It Is A Truly Dull, Quaint Street, And The
People Come Out To Stare At A Foreigner As If Foreigners Had Not
Become Common Events Since 1870, When Sir H. And Lady Parkes, The
First Europeans Who Were Permitted To Visit Nikko, Took Up Their
Abode In The Imperial Hombo.
It is a doll's street with small low
houses, so finely matted, so exquisitely clean, so finically neat,
so light and delicate, that even when I entered them without my
boots I felt like a "bull in a china shop," as if my mere weight
must smash through and destroy.
The street is so painfully clean
that I should no more think of walking over it in muddy boots than
over a drawing-room carpet. It has a silent mountain look, and
most of its shops sell specialties, lacquer work, boxes of
sweetmeats made of black beans and sugar, all sorts of boxes,
trays, cups, and stands, made of plain, polished wood, and more
grotesque articles made from the roots of trees.
It was not part of my plan to stay at the beautiful yadoya which
receives foreigners in Hachiishi, and I sent Ito half a mile
farther with a note in Japanese to the owner of the house where I
now am, while I sat on a rocky eminence at the top of the street,
unmolested by anybody, looking over to the solemn groves upon the
mountains, where the two greatest of the Shoguns "sleep in glory."
Below, the rushing Daiyagawa, swollen by the night's rain,
thundered through a narrow gorge. Beyond, colossal flights of
stone stairs stretch mysteriously away among cryptomeria groves,
above which tower the Nikkosan mountains. Just where the torrent
finds its impetuosity checked by two stone walls, it is spanned by
a bridge, 84 feet long by 18 wide, of dull red lacquer, resting on
two stone piers on either side, connected by two transverse stone
beams. A welcome bit of colour it is amidst the masses of dark
greens and soft greys, though there is nothing imposing in its
structure, and its interest consists in being the Mihashi, or
Sacred Bridge, built in 1636, formerly open only to the Shoguns,
the envoy of the Mikado, and to pilgrims twice a year. Both its
gates are locked. Grand and lonely Nikko looks, the home of rain
and mist. Kuruma roads end here, and if you wish to go any
farther, you must either walk, ride, or be carried.
Ito was long away, and the coolies kept addressing me in Japanese,
which made me feel helpless and solitary, and eventually they
shouldered my baggage, and, descending a flight of steps, we
crossed the river by the secular bridge, and shortly met my host,
Kanaya, a very bright, pleasant-looking man, who bowed nearly to
the earth. Terraced roads in every direction lead through
cryptomerias to the shrines; and this one passes many a stately
enclosure, but leads away from the temples, and though it is the
highway to Chiuzenjii, a place of popular pilgrimage, Yumoto, a
place of popular resort, and several other villages, it is very
rugged, and, having flights of stone steps at intervals, is only
practicable for horses and pedestrians.
At the house, with the appearance of which I was at once delighted,
I regretfully parted with my coolies, who had served me kindly and
faithfully. They had paid me many little attentions, such as
always beating the dust out of my dress, inflating my air-pillow,
and bringing me flowers, and were always grateful when I walked up
hills; and just now, after going for a frolic to the mountains,
they called to wish me good-bye, bringing branches of azaleas. I.
L. B.
LETTER VII
A Japanese Idyll - Musical Stillness -My Rooms - Floral Decorations-
-Kanaya and his Household - Table Equipments.
KANAYA'S, NIKKO, June 15.
I don't know what to write about my house. It is a Japanese idyll;
there is nothing within or without which does not please the eye,
and, after the din of yadoyas, its silence, musical with the dash
of waters and the twitter of birds, is truly refreshing. It is a
simple but irregular two-storied pavilion, standing on a stone-
faced terrace approached by a flight of stone steps. The garden is
well laid out, and, as peonies, irises, and azaleas are now in
blossom, it is very bright. The mountain, with its lower part
covered with red azaleas, rises just behind, and a stream which
tumbles down it supplies the house with water, both cold and pure,
and another, after forming a miniature cascade, passes under the
house and through a fish-pond with rocky islets into the river
below. The grey village of Irimichi lies on the other side of the
road, shut in with the rushing Daiya, and beyond it are high,
broken hills, richly wooded, and slashed with ravines and
waterfalls.
Kanaya's sister, a very sweet, refined-looking woman, met me at the
door and divested me of my boots. The two verandahs are highly
polished, so are the entrance and the stairs which lead to my room,
and the mats are so fine and white that I almost fear to walk over
them, even in my stockings. The polished stairs lead to a highly
polished, broad verandah with a beautiful view, from which you
enter one large room, which, being too large, was at once made into
two. Four highly polished steps lead from this into an exquisite
room at the back, which Ito occupies, and another polished
staircase into the bath-house and garden. The whole front of my
room is composed of shoji, which slide back during the day. The
ceiling is of light wood crossed by bars of dark wood, and the
posts which support it are of dark polished wood. The panels are
of wrinkled sky-blue paper splashed with gold. At one end are two
alcoves with floors of polished wood, called tokonoma. In one
hangs a kakemono, or wall-picture, a painting of a blossoming
branch of the cherry on white silk - a perfect piece of art, which
in itself fills the room with freshness and beauty.
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