KUMAMOTO, January, 1893.
DEAR NISHIDA,--Your charming letter has just come, full of news and
things to be grateful for. There is some news here too. Mr. Kano is
gone! We are all very, very sorry....
Perhaps I might go to Niigata during the summer. Setsu is always,
always, always talking about Tōkyō. I suppose I shall have to
take her there. And I want to visit Kompira, and Zenkōji in Nagano
(?)--where all the Souls of the Dead go,--and one might do all that
and see Niigata too. I am very anxious to see the dear kind Governor
and his daughter again. That kind of Governor is rare, and I think
will soon cease to exist in Japan. He always seemed to me a delightful
type of the old days,--like the princes of the _ehon_: the modernized
Governor scarcely seems to belong to the same race. And the Japanese of
the next generation will not be kind and open-hearted and unselfish, I
fear: they will become hard of character like the Western people,--more
intellectual and less moral. For old Japan, in unselfishness, was as far
in advance of the West as she was materially behind it.
[Illustration: THE SHINTŌ TEMPLE OF KIZUKI]
The curling-up of the toe in the statue of Inada-Hime is not according
to the canons of Western sculpture (which is still generally governed by
the Greek spirit),--because it shows the member in what is considered an
ungraceful position. But I thought after looking awhile at it, that it
was really natural. Not natural from the standpoint of a modern people
whose toes have lost both symmetry and flexibility owing to the wearing
of leather shoes; but natural among a people whose feet are well shaped
and whose toes remain supple, and to some degree, prehensile. Among
tropical races the toes retain extraordinary flexibility; but I don't
think any English girl could put her great-toe into the attitude taken
by that of Inada-Hime. I imagined that this movement represented in the
statue a little nervous feeling,--the involuntary shrinking of a woman
from sharp cold steel. But that is only a guess. What it really means I
should like to know.
I forgot in another letter to tell you that Herbert Spencer, in one
of his recent volumes ("Individual Life") severely criticized some of
the Mombushō Readers and other publications as immoral,--because
appealing to the desire of revenge and the passion of hatred and
bloodshed.... One thing is certain, that Readers for Japanese students
ought to be edited in Japan, and edited in a particular manner
with especial reference to national character and feeling. I prize
the Mombushō Readers, because I learn so much from them; but as
text-books they are not well written, and they do not appeal to the
student's natural love of novelty. It is hopeless to interest boys in
stories they know already by heart in their own language. They want what
is new and strange and beautiful.--But no thanks will ever be given
to the man who tries to do the work well; and his work itself will
almost certainly be spoiled by the emendations and interpolations of a
committee of men without knowledge or taste,--unless the thing should be
done quite independently of officialdom.
I am trying to teach Setsu English by a fast memory-system. I can't tell
whether I will succeed or not: if I find it strains her too much I must
stop,--for the system is exhausting. In the course of teaching I notice
something of what you tell me about Izumo pronunciation. It makes the
difficulty much greater.