack of experience with European ways caused many amusing things to

happen. For instance, when we were in the train crossing the Isthmus of

Suez--there was no canal then--one member of the party, unaccustomed to

window-glass, threw an orange-peel, expecting it to go out of the

window. The peel hit the glass and bounced back falling into the lap of

an official who had come to escort us across the isthmus. We were much

embarrassed.

"Later, in Paris, another absurd thing occurred. You must understand

that in Japan it is customary for guests, leaving a house where they

have been entertained, to wrap up cakes and such things and take them

home. One member of our party, who had never seen ice-cream before,

attempted this, wrapping the ice-cream in paper and tucking it in the

front of his kimono. Needless to say, the ice-cream was no longer

ice-cream when he got back to the hotel, and he himself was not very

comfortable.

"The Paris Exposition of 1867 was in progress when we arrived. When it

was over we travelled through Switzerland, Holland, Belgium, Italy, and

England. Originally it was planned that after our official tour we

should settle down to study, and I was eager for this time to come.

However, it was not long before we received news that the shogunate had

fallen.

"The news was puzzling. I could not gather what was happening in Japan.

First I heard that Yoshinobu, as shogun, had publicly returned full

authority of the Emperor, but later came word of the battle of

Toba-Fushimi, in which troops of the Imperial Party defeated troops of

the Shogun. This made it appear that Yoshinobu had played false, first

publicly relinquishing the shogun's power and then fighting to maintain

it. These seemingly conflicting acts puzzled me, for I knew that

Yoshinobu was a man of the highest honour.

"Presently came a messenger from Japan saying that Akitaké had become

head of the Mito branch of the Tokugawa family, which made it necessary

for us to abandon our plans and return. We sailed from England in

December 1867, reaching Japan in November 1868, eleven months later.

"I was dumbfounded by the changes I found. Though I knew that the Shogun

Government had fallen I had not visualized what that would mean. My

lord, Yoshinobu, was held prisoner in a house in Suruga. Learning that

he was allowed to see his intimate friends and retainers, I journeyed to

Suruga, where I had audience with him several times. I found him

reticent, and was able to get from him little information as to the

mysterious course he had pursued.

"After having been held prisoner for a year he was released, but he

continued for thirty years to reside in the neighbourhood of Suruga,

leading a secluded life. Not until thirty-one years after his

resignation of the shogunate did he come to Tokyo. Four years later the

Emperor created him a prince of the new régime. This showed pretty

clearly that the Emperor had not mistrusted him.

"For twenty years after my return to Japan I was unable to get at the

bottom of this matter. I tried to get some explanation from Yoshinobu

himself, but he evaded my inquiries. Meanwhile the question was

constantly discussed in Japan. Those hostile to Yoshinobu contended that

he had not acted with sincerity, having been led by the burdens

connected with the opening of foreign relations, to lay down the

shogunate, and having later changed his mind and fought to retain it. On

the face of it, this seemed true. Yoshinobu was called a coward and a

traitor, and was severely criticized for having escaped after the battle

of Toba-Fushimi.

"On the other hand, those who supported Yoshinobu asserted that he had

acted logically and wisely: that he had seen that his government was

going to fall, and had been entirely honest in surrendering the

shogunate prior to the battle. These adherents insisted that he had not

wanted a battle, but had set out for Kyoto to see the Emperor with a

view to arranging details, especially with regard to the future welfare

of his retainers. "But when a great lord, travelled, in those times, he

travelled with an army, and Yoshinobu's defenders maintained that this

was what had brought on the battle--that when the men of Choshu and

Satsuma learned that Yoshinobu was moving toward Kyoto with his

soldiers, they came out and attacked him, believing, or pretending to

believe, that he was on a hostile errand.

"At this time the Emperor was but seventeen years of age, and the

Government was in the hands of elder statesmen of the Imperial Party.

The Emperor himself probably had no idea on what errand Yoshinobu was

approaching Kyoto; and whether the elder statesmen knew or not, they

belonged to clans hostile to the shogunate, and preferred to fight.

"Many years passed before the truth began to become clear. At last, when

the old wounds were pretty well healed, I undertook the compilation of a

history of Yoshinobu's life and times. Finally I asked him point-blank

about the events connected with his resignation and the subsequent

battle. He told me that he had indeed started to Kyoto on a peaceful

errand, but that when the forces sent out by the great clansmen

appeared, he could not control his own men. He had neither sought nor

desired battle. Feeling that his highest duty was to the Emperor, he

withdrew from the battle, taking no part in it, and returned whence he

had come, going into retirement. He knew, of course, that the battle

would put him in a false light, and he decided that the wisest and most

honourable course for him to pursue was to show, by his life in

retirement, his absolute submission to the Emperor.

"In order fully to appreciate why Yoshinobu was so ready to lay down his

power, the old Japanese doctrine of loyalty to the throne must be fully

grasped. This loyalty amounts to a religion, and permeates the whole

life of Japan. That is why the shoguns who for so many centuries ruled

Japan, never attempted to usurp imperial rank, but were satisfied, while

usurping the power, to preserve the form of governing always as

vice-regents.

"It is my personal belief that when Yoshinobu Tokugawa accepted the

shogunate despite the opposition of his trusted retainers, he did so

with the full intention of restoring to the Imperial House its rightful

power. I used to ask him about this, and while he never admitted it, he

never denied it. That was characteristic of him. He was the most modest

and self-effacing of men--the last man who would have claimed for

himself the credit for performing a self-sacrificing and heroic act of

patriotism. For him the performance of the act was sufficient."

* * * * *

Throughout my talk with Viscount Shibusawa I felt in him the passionate

loyalty of the retainer to his lord. Where I had wished for

reminiscences of a more personal nature, the Viscount, I could see,

thought of himself first of all in his relation to the family of Prince

Yoshinobu, the last shogun, whose retainer he was. He was not interested

in telling me of his own career, but he was profoundly interested in

seeing that I, being a writer, should understand the relationship of

Prince Yoshinobu to the Imperial Restoration. His attitude reminded me

of that of a noble old Southern gentleman, now dead and gone, who had

been the adjutant of Robert E. Lee, and who loved Lee and loved to talk

about him. When I talked with him it was the same. I had great

difficulty in getting him to tell me about his own experiences.

The loyalty of the retainer to the family of his lord is also to be seen

in the relationship between the Viscount and young Prince Keikyu

Tokugawa, son of Yoshinobu. After the death of the father the Viscount

continued to act as advisor to the son. He became his chief counsellor,

and when, a few years since, he resigned from the board of directors of

the First Bank of Japan--the bank which he founded five years after the

Restoration--it was young Prince Tokugawa who succeeded to his empty

chair.

The Prince, who is a member of the House of Peers, is known in the

United States, having come here during the war as representative of the

Japanese Red Cross.

* * * * *

Viscount Shibusawa is also a figure not unfamiliar to Americans, having

visited this country several times. I am indebted to him for an anecdote

illustrative of the prodigious memory of President Roosevelt.

"Eighteen years ago," he said, "when Mr. Roosevelt was president, I

called upon him at the White House. We had a pleasant talk. He

complimented the behaviour of the Japanese troops in the Boxer trouble,

saying that they were not only brave but orderly and well disciplined.

Then he spoke with admiration of the art of Japan.

"I said to him, 'Mr. President, I am only a banker, and I regret to say

that in my country banking is not yet so highly developed as is art.'

"'Perhaps it will be,' he replied, 'by the time we meet again.'

"Thirteen years later, when I called upon him at his home at Oyster Bay,

he took up the conversation where we had left off.

"'The last time I saw you,' he said, 'I did not ask you about banking in

Japan. Now I want you to tell me all about it.'"

* * * * *

As I was leaving the bungalow in the garden late in the afternoon of the

second day spent in interviewing the Viscount, the thought came to me

that probably I should never again talk with a man who had lived through

such transitions. I wanted a souvenir, and I wished it to be something

emblematic of the changes witnessed by those shrewd, humorous old eyes.

Therefore, not without some hesitation, I asked the Viscount if he would

be so kind as to put on his two samurai swords and let me take his

photograph.

He dispatched a servant who presently returned from the house bearing

the weapons. The Viscount tucked them through his sash, and I snapped

the shutter, hoping fervently that the late afternoon light would prove

to have been adequate.

[Illustration: Viscount Shibusawa, one of the Grand Old Men of

Japan, consented to pose for me, wearing his samurai swords]

As the reader may see for himself, the picture turned out well. Indeed

it turned out better than I myself had anticipated, for besides the

swords and silken robes of Old Japan, there may be seen in it a very

modern note.

It was the Viscount's grandson who, when I showed him the photograph,

called attention to that.

"Yes," he said, with a smile, "you have there the swords of Old Japan.

But the watch-chain--that is an anachronism."

CHAPTER XVIII

_Viscount Kaneko's Home--Some Souvenirs--A Rooseveltian

Memory--Doctor Bigelow's Prophecy--A First Meeting with

Roosevelt--The Russo-Japanese War--Luncheons at the White

House--Roosevelt's Interest in the Samurai Tradition--Sagamore

Hill--Mrs. Roosevelt and Quentin--A Simple Home--The President

Brings Blankets--A Bear Hunt--The Peace of Portsmouth and a

Bearskin for the Emperor--A Letter of Roosevelt's on Relations

with Japan--A Letter from Mid-Africa--"American Samurai"_

Never while in Japan did I feel quite so close to home as on the several

occasions when I sat in the study of Viscount Kentaro Kaneko, in Tokyo,

listening to his reminiscences and looking at his souvenirs of Theodore

Roosevelt.

No Japanese has been more widely known in the United States, or more

familiar with our ways, than Viscount Kaneko (Harvard '78), Privy

Councilor to the Emperor, chairman of the commission which is engaged in

preparing the history of the reign of the late Emperor Meiji, and

president of the America-Japan Society of Tokyo.

I found him living in a good-sized but not ostentatious house, purely

Japanese in architecture. But it was not purely Japanese in its

equipment. Like the houses of other Tokyo gentlemen accustomed to see

much of foreigners, it had carpet over the hall matting, rendering the

removal of shoes unnecessary, and certain of its rooms were furnished in

the Occidental style.

Such rooms, in Japan, usually are stiff reception-rooms which look as if

they were used only when visitors from abroad put in an appearance; but

Viscount Kaneko's study held a homelike feeling which made me think the

room was frequented by the master of the house when no guests were

present.

On the walls were framed photographs of notables, European and American,

with the Roosevelt family very much to the fore, and I noticed beneath

the photograph of President Roosevelt a cordial inscription in the

familiar handwriting, so honest and boyish--writing as unlike that of

any other great man as Roosevelt himself was unlike any other great man.

When I had crossed and read the inscription, Viscount Kaneko called my

attention to the frame.

"That frame," he said, "is made from a piece of Oregon pine which was

brought among other presents to the Shogun by Commodore Perry. The

Emperor presented me with a piece of the wood, and I had made from it

that frame and a writing box on which the scene of Perry's arrival is

depicted in gold lacquer."

There was also a photograph of Mrs. Roosevelt with two of her sons, and

one of Quentin Roosevelt as a child, astride a pony, with an inscription

to the Viscount's son Takemaro, dated August seventh, 1905. In the

corner of the frame was inserted a photograph which the Viscount had

caused to be taken of Quentin's grave in France.

Viscount Kaneko was a student at Harvard when Roosevelt entered the

university, but they were two years apart and did not know each other

there. Their first meeting occurred in Washington in 1889, when

Roosevelt was Civil Service Commissioner and Viscount Kaneko was

returning to Japan after having visited the principal countries of

Europe for the purpose of studying parliamentary forms. The first

Japanese Parliament met in the year following, 1890, when Japan adopted

a Constitution.

In looking back upon my interviews with the Viscount I find myself

marvelling to-day, as I did then, at the detailed accuracy of his

memory. He recounted events of fifteen and more years before with a

vividness and an attention to trifles that was extraordinary. It was as

if he had refreshed his memory by reading from a diary.

"I had two letters of introduction to Roosevelt," he told me, "when I

went to Washington in 1889. One had been given to me by James Bryce,

later Viscount Bryce, who was then in Gladstone's Cabinet. The other I

received from my friend Dr. William Sturges Bigelow.

"When Doctor Bigelow gave me the letter, he said: 'This will introduce

you to a man who will some day be President of the United States.' I

always remembered that and watched Roosevelt's career with the more

interest for that reason.

"On reaching Washington I called on Roosevelt at a private boarding

house where he was living, and he returned my call next day. Naturally I

perceived at once that he was a man of extraordinarily vigorous mind. I

enjoyed him greatly, and was pleased and interested, after my return to

Japan, to see him steadily ascending. He became Assistant Secretary of

the Navy, Colonel of the Rough Riders, Governor of New York. 'Now,' I

said to myself on reading that he had been elected Governor, 'he is on

the way to fulfilling Doctor Bigelow's prophecy.' Then he became

Vice-President, and I thought: 'That is too bad. They have shelved him.

He won't be President after all.' But McKinley was assassinated and

Roosevelt came to the White House.

"Early in 1904, at the time of our war with Russia, I was sent to the

United States on an unofficial embassy. I went first to New York, where

I remained for a week; then to Washington. There I called on my old

friend Mr. Justice Holmes of the Supreme Court--'Brother Kaneko' he used

to call me--requesting him to take me to the White House to meet the

President, who I thought would not remember me. But Justice Holmes had

disagreed with Roosevelt over the Northern Securities case, and did not

feel that he was persona grata at the White House just then. Therefore I

arranged through our Minister, Mr. Takahira, for a meeting.

"One morning in May, 1904, the Minister took me to call upon the

President. Our appointment was for half past ten. We were not kept

waiting long. I will never forget the picture of Roosevelt as he quickly

thrust open the door and rushed into the room. The Minister had no

chance to present me. 'I am delighted to see you again Baron!' the

President exclaimed in that wonderfully hearty way of his. And as we

shook hands he threw his arm over my shoulder, demanding: 'Why did you

stay for a week in New York? Why didn't you come and see me right away?'

"During our talk, which lasted an hour, he let me see that he was

absolutely neutral in his official attitude toward our war with Russia,

but nevertheless made me feel that he had much personal sympathy for

Japan. He declared frankly that popular sentiment in the United States

was favourable to Japan, and added that the Russian Government had

complained that American army and navy officers were openly

pro-Japanese. This had made it necessary for him to issue a proclamation

of neutrality. But though, as President, he was particular to be

scrupulously just to both sides, I was in no doubt as to the

friendliness of his private sentiments.

"He advised me not to stay in Washington, but to make my headquarters in

New York, coming over to Washington to see him when it was necessary.

This I did, and as time went on, and we became closer friends, he often

did me the honour of inviting me to luncheon _en famille_ at the White

House.

"At one of these luncheons I told him of Doctor Bigelow's prophecy, and

of how I had watched him mounting step by step to its fulfilment. That

seemed to please him.

"'Edith,' he called across the table to Mrs. Roosevelt, 'do you hear

that? Here is a man who has kept a friendly eye on me from away off in

Japan.'

"Once at one of these intimate White House luncheons he remarked that as

President it was necessary to preserve a certain style. 'Coming to see

us here,' he said, 'you don't get an accurate idea of what our family

life really is. You must come and pay us a visit at Oyster Bay this

summer when we get home. Then you will know more about us.'

"He did not forget the invitation, but early in July 1905, repeated it

by telegraph. I went to Oyster Bay and stayed over night. It was in many

ways a memorable experience.

"He was always greatly interested in our samurai tradition and in the

doctrine we call bushido. I remember his asking me how much money was

required for the keeping up of a samurai's position. I explained that

there were different classes of samurai--that the shoguns had themselves

been samurai, with others of various grades below them.

"'Middle-class samurai,' I said, 'do not need a great deal of money.

They require only enough for dress to be worn on social occasions, for

the education of their families, and the maintenance of their political

position, whatever it may be. They need no money for pleasures or

extravagances.'

"'Just the same,' the President replied, 'a man doesn't want to fall

behind his ancestors, materially or otherwise. Take my own case: I want

to keep my place as my forbears kept theirs. I desire neither more nor

less than what my father had. I want my children to be able to grow up

in this old home at Oyster Bay just as the children of my generation

did.' Then he began to ask me more about the details of samurai life.

"'What about doctor's bills?' he asked. 'You didn't mention that item in

estimating the expense of living.'

"I told him of a curious custom we used to have. In each samurai class

there were families of doctors who were endowed by the Government, the

profession being passed down from father to son. These doctors took care

of samurai families of the rank corresponding to their own, and charged

nothing for so doing. Twice a year, in January and July, when it is

customary to give presents, presents were given to the doctors. They

also took care of the poor as a matter of charity.

"That interested him, too. He was always intensely interested in the

samurai, because our samurai virtues were virtues of a kind he

particularly admired--courage, stoicism, love of duty and of country.

"We sat on the wide verandah, overlooking the lawn sloping down toward

Long Island Sound. Mrs. Roosevelt sat with us, knitting. It was July,

but she was knitting mittens. Presently a maid came and spoke to her,

and she left us.

"When she came back she said to me, 'Baron, I want to ask a favour of

you. Quentin has been crying. He took great pains to clean his pony

to-day, to show it to you, and we promised that he should be allowed to

do so. He has been riding around the lawn hoping you would notice him.'

"Of course I sent for Quentin, and he appeared proudly upon his pony. I

asked him to ride around the lawn, which he did.

"'You ride splendidly!' I said, when he drew up again before the porch.

"'Do you think so?' he asked, evidently much pleased.

"'Indeed I do!' I said, and asked him to go around the lawn again.

"When he came back I told him about my son, who was just his age. 'I

shall have him learn to ride,' I said, 'and when he can ride as well as

you can I shall have his picture taken on a pony and send it to you.'

"That," continued the Viscount, "is how we happen to have this picture

of Quentin on his pony. He sent it to my son, and my son sent him a

picture. I always like to think of the good-will there was between those

two boys--an American boy and a Japanese boy who had never seen each

other.

"That night we sat talking in the drawing room which is to the left of

the hall as you go into the house. Mrs. Roosevelt was still knitting

mittens for the children. It was all wonderfully simple and homelike. I

could hardly believe that I was in the home of the head of a great

nation. At that time the house was lighted with kerosene lamps, yet in

Japan I had been using electric light for fifteen years.

"At about ten o'clock Mrs. Roosevelt said good night to us and retired.

Before she went upstairs she moved about, fastening windows and putting

out lamps in parts of the house in which they would not be needed any

more. Then she brought candles and matches so that we should have them

when we were ready to go to bed.

"After an hour's talk about the war, which was still raging, the

President rose and lit the candles. Then he put out the remaining lamps,

and conducted me upstairs to my room. It was a cool night. He felt of

the coverings on my bed, and decided that I might need another blanket.

'I'll get you one,' he said, leaving the room. And in a minute or two he

reappeared with a blanket over his shoulder.

"'Come,' he said, as he put it on the bed, 'and I'll show you the

bathroom.' I went with him. 'Here's soap,' said he, 'and here are clean

towels.' Then he took me back to my room and wished me a good night.

"As for me, I was fascinated, almost dazed. I kept saying to myself,

'This man who has lighted me upstairs with a candle, and carried me a

blanket, and shown me where to find soap and towels, is the President of

the United States! The President of the United States has done all these

things for me. It is the greatest honour a man could have.'

"Earlier in the same year, before the President moved from the White

House to Oyster Bay, he went bear hunting. That was just before Admiral

Togo's victory over the Russian fleet, in the Sea of Japan.

"Before leaving, the President sent for me and told me, in the presence

of Mr. Taft, who was Secretary of War, that if anything of importance

should come up during his absence, I was to see Mr. Taft about it, and

that in the event of its being anything absolutely vital, Mr. Taft would

know how to reach him.

"Mr. Taft showed me a photograph hanging on the wall of the President's

office, showing the wild country to which the President was going on his

hunting trip.

"I remarked playfully to him that I thought it advisable, at that time,

that the President refrain from killing bears, whatever other animals he

might see fit to slay.

"Roosevelt, sitting at his desk, overheard me.

"'What's that you are saying?' he asked.

"I repeated what I had said to Mr. Taft.

"'Why do you think I should not kill bears?' demanded the President.

"'Well, Mr. President,' I replied, 'you know that the various nations

have their special symbols in the animal kingdom. America has the eagle,

Britain the lion, France the cock, and Russia, well----'

"He got up, laughing and came over to me.

"'Nevertheless,' he said, 'I shall go right ahead and kill bears!'

"Before he left on that hunting trip I went to see him and asked as a

special favour that he give me the skin of one of the bears he should

kill.

"He refused, saying that if he were to start presenting trophies to his

friends they would all be after him.

"At that I said to him, 'If I were asking this for myself, Mr.

President, I would not pursue the matter further, but I am not asking it

for myself. I want that bear skin for our Emperor.'

"'Very well, then,' he said. 'You shall have it.'

"He went off on his hunting trip, and came back. Then followed the

negotiations for a cessation of hostilities between Japan and Russia,

and the Portsmouth Peace Conference, through which Roosevelt brought

about the end of the war.

"In August of the same year, 1905, I received this letter from him."

The Viscount handed me the letter to read. It was as follows:

Oyster Bay, N, Y,.

August 30, 1905.

_Personal_

MY DEAR BARON KANEKO:

I cannot too highly state my appreciation of the wisdom and

magnanimity of Japan, which make a fit crown to the prowess of

her soldiers. Will you tell the Emperor that I shall take the

liberty of sending him by you a bear skin? I want you soon to

come out here and take lunch.

Sincerely yours,

THEODORE ROOSEVELT.

"Later," the Viscount went on, "I was asked by the President to come to

Oyster Bay and select one of the skins. I however did not wish to make

the selection, so the President did that, picking out the largest skin

of all and giving it to me for the Emperor Meiji.

"His Majesty was greatly pleased with the skin, not only because it was

a trophy from the President himself, but because of the emblematic

nature of the gift. That bearskin was in his library at the Imperial

Palace in Tokyo as long as he lived."

* * * * *

One of the most important Roosevelt letters shown me by Viscount Kaneko

was on the subject of Japanese-American relations. As this letter is not

included in the two-volume collection of Roosevelt correspondence

compiled in such masterly fashion by Joseph Bucklin Bishop, Roosevelt's

literary executor, I have asked the permission of Mrs. Roosevelt and of

Mr. Bishop to quote it here.

It was as follows:

THE WHITE HOUSE

WASHINGTON

May 23, 1907.

_Confidential_

MY DEAR BARON KANEKO:

I much appreciate your thought of Archie. The little fellow was

very sick but is now all right. His mother and I have just had

him on a short trip in the country.

I was delighted to meet General Kuroki and Admiral Ijuin with

their staffs. General Kuroki is, of course, one of the most

illustrious men living. Through his interpreter, a very able

young staff officer, I spoke to him a little about our troubles

on the Pacific Slope.

Nothing during my Presidency has given me more concern than

these troubles. History often teaches by example, and I think we

can best understand just what the situation is, and how it ought

to be met, by taking into account the change in general

international relations during the last two or three centuries.

During this period all the civilized nations have made great

progress. During the first part of it Japan did not appear in

the general progress, but for the last half century she has gone

ahead so much faster than any other nation that I think we can

fairly say that, taking the last three centuries together, her

advance has been on the whole greater than that of any other

nation. But all have advanced, and especially in the way in

which the people of each treat people of other nationalities.

Two centuries ago there was the greatest suspicion and

malevolence exhibited by all the people, high and low, of each

European country, for all the people, high and low, of every

other European country, with but few exceptions. The cultivated

people of the different countries, however, had already begun to

treat with one another on good terms. But when, for instance,

the Huguenots were exiled from France, and great numbers of

Huguenot workmen went to England, their presence excited the

most violent hostility, manifesting itself even in mob violence,

among the English workmen. The men were closely allied by race

and religion, they had practically the same type of ancestral

culture, and yet they were unable to get on together. Two

centuries have passed, the world has moved forward, and now

there could be no repetition of such hostilities. In the same

way a marvellous progress has been made in the relations of

Japan with the Occidental nations. Fifty years ago you and I and

those like us could not have travelled in one another's

countries. We should have had very unpleasant and possibly very

dangerous experiences. But the same progress that has been going

on as between nations in Europe and their descendants in America

and Australia, has also been going on as between Japan and the

Occidental nations. In these times, then, gentlemen, all

educated people, members of professions and the like, get on so

well together that they not only travel each in the other's

country, but associate on the most intimate terms. Among the

friends whom I especially value I include a number of Japanese

gentlemen. But the half century has been too short a time for

the advance to include the labouring classes of the two

countries, as between themselves.

Exactly as the educated classes in Europe, among the several

nations, grew to be able to associate together generations

before it was possible for such association to take place among

the men who had no such advantages of education, so it is

evident we must not press too fast in bringing the labouring

classes of Japan and America together. Already in these fifty

years we have completely attained the goal as between the

educated and the intellectual classes of the two countries. We

must be content to wait another generation before we shall have

made progress enough to permit the same close intimacy between

the classes who have had less opportunity for cultivation, and

whose lives are less easy, so that each has to feel, in earning

its daily bread, the pressure of the competition of the other. I

have become convinced that to try to move too far forward all at

once is to incur jeopardy of trouble. This is just as true of

one nation as of the other. If scores of thousands of American

miners went to Saghalin, or of American mechanics to Japan or

Formosa, trouble would almost certainly ensue. Just in the same

way scores of thousands of Japanese labourers, whether

agricultural or industrial, are certain, chiefly because of the

pressure caused thereby, to be a sources of trouble if they

should come here or to Australia. I mention Australia because it

is a part of the British Empire, because the Australians have

discriminated against continental immigration in favour of

immigration from the British Isles, and have in effect

discriminated to a certain degree in favour of immigration from

England and Scotland as against immigration from Ireland.

My dear Baron, the business of statesmen is to try constantly to

keep international relations better, to do away with causes of

friction, and secure as nearly ideal justice as actual

conditions will permit. I think that with this object in view

and facing conditions not as I would like them to be, but as

they are, the best thing to do is to prevent the labouring

classes of either country from going in any numbers to the

other. In a generation I believe all need of such prevention

will have passed away; and at any rate this leaves free the

opportunity for all those fit to profit by intercourse, to go

each to the other's country. I have just appointed a commission

on general immigration which will very possibly urge restrictive

measures as regards European immigration, and which I am in

hopes will be able to bring about a method by which the result

we have in view will be obtained with the minimum friction.

With warm regards to the Baroness, believe me,

Sincerely yours,

THEODORE ROOSEVELT.

Baron Kentaro Kaneko,

Tokyo, Japan.

The foregoing letter may well be studied at this time when, through lack

of the kind of statesmanship shown by Roosevelt, the Californian

situation has become worse instead of better.

Another letter shown me by Viscount Kaneko was written in pencil on a

large sheet of yellow paper torn from a pad. It came from the African

jungle, and ran as follows:

Mid-Africa

Sept. 10th, 1909.

MY DEAR BARON,[3]

I have no facilities for writing here; but I must just send you

a line of thanks for your welcome note. I have had a most

interesting trip; my son Kermit has done particularly well. He

has the spirit of a samurai! I greatly hope to visit Japan; but

when it may be possible I can not say.

With warm regards to the Viscountess,[3] believe me,

Sincerely yours,

THEODORE ROOSEVELT.

[3] Despite the fact that Roosevelt knew that Kaneko had been

made a Viscount he addressed him in this letter by his old

title.

The last letter of the series was written on the stationery of the

Kansas City _Star_, of which Roosevelt was an associate editor with an

office in New York. The letter read:

New York, Aug. 21, 1918.

MY DEAR VISCOUNT KANEKO:

I thank you for your letter; and Mrs. Roosevelt was as much

touched by it as I was. Remember to give your son a letter to us

when he comes here to go to Harvard. One of our newspapers, the

Chicago _Tribune_, when the news was brought that Quentin was

dead and two of his brothers wounded, spoke of my four sons as

"American samurai." I was proud of the reference! As you say,

all of us who are born are doomed to die. No man is fit to live

who is afraid to die for a great cause. My sorrow for Quentin is

outweighed by my pride in him.

Faithfully your friend,

THEODORE ROOSEVELT.

The foregoing, written less than five months before Colonel Roosevelt's

death, was the last letter of the series shown me by Viscount Kaneko.

Reading it I was reminded of what Colonel Roosevelt said to me as he lay

on his bed in the hospital the last time I saw him.

Speaking of his four sons in the war he said:

"We have been an exceptionally united family. Come what may, we have

many absolutely satisfying years together to look back upon."

CHAPTER XIX

_Placidity and_ Sodans--_Talk and Tea--American Business

Methods_ versus _Japanese--The American Housekeeper in

Nippon--Japan's Problem-- Population and Food--The

Militarists--Land-Grabbing--Liberalism--Emigration--

Industrialism--Examples of Inefficiency--"Public

Futilities"--Comedies of the Telephone--The Cables_

Elsewhere I have said that the Japanese are generally hard workers;

wherefore it may seem paradoxical to add that they are also leisurely

workers. But the paradox is not so great as it would seem. The hours of

work are longer in Japan than in most other countries, but work is not

so vigorously pressed.

Without being in the least lazy, the Japanese take their time to

everything. With masters and servants, employers and workmen, it is much

the same. They appear placid. They hold _sodans_, conferring and

arranging matters with terrible precision. If you attempt to use the

telephone you are prepared for a long struggle and a long wait. The

clerks in the cable office act as if the cable had just been laid--as if

your cablegram were the first one they had ever been called upon to

send, and they didn't quite know how to handle it, or how much to

charge. Often they are unable to make change. Sometimes even the railway

ticket agents have no change. Business conferences are conducted over

successive cups of pale green tea, and I am told that it is customary to

begin them with talk on any topic other than the main one. In the

lexicon of Japanese trade and commerce there is no such word as

"snappy."

The hustling American business man who tries to rush things through

often arouses the Japanese business man's suspicion. What is he after?

Why is he in such a hurry? There must be something behind it all. It is

necessary to be particularly careful in dealing with such a man.

Negotiations drag and drag until the American, if he be of nervous

disposition, is driven nearly wild. And sometimes this results in his

making a bad bargain merely for the sake of getting through.

"I'm sorry I ever came to the Far East!" he will declare bitterly. "I

feel that I am getting nothing accomplished over here--nothing!" Then he

will tell you what is the trouble with the Japanese:

"They are used to playing only with white chips!"

The American housekeeper in Japan, if she knows what nerves are, may

have similar difficulties. Her Japanese servants will conduct her ménage

well enough if she lets them do it in their Japanese way, but if she

attempts to run her home as she would run it in the United States, she

is lost. It can't be done. I know of an American woman who could not get

a cook because her efforts to Americanize her household had given her a

bad reputation with the Cook's Guild. Another could get no sewing done,

for a like reason. For all the servants and working people have their

guilds, and news travels. Thus many an American housekeeper in Japan has

became a nervous wreck.

Yet on the other hand, numbers of American business men and their wives

enjoy Japanese life, and only come home when it is necessary to give

their children an American education. The men are successful and their

homes are comfortable and well run. But always you will find that they

are people of calm disposition: people having sufficient balance to

adjust themselves to the customs of the country.

The essential point seems to be that the Japanese view life in longer

perspective than we do. Where we see ourselves as individuals having

certain things to accomplish in a rather short life, they see themselves

as mere links in an endless family chain. We are conscious of our

parents and our children but they are conscious of ancestors, reaching

back to the mists of antiquity, and of a posterity destined to people

the nebulous vaults of the far-distant future.

But while, from a philosophical standpoint, this way of looking at life

may be quite as good as ours, or even better, still I believe it tends

to handicap the Japanese in meeting the urgent material problems by

which they are confronted. And though these problems are not so terrible

as those of war-racked Europe, they are, if measured by any other

standard, terrible enough.

Japan's fundamental problem--the one out of which grow all other

Japanese problems in which the world is interested--is, as I have said

before, that of great density of population coupled with an inadequate

supply of food and raw materials. Fifty years ago the population of

Japan proper was less than 33,000,000. To-day it is more than

57,000,000. There has been an increase in five decades of more than 75

per cent., but there has been no corresponding increase in the country's

arable land.

[Illustration: The film was not large enough to hold the family

of this youngish fisherman at Nabuto. Nine children! Fifty years

ago Japan had a population of 33,000,000. To-day it is nearing

60,000,000.]

In Japan itself there have been various theories as to how this problem

should be met. The militarists, who are still very powerful, have in the

past undoubtedly favoured what we have come lately to call the Prussian

system, the grabbing system: the system which has been followed in the

Far East not by Japan alone but by England, Russia, France, and

Germany--and by the United States (if in a form somewhat more moderate)

in the Hawaiian Islands, and the Philippines.

"If the others do it," the Japanese militarists have argued, "why

shouldn't we? Why shouldn't we, who need additional territory so much

more than they do, grab on the continent of Asia for land to which our

surplus population may be sent, and from which we may get food and raw

materials?"

To which the other nations answer: "Unfortunately for you, you came

along too late. The good old grabbing days are gone. The world is

radiant with a new international morality, and woe be unto those who

offend against it! Germany tried it--see what happened to her!"

Japan did see what happened to Germany and the lesson was not wasted on

her. Nor was the least striking part of the lesson contained in

America's exhibition of military might. And truth to tell, Japan needed

such a lesson; for her victories over China and Russia had put her

militarists in the ascendant, and had made them, and perhaps the bulk of

their countrymen also, over-confident, with the result that Japan

occasionally rattled the sabre in the Far East somewhat as Germany was

wont to do in Europe.

But although it cannot be denied that the Japanese militarists exhibited

undue aggressiveness in China and Siberia during the late war, and

although their actions since have not been altogether satisfactory to

the rest of the world, there is good reason to suppose that their

old-time dream of vast territorial aggrandizement has diminished, even

though it may not have entirely faded from the minds of some of them.

This new tendency toward moderation is due to the war's lesson and to

the marked growth of liberal and anti-militarist sentiment among the

Japanese people. The militarists, though they still control the

Government, are less aggressive than they used to be, both because the

Japanese public protests when too much aggressiveness is shown, and

because the more intelligent members of the militaristic group now

realize that if Japan were to bring on a great war she would inevitably

be ruined. So, while the power and aggressiveness of this dangerous

element slowly wane, the liberal element, led by some of the sanest and

ablest men in Japan, steadily gains strength.

The outcome of this struggle between the advocates of force and those of

fair dealing will, in my judgment, be determined largely by the course

pursued by other nations. If, as we all hope, a new order of things is

to grow out of the late war, then within a few years I believe we shall

see the liberal group running Japan. But if, on the contrary, the world

backslides, and the old selfish system is resumed, then the Japanese

militarists will say to the people: "Well, you see that we were right

after all!"

But however these matters may turn out, I do not believe that Japan will

ever fully settle her surplus population problem by means of emigration,

whether to annexed territory, or to other countries. The Japanese do not

like to leave home. There are only about 300,000 Japanese in China, for

example, and they have not colonized to nearly the extent they might

have in Siberia. If they do leave home they seek mild climates, but they

are now barred from colonizing in the United States, Canada, and

Australia and even when they settle in Mexico or South America one sees

protests in our press. Yet if Japan's population is to remain static

hundreds of thousands of her people must leave the islands every year.

All considered, it seems more than improbable that they will ever

emigrate in such a wholesale way.

By what means, then, is the problem to be solved?

Apparently the leaders of the small group that governs Japan came, some

years ago, to the conclusion that the best means for solving their

difficulties lay in turning Japan into an industrial country. They

determined to manufacture goods, export them, and with the proceeds pay

for imports of raw materials and food--in short, to adopt the plan which

England began to follow nearly a century ago, and which Belgium has also

followed. England's situation was in many respects like that of Japan,

for there were certain essential raw materials which she did not have

either at home or in her possessions; and like Japan she is unable to

feed herself. With Belgium the situation was even worse than with

England. Yet through industrializing themselves both countries have

prospered greatly. Is it not then logical to suppose that by following a

similar course Japan will likewise prosper? Recent statistics seem,

moreover, to indicate that with industrialization the birth-rate tends

to decline.

In attempting a great industrial programme Japan has two advantages: she

has abundant cheap labour and a short haul to the great markets of Asia.

Geographically we are her nearest competitor for Asiatic trade, yet we

have at the very least, four thousand miles farther to carry our goods.

Obviously this is an immense disadvantage to us, and we are further

handicapped by the high cost of our labour.

Having us at so great a disadvantage in the matter of commerce with

Asia, it would seem that Japan should have little difficulty in securing

for herself the lion's share of the Asiatic trade.

But it must not be supposed that Japan has as yet become sufficiently

industrialized to solve her problem. She must become a much greater

manufacturing and exporting nation than she now is. And in order to

accomplish that she must greatly improve in one particular: she must

master much more thoroughly than she has so far mastered them, the

horrid arts of "efficiency."

I do not mean to imply that the Japanese are never efficient, but only

that they are not always so efficient as they ought to be, and as they

must become. I am aware, now, that I expected too much of them in this

particular. Reports of their astonishing military efficiency at the time

of their war with Russia, caused me to think of them almost as supermen.

And they are not that. Nor is any other race.