The Front Was Mean And
Unpromising-Looking, But, On Reaching The Back By A Stone Bridge
Over A Stream Which
Ran through the house, I found a room 40 feet
long by 15 high, entirely open along one side to
A garden with a
large fish-pond with goldfish, a pagoda, dwarf trees, and all the
usual miniature adornments. Fusuma of wrinkled blue paper splashed
with gold turned this "gallery" into two rooms; but there was no
privacy, for the crowds climbed upon the roofs at the back, and sat
there patiently until night.
These were daimiyo's rooms. The posts and ceilings were ebony and
gold, the mats very fine, the polished alcoves decorated with
inlaid writing-tables and sword-racks; spears nine feet long, with
handles of lacquer inlaid with Venus' ear, hung in the verandah,
the washing bowl was fine inlaid black lacquer, and the rice-bowls
and their covers were gold lacquer.
In this, as in many other yadoyas, there were kakemonos with large
Chinese characters representing the names of the Prime Minister,
Provincial Governor, or distinguished General, who had honoured it
by halting there, and lines of poetry were hung up, as is usual, in
the same fashion. I have several times been asked to write
something to be thus displayed. I spent Sunday at Komatsu, but not
restfully, owing to the nocturnal croaking of the frogs in the
pond. In it, as in most towns, there were shops which sell nothing
but white, frothy-looking cakes, which are used for the goldfish
which are so much prized, and three times daily the women and
children of the household came into the garden to feed them.
When I left Komatsu there were fully sixty people inside the house
and 1500 outside - walls, verandahs, and even roofs being packed.
From Nikko to Komatsu mares had been exclusively used, but there I
encountered for the first time the terrible Japanese pack-horse.
Two horridly fierce-looking creatures were at the door, with their
heads tied down till their necks were completely arched. When I
mounted the crowd followed, gathering as it went, frightening the
horse with the clatter of clogs and the sound of a multitude, till
he broke his head-rope, and, the frightened mago letting him go, he
proceeded down the street mainly on his hind feet, squealing, and
striking savagely with his fore feet, the crowd scattering to the
right and left, till, as it surged past the police station, four
policemen came out and arrested it; only to gather again, however,
for there was a longer street, down which my horse proceeded in the
same fashion, and, looking round, I saw Ito's horse on his hind
legs and Ito on the ground. My beast jumped over all ditches,
attacked all foot-passengers with his teeth, and behaved so like a
wild animal that not all my previous acquaintance with the
idiosyncrasies of horses enabled me to cope with him. On reaching
Akayu we found a horse fair, and, as all the horses had their heads
tightly tied down to posts, they could only squeal and lash out
with their hind feet, which so provoked our animals that the
baggage horse, by a series of jerks and rearings, divested himself
of Ito and most of the baggage, and, as I dismounted from mine, he
stood upright, and my foot catching I fell on the ground, when he
made several vicious dashes at me with his teeth and fore feet,
which were happily frustrated by the dexterity of some mago.
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