UNBEATEN TRACKS IN JAPAN
AN ACCOUNT OF TRAVELS IN THE INTERIOR
INCLUDING VISITS TO THE ABORIGINES OF YEZO AND
THE SHRINE OF NIKKO BY ISABELLA L. BIRD
(From the 1911 John Murray edition)
PREFACE
Having been recommended to leave home, in April 1878, in order to
recruit my health by means which had proved serviceable before, I
decided to visit Japan, attracted less by the reputed excellence of
its climate than by the certainty that it possessed, in an especial
degree, those sources of novel and sustained interest which conduce
so essentially to the enjoyment and restoration of a solitary
health-seeker. The climate disappointed me, but, though I found
the country a study rather than a rapture, its interest exceeded my
largest expectations.
This is not a "Book on Japan," but a narrative of travels in Japan,
and an attempt to contribute something to the sum of knowledge of
the present condition of the country, and it was not till I had
travelled for some months in the interior of the main island and in
Yezo that I decided that my materials were novel enough to render
the contribution worth making. From Nikko northwards my route was
altogether off the beaten track, and had never been traversed in
its entirety by any European. I lived among the Japanese, and saw
their mode of living, in regions unaffected by European contact.
As a lady travelling alone, and the first European lady who had
been seen in several districts through which my route lay, my
experiences differed more or less widely from those of preceding
travellers; and I am able to offer a fuller account of the
aborigines of Yezo, obtained by actual acquaintance with them, than
has hitherto been given.
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