Chapter 10
recording by ma eighteen ninety one collection by various section ten two journal entries by lafcadio herne from the diary of an english teacher found in glimpses of an unfamiliar japan may first eighteen ninety one my favorite students often visit me of afternoons they first send me their cards to announce their presents on being told to come in they leave their footgear on the doorstep enter my little study prostrate themselves and we all squat down together on the floor which is in all japanese houses like a soft mattress the servant brings sabuton or small cushions to kneel upon and cakes and tea to sit as the japanese do requires practice and some europeans can never acquire the habit to acquire it indeed one must become accustomed to wearing japanese costume but once the habit of thus sitting has been formed one finds it is the most natural and easy of positions and assumes it by preference for eating reading smoking or chatting
it is not to be recommended perhaps for writing with a european pen as the motion in our occidental style of writing is from the supported wrist but it is the best posture for writing with the japanese footgear in using which the whole arm is unsupported and the motion from the oboe after having become habituated to japanese habits for more than a year i must confess that i find it now somewhat irksome to use a chair when we have all greeted each other and taken our places upon the kneeling cushions a little polite silence ensues which i am the first to break some of the lads speak a good deal of english they understand me well when i pronounce every word slowly and distinctly using simple phrases and avoiding idioms when a word with which they are not familiar must be used we refer to a good english japanese dictionary which gives each vernacular meaning both in the kana and in the chinese characters
usually my young visitors stay a long time and their stay is rarely tiresome their conversation and their thoughts are of the simplest and frankest they do not come to learn they know that to ask their teacher to teach out of school would be unjust they speak chiefly of things which they think have some particular interest for me sometimes they scarcely speak at all but appear to sink into a sort of happy reverie what they come really for is the quiet pleasure of sympathy not an intellectual sympathy but the sympathy of pure good-will the simple pleasure of being quite comfortable with a friend they pay but my books and pictures and sometimes they bring books and pictures to show me delightfully queer things family heirlooms which i regret much that i cannot buy they also like to look at my garden and enjoy all that is in it even more than i often they bring me gifts of flowers never by any possible chance are they troublesome impolite curious or even talkative
courtesy in its utmost possible exquisiteness an exquisiteness of which even the french have no conception seems natural to the izumo boy as the colour of his hair or the tint of his skin nor is he less kind than courteous to contrive pleasurable surprises for me is one of the particular delights of my boys and they either bring or cause to be brought to the house all sorts of strange things of all the strange or beautiful things which i am thus privileged to examine none gives me so much pleasure as a certain wonderful kakimono of amida niore it is a rather large picture and has been borrowed from a priest that i may see it the buddha stands in the attitude of exhortation with one hand uplifted behind his head a huge moon makes an aureole and across the face of that moon stream winding lines of thinnest cloud beneath his feet like a rolling of smoke curl heavier and darker clouds
merely as a work of colour and design the thing is a marvel but the real wonder of it is not in colour or design at all minute examination reveals the astonishing fact that every shadow and clouding is formed by a fairy text of chinese characters so minute that only a keen eye can discern them and this text is the entire text of two famed sutras the kawamurijo kyo and the amida kyo text no larger than the limbs of fleas and all the strong dark lines of the figure such as the seams of the buddha's robe are formed by the characters of the holy invocation of the shinshu sect repeated thousands of times namu amida batsu infinite patience tireless silent labour of loving faith in some dim temple long ago another day one of my boys persuades his father to let him bring to my house a wonderful statue of koshi confucius made i am told in china
toward the close of the period of the ming dynasty i am also assured it is the first time the statue has ever been removed from the family residence to be shown to any one previously whoever desired to pay it reverence had to visit the house it is truly a beautiful bronze the figure of a smiling bearded old man with fingers uplifted and lips apart as if discoursing he wears quaint chinese shoes and his flowing robes are adorned with the figure of the mystic phoenix the microscopic finish of detail seems indeed to reveal the wonderful cunning of a chinese hand each tooth each tooth each hair looks as though it had been made the subject of a special study another student conducts me to the home of one of his relatives that i may see a cat made of wood said to have been chiseled by the famed hidari a cat crouching and watching and so lifelike that real cats have been known to put up their backs and spit at it nevertheless i have a private conviction that some old artists even now living in
could make a still more wonderful cat among these is the venerable arakawa junosuke who wrought many rare things for the daimyo of izumo in the tempo era and whose acquaintance i have been enabled to make through my school friends one evening he brings to my house something very odd to show me concealed in his sleeve it is a doll just a small carven and painted head without a body the body being represented by a tiny robe only attached to the neck yet as a rakawa junosuke manipulates it it seems to become alive the back of its head is like the back of a very old man's head but its face is the face of an amused child and there is scarcely any forehead nor any evidence of a thinking disposition and whatever way the head is turned it looks so funny that one cannot help laughing at it it represents a kerakupo what we might call in english a jolly old boy one who is naturally too hearty and too innocent to feel trouble of any sort
it is not an original but a model of a very famous original whose history is recorded in a faded scroll which arakawa takes out of his other sleeve and which a friend translates for me this little history throws a curious light upon the simple-hearted ways of japanese life and thought in other centuries two hundred and sixty years ago this doll was made by a famous maker of no masks in the city of kyoto for the emperor go mizu no o the emperor used to have it placed beside his pillow each night before he slept and was very fond of it and he composed the following poem concerning it yo no naka wo kiraku ni kerase nani koto mo omo wa niba koso on the death of the emperor this doll becomes the property of prince kanoyi in whose family it is said to be still preserved about one hundred and seven years ago the then ex-impress whose posthumous name is ce quat manine borrowed the doll from prince kanoyi and ordered a copy of it to be made this copy she kept always beside her and was very fond of it
after the death of the good empress this doll was given to a lady of the court whose family name is not recorded afterwards this lady for reasons which are not known cut off her hair and became a buddhist nun taking the name of shingyo in and one who knew the nun shingyo in a man whose name was kondo ju haku in hokyo had the honor of receiving the doll as a gift now i who write this document at one time fell sick and my sickness was caused by despondency and my friend kondo ju haku in hokyo coming to see me said i have in my house something which will make you well and he went home and presently returning brought to me this doll and lent it to me putting it by my pillow that i might see it and laugh at it afterward i myself having called upon the nun shingyo in whom i now also have the honor to know wrote down the history of the doll and make a poem thereupon dated about ninety years ago no signature june first eighteen ninety one
i find among the students a healthy tone of skepticism in regard to certain forms of popular belief science education is rapidly destroying credulity in old superstitions yet current among the unlettered and especially among the peasantry as for instance faith in mamori and of fuddha the outward forms of buddhism its images its relics its commoner practices affect the average student very little he is not as a foreigner may be interested in iconography or religious folklore or the comparative study of religions and in nine cases out of ten he is rather ashamed of the signs and tokens of popular faith all around him but the deeper religious sense which underlies all symbolism remains with him and the monistic idea in buddhism is being strengthened and expanded rather than weakened by the new education what is true of the effect of the public schools upon the lower buddhism is equally true of its effect upon the lower shinto
the students all sincerely are or very nearly all yet not as fervent worshippers of certain kami but as rigid observers of what the higher shinto signifies loyalty filial piety obedience to parents teachers and superiors and respect to ancestors for shinto means more than faith when for the first time i stood before the shrine of the great deity of kitsuki as the first occidental to whom that privilege had been accorded not without a sense of awe there came to me the this is the shrine of the father of a race this is the symbolic centre of a nation's reverence for its past and i too paid reverence to the memory of the progenitor of this people as i then felt so feels the intelligent student of the meiji era whom education has lifted above the common plane of popular creeds and shinto also means for him whether he reasons upon the question or not all the ethics of the family and all that spirit of loyalty which has become so innate that at the call of duty life itself ceases to have value save as an instrument for duties accomplishment
as yet this orient little needs to reason about the origin of its loftier ethics imagine the musical sense in our own race so developed that a child could play a complicated instrument so soon as the little fingers gained sufficient force and flexibility to strike the notes by some such comparison only can one obtain a just idea of what inherent religion and instinctive duty signify in izumo of the rude and aggressive form of scepticism so common in the occident which is the natural reaction after sudden emancipation from superstitious belief i find no trace among my students but such sentiment may be found elsewhere especially in tokyo among the university students one of whom upon hearing the tones of a magnificent temple bell exclaimed to a friend of mine is it not a shame that in this nineteenth century we must still hear such a sound for the benefit of curious travellers however i may here take occasion to observe that to talk buddhism to japanese gentlemen
of the new school is in just as bad taste as to talk christianity at home to men of that class whom knowledge has placed above creeds and forms there are of course japanese scholars willing to aid researches of foreign scholars in religion or in folk-lore but these specialists do not undertake to gratify idle curiosity of the globe-trotting description i may also say that the foreigner desirous to learn the religious ideas or superstitions of the common people must obtain them from the people themselves not from the educated classes among all my favourite students two or three from each class i cannot decide whom i like the best each has a particular merit of his own but i think the names and faces of those of whom i am about to speak will longest remain vivid in my remembrance ishi hara otani masanobu
azuki zawa yokoji ishida ishi hara is a samurai a very influential lad in his class because of his uncommon force of character compared with others he has a somewhat brusque independent manner pleasing however by its honest manliness he says everything he thinks and precisely in the tone that he thinks it even to the degree of being a little embarrassing sometimes he does not hesitate for example to find fault with a teacher's method of explanation and to insist upon a more lucid one he has criticised me more than once but i never found that he was wrong we like each other very much he often brings me flowers one day that he had brought two beautiful sprays of plum blossoms he said to me i saw you bow before our emperor's picture at the ceremony on the birthday of his majesty you are not like a former english teacher we had how he said we were savages why
he said there is nothing respectable except god his god and that only vulgar and ignorant people respect anything else where did he come from he was a christian clergyman and said he was an english subject but if he was an english subject he was bound to respect her majesty the queen he could not even enter the office of a british council without removing his hat i don't know what he did in the country he came from but that was what he said now we think we should love and honour our emperor we think it is a duty we think it is a joy we think it is happiness to be able to give our lives for our emperor but he said we were only savages ignorant savages what do you think of that i think my dear lad that he himself was a savage a vulgar ignorant savage bigot i think it is your highest social duty to honour your emperor to obey his laws and to be ready to give your blood whenever he may require it of you for the sake of japan
i think it is your duty to respect the gods of your fathers the religion of your country even if you yourself cannot believe all that others believe and i think also that it is your duty for your emperor's sake and for your country's sake to resent any such wicked and vulgar language as that you have told me of no matter by whom uttered massinobu visits me seldom and always comes alone a slender handsome lad with rather feminine features reserved and perfectly self-possessed in manner refined he is somewhat serious does not often smile and i never heard him laugh he has risen to the head of his class and appears to remain there without any extraordinary effort much of his leisure time he devotes to botany collecting and classifying plants he is a musician like all the male members of his family he plays a variety of instruments never seen or heard of in the west including flutes of marble flutes of ivory flutes of bamboo of wonderful shapes and tones and that shrill chinese instrument called
a sort of mouth or a sort of mouth or a sort of mouth a sort of mouth-watering a sort of mouth-watering consisting of seventeen tubes of different lengths fixed in a silver frame he first explained to me the uses in temple music of the teiku and shoko which are drums of the flutes called fe or teki of the flagellet termed ichiriki and of the kako which is a little drum shaped like a spool with very narrow waist on great buddhist festivals masanobu and his father and his brothers are the musicians in the temple services and they play the strange music called ojo and batto music which at first no western ear can feel pleasure in but which when often heard becomes comprehensible and is found to possess a weird charm of its own when masanobu comes to the house it is usually in order to invite me to attend some buddhist or shinto festival matsuri which he knows will interest me
adzuki zawa bears so little resemblance to masanobu that one might suppose the two belong to totally different races adzuki zawa is a large raw-boned heavy-looking with a face singularly like that of a north american indian his people are not rich he can afford few pleasures which cost money except one buying books even to be able to do this he works in his leisure hours to earn money he is a perfect bookworm a natural born researcher a collector of curious documents a haunter of all the queer second-hand stores in terramachi and other streets where old manuscripts or prints are on sale as waste paper he is an omnivorous reader and a perpetual borrower of volumes which he always returns in perfect condition after having copied what he deemed of most value to him but his special delight is philosophy and the history of philosophers in all countries he has read various epitomes of the history of philosophy in the occident and everything of modern philosophy which has been translated into japanese
including spencer's first principles i have been able to introduce him to lewes and john fiske both of which he appreciates although the strain of studying philosophy in english is no small one happily he is so strong that no amount of study is likely to injure his health and his nerves are tough as wire he is quite an ascetic withal as it is the japanese custom to set cakes and tea before visitors i always have both in readiness and an especially fine quality of kwashi made at kitsuki of which the students are very fond aadzuki zala alone refuses to taste cakes or confectionery of any kind saying as i am the youngest brother i must begin to earn my own living soon i shall have to endure much hardship and if i allow myself to like dainties now i shall only suffer more later on
has seen much of human life and character he is naturally observant and he has managed in some extraordinary way to learn the history of everybody in he has brought me old tattered prints to prove that the opinions now held by our director are diametrically opposed to the opinions he advocated fourteen years ago in a public address i asked the director about it he laughed and said of course that is aadzuki zawa but he is right i was very young then and i wonder if aadzuki zawa was ever young yokochi aadzuki zawa's dearest friend is a very rare visitor for he is always studying at home he is always first in his class the third year class while anzuki zawa is fourth anzuki zawa's account of the beginning of their acquaintance is this
i watched him when he came and saw that he spoke very little walked very quickly and looked straight into everybody's eyes so i knew he had a particular character i like to know people with a particular character aadzuki zawa was perfectly right under a very gentle exterior yokoji has an extremely strong character he is the son of a carpenter and his parents could not afford to send him to the middle school but he had shown such exceptional qualities while in the elementary school that a wealthy man became interested in him and offered to pay for his education he is now the pride of the school he has a remarkably placid face with peculiarly long eyes and a delicious smile in class he is always asking intelligent questions questions so original that i am sometimes extremely puzzled how to answer them and he never ceases to ask until the explanation is quite satisfactory to himself
he never cares about the opinion of his comrades if he thinks he is right on one occasion when the whole class refused to attend the lectures of a new teacher of physics yokoji alone refused to act with them arguing that although the teacher was not all that could be desired there was no immediate possibility of his removal and no just reason for making unhappy a man who though unskilled was sincerely doing his best aadzuki zawa finally stood by him these two alone attended the lectures until the remainder of the students two weeks later found that yokoji's views were rational on another occasion when some vulgar proselytism was attempted by a christian missionary yokoji went boldly to the proselytizer's house argued with him on the morality of his effort and reduced him to silence some of his comrades praised his cleverness in the argument i am not clever he made answer it does not require cleverness to argue against what is morally wrong
it requires only the knowledge that one is morally right at least such as about the translation of what he said as told me by a shida another visitor is a very delicate sensitive boy whose soul is full of art he is very skilful at drawing and painting and he has a wonderful set of picture books by the old japanese masters the last time he came he brought some prints to show me rare ones fairy maidens and ghosts as i looked at his beautiful pale face and weirdly frail fingers i could not help fearing for him fearing that he might soon become a little ghost i have not seen him now for more than two months he has been very very ill and his lungs are so weak that the doctor has forbidden him to converse but adzukiizawa has been to visit him and brings me this translation of a japanese letter which the sick boy wrote and pasted upon the wall above his bed
thou my lord soul dost govern me thou knowest that i cannot now govern myself deign i pray thee to let me be cured speedily do not suffer me to speak much make me to obey in all things the command of the physician this ninth day of the eleventh month of the twenty fourth year of me from the sick body of shida to his soul in the section ten
