CHAPTER XXXIII

A GENEROUS HUSBAND

Displaying many affectations, M. Sucre dips the tip of his delicate

paint-brush in India-ink and traces a pair of charming storks on a pretty

sheet of rice-paper, offering them to me in the most courteous manner, as

a souvenir of himself. I have put them in my cabin on board, and when I

look at them, I fancy I can see M. Sucre tracing them with an airy touch

and with elegant facility.

The saucer in which he mixes his ink is in itself a little gem. It is

chiselled out of a piece of jade, and represents a tiny lake with a

carved border imitating rockwork. On this border is a little mamma toad,

also in jade, advancing as if to bathe in the little lake in which M.

Sucre carefully keeps a few drops of very dark liquid. The mamma toad has

four little baby toads, in jade, one perched on her head, the other three

playing about under her.

M. Sucre has painted many a stork in the course of his lifetime, and he

really excels in reproducing groups and duets, if one may so express it,

of this bird. Few Japanese possess the art of interpreting this subject

in a manner at once so rapid and so tasteful; first he draws the two

beaks, then the four claws, then the backs, the feathers, dash, dash,

dash--with a dozen strokes of his clever brush, held in his daintily

posed hand, it is done, and always perfectly well done!

M. Kangourou relates, without seeing anything wrong in it whatever, that

formerly this talent was of great service to M. Sucre. It appears that

Madame Prune--how shall I say such a thing, and, who could guess it now,

on beholding so devout and sedate an old lady, with eyebrows so

scrupulously shaven?--however, it appears that Madame Prune used to

receive a great many visits from gentlemen--gentlemen who always came

alone--which led to some gossip. Therefore, when Madame Prune was engaged

with one visitor, if a new arrival made his appearance, the ingenious

husband, to induce him to wait patiently, and to wile away the time in

the anteroom, immediately offered to paint him some storks in a variety

of attitudes.

And this is why, in Nagasaki, all the Japanese gentlemen of a certain age

have in their collections two or three of these little pictures, for

which they are indebted to the delicate and original talent of M. Sucre!

ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:

Ah! the natural perversity of inanimate things

Found nothing that answered to my indefinable expectations

Habit turns into a makeshift of attachment

I know not what lost home that I have failed to find

When the inattentive spirits are not listening

MADAME CHRYSANTHEME

By PIERRE LOTI

BOOK 3.

CHAPTER XXXIV

THE FEAST OF THE TEMPLE

Sunday, August 25th.

About six o'clock, while I was on duty, the 'Triomphante' abandoned her

prison walls between the mountains and came out of dock. After much

manoeuvring we took up our old moorings in the harbor, at the foot of the

Diou-djen-dji hills. The weather was again calm and cloudless, the sky

presenting a peculiar clarity, as if it had been swept by a cyclone, an

exceeding transparency bringing out the minutest details in the distance

till then unseen; as if the terrible blast had blown away every vestige

of the floating mists and left behind it nothing but void and boundless

space. The coloring of woods and mountains stood out again in the

resplendent verdancy of spring after the torrents of rain, like the wet

colors of some freshly washed painting. The sampans and junks, which for

the last three days had been lying under shelter, had now put out to sea,

and the bay was covered with their white sails, which looked like a

flight of enormous seabirds.

At eight o'clock, at nightfall, our manoeuvres having ended, I embarked

with Yves on board a sampan; this time it is he who is carrying me off

and taking me back to my home.

On land, a delicious perfume of new-mown hay greets us, and the road

across the mountains is bathed in glorious moonlight. We go straight up

to Diou-djen-dji to join Chrysantheme; I feel almost remorseful, although

I hardly show it, for my neglect of her.

Looking up, I recognize from afar my little house, perched on high. It is

wide open and lighted; I even hear the sound of a guitar. Then I perceive

the gilt head of my Buddha between the little bright flames of its two

hanging night-lamps. Now Chrysantheme appears on the veranda, looking out

as if she expected us; and with her wonderful bows of hair and long,

falling sleeves, her silhouette is thoroughly Nipponese.

As I enter, she comes forward to kiss me, in a graceful, though rather

hesitating manner, while Oyouki, more demonstrative, throws her arms

around me.

Not without a certain pleasure do I see once more this Japanese home,

which I wonder to find still mine when I had almost forgotten its

existence. Chrysantheme has put fresh flowers in our vases, spread out

her hair, donned her best clothes, and lighted our lamps to honor my

return. From the balcony she had watched the 'Triomphante' leave the

dock, and, in the expectation of our prompt return, she had made her

preparations; then, to wile away the time, she was studying a duet on the

guitar with Oyouki. Not a question did she ask, nor a reproach did she

make. Quite the contrary.

"We understood," she said, "how impossible it was, in such dreadful

weather, to undertake so lengthy a crossing in a sampan."

She smiled like a pleased child, and I should be fastidious indeed if I

did not admit that to-night she is charming.

I announce my intention of taking a long stroll through Nagasaki; we will

take Oyouki-San and two little cousins who happen to be here, as well as

some other neighbors, if they wish it; we will buy the most amusing toys,

eat all sorts of cakes, and entertain ourselves to our hearts' content.

"How lucky we are to be here, just at the right moment," they exclaim,

jumping with joy. "How fortunate we are! This very evening there is to be

a pilgrimage to the great temple of the jumping Tortoise! The whole town

will be there; all our married friends have already started, the whole

set, X----, Y----, Z----, Touki-San, Campanule, and Jonquille, with 'the

friend of amazing height.' And these two, poor Chrysantheme and poor

Oyouki, would have been obliged to stay at home with heavy hearts, had we

not arrived, because Madame Prune had been seized with faintness and

hysterics after her dinner."

Quickly the mousmes must deck themselves out. Chrysantheme is ready;

Oyouki hurries, changes her dress, and, putting on a mouse-colored gray

robe, begs me to arrange the bows of her fine sash-black satin lined with

yellow-sticking at the same time in her hair a silver topknot. We light

our lanterns, swinging at the end of little sticks; M. Sucre,

overwhelming us with thanks for his daughter, accompanies us on all fours

to the door, and we go off gayly through the clear and balmy night.

Below, we find the town in all the animation of a great holiday. The

streets are thronged; the crowd passes by--a laughing, capricious, slow,

unequal tide, flowing onward, however, steadily in the same direction,

toward the same goal. From it rises a penetrating but light murmur, in

which dominate the sounds of laughter, and the low-toned interchange of

polite speeches. Then follow lanterns upon lanterns. Never in my life

have I seen so many, so variegated, so complicated, and so extraordinary.

We follow, drifting with the surging crowd, borne along by it. There are

groups of women of every age, decked out in their smartest clothes,

crowds of mousmes with aigrettes of flowers in their hair, or little

silver topknots like Oyouki--pretty little physiognomies, little, narrow

eyes peeping between their slits like those of new-born kittens, fat,

pale, little cheeks, round, puffed-out, half-opened lips. They are

pretty, nevertheless, these little Nipponese, in their smiles and

childishness.

The men, on the other hand, wear many a pot-hat, pompously added to the

long national robe, and giving thereby a finishing touch to their

cheerful ugliness, resembling nothing so much as dancing monkeys. They

carry boughs in their hands, whole shrubs even, amid the foliage of which

dangle all sorts of curious lanterns in the shapes of imps and birds.

As we advance in the direction of the temple, the streets become more

noisy and crowded. All along the houses are endless stalls raised on

trestles, displaying sweetmeats of every color, toys, branches of

flowers, nosegays and masks. There are masks everywhere, boxes full of

them, carts full of them; the most popular being the one that represents

the livid and cunning muzzle, contracted as by a deathlike grimace, the

long straight ears and sharp-pointed teeth of the white fox, sacred to

the God of Rice. There are also others symbolic of gods or monsters,

livid, grimacing, convulsed, with wigs and beards of natural hair. All

manner of folk, even children, purchase these horrors, and fasten them

over their faces. Every sort of instrument is for sale, among them many

of those crystal trumpets which sound so strangely--this evening they are

enormous, six feet long at least--and the noise they make is unlike

anything ever heard before: one would say gigantic turkeys were gobbling

amid the crowd, striving to inspire fear.

In the religious amusements of this people it is not possible for us to

penetrate the mysteriously hidden meaning of things; we can not divine

the boundary at which jesting stops and mystic fear steps in. These

customs, these symbols, these masks, all that tradition and atavism have

jumbled together in the Japanese brain, proceed from sources utterly dark

and unknown to us; even the oldest records fail to explain them to us in

anything but a superficial and cursory manner, simply because we have

absolutely nothing in common with this people. We pass through the midst

of their mirth and their laughter without understanding the wherefore, so

totally do they differ from our own.

Chrysantheme with Yves, Oyouki with me, Fraise and Zinnia, our cousins,

walking before us under our watchful eyes, move slowly through the crowd,

holding hands lest we should lose one another.

Along the streets leading to the temple, the wealthy inhabitants have

decorated the fronts of their houses with vases and nosegays. The

peculiar shed-like buildings common in this country, with their open

platform frontage, are particularly well suited for the display of choice

objects; all the houses have been thrown open, and the interiors are hung

with draperies that hide the back of the apartments. In front of these

hangings, and standing slightly back from the movement of the passing

crowd, the various exhibited articles are placed methodically in a row,

under the full glare of hanging lamps. Hardly any flowers compose the

nosegays, nothing but foliage--some rare and priceless, others chosen, as

if purposely, from the commonest plants, arranged, however, with such

taste as to make them appear new and choice; ordinary lettuce-leaves,

tall cabbage-stalks are placed with exquisite artificial taste in vessels

of marvellous workmanship. All the vases are of bronze, but the designs

are varied according to each changing fancy: some complicated and

twisted, others, and by far the larger number, graceful and simple, but

of a simplicity so studied and exquisite that to our eyes they seem the

revelation of an unknown art, the subversion of all acquired notions of

form.

On turning a corner of a street, by good luck we meet our married

comrades of the Triomphante and Jonquille, Toukisan and Campanule! Bows

and curtseys are exchanged by the mousmes, reciprocal manifestations of

joy at meeting; then, forming a compact band, we are carried off by the

ever-increasing crowd and continue our progress in the direction of the

temple.

The streets gradually ascend (the temples are always built on a height);

and by degrees, as we mount, there is added to the brilliant fairyland of

lanterns and costumes yet another, ethereally blue in the haze of

distance; all Nagasaki, its pagodas, its mountains, its still waters full

of the rays of moonlight, seem to rise with us into the air. Slowly, step

by step, one may say it springs up around, enveloping in one great

shimmering veil all the foreground, with its dazzling red lights and

many-colored streamers.

No doubt we are drawing near, for here are steps, porticoes and monsters

hewn out of enormous blocks of granite. We now have to climb a series of

steps, almost carried by the surging crowd ascending with us.

We have arrived at the temple courtyard.

This is the last and most astonishing scene in the evening's

fairy-tale--a luminous and weird scene, with fantastic distances lighted

up by the moon, with the gigantic trees, the sacred cryptomerias,

elevating their sombre boughs into a vast dome.

Here we are all seated with our mousmes, beneath the light awning,

wreathed in flowers, of one of the many little teahouses improvised in

this courtyard. We are on a terrace at the top of the great steps, up

which the crowd continues to flock, and at the foot of a portico which

stands erect with the rigid massiveness of a colossus against the dark

night sky; at the foot also of a monster, who stares down upon us, with

his big stony eyes, his cruel grimace and smile.

This portico and the monster are the two great overwhelming masses in the

foreground of the incredible scene before us; they stand out with

dazzling boldness against the vague and ashy blue of the distant sphere

beyond; behind them, Nagasaki is spread out in a bird's-eye view, faintly

outlined in the transparent darkness with myriads of little colored

lights, and the extravagantly dented profile of the mountains is

delineated on the starlit sky, blue upon blue, transparency upon

transparency. A corner of the harbor also is visible, far up, undefined,

like a lake lost in clouds the water, faintly illumined by a ray of

moonlight, making it shine like a sheet of silver.

Around us the long crystal trumpets keep up their gobble. Groups of

polite and frivolous persons pass and repass like fantastic shadows:

childish bands of small-eyed mousmes with smile so candidly meaningless

and coiffures shining through their bright silver flowers; ugly men

waving at the end of long branches their eternal lanterns shaped like

birds, gods, or insects.

Behind us, in the illuminated and wide-open temple, the bonzes sit,

immovable embodiments of doctrine, in the glittering sanctuary inhabited

by divinities, chimeras, and symbols. The crowd, monotonously droning its

mingled prayers and laughter, presses around them, sowing its alms

broadcast; with a continuous jingle, the money rolls on the ground into

the precincts reserved to the priests, where the white mats entirely f

disappear under the mass of many-sized coins accumulated there as if

after a deluge of silver and bronze.

We, however, feel thoroughly at sea in the midst of this festivity; we

look on, we laugh like the rest, we make foolish and senseless remarks in

a language insufficiently learned, which this evening, I know not why, we

can hardly understand. Notwithstanding the night breeze, we find it very

hot under our awning, and we absorb quantities of odd-looking water-ices,

served in cups, which taste like scented frost, or rather like flowers

steeped in snow. Our mousmes order for themselves great bowls of candied

beans mixed with hail--real hailstones, such as we might pick up after a

hailstorm in March.

Glou! glou! glou! the crystal trumpets slowly repeat their notes, the

powerful sonority of which has a labored and smothered sound, as if they

came from under water; they mingle with the jingling of rattles and the

noise of castanets. We have also the impression of being carried away in

the irresistible swing of this incomprehensible gayety, composed, in

proportions we can hardly measure, of elements mystic, puerile, and even

ghastly. A sort of religious terror is diffused by the hidden idols

divined in the temple behind us; by the mumbled prayers, confusedly

heard; above all, by the horrible heads in lacquered wood, representing

foxes, which, as they pass, hide human faces--hideous livid masks.

In the gardens and outbuildings of the temple the most inconceivable

mountebanks have taken up their quarters, their black streamers, painted

with white letters, looking like funeral trappings as they float in the

wind from the tops of their tall flagstaffs. Thither we turn our steps,

as soon as our mousmes have ended their orisons and bestowed their alms.

In one of the booths a man, stretched on a table, flat on his back, is

alone on the stage; puppets of almost human size, with horribly grinning

masks, spring out of his body; they speak, gesticulate, then fall back

like empty rags; with a sudden spring they start up again, change their

costumes, change their faces, tearing about in one continual frenzy.

Suddenly three, even four, appear at the same time; they are nothing more

than the four limbs of the outstretched man, whose legs and arms, raised

on high, are each dressed up and capped with a wig under which peers a

mask; between these phantoms tremendous fighting and battling take place,

and many a sword-thrust is exchanged. The most fearful of all is a

certain puppet representing an old hag; every time she appears, with her

weird head and ghastly grin, the lights burn low, the music of the

accompanying orchestra moans forth a sinister strain given by the flutes,

mingled with a rattling tremolo which sounds like the clatter of bones.

This creature evidently plays an ugly part in the piece--that of a

horrible old ghoul, spiteful and famished. Still more appalling than her

person is her shadow, which, projected upon a white screen, is abnormally

and vividly distinct; by means of some unknown process this shadow, which

nevertheless follows all her movements, assumes the aspect of a wolf. At

a given moment the hag turns round and presents the profile of her

distorted snub nose as she accepts the bowl of rice which is offered to

her; on the screen at the very same instant appears the elongated outline

of the wolf, with its pointed ears, its muzzle and chops, its great teeth

and hanging tongue. The orchestra grinds, wails, quivers; then suddenly

bursts out into funereal shrieks, like a concert of owls; the hag is now

eating, and her wolfish shadow is eating also, greedily moving its jaws

and nibbling at another shadow easy to recognize--the arm of a little

child.

We now go on to see the great salamander of Japan, an animal rare in this

country, and quite unknown elsewhere, a great, cold mass, sluggish and

benumbed, looking like some antediluvian experiment, forgotten in the

inner seas of this archipelago.

Next comes the trained elephant, the terror of our mousmes, the

equilibrists, the menagerie.

It is one o'clock in the morning before we are back at Diou-djen-dji.

We first get Yves to bed in the little paper room he has already once

occupied. Then we go to bed ourselves, after the inevitable preparations,

the smoking of the little pipe, and the tap! tap! tap! tap! on the edge

of the box.

Suddenly Yves begins to move restlessly in his sleep, to toss about,

giving great kicks on the wall, and making a frightful noise.

What can be the matter? I imagine at once that he must be dreaming of the

old hag and her wolfish shadow. Chrysantheme raises herself on her elbow

and listens, with astonishment depicted on her face.

Ah, happy thought! she has guessed what is tormenting him:

"Ka!" ("mosquitoes") she says.

And, to impress the more forcibly her meaning on my mind, she pinches my

arm so hard with her little pointed nails, at the same time imitating,

with such an amusing play of her features, the grimace of a person who is

stung, that I exclaim:

"Oh! stop, Chrysantheme, this pantomime is too expressive, and indeed

useless! I know the word 'Ka', and had quite understood, I assure you."

It is done so drolly and so quickly, with such a pretty pout, that in

truth I can not think of being angry, although I shall certainly have

tomorrow a blue mark on my arm; about that there is no doubt.

"Come, we must get up and go to Yves's rescue; he must not be allowed to

go on thumping in that manner. Let us take a lantern, and see what has

happened."

It was indeed the mosquitoes. They are hovering in a thick cloud about

him; those of the house and those of the garden all seem collected

together, swarming and buzzing. Chrysantheme indignantly burns several at

the flame of her lantern, and shows me others (Hou!) covering the white

paper walls.

He, tired out with his day's amusement, sleeps on; but his slumbers are

restless, as may be easily imagined. Chrysantheme gives him a shake,

wishing him to get up and share our blue mosquito-net.

After a little pressing he does as he is bid and follows us, looking like

an overgrown boy only half awake. I make no objection to this singular

hospitality; after all, it looks so little like a bed, the matting we are

to share, and we sleep in our clothes, as we always do, according to the

Nipponese fashion. After all, on a journey in a railway, do not the most

estimable ladies stretch themselves without demur by the side of

gentlemen unknown to them?

I have, however, placed Chrysantheme's little wooden block in the centre

of the gauze tent, between our two pillows.

Without saying a word, in a dignified manner, as if she were rectifying

an error of etiquette that I had inadvertently committed, Chrysantheme

takes up her piece of wood, putting in its place my snake-skin drum; I

shall therefore be in the middle between the two. It is really more

correct, decidedly more proper; Chrysantheme is evidently a very decorous

young person.

Returning on board next morning, in the clear morning sun, we walk

through pathways full of dew, accompanied by a band of funny little

mousmes of six or eight years of age, who are going to school.

Needless to say, the cicalas around us keep up their perpetual sonorous

chirping. The mountain smells delicious. The atmosphere, the dawning day,

the infantine grace of these little girls in their long frocks and shiny

coiffures-all is redundant with freshness and youth. The flowers and

grasses on which we tread sparkle with dewdrops, exhaling a perfume of

freshness. What undying beauty there is, even in Japan, in the fresh

morning hours in the country, and the dawning hours of life!

Besides, I am quite ready to admit the attractiveness of the little

Japanese children; some of them are most fascinating. But how is it that

their charm vanishes so rapidly and is so quickly replaced by the elderly

grimace, the smiling ugliness, the monkeyish face?

CHAPTER XXXV

THROUGH A MICROSCOPE

The small garden of my mother-in-law, Madame Renoncule, is, without

exception, one of the most melancholy spots I have seen in all my travels

through the world.

Oh, the slow, enervating, dull hours spent in idle and diffuse

conversation on the dimly lighted veranda! Oh, the detestable peppered

jam in the tiny pots! In the middle of the town, enclosed by four walls,

is this park of five yards square, with little lakes, little mountains,

and little rocks, where all wears an antiquated appearance, and

everything is covered with a greenish mold from want of sunlight.

Nevertheless, a true feeling for nature has inspired this tiny

representation of a wild spot. The rocks are well placed, the dwarf

cedars, no taller than cabbages, stretch their gnarled boughs over the

valleys in the attitude of giants wearied by the weight of centuries; and

their look of full-grown trees perplexes one and falsifies the

perspective. When from the dark recesses of the apartment one perceives

at a certain distance this diminutive landscape dimly lighted, the wonder

is whether it is all artificial, or whether one is not one's self the

victim of some morbid illusion; and whether it is not indeed a real

country view seen through a distorted vision out of focus, or through the

wrong end of a telescope.

To any one familiar with Japanese life, my mother-in-law's house in

itself reveals a refined nature--complete bareness, two or three screens

placed here and there, a teapot, a vase full of lotus-flowers, and

nothing more. Woodwork devoid of paint or varnish, but carved in most

elaborate and capricious openwork, the whiteness of the pinewood being

preserved by constant scrubbing with soap and water. The posts and beams

of the framework are varied by the most fanciful taste: some are cut in

precise geometrical forms; others are artificially twisted, imitating

trunks of old trees covered with tropical creepers. Everywhere are little

hiding-places, little nooks, little closets concealed in the most

ingenious and unexpected manner under the immaculate uniformity of the

white paper panels.

I can not help smiling when I think of some of the so-called "Japanese"

drawing-rooms of our Parisian fine ladies, overcrowded with knickknacks

and curios and hung with coarse gold embroideries on exported satins. I

would advise those persons to come and look at the houses of people of

taste out here; to visit the white solitudes of the palaces at Yeddo. In

France we have works of art in order to enjoy them; here they possess

them merely to ticket them and lock them up carefully in a kind of

mysterious underground room called a 'godoun', shut in by iron gratings.

On rare occasions, only to honor some visitor of distinction, do they

open this impenetrable depositary. The true Japanese manner of

understanding luxury consists in a scrupulous and indeed almost excessive

cleanliness, white mats and white woodwork; an appearance of extreme

simplicity, and an incredible nicety in the most infinitesimal details.

My mother-in-law seems to be really a very good woman, and were it not

for the insurmountable feeling of spleen the sight of her garden produces

on me, I should often go to see her. She has nothing in common with the

mammas of Jonquille, Campanule, or Touki she is vastly their superior;

and then I can see that she has been very good-looking and fashionable.

Her past life puzzles me; but, in my position as a son-in-law, good

manners prevent my making further inquiries.

Some assert that she was formerly a celebrated geisha in Yeddo, who lost

public favor by her folly in becoming a mother. This would account for

her daughter's talent on the guitar; she had probably herself taught her

the touch and style of the Conservatory.

Since the birth of Chrysantheme (her eldest child and first cause of this

loss of favor), my mother-in-law, an expansive although distinguished

nature, has fallen seven times into the same fatal error, and I have two

little sisters-in-law: Mademoiselle La Neige,--[Oyouki-San]--and

Mademoiselle La Lune,--[Tsouki-San.]--as well as five little

brothers-in-law: Cerisier, Pigeon, Liseron, Or, and Bambou.

Little Bambou is four years old--a yellow baby, fat and round all over,

with fine bright eyes; coaxing and jolly, sleeping whenever he is not

laughing. Of all my Nipponese family, Bambou is the one I love the most.

CHAPTER XXXVI

MY NAUGHTY DOLL

Tuesday, August 27th.

During this whole day we--Yves, Chrysantheme, Oyouki and myself--have

spent the time wandering through dark and dusty nooks, dragged hither and

thither by four quick-footed djins, in search of antiquities in the

bric-a-brac shops.

Toward sunset, Chrysantheme, who has wearied me more than ever since

morning, and who doubtless has perceived it, pulls a very long face,

declares herself ill, and begs leave to spend the night with her mother,

Madame Renoncule.

I agree to this with the best grace in the world; let her go, tiresome

little mousme! Oyouki will carry a message to her parents, who will shut

up our rooms; we shall spend the evening, Yves and I, in roaming about as

fancy takes us, without any mousme dragging at our heels, and shall

afterward regain our own quarters on board the 'Triomphante', without

having the trouble of climbing up that hill.

First of all, we make an attempt to dine together in some fashionable

tea-house. Impossible! not a place is to be had; all the absurd paper

rooms, all the compartments contrived by so many ingenious tricks of

slipping and sliding panels, all the nooks and corners in the little

gardens are filled with Japanese men and women eating impossible and

incredible little dishes. Numberless young dandies are dining tete-a-tete

with the ladies of their choice, and sounds of dancing-girls and music

issue from the private rooms.

The fact is, to-day is the third and last day of the great pilgrimage to

the temple of the jumping Tortoise, of which we saw the beginning

yesterday; and all Nagasaki is at this time given over to amusement.

At the tea-house of the Indescribable Butterflies, which is also full to

overflowing, but where we are well known, they have had the bright idea

of throwing a temporary flooring over the little lake--the pond where the

goldfish live--and our meal is served here, in the pleasant freshness of

the fountain which continues its murmur under our feet.

After dinner, we follow the faithful and ascend again to the temple.

Up there we find the same elfin revelry, the same masks, the same music.

We seat ourselves, as before, under a gauze tent and sip odd little

drinks tasting of flowers. But this evening we are alone, and the absence

of the band of mousmes, whose familiar little faces formed a bond of

union between this holiday-making people and ourselves, separates and

isolates us more than usual from the profusion of oddities in the midst

of which we seem to be lost. Beneath us lies always the immense blue

background: Nagasaki illumined by moonlight, and the expanse of silvered,

glittering water, which seems like a vaporous vision suspended in

mid-air. Behind us is the great open temple, where the bonzes officiate,

to the accompaniment of sacred bells and wooden clappers-looking, from

where we sit, more like puppets than anything else, some squatting in

rows like peaceful mummies, others executing rhythmical marches before

the golden background where stand the gods. We do not laugh to-night, and

speak but little, more forcibly struck by the scene than we were on the

first night; we only look on, trying to understand. Suddenly, Yves,

turning round, says:

"Hullo! brother, there is your mousme!"

Actually, there she is, behind him; Chrysantheme, almost on all fours,

hidden between the paws of a great granite beast, half tiger, half dog,

against which our fragile tent is leaning.

"She pulled my trousers with her nails, for all the world like a little

cat," said Yves, still full of surprise, "positively like a cat!"

She remains bent double in the most humble form of salutation; she smiles

timidly, afraid of being ill received, and the head of my little

brother-in-law, Bambou, appears smiling too, just above her own. She has

brought this little mousko--[Mousko is the masculine of mousme, and

signifies little boy. Excessive politeness makes it mousko-san (Mr.

little boy).]--with her, perched astride her back; he looks as absurd as

ever, with his shaven head, his long frock and the great bows of his

silken sash. There they stand gazing at us, anxious to know how their

joke will be taken.

For my part, I have not the least idea of giving them a cold reception;

on the contrary, the meeting amuses me. It even strikes me that it is

rather pretty of Chrysantheme to come around in this way, and to bring

Bambou-San to the festival; though it savors somewhat of her low

breeding, to tell the truth, to carry him on her back, as the poorer

Japanese women carry their little ones.

However, let her sit down between Yves and myself and let them bring her

those iced beans she loves so much; and we will take the jolly little

mousko on our knees and cram him with sugar and sweetmeats to his heart's

content.

When the evening is over, and we begin to think of leaving, and of going

down again, Chrysantheme replaces her little Bambou astride upon her

back, and sets forth, bending forward under his weight and painfully

dragging her Cinderella slippers over the granite steps and flagstones.

Yes, decidedly low, this conduct! but low in the best sense of the word:

nothing in it displeases me; I even consider Chrysantheme's affection for

Bambou-San engaging and attractive in its simplicity.

One can not deny this merit to the Japanese--a great love for little

children, and a talent for amusing them, for making them laugh, inventing

comical toys for them, making the morning of their life happy; for a

specialty in dressing them, arranging their heads, and giving to the

whole personage the most fascinating appearance possible. It is the only

thing I really like about this country: the babies and the manner in

which they are understood.

On our way we meet our married friends of the Triomphante, who, much

surprised at seeing me with this mousko, jokingly exclaim:

"What! a son already?"

Down in the town, we make a point of bidding goodby to Chrysantheme at

the turning of the street where her mother lives. She smiles, undecided,

declares herself well again, and begs to return to our house on the

heights. This did not precisely enter into my plans, I confess. However,

it would look very ungracious to refuse.

So be it! But we must carry the mousko home to his mamma, and then begin,

by the flickering light of a new lantern bought from Madame Tres-Propre,

our weary homeward ascent.

Here, however, we find ourselves in another predicament: this ridiculous

little Bambou insists upon coming with us! No, he will take no denial, we

must take him with us. This is out of all reason, quite impossible!

However, it will not do to make him cry, on the night of a great festival

too, poor little mousko! So we must send a message to Madame Renoncule,

that she may not be uneasy about him, and as there will soon not be a

living creature on the footpaths of Diou-djen-dji to laugh at us, we will

take it in turn, Yves and I, to carry him on our backs, all the way up

that climb in the darkness.

And here am I, who did not wish to return this way tonight, dragging a

mousme by the hand, and actually carrying an extra burden in the shape of

a mousko on my back. What an irony of fate!

As I had expected, all our shutters and doors are closed, bolted, and

barred; no one expects us, and we have to make a prodigious noise at the

door. Chrysantheme sets to work and calls with all her might:

"Hou Oume-San-an-an-an!" (In English: "Hi! Madame Pru-u-uu-une!")

These intonations in her little voice are unknown to me; her long-drawn

call in the echoing darkness of midnight has so strange an accent,

something so unexpected and wild, that it impresses me with a dismal

feeling of far-off exile.

At last Madame Prune appears to open the door to us, only half awake and

much astonished; by way of a nightcap she wears a monstrous cotton

turban, on the blue ground of which a few white storks are playfully

disporting themselves. Holding in the tips of her fingers, with an

affectation of graceful fright, the long stalk of her beflowered lantern,

she gazes intently into our faces, one after another, to reassure herself

of our identity; but the poor old lady can not get over her surprise at

the sight of the mousko I am carrying.

CHAPTER XXXVII

COMPLICATIONS

At first it was only to Chrysantheme's guitar that I listened with

pleasure now I am beginning to like her singing also.

She has nothing of the theatrical, or the deep, assumed voice of the

virtuoso; on the contrary, her notes, always very high, are soft, thin,

and plaintive.

She often teaches Oyouki some romance, slow and dreamy, which she has

composed, or which comes back to her mind. Then they both astonish me,

for on their well-tuned guitars they will pick out accompaniments in

parts, and try again each time that the chords are not perfectly true to

their ear, without ever losing themselves in the confusion of these

dissonant harmonies, always weird and always melancholy.

Usually, while their music is going on, I am writing on the veranda, with

the superb panorama before me. I write, seated on a mat on the floor and

leaning upon a little Japanese desk, ornamented with swallows in relief;

my ink is Chinese, my inkstand, just like that of my landlord, is in

jade, with dear little frogs and toads carved on the rim. In short, I am

writing my memoirs,--exactly as M. Sucre does downstairs! Occasionally I

fancy I resemble him--a very disagreeable fancy.

My memoirs are composed of incongruous details, minute observations of

colors, shapes, scents, and sounds.

It is true that a complete imbroglio, worthy of a romance, seems ever

threatening to appear upon my monotonous horizon; a regular intrigue

seems ever ready to explode in the midst of this little world of mousmes

and grasshoppers: Chrysantheme in love with Yves; Yves with Chrysantheme;

Oyouki with me; I with no one. We might even find here, ready to hand,

the elements of a fratricidal drama, were we in any other country than

Japan; but we are in Japan, and under the narrowing and dwarfing

influence of the surroundings, which turn everything into ridicule,

nothing will come of it all.

CHAPTER XXXVIII

THE HEIGHT OF SOCIABILITY!

In this fine town of Nagasaki, about five or six o'clock in the evening,

one hour of the day is more comical than any other. At that moment every

human being is naked: children, young people, old people, old men, old

women--every one is seated in a tub of some sort, taking a bath. This

ceremony takes place no matter where, without the slightest screen, in

the gardens, the courtyards, in the shops, even upon the thresholds, in

order to give greater facility for conversation among the neighbors from

one side of the street to the other. In this situation visitors are

received; and the bather, without any hesitation, leaves his tub, holding

in his hand his little towel (invariably blue), to offer the caller a

seat, and to exchange with him some polite remarks. Nevertheless, neither

the mousmes nor the old ladies gain anything by appearing in this

primeval costume. A Japanese woman, deprived of her long robe and her

huge sash with its pretentious bows, is nothing but a diminutive yellow

being, with crooked legs and flat, unshapely bust; she has no longer a

remnant of her little artificial charms, which have completely

disappeared in company with her costume.

There is yet another hour, at once joyous and melancholy, a little later,

when twilight falls, when the sky seems one vast veil of yellow, against

which stand the clear-cut outlines of jagged mountains and lofty,

fantastic pagodas. It is the hour at which, in the labyrinth of little

gray streets below, the sacred lamps begin to twinkle in the ever-open

houses, in front of the ancestor's altars and the familiar Buddhas;

while, outside, darkness creeps over all, and the thousand and one

indentations and peaks of the old roofs are depicted, as if in black

festoons, on the clear golden sky. At this moment, over merry, laughing

Japan, suddenly passes a sombre shadow, strange, weird, a breath of

antiquity, of savagery, of something indefinable, which casts a gloom of

sadness. And then the only gayety that remains is the gayety of the young

children, of little mouskos and little mousmes, who spread themselves

like a wave through the streets filled with shadow, as they swarm from

schools and workshops. On the dark background of all these wooden

buildings, the little blue and scarlet dresses stand out in startling

contrast,--drolly bedizened, drolly draped; and the fine loops of the

sashes, the flowers, the silver or gold topknots stuck in these baby

chignons, add to the vivid effect.

They amuse themselves, they chase one another, their great pagoda sleeves

fly wide open, and these tiny little mousmes of ten, of five years old,

or even younger still, have lofty head-dresses and imposing bows of hair

arranged on their little heads, like grown-up women. Oh! what loves of

supremely absurd dolls at this hour of twilight gambol through the

streets, in their long frocks, blowing their crystal trumpets, or running

with all their might to start their fanciful kites. This juvenile world

of Japan--ludicrous by birth, and fated to become more so as the years

roll on--starts in life with singular amusements, with strange cries and

shouts; its playthings are somewhat ghastly, and would frighten the

children of other countries; even the kites have great squinting eyes and

vampire shapes.

And every evening, in the little dark streets, bursts forth the overflow

of joyousness, fresh, childish, but withal grotesque to excess. It would

be difficult to form any idea of the incredible things which, carried by

the wind, float in the evening air.

CHAPTER XXXIX

A LADY OF JAPAN

My little Chrysantheme is always attired in dark colors, a sign here of

aristocratic distinction. While her friends Oyouki-San, Madame Touki, and

others, delight in gay-striped stuffs, and thrust gorgeous ornaments in

their chignons, she always wears navy-blue or neutral gray, fastened

round her waist with great black sashes brocaded in tender shades, and

she puts nothing in her hair but amber-colored tortoiseshell pins. If she

were of noble descent she would wear embroidered on her dress in the

middle of the back a little white circle looking like a postmark with

some design in the centre of it--usually the leaf of a tree; and this

would be her coat-of-arms. There is really nothing wanting but this

little heraldic blazon on the back to give her the appearance of a lady

of the highest rank.

In Japan the smart dresses of bright colors shaded in clouds, embroidered

with monsters of gold or silver, are reserved by the great ladies for

home use on state occasions; or else they are used on the stage for

dancers and courtesans.

Like all Japanese women, Chrysantheme carries a quantity of things in her

long sleeves, in which pockets are cunningly hidden. There she keeps

letters, various notes written on delicate sheets of rice-paper, prayer

amulets drawn up by the bonzes; and above all a number of squares of a

silky paper which she puts to the most unexpected uses--to dry a teacup,

to hold the damp stalk of a flower, or to blow her quaint little nose,

when the necessity presents itself. After the operation she at once

crumples up the piece of paper, rolls it into a ball, and throws it out

of the window with disgust.

The very smartest people in Japan blow their noses in this manner.

CHAPTER XL

OUR FRIENDS THE BONZES

September 2d.

Fate has favored us with a friendship as strange as it is rare: that of

the head bonzes of the temple of the jumping Tortoise, where we witnessed

last month such a surprising pilgrimage.

The approach to this place is as solitary now as it was thronged and

bustling on the evenings of the festival; and in broad daylight one is

surprised at the deathlike decay of the sacred surroundings which at

night had seemed so full of life. Not a creature to be seen on the

time-worn granite steps; not a creature beneath the vast, sumptuous

porticoes; the colors, the gold-work are dim with dust. To reach the

temple one must cross several deserted courtyards terraced on the

mountain-side, pass through several solemn gateways, and up and up

endless stairs rising far above the town and the noises of humanity into

a sacred region filled with innumerable tombs. On all the pavements, in

all the walls, are lichen and stonecrop; and over all the, gray tint of

extreme age spreads like a fall of ashes.

In a side temple near the entrance is enthroned a colossal Buddha seated

in his lotus--a gilded idol from forty-five to sixty feet high, mounted

on an enormous bronze pedestal.

At length appears the last doorway with the two traditional giants,

guardians of the sacred court, which stand the one on the right hand, the

other on the left, shut up like wild beasts, each in an iron cage. They

are in attitudes of fury, with fists upraised as if to strike, and

features atrociously fierce and distorted. Their bodies are covered with

bullets of crumbled paper, which have been aimed at them through the

bars, and which have stuck to their monstrous limbs, producing an

appearance of white leprosy: this is the manner in which the faithful

strive to appease them, by conveying to them their prayers written upon

delicate leaflets by the pious bonzes.

Passing between these alarming scarecrows, one reaches the innermost

court. The residence of our friends is on the right, the great hall of

the pagoda is before us.

In this paved court are bronze torch-holders as high as turrets. Here,

too, stand, and have stood for centuries, cyca palms with fresh, green

plumes, their numerous stalks curving with a heavy symmetry, like the

branches of massive candelabra. The temple, which is open along its

entire length, is dark and mysterious, with touches of gilding in distant

corners melting away into the gloom. In the very remotest part are seated

idols, and from outside one can vaguely see their clasped hands and air

of rapt mysticism; in front are the altars, loaded with marvellous vases

in metalwork, whence spring graceful clusters of gold and silver lotus.

From the very entrance one is greeted by the sweet odor of the

incense-sticks unceasingly burned by the priests before the gods.

To penetrate into the dwelling of our friends the bonzes, which is

situated on the right side as you enter, is by no means an easy matter.

A monster of the fish tribe, but having claws and horns, is hung over

their door by iron chains; at the least breath of wind he swings

creakingly. We pass beneath him and enter the first vast and lofty hall,

dimly lighted, in the corners of which gleam gilded idols, bells, and

incomprehensible objects of religious use.

Quaint little creatures, choir-boys or pupils, come forward with a

doubtful welcome to ask what is wanted.

"Matsou-San!! Dondta-San!!" they repeat, much astonished, when they

understand to whom we wish to be conducted. Oh! no, impossible, they can

not be seen; they are resting or are in contemplation. "Orimas! Orimas!"

say they, clasping their hands and sketching a genuflection or two to

make us understand better. ("They are at prayer! the most profound

prayer!")

We insist, speak more imperatively; even slip off our shoes like people

determined to take no refusal.

At last Matsou-San and Donata-San make their appearance from the tranquil

depths of their bonze-house. They are dressed in black crape and their

heads are shaved. Smiling, amiable, full of excuses, they offer us their

hands, and we follow, with our feet bare like theirs, to the interior of

their mysterious dwelling, through a series of empty rooms spread with

mats of the most unimpeachable whiteness. The successive halls are

separated one from the other only by bamboo curtains of exquisite

delicacy, caught back by tassels and cords of red silk.

The whole wainscoting of the interior is of the same wood, of a pale

yellow shade made with extreme nicety, without the least ornament, the

least carving; everything seems new and unused, as if it had never been

touched by human hand. At distant intervals in this studied bareness,

costly little stools, marvellously inlaid, uphold some antique bronze

monster or a vase of flowers; on the walls hang a few masterly sketches,

vaguely tinted in Indian ink, drawn upon strips of gray paper most

accurately cut but without the slightest attempt at a frame. This is all:

not a seat, not a cushion, not a scrap of furniture. It is the very acme

of studied simplicity, of elegance made out of nothing, of the most

immaculate and incredible cleanliness. And while following the bonzes

through this long suite of empty halls, we are struck by their contrast

with the overflow of knickknacks scattered about our rooms in France, and

we take a sudden dislike to the profusion and crowding delighted in at

home.

The spot where this silent march of barefooted folk comes to an end, the

spot where we are to seat ourselves in the delightful coolness of a

semi-darkness, is an interior veranda opening upon an artificial site. We

might suppose it the bottom of a well; it is a miniature garden no bigger

than the opening of an oubliette, overhung on all sides by the crushing

height of the mountain and receiving from on high but the dim light of

dreamland. Nevertheless, here is simulated a great natural ravine in all

its wild grandeur: here are caverns, abrupt rocks, a torrent, a cascade,

islands. The trees, dwarfed by a Japanese process of which we have not

the secret, have tiny little leaves on their decrepit and knotty

branches. A pervading hue of the mossy green of antiquity harmonizes all

this medley, which is undoubtedly centuries old.

Families of goldfish swim round and round in the clear water, and tiny

tortoises (jumpers probably) sleep upon the granite islands, which are of

the same color as their own gray shells.

There are even blue dragon-flies which have ventured to descend, heaven

knows whence, and alight with quivering wings upon the miniature

water-lilies.

Our friends the bonzes, notwithstanding an unctuousness of manner

thoroughly ecclesiastical, are very ready to laugh--a simple, pleased,

childish laughter; plump, chubby, shaven and shorn, they dearly love our

French liqueurs and know how to take a joke.

We talk first of one thing and then another. To the tranquil music of

their little cascade, I launch out before them with phrases of the most

erudite Japanese, I try the effect of a few tenses of verbs:

'desideratives, concessives, hypothetics in ba'. While they chant they

despatch the affairs of the church: the order of services sealed with

complicated seals for inferior pagodas situated in the neighborhood; or

trace little prayers with a cunning paint-brush, as medical remedies to

be swallowed like pills by invalids at a distance. With their white and

dimpled hands they play with a fan as cleverly as any woman, and when we

have tasted different native drinks, flavored with essences of flowers,

they bring up as a finish a bottle of Benedictine or Chartreuse, for they

appreciate the liqueurs composed by their Western colleagues.

When they come on board to return our visits, they by no means disdain to

fasten their great round spectacles on their flat noses in order to

inspect the profane drawings in our illustrated papers, the 'Vie

Parisienne' for instance. And it is even with a certain complacency that

they let their fingers linger upon the pictures representing women.

The religious ceremonies in their great temple are magnificent, and to

one of these we are now invited. At the sound of the gong they make their

entrance before the idols with a stately ritual; twenty or thirty priests

officiate in gala costumes, with genuflections, clapping of hands and

movements to and fro, which look like the figures of some mystic

quadrille.

But for all that, let the sanctuary be ever so immense and imposing in

its sombre gloom, the idols ever so superb, all seems in Japan but a mere

semblance of grandeur. A hopeless pettiness, an irresistible effect the

ludicrous, lies at the bottom of all things.

And then the congregation is not conducive to thoughtful contemplation,

for among it we usually discover some acquaintance: my mother-in-law, or

a cousin, or the woman from the china-shop who sold us a vase only

yesterday. Charming little mousmes, monkeyish-looking old ladies enter

with their smoking-boxes, their gayly daubed parasols, their curtseys,

their little cries and exclamations; prattling, complimenting one

another, full of restless movement, and having the greatest difficulty in

maintaining a serious demeanor.

CHAPTER XLI

AN UNEXPECTED CALL

September 3d.

My little Chrysantheme for the first time visited me on board-ship to

day, chaperoned by Madame Prune, and followed by my youngest sister

in-law, Mademoiselle La Neige. These ladies had the tranquil manners of

the highest gentility. In my cabin is a great Buddha on his throne, and

before him is a lacquer tray, on which my faithful sailor servant places

any small change he may find in the pockets of my clothes. Madame Prune,

whose mind is much swayed by mysticism, at once supposed herself before a

regular altar; in the gravest manner possible she addressed a brief

prayer to the god; then drawing out her purse (which, according to

custom, was attached to her sash behind her back, along with her little

pipe and tobacco-pouch), placed a pious offering in the tray, while

executing a low curtsey.

They were on their best behavior throughout the visit. But when the

moment of departure came, Chrysantheme, who would not go away without

seeing Yves, asked for him with a thinly veiled persistency which was

remarkable. Yves, for whom I then sent, made himself particularly

charming to her, so much so that this time I felt a shade of more serious

annoyance; I even asked myself whether the laughably pitiable ending,

which I had hitherto vaguely foreseen, might not, after all, soon break

upon us.

CHAPTER XLII

AN ORIENTAL VISION

September 4th.

Yesterday I encountered, in an ancient and ruined quarter of the town, a

perfectly exquisite mousme, charmingly dressed; a fresh touch of color

against the sombre background of decayed buildings.

I met her at the farthest end of Nagasaki, in the most ancient part of

the town. In this region are trees centuries old, antique temples of

Buddha, of Amiddah, of Benten, or Kwanon, with steep and pompous roofs;

monsters carved in granite sit there in courtyards silent as the grave,

where the grass grows between the stones. This deserted quarter is

traversed by a narrow torrent running in a deep channel, across which are

thrown little curved bridges with granite balustrades eaten away by

lichen. All the objects there wear the strange grimace, the quaint

arrangement familiar to us in the most antique Japanese drawings.

I walked through it all at the burning hour of midday, and saw not a

soul, unless, indeed, through the open windows of the bonze-houses, I

caught sight of some few priests, guardians of tombs or sanctuaries,

taking their siesta under dark-blue gauze nets.

Suddenly this little mousme appeared, a little above me, just at the

point of the arch of one of these bridges carpeted with gray moss; she

was in full sunshine, and stood out in brilliant clearness, like a fairy

vision, against the background of old black temples and deep shadows. She

was holding her robe together with one hand, gathering it close round her

ankles to give herself an air of greater slimness. Over her quaint little

head, her round umbrella with its thousand ribs threw a great halo of

blue and red, edged with black, and an oleander-tree full of flowers,

growing among the stones of the bridge, spread its glory beside her,

bathed, like herself, in the sunshine. Behind this youthful figure and

this flowering shrub all was blackness. Upon the pretty red and blue

parasol great white letters formed this inscription, much used among the

mousmes, and which I have learned to recognize: 'Stop! clouds, to see her

pass!' And it was really worth the trouble to stop and look at this

exquisite little person, of a type so ideally Japanese.

However, it will not do to stop too long and be ensnared--it would only

be another delusion. A doll like the rest, evidently, an ornament for a

china shelf, and nothing more. While I gaze at her, I say to myself that

Chrysantheme, appearing in this same place, with this dress, this play of

light, and this aureole of sunshine, would produce just as delightful an

effect.

For Chrysantheme is pretty, there can be no doubt about it. Yesterday

evening, in fact, I positively admired her. It was quite night; we were

returning with the usual escort of little married couples like ourselves,

from the inevitable tour of the tea-houses and bazaars. While the other

mousmes walked along hand in hand, adorned with new silver topknots which

they had succeeded in having presented to them, and amusing themselves

with playthings, she, pleading fatigue, followed, half reclining, in a

djin carriage. We had placed beside her great bunches of flowers destined

to fill our vases, late iris and long-stemmed lotus, the last of the

season, already smelling of autumn. And it was really very pretty to see

this Japanese girl in her little car, lying carelessly among all these

water-flowers, lighted by gleams of ever-changing colors, as they chanced

from the lanterns we met or passed. If, on the evening of my arrival in

Japan, any one had pointed her out to me, and said: "That shall be your

mousme," there can not be a doubt I should have been charmed. In reality,

however, I am not charmed; it is only Chrysantheme, always Chrysantheme,

nothing but Chrysantheme: a mere plaything to laugh at, a little creature

of finical forms and thoughts, with whom the agency of M. Kangourou has

supplied me.

CHAPTER XLIII

THE CATS AND THE DOLLS

The water used for drinking in our house, for making tea, and for lesser

washing purposes, is kept in large white china tubs, decorated with

paintings representing blue fish borne along by a swift current through

distorted rushes. In order to keep them cool, the tubs are kept out of

doors on Madame Prune's roof, at a place where we can, from the top of

our projecting balcony, easily reach them by stretching out an arm. A

real godsend for all the thirsty cats in the neighborhood, on warm summer

nights, is this corner of the roof with our gayly painted tubs, and it

proves a delightful trysting-place for them, after all their caterwauling

and long solitary rambles on the tops of the walls.

I had thought it my duty to warn Yves the first time he wished to drink

this water.

"Oh!" he replied, rather surprised, "cats, do you say? But they are not

dirty!"

On this point Chrysantheme and I agree with him: we do not consider cats

unclean animals, and we do not object to drink after them.

Yves considers Chrysantheme much in the same light. "She is not dirty,

either," he says; and he willingly drinks after her, out of the same cup,

putting her in the same category with the cats.

These china tubs are one of the daily preoccupations of our household: in

the evening, when we return from our walk, after the clamber up, which

makes us thirsty, and Madame L'Heure's waffles, which we have been eating

to beguile the way, we always find them empty. It seems impossible for

Madame Prune, or Mademoiselle Oyouki, or their young servant,

Mademoiselle Dede,--[Dede-San means "Miss Young Girl," a very common

name.]--to have forethought enough to fill them while it is still

daylight. And when we are late in returning home, these three ladies are

asleep, so we are obliged to attend to the business ourselves.

We must therefore open all the closed doors, put on our boots, and go

down into the garden to draw water.

As Chrysantheme would die of fright all alone in the dark, in the midst

of the trees and buzzing of insects, I am obliged to accompany her to the

well. For this expedition we require a light, and must seek among the

quantity of lanterns purchased at Madame Tres-Propre's booth, which have

been thrown night after night into the bottom of one of our little paper

closets; but alas, all the candles are burned down! I thought as much!

Well, we must resolutely take the first lantern to hand, and stick a

fresh candle on the iron point at the bottom; Chrysantheme puts forth all

her strength, the candle splits, breaks; the mousme pricks her fingers,

pouts and whimpers. Such is the inevitable scene that takes place every

evening, and delays our retiring to rest under the dark-blue gauze net

for a good quarter of an hour; while the cicalas on the roof seem to mock

us with their ceaseless song.

All this, which I should find amusing in any one else,--any one I

loved--irritates me in her.

CHAPTER XLIV

TENDER MINISTRATIONS

September 11th.

A week has passed very quietly, during which I have written nothing.

By degrees I am becoming accustomed to my Japanese household, to the

strangeness of the language, costumes, and faces. For the last three

weeks no letters have arrived from Europe; they have no doubt miscarried,

and their absence contributes, as is usually the case, to throw a veil of

oblivion over the past.

Every day, therefore, I climb up to my villa, sometimes by beautiful

starlit nights, sometimes through downpours of rain. Every morning as the

sound of Madame Prune's chanted prayer rises through the reverberating

air, I awake and go down toward the sea, by grassy pathways full of dew.

The chief occupation in Japan seems to be a perpetual hunt after curios.

We sit down on the mattings, in the antique-sellers' little booths,

taking a cup of tea with the salesmen, and rummage with our own hands in

the cupboards and chests, where many a fantastic piece of old rubbish is

huddled away. The bargaining, much discussed, is laughingly carried on

for several days, as if we were trying to play off some excellent little

practical joke upon each other.

I really make a sad abuse of the adjective little; I am quite aware of

it, but how can I do otherwise? In describing this country, the

temptation is great to use it ten times in every written line. Little,

finical; affected,--all Japan is contained, both physically and morally,

in these three words.

My purchases are accumulating in my little wood and paper house; but how

much more Japanese it really was, in its bare emptiness, such as M. Sucre

and Madame Prune had conceived it. There are now many lamps of sacred

symbolism hanging from the ceiling; many stools and many vases, as many

gods and goddesses as in a pagoda.

There is even a little Shintoist altar, before which Madame Prune has not

been able to restrain her feelings, and before which she has fallen down

and chanted her prayers in her bleating, goat-like voice:

"Wash me clean from all my impurity, O Ama-Terace-Omi-Kami! as one washes

away uncleanness in the river of Kamo."

Alas for poor Ama-Terace-Omi-Kami to have to wash away the impurities of

Madame Prune! What a tedious and ungrateful task!!

Chrysantheme, who is a Buddhist, prays sometimes in the evening before

lying down; although overcome with sleep, she prays clapping her hands

before the largest of our gilded idols. But she smiles with a childish

disrespect for her Buddha, as soon as her prayer is ended. I know that

she has also a certain veneration for her Ottokes (the spirits of her

ancestors), whose rather sumptuous altar is set up at the house of her

mother, Madame Renoncule. She asks for their blessings, for fortune and

wisdom.

Who can fathom her ideas about the gods, or about death? Does she possess

a soul? Does she think she has one? Her religion is an obscure chaos of

theogonies as old as the world, treasured up out of respect for ancient

customs; and of more recent ideas about the blessed final annihilation,

imported from India by saintly Chinese missionaries at the epoch of our

Middle Ages. The bonzes themselves are puzzled; what a muddle, therefore,

must not all this become, when jumbled together in the childish brain of

a sleepy mousme!

Two very insignificant episodes have somewhat attached me to her--(bonds

of this kind seldom fail to draw closer in the end). The first occasion

was as follows:

Madame Prune one day brought forth a relic of her gay youth, a

tortoise-shell comb of rare transparency, one of those combs that it is

good style to place on the summit of the head, lightly poised, hardly

stuck at all in the hair, with all the teeth showing. Taking it out of a

pretty little lacquered box, she held it up in the air and blinked her

eyes, looking through it at the sky--a bright summer sky--as one does to

examine the quality of a precious stone.

"Here is," she said, "an object of great value that you should offer to

your little wife."

My mousme, very much taken by it, admired the clearness of the comb and

its graceful shape.

The lacquered box, however, pleased me more. On the cover was a wonderful

painting in gold on gold, representing a field of rice, seen very close,

on a windy day; a tangle of ears and grass beaten down and twisted by a

terrible squall; here and there, between the distorted stalks, the muddy

earth of the rice-swamp was visible; there were even little pools of

water, produced by bits of the transparent lacquer on which tiny

particles of gold seemed to float about like chaff in a thick liquid; two

or three insects, which required a microscope to be well seen, were

clinging in a terrified manner to the rushes, and the whole picture was

no larger than a woman's hand.

As for Madame Prune's comb, I confess it left me indifferent, and I

turned a deaf ear, thinking it very insignificant and expensive. Then

Chrysantheme answered, mournfully:

"No, thank you, I don't want it; take it away, dear Madame Prune."

And at the same time she heaved a deep sigh, full of meaning, which

plainly said:

"He is not so fond of me as all that.--Useless to bother him."

I immediately made the wished-for purchase.

Later when Chrysantheme will have become an old monkey like Madame Prune,

with her black teeth and long orisons, she, in her turn, will retail that

comb to some fine lady of a fresh generation.

On another occasion the sun had given me a headache; I lay on the floor

resting my head on my snake-skin pillow. My eyes were dim; and everything

appeared to turn around: the open veranda, the big expanse of luminous

evening sky, and a variety of kites hovering against its background. I

felt myself vibrating painfully to the rhythmical sound of the cicalas

which filled the atmosphere.

She, crouching by my side, strove to relieve me by a Japanese process,

pressing with all her might on my temples with her little thumbs and

turning them rapidly around, as if she were boring a hole with a gimlet.

She had become quite hot and red over this hard work, which procured me

real comfort, something similar to the dreamy intoxication of opium.

Then, anxious and fearful lest I should have an attack of fever, she

rolled into a pellet and thrust into my mouth a very efficacious prayer

written on rice-paper, which she had kept carefully in the lining of one

of her sleeves.

Well, I swallowed that prayer without a smile, not wishing to hurt her

feelings or shake her funny little faith.

CHAPTER XLV

TWO FAIR ARISTOCRATS

Today, Yves, my mousme and I went to the best photographer in Nagasaki,

to be taken in a group. We shall send the picture to France. Yves laughs

as he thinks of his wife's astonishment when she sees Chrysantheme's

little face between us, and he wonders how he shall explain it to her.

"I shall just say it is one of your friends, that's all!" he says to me.

In Japan there are many photographers like our own, with this difference,

that they are Japanese, and inhabit Japanese houses. The one we intend to

honor to-day carries on his business in the suburbs, in that ancient

quarter of big trees and gloomy pagodas where, the other day, I met the

pretty little mousme. His signboard, written in several languages, is

posted against a wall on the edge of the little torrent which, rushing

down from the green mountain above, is crossed by many a curved bridge of

old granite and lined on either side with light bamboos or oleanders in

full bloom.

It is astonishing and puzzling to find a photographer perched there, in

the very heart of old Japan.

We have come at the wrong moment; there is a file of people at the door.

Long rows of djins' cars are stationed there, awaiting the customers they

have brought, who will all have their turn before us. The runners, naked

and tattooed, their hair carefully combed in sleek bands and shiny

chignons, are chatting, smoking little pipes, or bathing their muscular

legs in the fresh water of the torrent.

The courtyard is irreproachably Japanese, with its lanterns and dwarf

trees. But the studio where one poses might be in Paris or Pontoise; the

self-same chair in "old oak," the same faded "poufs," plaster columns,

and pasteboard rocks.

The people who are being photographed at this moment are two ladies of

quality, evidently mother and daughter, who are sitting together for a

cabinet-size portrait, with accessories of the time of Louis XV. A

strange group this, the first great ladies of this country I have seen so

near, with their long, aristocratic faces, dull, lifeless, almost gray by

dint of rice-powder, and their mouths painted heart-shape in vivid

carmine. Withal they have an undeniable look of good breeding that

strongly impresses us, notwithstanding the intrinsic differences of race

and acquired notions.

They scanned Chrysantheme with a look of obvious scorn, although her

costume was as ladylike as their own. For my part, I could not take my

eyes off these two creatures; they captivated me like incomprehensible

things that one never had seen before. Their fragile bodies, outlandishly

graceful in posture, are lost in stiff materials and redundant sashes, of

which the ends droop like tired wings. They make me think, I know not

why, of great rare insects; the extraordinary patterns on their garments

have something of the dark motley of night-moths. Above all, I ponder

over the mystery of their tiny slits of eyes, drawn back and up so far

that the tight-drawn lids can hardly open; the mystery of their

expression, which seems to denote inner thoughts of a silly, vague,

complacent absurdity, a world of ideas absolutely closed to ourselves.

And I think as I gaze at them: "How far we are from this Japanese people!

how totally dissimilar are our races!"

We are compelled to let several English sailors pass before us, decked

out in their white drill clothes, fresh, fat, and pink, like little sugar

figures, who attitudinize in a sheepish manner around the shafts of the

columns.

At last it is our turn; Chrysantheme settles herself slowly in a very

affected style, turning in the points of her toes as much as possible,

according to the fashion.

And on the negative shown to us we look like a supremely ridiculous

little family drawn up in a line by a common photographer at a fair.

CHAPTER XLVI

GRAVE SUSPICIONS

September 13th.

Tonight Yves is off duty three hours earlier than I; occasionally this

happens, according to the arrangement of the watches. At those times he

lands first, and goes up to wait for me at Diou-djen-dji.

From the deck I can see him through my glass, climbing up the green

mountain-path; he walks with a brisk, rapid step, almost running; what a

hurry he seems in to rejoin little Chrysantheme!

When I arrive, about nine o'clock, I find him seated on the floor, in the

middle of my rooms, with naked torso (this is a sufficiently proper

costume for private life here, I admit). Around him are grouped

Chrysantheme, Oyouki, and Mademoiselle Dede the maid, all eagerly rubbing

his back with little blue towels decorated with storks and humorous

subjects.

Good heavens! what can he have been doing to be so hot, and to have put

himself in such a state?

He tells me that near our house, a little farther up the mountain, he has

discovered a fencing-gallery: that till nightfall he had been engaged in

a fencing-bout against Japanese, who fought with two-handed swords,

springing like cats, as is the custom of their country. With his French

method of fencing, he had given them a good drubbing. Upon which, with

many a low bow, they had shown him their admiration by bringing him a

quantity of nice little iced things to drink. All this combined had

thrown him into a fearful perspiration.

Ah, very well! Nevertheless, this did not quite explain to me!

He is delighted with his evening; intends to go and amuse himself every

day by beating them; he even thinks of taking pupils.

Once his back is dried, all together, the three mousmes and himself, play

at Japanese pigeon-vole. Really I could not wish for anything more

innocent, or more correct in every respect.

Charles N----and Madame Jonquille, his wife, arrived unexpectedly about

ten o'clock. (They were wandering about in the dark shrubberies in our

neighborhood, and, seeing our lights, came up to us.)

They intend to finish the evening at the tea-house of the toads, and they

try to induce us to go and drink some iced sherbets with them. It is at

least an hour's walk from here, on the other side of the town, halfway up

the hill, in the gardens of the large pagoda dedicated to Osueva; but

they stick to their idea, pretending that in this clear night and bright

moonlight we shall have a lovely view from the terrace of the temple.

Lovely, I have no doubt, but we had intended going to bed. However, be it

so, let us go with them.

We hire five djins and five cars down below, in the principal street, in

front of Madame Tres-Propre's shop, who, for this late expedition,

chooses for us her largest round lanterns-big, red balloons, decorated

with starfish, seaweed, and green sharks.

It is nearly eleven o'clock when we make our start. In the central

quarters the virtuous Nipponese are already closing their little booths,

putting out their lamps, shutting the wooden framework, drawing their

paper panels.

Farther on, in the old-fashioned suburban streets, all is shut up long

ago, and our carts roll on through the black night. We cry out to our

djins: "Ayakou! ayakou!" ("Quick! quick!")and they run as hard as they

can, uttering little shrieks, like merry animals full of wild gayety. We

rush like a whirlwind through the darkness, all five in Indian file,

dashing and jolting over the old, uneven flagstones, dimly lighted up by

our red balloons fluttering at the end of their bamboo stems. From time

to time some Japanese, night-capped in his blue kerchief, opens a window

to see who these noisy madcaps can be, dashing by so rapidly and so late.

Or else some faint glimmer, thrown by us on our passage, discovers the

hideous smile of a large stone animal seated at the gate of a pagoda.

At last we arrive at the foot of Osueva's temple, and, leaving our djins

with our little gigs, we clamber up the gigantic steps, completely

deserted at this hour of the night.

Chrysantheme, who always likes to play the part of a tired little girl,

of a spoiled and pouting child, ascends slowly between Yves and myself,

clinging to our arms.

Jonquille, on the contrary, skips up like a bird, amusing herself by

counting the endless steps.

She lays a great stress on the accentuations, as if to make the numbers

sound even more droll.

A little silver aigrette glitters in her beautiful black coiffure; her

delicate and graceful figure seems strangely fantastic, and the darkness

that envelops us conceals the fact that her face is quite ugly, and

almost without eyes.

This evening Chrysantheme and Jonquille really look like little fairies;

at certain moments the most insignificant Japanese have this appearance,

by dint of whimsical elegance and ingenious arrangement.

The granite stairs, imposing, deserted, uniformly gray under the

nocturnal sky, appear to vanish into the empty space above us, and, when

we turn round, to disappear in the depths beneath, to fall into the abyss

with the dizzy rapidity of a dream. On the sloping steps the black

shadows of the gateways through which we must pass stretch out

indefinitely; and the shadows, which seem to be broken at each projecting

step, look like the regular creases of a fan. The porticoes stand up

separately, rising one above another; their wonderful shapes are at once

remarkably simple and studiously affected; their outlines stand out sharp

and distinct, having nevertheless the vague appearance of all very large

objects in the pale moonlight. The curved architraves rise at each

extremity like two menacing horns, pointing upward toward the far-off

blue canopy of the star-spangled sky, as if they would communicate to the

gods the knowledge they have acquired in the depths of their foundations

from the earth, full of sepulchres and death, which surrounds them.

We are, indeed, a very small group, lost now in the immensity of the

colossal acclivity as we move onward, lighted partly by the wan moon,

partly by the red lanterns we hold in our hands, floating at the ends of

their long sticks.

A deep silence reigns in the precincts of the temple, even the sound of

insects is hushed as we ascend. A sort of reverence, a kind of religious

fear steals over us, and, at the same moment, a delicious coolness

suddenly pervades the air, and passes over us.

On entering the courtyard above, we feel a little daunted. Here we find

the horse in jade, and the china turrets. The enclosing walls make it the

more gloomy, and our arrival seems to disturb I know not what mysterious

council held between the spirits of the air and the visible symbols that

are there, chimeras and monsters illuminated by the blue rays of the

moon.

We turn to the left, and go through the terraced gardens, to reach the

tea-house of the toads, which this evening is our goal; we find it shut

up--I expected as much--closed and dark, at this hour! We drum all

together on the door; in the most coaxing tones we call by name the

waiting-maids we know so well: Mademoiselle Transparente, Mademoiselle

Etoile, Mademoiselle Rosee-matinale, and Mademoiselle Margueritereine.

Not an answer. Good-by, perfumed sherbets and frosted beans!

In front of the little archery-house our mousmes suddenly jump aside,

terrified, declaring that there is a dead body on the ground. Yes,

indeed, some one is lying there. We cautiously examine the place by the

light of our red balloons, carefully held out at arm's length for fear of

this dead man. It is only the marksman, he who on the 4th of July chose

such magnificent arrows for Chrysantheme; and he sleeps, good man! with

his chignon somewhat dishevelled, a sound sleep, which it would be cruel

to disturb.

Let us go to the end of the terrace, contemplate the harbor at our feet,

and then return home. To-night the harbor looks like only a dark and

sinister rent, which the moonbeams can not fathom--a yawning crevasse

opening into the very bowels of the earth, at the bottom of which lie

faint, small glimmers, an assembly of glowworms in a ditch--the lights of

the different vessels lying at anchor.

ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:

Dull hours spent in idle and diffuse conversation

Prayers swallowed like pills by invalids at a distance

Trees, dwarfed by a Japanese process

Which I should find amusing in any one else,--any one I loved

MADAME CHRYSANTHEME

By PIERRE LOTI

BOOK 4.

CHAPTER XLVII

A MIDNIGHT ALARM

It is the middle of the night, perhaps about two o'clock in the morning.

Our lamps are burning somewhat dimly before our placid idols.

Chrysantheme wakes me suddenly, and I turn to look at her: she has raised

herself on one arm, and her face expresses the most intense terror; she

makes a sign, without daring to speak, that some one or something is

near, creeping up to us. What ill-timed visit is this? A feeling of fear

gains possession of me also. I have a rapid impression of some great

unknown danger, in this isolated spot, in this strange country of which I

do not even yet comprehend the inhabitants and the mysteries. It must be

something very frightful to hold her there, rooted to the spot, half dead

with fright, she who does comprehend all these things.

It seems to be outside; it is coming from the garden; with trembling hand

she indicates to me that it will come through the veranda, over Madame

Prune's roof. Certainly, I hear faint noises, and they do approach us.

I suggest to her

"Neko-San?" ("It is Messieurs the cats?")

"No!" she replies, still terrified, and in an alarmed tone.

"Bakemono-Sama?" ("Is it my lords the ghosts?") I have already the

Japanese habit of expressing myself with excessive politeness.

"No! 'Dorobo'!" ("Thieves!")

Thieves! Ah! this is better; I much prefer this to a visit such as I have

just been dreading in the sudden awakening from sleep: from ghosts or

spirits of the dead; thieves, that is to say, worthy fellows very much

alive, and having, undoubtedly, inasmuch as they are Japanese thieves,

faces of the most meritorious oddity. I am not in the least frightened,

now that I know precisely what to expect, and we will immediately set to

work to ascertain the truth, for something is certainly moving on Madame

Prune's roof; some one is walking upon it.

I open one of our wooden panels and look out.

I can see only a vast expanse, calm, peaceful, and exquisite under the

full brilliance of the moonlight; sleeping Japan, lulled by the sonorous

song of the grasshoppers, is charming indeed to-night, and the free, pure

air is delicious.

Chrysantheme, half hidden behind my shoulder, listens tremblingly,

peering forward to examine the gardens and the roofs with dilated eyes

like a frightened cat. No, nothing! not a thing moves. Here and there are

a few strangely substantial shadows, which at first glance were not easy

to explain, but which turn out to be real shadows, thrown by bits of

wall, by boughs of trees, and which preserve an extremely reassuring

stillness. Everything seems absolutely tranquil, and profound silence

reigns in the dreamy vagueness which moonlight sheds over all.

Nothing; nothing to be seen anywhere. It was Messieurs the cats after

all, or perhaps my ladies the owls; sounds increase in volume in the most

amazing manner at night, in this house of ours.

Let us close the panel again carefully, as a measure of prudence, and

then light a lantern and go downstairs to see whether there may be any

one hidden in corners, and whether the doors are tightly shut; in short,

to reassure Chrysantheme we will go the round of the house.

Behold us, then, on tiptoe, searching together every hole and corner of

the house, which, to judge by its foundations, must be very ancient,

notwithstanding the fragile appearance of its panels of white paper. It

contains the blackest of cavities, little vaulted cellars with worm-eaten

beams; cupboards for rice which smell of mould and decay; mysterious

hollows where lies accumulated the dust of centuries. In the middle of

the night, and during a hunt for thieves, this part of the house, as yet

unknown to me, has an ugly look.

Noiselessly we step across the apartment of our landlord and landlady.

Chrysantheme drags me by the hand, and I allow myself to be led. There

they are, sleeping in a row under their blue gauze tent, lighted by the

night-lamps burning before the altars of their ancestors. Ha! I observe

that they are arranged in an order which might give rise to gossip. First

comes Mademoiselle Oyouki, very taking in her attitude of rest! Then

Madame Prune, who sleeps with her mouth wide open, showing her rows of

blackened teeth; from her throat arises an intermittent sound like the

grunting of a sow. Oh! poor Madame Prune! how hideous she is!! Next, M.

Sucre, a mere mummy for the time being. And finally, at his side, last of

the row, is their servant, Mademoiselle Dede!

The gauze hanging over them throws reflections as of the sea upon them;

one might suppose them victims drowned in an aquarium. And withal the

sacred lamps, the altar crowded with strange Shintoist symbols, give a

mock religious air to this family tableau.

'Honi soit qui mal y pense', but why is not that maidservant rather laid

by the side of her mistresses? Now, when we on the floor above offer our

hospitality to Yves, we are careful to place ourselves under our

mosquito-net in a more correct style!

One corner, which as a last resort we inspect, inspires me with a certain

amount of apprehension. It is a low, mysterious loft, against the door of

which is stuck, as a thing no longer wanted, a very old, pious image

Kwanon with the thousand arms, and Kwanon with the horses' head, seated

among clouds and flames, both horrible to behold with their spectral

grins.

We open the door, and Chrysantheme starts back uttering a fearful cry. I

should have thought the robbers were there, had I not seen a little gray

creature, rapid and noiseless, rush by her and disappear; a young rat

that had been eating rice on the top of a shelf, and, in its alarm, had

dashed in her face.

CHAPTER XLVIII

UNUSUAL HOSPITALITY

September 16th.

Yves has let fall his silver whistle in the ocean, the whistle so

absolutely indispensable for the manoeuvres; and we search the town all

day long, followed by Chrysantheme and Mesdemoiselles La Neige and La

Lune, her sisters, in the endeavor to find another.

It is, however, very difficult to find such a thing in Nagasaki; above

all, very difficult to explain in Japanese what is a sailor's whistle of

the traditional shape, curved, and with a little ball at the end to

modulate the trills and the various sounds of official orders. For three

hours we are sent from shop to shop; at each one they pretend to

understand perfectly what is wanted and trace on tissue-paper, with a

paint-brush, the addresses of the shops where we shall without fail meet

with what we require. Away we go, full of hope, only to encounter some

fresh mystification, till our breathless djins get quite bewildered.

They understand admirably that we want a thing that will make a noise,

music, in short; thereupon they offer us instruments of every, and of the

most unexpected, shape--squeakers for Punch-and-Judy voices,

dog-whistles, trumpets. Each time it is something more and more absurd,

so that at last we are overcome with uncontrollable fits of laughter.

Last of all, an aged Japanese optician, who assumes a most knowing air, a

look of sublime wisdom, goes off to forage in his back shop, and brings

to light a steam fog-horn, a relict from some wrecked steamer.

After dinner, the chief event of the evening is a deluge of rain, which

takes us by surprise as we leave the teahouses, on our return from our

fashionable stroll. It so happened that we were a large party, having

with us several mousme guests, and from the moment that the rain began to

fall from the skies, as if out of a watering-pot turned upside down, the

band became disorganized. The mousmes run off, with bird-like cries, and

take refuge under doorways, in the shops, under the hoods of the djins.

Then, before long-when the shops shut up in haste, when the emptied

streets are flooded, and almost black, and the paper lanterns, piteous

objects, wet through and extinguished--I find myself, I know not how it

happens, flattened against a wall, under the projecting eaves, alone in

the company of Mademoiselle Fraise, my cousin, who is crying bitterly

because her fine robe is wet through. And in the noise of the rain, which

is still falling, and splashing everything with the spouts and gutters,

which in the darkness plaintively murmur like running streams, the town

appears to me suddenly an abode of the gloomiest sadness.

The shower is soon over, and the mousmes come out of their holes like so

many mice; they look for one another, call one another, and their little

voices take the singular, melancholy, dragging inflections they assume

whenever they have to call from afar.

"Hi! Mademoiselle Lu-u-u-u-une!"

"Hi! Madame Jonqui-i-i-i-ille!"

They shout from one to another their outlandish names, prolonging them

indefinitely in the now silent night, in the reverberations of the damp

air after the great summer rain.

At length they are all collected and united again, these tiny personages

with narrow eyes and no brains, and we return to Diou-djen-dji all wet

through.

For the third time, we have Yves sleeping beside us under our blue tent.

There is a great noise shortly after midnight in the apartment beneath

us: our landlord's family have returned from a pilgrimage to a

far-distant temple of the Goddess of Grace. (Although Madame Prune is a

Shintoist, she reveres this deity, who, scandal says, watched over her

youth.) A moment after, Mademoiselle Oyouki bursts into our room like a

rocket, bringing, on a charming little tray, sweetmeats which have been

blessed and bought at the gates of the temple yonder, on purpose for us,

and which we must positively eat at once, before the virtue is gone out

of them. Hardly rousing ourselves, we absorb these little edibles

flavored with sugar and pepper, and return a great many sleepy thanks.

Yves sleeps quietly on this occasion, without dealing any blows to the

floor or the panels with either fists or feet. He has hung his watch on

one of the hands of our gilded idol in order to be more sure of seeing

the hour at any time of the night, by the light of the sacred lamps. He

gets up betimes in the morning, asking: "Well, did I behave properly?"

and dresses in haste, preoccupied about duty and the roll-call.

Outside, no doubt, it is daylight already: through the tiny holes which

time has pierced in our wooden panels, threads of morning light penetrate

our chamber, and in the atmosphere of our room where night still lingers,

they trace vague white rays. Soon, when the sun shall have risen, these

rays will lengthen and become beautifully golden. The cocks and the

cicalas make themselves heard, and now Madame Prune will begin her mystic

drone.

Nevertheless, out of politeness for Yves-San, Chrysantheme lights a

lantern and escorts him to the foot of the dark staircase. I even fancy

that, on parting, I hear a kiss exchanged. In Japan this is of no

consequence, I know; it is very usual, and quite admissible; no matter

where one goes, in houses one enters for the first time, one is quite at

liberty to kiss any mousme who may be present, without any notice being

taken of it. But with regard to Chrysantheme, Yves is in a delicate

position, and he ought to understand it better. I begin to feel uneasy

about the hours they have so often spent together alone; and I make up my

mind that this very day I will not play the spy upon them, but speak

frankly to Yves, and make a clean breast of it.

Suddenly from below, clac! clac! two dry hands are clapped together; it

is Madame Prune's warning to the Great Spirit. And immediately after her

prayer breaks forth, soars upward in a shrill nasal falsetto, like a

morning alarum when the hour for waking has come, the mechanical noise of

a spring let go and running down.

" . . .The richest woman in the world! Cleansed from all my sins, O

Ama-Terace-Omi-Kami! in the river of Kamo."

And this extraordinary bleating, hardly human, scatters and changes my

ideas, which were very nearly clear at the moment I awoke.

CHAPTER XLIX

RUMORS OF DEPARTURE

September 15th.

Rumor of departure is in the air. Since yesterday there has been vague

talk of our being sent to China, to the Gulf of Pekin; one of those

rumors which spread, no one knows how, from one end of the ship to the

other, two or three days before the official orders arrive, and which

usually turn out tolerably correct. What will the last act of my little

Japanese comedy be? the denouement, the separation? Will there be any

touch of sadness on the part of my mousme, or on my own, just a

tightening of the heartstrings at the moment of our final farewell? At

this moment I can imagine nothing of the sort. And then the adieus of

Yves and Chrysantheme, what will they be? This question preoccupies me

more than all.

Nothing very definite has been learned as yet, but it is certain that,

one way or another, our stay in Japan is drawing to a close. It is this,

perhaps, which disposes me this evening to look more kindly on my

surroundings. It is about six o'clock, after a day spent on duty, when I

reach Diou-djen-dji. The evening sun, low in the sky, on the point of

setting, pours into my room, and floods it with rays of red gold,

lighting up the Buddhas and the great sheaves of quaintly arranged

flowers in the antique vases. Here are assembled five or six little

dolls, my neighbors, amusing themselves by dancing to the sound of

Chrysantheme's guitar. And this evening I experienced a real charm in

feeling that this dwelling and the woman who leads the dance are mine. On

the whole, I have perhaps been unjust to this country; it seems to me

that my eyes are at last opened to see it in its true light, that all my

senses are undergoing a strange and abrupt transition. I suddenly have a

better perception and appreciation of all the infinity of dainty trifles

among which I live; of the fragile and studied grace of their forms, the

oddity of their drawings, the refined choice of their colors.

I stretch myself upon the white mats; Chrysantheme, always eagerly

attentive, brings me my pillow of serpent's-skin; and the smiling

mousmes, with the interrupted rhythm of a while ago still running in

their heads, move around me with measured steps.

Their immaculate socks with the separate great toes make no noise;

nothing is heard, as they glide by, but a 'froufrou' of silken stuffs. I

find them all pleasant to look upon; their dollish air pleases me now,

and I fancy I have discovered what it is that gives it to them: it is not

only their round, inexpressive faces with eyebrows far removed from the

eyelids, but the excessive amplitude of their dress. With those huge

sleeves, it might be supposed they have neither back nor shoulders; their

delicate figures are lost in these wide robes, which float around what

might be little marionettes without bodies at all, and which would slip

to the ground of themselves were they not kept together midway, about

where a waist should be, by the wide silken sashes--a very different

comprehension of the art of dressing to ours, which endeavors as much as

possible to bring into relief the curves, real or false, of the figure.

And then, how much I admire the flowers in our vases, arranged by

Chrysantheme, with her Japanese taste lotus-flowers, great, sacred

flowers of a tender, veined rose color, the milky rose-tint seen on

porcelain; they resemble, when in full bloom, great water-lilies, and

when only in bud might be taken for long pale tulips. Their soft but

rather cloying scent is added to that other indefinable odor of mousmes,

of yellow race, of Japan, which is always and everywhere in the air. The

late flowers of September, at this season very rare and expensive, grow

on longer stems than the summer blooms; Chrysantheme has left them in

their large aquatic leaves of a melancholy seaweed-green, and mingled

with them tall, slight rushes. I look at them, and recall with some irony

those great round bunches in the shape of cauliflowers, which our

florists sell in France, wrapped in white lace-paper!

Still no letters from Europe, from any one. How things change, become

effaced and forgotten! Here am I, accommodating myself to this finical

Japan and dwindling down to its affected mannerism; I feel that my

thoughts run in smaller grooves, my tastes incline to smaller

things-things which suggest nothing greater than a smile. I am becoming

used to tiny and ingenious furniture, to doll-like desks, to miniature

bowls with which to play at dinner, to the immaculate monotony of the

mats, to the finely finished simplicity of the white woodwork. I am even

losing my Western prejudices; all my preconceived ideas are this evening

evaporating and vanishing; crossing the garden I have courteously saluted

M. Sucre, who was watering his dwarf shrubs and his deformed flowers; and

Madame Prune appears to me a highly respectable old lady, in whose past

there is nothing to criticise.

We shall take no walk to-night; my only wish is to remain stretched out

where I am, listening to the music of my mousme's 'chamecen'.

Till now I have always used the word guitar, to avoid exotic terms, for

the abuse of which I have been so reproached. But neither the word guitar

nor mandolin suffices to designate this slender instrument with its long

neck, the high notes of which are shriller than the voice of the

grasshopper; and henceforth, I will write 'chamecen'.

I will also call my mousme Kikou, Kikou-San; this name suits her better

than Chrysantheme, which, though translating the sense exactly, does not

preserve the strange-sounding euphony of the original.

I therefore say to Kikou, my wife:

"Play, play on for me; I shall remain here all the evening and listen to

you."

Astonished to find me in so amiable a mood, she requires pressing a

little, and with almost a bitter curve of triumph and disdain upon her

lips, she seats herself in the attitude of an idol, raises her long,

dark-colored sleeves, and begins. The first hesitating notes are murmured

faintly and mingle with the music of the insects humming outside, in the

quiet air of the warm and golden twilight. First she plays slowly, a

confused medley of fragments which she does not seem to remember

perfectly, of which one waits for the finish and waits in vain; while the

other girls giggle, inattentive, and regretful of their interrupted

dance. She herself is absent, sulky, as if she were only performing a

duty.

Then by degrees, little by little, the music becomes more animated, and

the mousmes begin to listen. Now, tremblingly, it grows into a feverish

rapidity, and her gaze has no longer the vacant stare of a doll. Then the

music changes again; in it there is the sighing of the wind, the hideous

laughter of ghouls; tears, heartrending plaints, and her dilated pupils

seem to be directed inwardly in settled gaze on some indescribable

Japanesery within her own soul.

I listen, lying there with eyes half shut, looking out between my

drooping eyelids, which are gradually lowering, in involuntary heaviness,

upon the enormous red sun dying away over Nagasaki. I have a somewhat

melancholy feeling that my past life and all other places in the world

are receding from my view and fading away. At this moment of nightfall I

feel almost at home in this corner of Japan, amidst the gardens of this

suburb. I never have had such an impression before.

CHAPTER L

A DOLLS' DUET

September 16th.

Seven o'clock in the evening. We shall not go down into Nagasaki tonight;

but, like good Japanese citizens, remain in our lofty suburb.

In undress uniform we shall go, Yves and I, in a neighborly way, as far

as the fencing-gallery, which is only two steps away, just above our

villa, and almost abutting on our fresh and scented garden.

The gallery is closed already, and a little mousko, seated at the door,

explains, with many low bows, that we come too late, all the amateurs are

gone; we must come again tomorrow.

The evening is so mild and fine that we remain out of doors, following,

without any definite purpose, the pathway which rises ever higher and

higher, and loses itself at length in the solitary regions of the

mountain among the upper peaks.

For an hour at least we wander on--an unintended walk--and finally find

ourselves at a great height commanding an endless perspective lighted by

the last gleams of daylight; we are in a desolate and mournful spot, in

the midst of the little Buddhist cemeteries, which are scattered over the

country in every direction.

We meet a few belated laborers, who are returning from the fields with

bundles of tea upon their shoulders. These peasants have a half-savage

air. They are half naked, too, or clothed only in long robes of blue

cotton; as they pass, they salute us with humble bows.

No trees in this elevated region. Fields of tea alternate with tombs: old

granite statues which represent Buddha in his lotus, or else old

monumental stones on which gleam remains of inscriptions in golden

letters. Rocks, brushwood, uncultivated spaces, surround us on all sides.

We meet no more passers-by, and the light is failing. We will halt for a

moment, and then it will be time to turn our steps homeward.

But, close to the spot where we stand, a box of white wood provided with

handles, a sort of sedan-chair, rests on the freshly disturbed earth,

with its lotus of silvered paper, and the little incense-sticks, burning

yet, by its side; clearly some one has been buried here this very

evening.

I can not picture this personage to myself; the Japanese are so grotesque

in life that it is almost impossible to imagine them in the calm majesty

of death. Nevertheless, let us move farther on, we might disturb him; he

is too recently dead, his presence unnerves us. We will go and seat

ourselves on one of these other tombs, so unutterably ancient that there

can no longer be anything within it but dust. And there, seated in the

dying sunlight, while the valleys and plains of the earth below are

already lost in shadow, we will talk together.

I wish to speak to Yves about Chrysantheme; it is indeed somewhat in view

of this that I have persuaded him to sit down; but how to set about it

without hurting his feelings, and without making myself ridiculous, I

hardly know. However, the pure air playing round me up here, and the

magnificent landscape spread beneath my feet, impart a certain serenity

to my thoughts which makes me feel a contemptuous pity, both for my

suspicions and the cause of them.

We speak, first of all, of the order for departure, which may arrive at

any moment, for China or for France. Soon we shall have to leave this

easy and almost amusing life, this Japanese suburb where chance has

installed us, and our little house buried among flowers. Yves perhaps

will regret all this more than I. I know that well enough; for it is the

first time that any such interlude has broken the rude monotony of his

hard-worked career. Formerly, when in an inferior rank, he was hardly

more often on shore, in foreign countries, than the sea-gulls themselves;

while I, from the very beginning, have been spoiled by residence in all

sorts of charming spots, infinitely superior to this, in all sorts of

countries, and the remembrance still haunts me pleasurably.

In order to discover how the land lies, I risk the remark:

"You will perhaps be more sorry to leave little Chrysantheme than I."

Silence reigns between us.

After which I go on, and, burning my ships, I add:

"You know, after all, if you have such a fancy for her, I haven't really

married her; one can't really consider her my wife."

In great surprise he looks in my face.

"Not your wife, you say? But, by Jove, though, that's just it; she is

your wife."

There is no need of many words at any time between us two; I know exactly

now, by his tone, by his great good-humored smile, how the case stands; I

understand all that lies in the little phrase: "That's just it, she is

your wife." If she were not, well, then, he could not answer for what

might happen--notwithstanding any remorse he might have in the depths of

his heart, since he is no longer a bachelor and free as air, as in former

days. But he considers her my wife, and she is sacred. I have the fullest

faith in his word, and I experience a positive relief, a real joy, at

finding my stanch Yves of bygone days. How could I have so succumbed to

the demeaning influence of my surroundings as to suspect him even, and to

invent for myself such a mean, petty anxiety?

We never shall even mention that doll again.

We remain up there very late, talking of other things, gazing at the

immense depths below, at the valleys and mountains as they become, one by

one, indistinct and lost in the deepening darkness. Placed as we are at

an enormous height, in the wide, free atmosphere, we seem already to have

quitted this miniature country, already to be freed from the impression

of littleness which it has given us, and from the little links by which

it was beginning to bind--us to itself.

Seen from such heights as these, all the countries of the globe bear a

strong resemblance to one another; they lose the imprint made upon them

by man, and by races; by all the atoms swarming on the surface.

As of old, in the Breton marshes, in the woods of Toulven, or at sea in

the night-watches, we talk of all those things to which thoughts

naturally revert in darkness; of ghosts, of spirits, of eternity, of the

great hereafter, of chaos--and we entirely forget little Chrysantheme!

When we arrive at Diou-djen-dji in the starry night, the music of her

'chamecen', heard from afar, recalls to us her existence; she is studying

some vocal duet with Mademoiselle Oyouki, her pupil.

I feel myself in very good humor this evening, and, relieved from my

absurd suspicions about my poor Yves, am quite disposed to enjoy without

reserve my last days in Japan, and to derive therefrom all the amusement

possible.

Let us then repose ourselves on the dazzling white mats, and listen to

the singular duet sung by those two mousmes: a strange musical medley,

slow and mournful, beginning with two or three high notes, and descending

at each couplet, in an almost imperceptible manner, into actual

solemnity. The song keeps its dragging slowness; but the accompaniment,

becoming more and more accentuated, is like the impetuous sound of a

far-off hurricane. At the end, when these girlish voices, usually so

soft, give out their hoarse and guttural notes, Chrysantheme's hands fly

wildly and convulsively over the quivering strings. Both of them lower

their heads, pout their underlips in the effort to bring out these

astonishingly deep notes. And at these moments their little narrow eyes

open, and seem to reveal an unexpected something, almost a soul, under

these trappings of marionettes.

But it is a soul which more than ever appears to me of a different

species from my own; I feel my thoughts to be as far removed from theirs

as from the flitting conceptions of a bird, or the dreams of a monkey; I

feel there is between them and myself a great gulf, mysterious and awful.

Other sounds of music, wafted to us from the distance, interrupt for a

moment those of our mousmes. From the depths below, in Nagasaki, arises a

sudden noise of gongs and guitars; we rush to the balcony of the veranda

to hear it better.

It is a 'matsouri', a fete, a procession passing through the quarter

which is not so virtuous as our own, so our mousmes tell us, with a

disdainful toss of the head. Nevertheless, from the heights on which we

dwell, seen thus in a bird's-eye view, by the uncertain light of the

stars, this district has a singularly chaste air, and the concert going

on therein, purified in its ascent from the depths of the abyss to our

lofty altitudes, reaches us confusedly, a smothered, enchanted,

enchanting sound.

Then it diminishes, and dies away into silence.

The two little friends return to their seats on the mats, and once more

take up their melancholy duet. An orchestra, discreetly subdued but

innumerable, of crickets and cicalas, accompanies them in an unceasing

tremolo--the immense, far-reaching tremolo, which, gentle and eternal,

never ceases in Japan.

CHAPTER LI

THE LAST DAY

September 17th

At the hour of siesta, a peremptory order arrives to start tomorrow for

China, for Tche-fou (a terrible place, in the gulf of Pekin). Yves comes

to wake me in my cabin to bring me the news.

"I must positively get leave to go on shore this evening," he says, while

I endeavor to shake myself awake, "if it is only to help you to dismantle

and pack up."

He gazes through my port-hole, raising his glance toward the green

summits, in the direction of Diou-djen-dji and our echoing old cottage,

hidden from us by a turn of the mountain.

It is very nice of him to wish to help me in my packing; but I think he

counts also upon saying farewell to his little Japanese friends up there,

and I really can not find fault with that.

He finishes his work, and does in fact obtain leave, without help from

me, to go on shore at five o'clock, after drill and manoeuvres.

As for myself I start at once, in a hired sampan. In the vast flood of

midday sunshine, to the quivering noise of the cicalas, I mount to

Diou-djen-dji.

The paths are solitary, the plants are drooping in the heat. Here,

however, is Madame Jonquille, taking the air in the bright, grasshoppers'

sunshine, sheltering her dainty figure and her charming face under an

enormous paper parasol, a huge circle, closely ribbed and fantastically

striped.

She recognizes me from afar, and, laughing as usual, runs to meet me.

I announce our departure, and a tearful pout suddenly contracts her

childish face. After all, does this news grieve her? Is she about to shed

tears over it? No! it turns to a fit of laughter, a little nervous

perhaps, but unexpected and disconcerting--dry and clear, pealing through

the silence and warmth of the narrow paths, like a cascade of little mock

pearls.

Ah, there indeed is a marriage-tie which will be broken without much

pain! But she fills me with impatience, poor empty-headed linnet, with

her laughter, and I turn my back upon her to continue my journey.

Above-stairs, Chrysantheme sleeps, stretched out on the floor; the house

is wide open, and the soft mountain breeze rustles gently through it.