A Hard Day's Journey - An Overturn - Nearing the Ocean - Joyful
Excitement - Universal Greyness - Inopportune Policemen - A Stormy
Voyage - A Wild Welcome - A Windy Landing - The Journey's End.
HAKODATE, YEZO, August, 1878.
The journey from Kuroishi to Aomori, though only 22.5 miles, was a
tremendous one, owing to the state of the roads; for more rain had
fallen, and the passage of hundreds of pack-horses heavily loaded
with salt-fish had turned the tracks into quagmires. At the end of
the first stage the Transport Office declined to furnish a kuruma,
owing to the state of the roads; but, as I was not well enough to
ride farther, I bribed two men for a very moderate sum to take me
to the coast; and by accommodating each other we got on tolerably,
though I had to walk up all the hills and down many, to get out at
every place where a little bridge had been carried away, that the
kuruma might be lifted over the gap, and often to walk for 200
yards at a time, because it sank up to its axles in the quagmire.
In spite of all precautions I was upset into a muddy ditch, with
the kuruma on the top of me; but, as my air-pillow fortunately fell
between the wheel and me, I escaped with nothing worse than having
my clothes soaked with water and mud, which, as I had to keep them
on all night, might have given me cold, but did not. We met
strings of pack-horses the whole way, carrying salt-fish, which is
taken throughout the interior.
The mountain-ridge, which runs throughout the Main Island, becomes
depressed in the province of Nambu, but rises again into grand,
abrupt hills at Aomori Bay. Between Kuroishi and Aomori, however,
it is broken up into low ranges, scantily wooded, mainly with pine,
scrub oak, and the dwarf bamboo. The Sesamum ignosco, of which the
incense-sticks are made, covers some hills to the exclusion of all
else. Rice grows in the valleys, but there is not much
cultivation, and the country looks rough, cold, and hyperborean.
The farming hamlets grew worse and worse, with houses made roughly
of mud, with holes scratched in the side for light to get in, or
for smoke to get out, and the walls of some were only great pieces
of bark and bundles of straw tied to the posts with straw ropes.
The roofs were untidy, but this was often concealed by the profuse
growth of the water-melons which trailed over them. The people
were very dirty, but there was no appearance of special poverty,
and a good deal of money must be made on the horses and mago
required for the transit of fish from Yezo, and for rice to it.
At Namioka occurred the last of the very numerous ridges we have
crossed since leaving Nikko at a point called Tsugarusaka, and from
it looked over a rugged country upon a dark-grey sea, nearly
landlocked by pine-clothed hills, of a rich purple indigo colour.
The clouds were drifting, the colour was intensifying, the air was
fresh and cold, the surrounding soil was peaty, the odours of pines
were balsamic, it looked, felt, and smelt like home; the grey sea
was Aomori Bay, beyond was the Tsugaru Strait, - my long land-
journey was done. A traveller said a steamer was sailing for Yezo
at night, so, in a state of joyful excitement, I engaged four men,
and by dragging, pushing, and lifting, they got me into Aomori, a
town of grey houses, grey roofs, and grey stones on roofs, built on
a beach of grey sand, round a grey bay - a miserable-looking place,
though the capital of the ken.
It has a great export trade in cattle and rice to Yezo, besides
being the outlet of an immense annual emigration from northern
Japan to the Yezo fishery, and imports from Hakodate large
quantities of fish, skins, and foreign merchandise. It has some
trade in a pretty but not valuable "seaweed," or variegated
lacquer, called Aomori lacquer, but not actually made there, its
own speciality being a sweetmeat made of beans and sugar. It has a
deep and well-protected harbour, but no piers or conveniences for
trade. It has barracks and the usual Government buildings, but
there was no time to learn anything about it, - only a short half-
hour for getting my ticket at the Mitsu Bishi office, where they
demanded and copied my passport; for snatching a morsel of fish at
a restaurant where "foreign food" was represented by a very dirty
table-cloth; and for running down to the grey beach, where I was
carried into a large sampan crowded with Japanese steerage
passengers.
The wind was rising, a considerable surf was running, the spray was
flying over the boat, the steamer had her steam up, and was ringing
and whistling impatiently, there was a scud of rain, and I was
standing trying to keep my paper waterproof from being blown off,
when three inopportune policemen jumped into the boat and demanded
my passport. For a moment I wished them and the passport under the
waves! The steamer is a little old paddle-boat of about 70 tons,
with no accommodation but a single cabin on deck. She was as clean
and trim as a yacht, and, like a yacht, totally unfit for bad
weather. Her captain, engineers, and crew were all Japanese, and
not a word of English was spoken. My clothes were very wet, and
the night was colder than the day had been, but the captain kindly
covered me up with several blankets on the floor, so I did not
suffer. We sailed early in the evening, with a brisk northerly
breeze, which chopped round to the south-east, and by eleven blew a
gale; the sea ran high, the steamer laboured and shipped several
heavy seas, much water entered the cabin, the captain came below
every half-hour, tapped the barometer, sipped some tea, offered me
a lump of sugar, and made a face and gesture indicative of bad
weather, and we were buffeted about mercilessly till 4 a.m., when
heavy rain came on, and the gale fell temporarily with it.
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