YALE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY

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Bought with the income of the
William C. Egleston Fund
1914

JAPAN'S INHERITANCE

SCENE OF THE GREAT EXPLOSION ON BANDAISAN
(July is, 188S).
The steam-clouds in th e foreground mark the main line of fracture ; the lakes
in the distance were formed by the crvption. Between the two is a differ
ence of level of about three thousand feet.

Frontispiece.

JAPAN'S INHERITANCE
THE COUNTRY, ITS PEOPLE,
AND THEIR DESTINY

BY
E. BRUCE MITFORD, F.R.G.S.

WITH TWELVE MAPS AND PLANS AND SEVENTY-FIVE
ILLUSTRATIONS FROM PHOTOGRAPHS

NEW YORK
DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY
1914

(All rights reserved)

PREFACE
Wanted— the truth about Japan. An American
writer, after complaining of " the world-wide
false impression of Japan " which has been given
by " the eclogues of European visitors," declares
it to be the " vital concern " of his countrymen
to know as much as possible of " nothing but
the truth." '
Whether or not he succeeded in replacing
" the world-wide false impression " by one
nearer the mark— and no Occidental taking up
a strongly anti-Japanese attitude can success
fully interpret the spirit of this nation, the leader
of the East — Mr. Price Collier is right in saying
that knowledge of things Japanese is of real
concern to the American people. With them,
in large measure, it rests to determine the manner
of the meeting of East and West. But other
Western nations, scarcely less interested in the
future of Japan, are asking the immortal ques-
1 Price Collier, The West in the East (1911).
I A

Preface
tion, "What is truth?" and waiting for the
answer. It is in the hope of contributing, in
a humble way, to the satisfaction of this demand
that I have put together these pages — the results
of travels and observations extending over a
period of ten years.
Some good folk contend that enough has
already been said of Japan. Any addition to
the multitude of books thereon is, in their view,
an action calling at least for apology. By way
of excuse, then, I would point to the fact that
the men who, by long residence and study, are
eminently fitted to write about Japan have, as
a rule, specialized in some particular branch of
the subject — history, literature, folk-lore, politics,
art. The description of the country, qua country,
has been left to the casual visitor. He, in faith,
has given us of his impressions freely ; but is
it not inevitable that such works should lack
authority? They may, as Count Hayashi says,
be " very amusing, and useful for killing time,"
but " the ideas gathered from their statements
are more injurious than useful as aids to forming
a judgment on events occurring in the Far East."
Quot homines, tot sententioe. Between the
enthusiasm of the writer who declares that " the
scenery surpasses the imagination of man
2

Preface
no fault can be found either with the country
or with the people," l and the prejudice of the
critic who condemns Japan as a Nazareth out
of which no good thing can come, there must
exist a happy mean. My hope and aim is to
aid in its finding. I have sought herein to set
down about the country " nothing but the truth,"
and, about the people, a few of the things that
matter. If a clearer conception be thereby
gained of what is admittedly a beautiful land,
of that most complex entity, " the Japanese
soul," and of the part marked out for Japan in
the Far Eastern scheme of things, my labour
will not have been in vain.
Every student of Japan is deeply in debt to
the works of Brinkley, Chamberlain, and Rein
— myself as much as any. The Transactions of
the Asiatic and Seismological Societies of Japan
have also furnished information, the value of
which I gratefully acknowledge. For " photo
graphic sympathy " my thanks are due to
Professor W. B. Mason, Professor Immanuel
Friedlander, Masatoshi Mori, Esq., and other
kind friends. Illustrations bearing on various
aspects of Japanese life have been kindly sup
plied by Messrs. Ogawa and Lewis, of Tokyo
1 Rittner, Impressions of Japan (1904).
3

Preface
and Yokohama respectively. I have also to
thank the Editors of the Field, Fry's Magazine,
Vanity Fair, and the National Review for permis
sion to reproduce photographs or portions of
articles which appeared originally in their pages.
I leave to the last my greatest debt of all —
to the generous aid and sympathy of the late
Rev. Arthur Lloyd/ of Tokyo, without whose
encouragement this work would not have been
undertaken. Integer vitce scelerisque pur us.
For him at least Shakespeare's lament must be
reversed. Evil was there none ; the good lives
after him.

CONTENTS

PAGE
PREFACE ...... C
CHAPTER I. THE CALL OF THE LAND . . . 13
Japan's story — Couleur de rose — First impressions —
Environment and character.
II. TIMES AND SEASONS . . . -25
Vagaries of climate — Rainfall and flood — Unconforming
seasons — When to see Japan.
III. WAYS AND MEANS . . . . .38
Travel in the interior — The Japanese bed — Basha and
Hnrikisha — Accidents will happen.
IV. THE TYPICALLY JAPANESE LANDSCAPE . . 62
The raw material of the Japanese landscape — "Soft"
contours and "little" — The Sankei — Nikko.
V. LAKE AND STREAM . . . . -79
Mischievous rivers — The Sandai-ka — Rapids — Lakes ol
depression — Fuji's mirrors.
VI. THE JAPANESE HIGHLANDS . . 97
Elements of sublimity — The great upheaval — In the wild
— Lakes "while you wait." 5

Contents

CHAPTER PAGE
VII. FUJI'S LIFE AND LORE . . . II4
Curves and similitudes — Legendary origins — Climbing a
devotional exercise — Sunrise from the summit.

VIII. CRATERS, ALIVE AND DEAD . . . I33
Volcanoes and the supernatural — Cones independent and
parasitic — Variety of formations— Recent activity.

IX. SOME TYPICAL VOLCANIC ASCENTS . . 150
Oshima and its Somna — Asama's detonations — A fatal
outburst — Bandai and the unexpected — The within-the-
mountain hut — Aso's great crater — A place of suicide.
X. EARTHQUAKES ..... I9I
Superstitions and " nerves " — Historic shocks — Causation
and prediction — The " offspring of the earthquake."
XI. THE SPAS OF JAPAN .... 209
A volcanic legacy — Conventions at a discount— Composi
tion and temperature — " Hells."
XII. THE GATEWAY OF THE SOUTH . . 225
Kyushu's past — Matsuri — Fantastic landscapes — Tobacco
culture on volcanic soil.
XIII. ACROSS THE STRAITS .... 242
A new land — Ainus and pit-dwellers — The Japanese
" coaster " — A succulent weed.

XIV. COUNTRY LIFE IN JAPAN . . . 255
All work and no play — Capitalist owners — Travel-clubs —
Physique of the country folk. 6

Contents

XV. CENTRES OF POPULATION .... 270
The "Estuary Gate" — Locomotion and "magnificent
distances " — The typical city — A midnight fire.

XVI. EDUCATION AND RELIGION . . . 29O
The inculcation of patriotism — Students and missionaries
— Wanted : a Religion — " Morals" and the Rescript.

XVII. THE POLITICAL FABRIC .... 309
" Spionitis " and militarism — Steps towards constitu
tionalism — The Genro and the Diet — Vox populi.

XVIII. JAPAN AS A COLONIAL POWER . . . 329
Fruits of war — State Socialism — Formosa and Korea : a
contrast — The Japanese official.
XIX. WHERE EAST MEETS WEST . . . 345
First results — Mixed marriages — Attitude of the West —
The Japanese abroad — The " Yellow Peril."
XX. A PEEP INTO THE FUTURE . . . 366
Japan's mission — Is her "soul" equal to it? — Pacific
problems — The demand for equality.
INDEX ... . 381

ILLUSTRATIONS

SCENE OF THE GREAT EXPLOSION ON BANDAISAN . Frontispiece FACING PAGE
THE SPEAR OF NINIGI ...... 14

THE PEAK OF THE HEAVENLY SPEAR, FROM THE NORTH
CHERRY-TREES IN BLOOM, UYENO PARK, TOKYO
CHERRY BLOSSOMS UNDER SNOW, YOKOHAMA PARK .
A SUMMER SCENE, CENTRAL JAPAN
A DIAGNOSIS — BY A DOCTOR OF THE OLD SCHOOL
IN A HOKKAIDO PORT : SAMPAN GOING OUT TO STEAMER
CRYPTOMERIA AVENUE, NEAR NIKKO
BASHA OUTSIDE INN, HOKKAIDO
TRAVEL BY PACK-HORSE ....
SOFT CONTOURS : " PLAINS OF HEAVEN," NEAR KAMAKURA
GRAVE OF WILL ADAMS AND HIS JAPANESE WIFE, NEAR
YOKOSUKA ......

14
282834
34
4848
4848
6868
68

MAN AND WIFE ROCKS, FUTAMI, ISE
THE TORII AT MIYAJIMA . 70
AMA-NO-HASHIDATE, "THE LADDER OF HEAVEN" . 70
MATSUSHIMA . SOME OF THE 800 ISLANDS . . 70
SOFT CONTOURS IN A VOLCANIC REGION, HAKONE . 76
THE GORGE OF YABAKEI, KYUSHU . , . -76
9

Illustrations

RAPIDS OF THE FUJIKAWA

FACING PAGE 86

RIVER SCENE, WESTERN JAPAN . . 86
ONAMI-IKE, CRATER LAKE, KIRISHIMA . 86
CLIFF SCENERY, ENOSHIMA, SOUTH END 94
KEGON FALL, NIKKO 94
YUMOTO SPA, NIKKO 94
LAKE YUMOTO AND SHIRANESAN . 94
HODAKAYAMA, FROM THE TOKUGO-TOGE, JAPANESE ALPS . 98
KAMIKOCHI VALLEY AND THE AZUSAGAWA 98
ONTAKE'S CRATERED RIDGE . . 98
LAKE TOYA AND THE NEW CONES OF USU HO
SULPHUR-DIGGERS ON AZUMAYAMA, NORTHERN JAPAN . HO
FUJI FROM THE SOUTH-WEST, SHOWING HOEIZAN . .HO
FUJI, FROM LAKE MOTOSU Il8
FUJI, FROM SHOJI LAKE . 13°
PILGRIMS ON FUJI . 130
THE SUMMIT-CRATER OF FUJI 130
VOLCANOES ARE SACRED : TEMPLE AT FOOT OF DAISEN,
WESTERN JAPAN . . . . . .136
TORII MARKING APPROACH TO ESAN VOLCANO, HOKKAIDO . 136
VOLCANIC STUMP, SAMBONTAKE, ISLES OF IZU . . 146
FUMAROLES ON THE FLOOR OF TAKACHIHO, KYUSHU . I46
TRIPLE-CRATERED SHIRANESAN, WITH BOILING CENTRAL LAKE 146
VOLCANIC CEMENT ON YAKEGATAKE, JAPANESE ALPS . 148
OPEN FOR INSPECTION : BREACHED CRATER OF ESAN . 148
ERUPTION OF USUDAKE (1910) : FOREST OF BLASTED PINES 148
IO

Illustrations

FACING PAGE
THE SOMNA AND CENTRAL CONE OF MIHARA (OSHIMA) . 1 56
THE CRATER OF MIHARA : EASTERN WALL

ASAMA FROM KARUIZAWA : A " PUFF " .
AN UNPLEASANT PROMONTORY : DYKE PROJECTING INTO
CRATER ......
THE LAVA STREAM OF 1 783 ....
LAKE HIBARA FROM THE SUMMIT OF BANDAISAN
THE CRATER OF ASOSAN : AN EXPLOSION
GORGE OF THE SHIRAKAWA, ASOSAN
THE NEW VENT ON ASOSAN ....
GENESIS OF A MOUNTAIN SPA : NOBORIBETSU, HOKKAIDO
ASHINOYU SPA : HAKONE MOUNTAINS .
AN ALFRESCO SHOWER : NOBORIBETSU .
BATH-HOUSE IN MID-STREAM : SHUZENJI, IZU .
ISLAND-VOLCANO OF SAKURAJIMA, KAGOSHIMA BAY .
"THE HORSE'S BONE," TAKACHIHO
KOMAGATAKE FROM ONUMA LAKE
THE DOME OF TARUMAI .
DABBY AND JOAN .
IN THE RICE-FIELDS
A FISHING VILLAGE, IZU COAST .
A RURAL POSTMAN
ONE OF TOKYO'S PRINCIPAL THOROUGHFARES, NEAR NIHON
BASHI ......
OUTSKIRTS OF YOKOHAMA, LOOKING SOUTH
A FIRE-BRIGADE DISPLAY II

I58166166166176
184 188 188
212212
216 216
238 238252252
264264 264 264
274274286

Illustrations FACING PAGE
STREET SCENE, KOBII 2°°
STUDENTS AT WORK, KEIO UNIVERSITY, TOKYO 296
A JAPANESE WEDDING . 29°
CALLED TO THE COLOURS 3*4
A GEISHA DANCE . . 3J4
THE TEMPLE OF HACHIMAN, GOD OF WAR, KAMAKURA . 314
FUNERAL OF COMMANDER HIROSE, ONE OF THE PORT
ARTHUR HEROES 3'4

MAPS AND PLANS
KEY MAP OF JAPANESE SCENERY, IN COLOURS Facing page 9
Specially illustrating chapters IV-VI
ANNUAL RAINFALL . Page 32
THE RAILWAY SYSTEM . 43
THE JAPANESE HIGHLANDS 103
VOLCANIC ZONES, SHOWING ARRANGEMENT OF PRIN
CIPAL VENTS .... 141
PLAN OF THE ISLAND OF OSHIMA, IZU 1 54
SECTIONS OF OSHIMA
PLAN OF THE CRATER OF BANDAISAN .

157 174

THE STRUCTURE OF ASOSAN (DIAGRAMMATIC) . . 185

KOREAN AND MANCHURIAN RAILWAYS

229

THE HOKKAIDO (YEZO) 244

FORMOSA

334

12

JAPAN'S INHERITANCE
CHAPTER I
THE CALL OF THE LAND
The story of Japan — Mythology and science — A tale in three
chapters — The old version preferred — A heritage of
worth — Couleur de rose — Ignorance and prejudice — First
impressions — The points of arrival — Where the East
begins — Terrestrial stress and strain — Environment and
character — What is truth ?
The story of Japan varies with the teller.
According to Japanese mythology, the Land of
the Rising Sun was begotten by heavenly deities
— Izanagi and Izanami— to be the abode of their
favoured descendants. It was indeed the first-
fruit of their mystic union . The rest of the world
followed — incidentally, as it were, and as occasion
arose .
Should sceptic mortal call in question this
celestial genesis, the Spear of Ninigi, grandson
of the Sun-goddess Amaterasu, remains to this
day transfixed in a cairn at the summit of the
x3

Japan's Inheritance
sacred Takachiho, in Southern Kyushu, to confute
such unbelief. Amaterasu, of course, was the
daughter of the twin deities mentioned above-
born, to be precise, from the left eye of the
Creator, Izanagi. By her Ninigi was commis
sioned to descend to terrestrial realms that he
might secure the sovereignty for Jimmu, first
human ruler of Japan. Where the child of the
Sun-god touched Daughter Earth, there he left
his Heavenly Spear. Than this relic, in the
whole gamut of Japan's sacred things, there is
but one more sacred. It is the Mirror of the
Sun -goddess herself, secluded from mortal gaze
in the holy of holies of the Daijingu Shrine
at Ise\
Science has a different tale to tell . Once upon
a time, it says, Japan was no distinct division
of land, but a part of the Asiatic continent.
Instead of four thousand islands — five hundred
of them with a diameter exceeding one mile —
there were no islands at all. Then, from beneath
the ocean, vast terrestrial forces came into play.
The edge of the continent was reared upwards
in great crumpled ridges, and the low land
beyond sank beneath its ancient level. On either
side of the depression thus created, the waters
forced in their way. Thus were made, of the
low lands, a narrow sea and, of the projecting
arc, an island. With this great act of separa
tion, the first stage of Japan's story ends.
J4

l-^ofj

***?>'

1

b' #1 ^ %

THE SPEAR OF NINIGI.
In a cairn at the summit of Tabachilio.

THE PEAK OF THE HEAVENLY SPEAR, FROM THE NORTH

Tj lace p. 14.

The Call of the Land
Things were not suffered to remain long thus.
After a pause the attack was renewed, this time
upon the island-arc. Its northern half, borne
backwards and downwards, subsided beneath the
sea. Midway, from shore to shore, the whole
arc snapped, while the southern half broke up
into three large and a number of small islands.
Kyushu and Shikoku were two of the large
islands ; Awaji (deemed by the mythologists a
crystal fallen frornl the Creator's jewelled spear)
was one of the small.
After long submergence Hondo reappeared
above the waves. Its resurrection was the signal
for an outburst of subterranean activity on a
tremendous scale. At this time, no doubt, Euji
and many another of Japan's volcanoes began
their troubled careersa and the newly risen area,
in particular, was extensively overlaid with " the
ashes of earth's fires." Meanwhile the agents of
earth-sculpture got to work and, aided by subter
ranean force, made the face of the country what
it is to-day.
In the Nai-ku (" Inner Temple") of Ise, in
Yamato, the Story of the Creation, according to
Japanese lore, finds a local habitation and a
name. Thither at set periods the nation turns
in spirit, and as one man. Half a million
pilgrims annually repair to worship in person,
and those who cannot perform the journey receive
from the Shinto authorities, on the last day of
i5

Japan's Inheritance
each year, a portion of the O-Nusa (" Great
Offering "), to be reverently placed on their own
tokonoma, altar of the household gods. School
boys have been known to play truant for weeks
on end, and, by begging their way, to " tramp
it" to the shrine of the Sun -goddess. Nor may
stern parent or principal chide them on their
return from so pious a performance. Heads of
universities, lending to science too ready an ear,
have been cashiered for venturing to pronounce
this Story a myth. And public opinion is on the
side of "the authorities."
What thinks the twentieth-century Japanese
of the handiwork of his Imperial ancestors ? He
finds it good. Its graces are more than a delight
to mind and eye ; they have a value measurable
in yen. Nor will this value fade with time.
To all the beauty-seeking world the land makes
irresistible appeal, and, with distance near
annihilation, the insulce fortunatce of the East
promise to become the playground of mankind.
But let none suppose that days or months, that
flying visit or officially conducted tour, will suffice
to win their secrets. He who would know Japan
must woo first-hand, and patiently.
But hear a warning. The combination of
novelty and old-world charm which distinguishes
both the Japanese landscape and the ways of the
people carries many an impressionable stranger
off his feet. Rose-coloured spectacles become
16

The Call of the Land
his medium of vision ; the sense of proportion
departs. Eor him, bemused, no ugliness exists,
or could exist, in " lotus land." On other folk,
again, the opposite effect is produced. They
have eyes only for Dai Nippon's sins. The
characteristics of her scenery are defects ; her
people "are compounded of conceit and deceit."
But all these estimates are the limits of infatua
tion on the one hand, of ignorance or prejudice
on the other. Via media holds the way of truth.
Most people's first impressions of Japan seem
to be connected in one way or another with
Fujiyama. The number of drowsy passengers
who have been dragged from their bunks to
behold the " silver bell " of that great volcano's
summit, suspended as it were between heaven
and earth, is legion ; and the language of our
forefathers has suffered much at the hands of
many who have attempted to describe the scene.
As a matter of fact, the majority of visitors to
the Land of the Rising Sun approach it from
the south, via " the ports," as the saying goes
in that part of the world. They thus set foot
in Japan for the first time at Nagasaki or at
Kobe. Even to the eye of faith Fuji is invisible
from either of these places. Sometimes, how
ever, enthusiasm1 plays strange tricks with
geography. In more than one recent con
troversy as to " the finest view in the world,"
the palm has been given to " the image of Fuji
17 B

Japan's Inheritance
in the beauteous waters of Lake Biwa." Of
course, the lake in question is the one which, em
bosomed in the mountains of Hakone, takes from
them its name. Legend has, indeed, connected
the celebrated lake of Omi with the great volcano
in another way ; but the distance between the
two — 150 miles as the crow flies— effectually dis
qualifies Lake Biwa from serving as the " mirror
of Fuji." As for those who approach Japan from
America, they are more likely, long before Fuji
comes in sight, to catch a glimpse of the fog
bound Hokkaido or of the half-sunken reef over
whose jagged crests the huge Dakota rushed
to its doom.
We know that the mons excelsus et singularis
of Japan, as Kaempfer called it, is visible from
a great distance out at sea. Reliable witnesses
have seen it from a hundred miles out, and it is
even said to be discernible, in exceptionally clear
weather, from the holy island of Kinkwazan,
250 miles away to the north. During the
summer months, however, the great volcano not
infrequently obscures itself for days together
behind a veil of clouds. At such times the
stranger approaching the shores of Eastern
Japan is more likely to have his attention
directed to a sight as remarkable in its way
—the ever-active volcano of Oshima (Vries
Island), which lies in the fairway of the
approach to Yedo Bay. I remember seeing this
18

The Call of the Land
island to great advantage from the deck of an
Empress, when nearing Japan for the first time.
The double-cratered summit of the mountain (for
the island is the volcano, and the volcano the
island), with billowy steam-clouds rolling from
it, made, to my mind, a singularly impressive
scene. I asked a fellow -passenger if it had ever
been ascended. He was an " old timer," who
had made the voyage from Shanghai to Yoko
hama " on business " a score of times, and what
he did not know about the route was not worth
knowing. " I did hear of one fellow," he said,
" who was fool enough to climb up and look into
the crater. . . . He was a German professor,
or something of the sort," he added. " And what
did he have to say about it?" I asked. "Oh,
he was never heard of again ! " was the reply.
My fortune has been, since then, to look into that
crater on five separate occasions.
Of the several points of approach to Eastern
Japan, Nagasaki, with its verdant fiord-like
harbour, is the most picturesque ; Kobe comes
next, Yokohama last. The order of merit, in
point of scenery, coincides with the order in
which they are usually seen. On acquaintance,
this is reversed. Nagasaki, so to speak, wears
its heart on its sleeve ; it is soon known. Yoko
hama, as a world-port and gateway of the
metropolis, gains immensely in interest and in
" life." Moreover, the comparatively low country
19

Japan's Inheritance
behind the harbour, which tends to give it a tame
appearance, turns out to be pretty enough when
explored. Kobe, on the other hand, if not so
beautiful as the Kyushu port, occupies a situation
of much dignity on a well-shaped bay at the
base of wooded hills rising to 2,000 feet. Its
nearness to " Old Japan "—the region consisting
of the Go-kinai, or five " Home Provinces," with
Kyoto for its centre— will, to many minds, give
it a superior claim in point of interest. Still,
there is no denying that Tokyo has become the
social and political — as well as, to a large extent,
the commercial — centre of gravity. From this
movement northwards, Nagasaki, as being the
remotest, has been the first to suffer ; and though
the Inland Sea port has suffered also, the rise
of Osaka as an industrial centre not only redeems
Kobe from anything like inanition, but has given
it the first place in the bulk, if not in the value,
of Japan's oversea trade.
Both Kobe and Yokohama were wont to rejoice
in the possession of " foreign settlements." With
the abolition of extra -territoriality, the term
became an anachronism, and the Japanese took
care that the quarters set apart in the old days
for the foreign community were officially re
named. Except that dapper little Japanese
policemen — saved from insignificance by their
swords — have replaced the consular guards, the
settlements remain very much as they were. On
20

The Call of the Land
landing from an orthodox steam-launch at pier
or bund, the stranger may enjoy the fascinating
experience of his first " rick'sha " ride. It
should, indeed, provide a medley of sensations.
Not only will he be drawn by a little brown man
with amazingly developed legs, attired in a cos
tume of the Middle Ages, with a hat fashioned
after the similitude of an umbrella, but he will
be drawn along a " foreign " roadway bounded
by substantial, not to say imposing, buildings of
brick and stone. Where are the wonderful fairy -
like structures of wood and paper? Fortunately,
not far away. Just outside the borders of each
of the former settlements is Motomachi (main
street), where Japanese tradesmen, clad in the
quaint kimono, do business on yellow tatami, with
sliding paper-doors about them ; and gaily
dressed brown-skinned children, with geta on
their feet and babies on their backs, play about
the streets. Here, not on Bund or Bluff, the
West ends and the East begins.
The Japanese people may be little, but not so
the land. The Britain of the East, even if one
leaves out of the reckoning such of her outlying
possessions as Chosen and Formosa, can allow
Great Britain a margin in area of 25,000 square
miles. Excluding the insular festoons of Liukiu
and Chishima, Dai Nippon extends in length
twelve hundred miles, as against Britain's six.
The natural features are on a scale which
21

Japan's Inheritance

reminds us that Japan is less an island chain than
the edge of a great continent. More than that,
the Japanese arc abuts upon an oceanic depres
sion as profound as any on the face of this planet.
Between the salient points of the Central High
lands and the abysses of the Tuscarora— a
difference in level of nearly 40,000 feet— lies a
region of enormous terrestrial stress and strain.
Thus it comes that the land of the lotus and
the cherry blossom is also the home of the
earthquake, the tidal flood, and the Volcanic out
burst. As if to remind the easygoing people
of their indebtedness, these same forces from
time to time lay waste large areas of the land
they have helped to build, exacting a heavy toll
in life and property.
Nations vary as the lands that bear them. For
effects of environment upon the Japanese
character we shall not look in vain. The natural
charms which surround them have developed a
sense of the beautiful which may justly be con
sidered national. They have furnished also
inspiration and motive for innumerable works of
art. The limited amount of soil available for
cultivation and the unremitting care required in
its preparation have made the inhabitants thrifty
and industrious. The simple mode of living thus
inculcated and a somewhat rough climate have
helped to make them hardy and capable of great
endurance. For mountains of any description,
22

The Call of the Land
and for volcanic mountains in particular — as
being (so to speak) the most demonstrative — the
Japanese people show an extraordinary regard.
This veneration has a religious origin and ten
dency, because many of the natural phenomena,
especially those of a terrifying or destructive
character, have always been regarded as mani
festations of the divine will. Without going so
far as the lady-writer who asserted that the
" excitability " of the Japanese— a characteristic
not usually attributed to them — arose from the
volcanic nature of the country, it may be said
that the earthquake and the flood have made
fatalists of the Japanese. They set great store
by a happy life, but they do not forget that it
may be brief. Adjoining the comparatively
flimsy abode of all Japanese of substance may
be seen a ponderous and imposing structure, sug
gestive of a gigantic safe, which is supposed to
be proof against earthquake, fire, and flood. In
this fortress they keep their valuables ; in the
doll's house they keep themselves.
To enable us to strike a balance between the
very diverse opinions regarding the Japanese
people and their country which have been
given to the world, we must take into account
the actual — and, in a sense, unique — conditions
under which the Japanese have grown to nation
hood. We must have a clear idea of their
physical as well as their social and political
23

Japan's Inheritance

environment. We must make generous allow
ance for the effects of the unprecedented changes
which have taken place within the last fifty years,
remembering that, in this brief period, a nation
with the unbroken history of more than two
millenniums behind it has turned from one
civilization to another. Only by fully and
faithfully examining these real foundations of
Japanese life shall we be in a position to appre
ciate the remarkable position which the Island
People of the East have gained in the modern
world. Then, having thus learned of the Past,
we may ask of the future what it holds in store
for them.

24

CHAPTER II
TIMES AND SEASONS
Japan not a hot country — Vagaries of climate — The West
and North — The Kuroshiwo — The " winter's wind " and
the Japanese house — Skating an imported art — Rainfall
and flood — Unconforming seasons — Climate and health
— The seasons in colour — Autumnal tints — When to see
Japan.
A widespread impression persists in the West
that Japan is a hot country. The fact is over
looked that the Empire extends over a distance
of 2,000 miles through thirty degrees of latitude,
and presents in consequence an immense variety
of climatic conditions. Even if we consider
only the four large islands which constitute Japan
proper, very great differences remain. Let us
in the first instance confine our attention to the
central or salient part of the main Japanese arc,
abutting on the Pacific — in other words, the
eastern slope of the country for roughly
200 miles north and south of Tokyo Bay.
Taking this region — a mean between the extremes
25

Japan's Inheritance
— as representative of the whole, the first con
clusion at which we shall arrive is that the
Japanese climate, so far from being one of
tropical warmth, is colder than its latitude would
lead us to expect. On this basis of latitude,
Tokyo should enjoy as genial weather as Naples
or Seville. But does it? For two months of
the year it is uncomfortably hot— the discomfort
proceeding rather from the dampness of the
atmosphere than the height of the temperature ;
and, for the rest, in all the essentials of a good
climate it is a long way behind Andalusia or
the south of Italy.
Were it not for a rainfall exceeding 120 inches
per annum, one part of Japan — to wit, southern
Kyushu — could claim a climate of Italian
amenity. Sugar-cane is grown, and left stand
ing all the year round, on the southward slopes
of Sakurajima — the only place, I believe, in
Japan.1 That most malodorous radish, the
daikon, here grows as big as a man. Rain
ruins the summer of Japan's " farthest south,"
but the winter is as nearly as possible perfec
tion. Snow is the rarest of visitations. Nor,
for the matter of that, is it common in the Tokyo
district— there are on the average three or four
falls of an inch or so during the season ; but
1 In other parts of the country the small and hardy Chinese
variety (Saccharum sinense) is planted yearly in the spring
and harvested in autumn. 26

Times and Seasons
it seems to make a point of coming at untoward
times. One of the heaviest falls of recent years
was in mid -April, 1908, when the Japanese
world-and-his-wife went to bed dreaming of the
morrow's promenade under the cherry-blossoms,
but woke to find roseate loveliness smothered
beneath several inches of snow. To such con
ditions — it is perhaps superfluous to remark —
the Japanese foot-gear does not lend itself.
More to be feared are they than floods, for these
are more in the nature of things, and when they
do descend upon the land one can at least fall
back upon jinrikisha or sampan.
In Eastern Japan, then, the seasons have their
vagaries. What of the rest? Cross the dividing
backbone range to the Western coast, at any
time after mid-November, and you will find a
climate like that of Eastern Canada — a country
side under 4 or 5 feet of snow. Streets lie
buried up to the eaves of the houses, and on
either side notice-boards project above the
temporarily elevated way — " You will find the
post-office below," " The police-station lies
buried beneath this spot," and so on. Of
course, the farther north the more pronounced
these wintry rigours. If the climate of southern
Kyushu may be called sub -tropical, that of Yezo
approaches the Arctic. For five months of the
year the Hokkaido lies under snow and ice.
And yet, taken all round, its climate is the driest,
27

Japan's Inheritance
with a summer delightful, if all too brief. Add
to this medley of meteorological conditions the
fact that few parts of Japan escape being
drenched by floods or swept by a typhoon once
a year at least, and it will appear that the ways
of the weather, over the Empire as a whole,
can boast little moderation or regularity.
So far we have treated of effects without
reference to causes. These, however, will throw
some light upon the mysteries of the Japanese
climate. To take the first of these, Japan
has its Gulf Stream— the Kuroshiwo (" Black
Current ") — which with a temperature of 8o° E.
brings warmth and moisture to the southern and
south-eastern shores. To this " Black Current,"
as it is called from the purplish hue of its
waters, Japan owes those summer rains which,
however disconcerting to the tourist, are valuable
to the country — the secret of its wonderful, all-
pervading verdure. The same genial influence
redeems the Japanese winter, inclement though
it is, from the severity of that of the adjacent
continent. The southward slopes of Kyushu and
Shikoku especially profit from the nearness of
the Kuroshiwo. Two rice crops annually are
here a certainty. In the higher regions there
is " a vigorous growth of deciduous trees, where
horse-chestnuts and magnolias intermingle with
beech, ash, oak, and alder trees. Evergreens
venture much higher than in Hondo, and, in
28

CHERRY-TREES IN BLOOM, UYENO PARK, TOKYO.

CHERRY BLOSSOMS UNDER SNOW, YOKOHAMA PARK.

Times and Seasons
lower levels, camphor -trees and other cinnamon
species take part in the composition of the ever
green forests." At 39° N., however, in the
vicinity of Kinkwazan, the Kuroshiwo turns
sharply to the east, and, skirting the abysses
of the Tuscarora, strikes across the ocean for
the British Columbian coast. A tributary of this
stream enters the Tsushima Straits and warms
the south-western coast of Hondo, but makes
little headway beyond the Oki Archipelago.
Down from the north, on the other hand, comes
a cold current which enwraps Yezo in its icy
embrace, passing out into the Pacific through
the deep Tsugaru Straits.
The next great factor in the making of
the Japanese climate is the nearness of the
Siberian land massif. No part of Japan from
November to April escapes the keen northerly
wind, which makes the Japanese winter seem
even colder than it is. It is the same wind that
compels foreign residents of North China, from
Tientsin to Chefoo, to fit double windows to their
houses and stuff the interstices with cotton-wool
" to expel the winter's flaw." So far as Japan
is concerned, the passage of this icy blast over
the slightly warmer Sea of Japan adds to its
moisture and robs it of some of its keenness.
Nevertheless, after draping the western slope of
the watershed with snow, it sweeps from the
drifts of the dividing ridge upon the hills and
29

Japan's Inheritance
plains of Eastern Japan. What resistance to
its onset can the wood-and-paper houses of the
Japanese afford ? The inmates can but tuck their
feet more tightly beneath them and crouch more
closely over their poisonous hibachi. Few bother
to concern themselves with the Home Depart
ment's mortality returns, which show that the
death-rate from tuberculosis and other chest
complaints stands higher in Japan than in any
other civilized country.
Nine out of every ten Japanese, confronted
with these facts, would with an almost Gallic
shrug of the shoulders reply Shikata-ga-nai (It
cannot be helped). An ordinary artisan's dwell
ing can be put together for £15, whereas a
structure of clapboard with lath and plaster
" walls " within — the style of most of the
" foreign " houses — designed to keep out some
at least of the cold, would cost many times that
sum. And how many clerks or working men,
earning perhaps 25 yen a month, could afford to
pay the necessary rent? People have wondered
at the cheerful regularity with which Japanese
families adjourn nightly to the nearest public
bath-house. The raw chilliness of the Japanese
winter supplies, in part, the answer : they can
there be warm for at least one hour out of the
twenty-four. But if the Japanese winter is cold, it has its
compensations in the warmth of sunshine and
3°

Times and Seasons
comparative absence of rain. The north wind
nightly coats the " paddies " with a film of ice,
which the noonday sun destroys. This much at
least East-Central Japan owes to her latitude of
3 6° N . For the same reason skating can seldom
be enjoyed in the Tokyo district. As a pastime
it was unknown in Japan prior to 1878. In that
exceptionally severe winter, when even in mid-
Kyushu snow lay four feet deep, some foreign
residents astonished the natives by their gyrations
on the ice. Skating enthusiasts, Japanese and
foreign, now repair to the highlands, and a yearly
championship contest is held on Lake Suwa, in
Central Japan, 2,600 feet above sea-level. Out
side of the mountain districts day -frosts are rare.
Beyond what might be considered the limit of
the temperate climate, the Sendai-Niigata line,
there is, of course, another tale to tell.
Of the whole year the four or five months
from mid-October to early March are the driest.
Less than a fifth of the total rainfall occurs
during this period, which offers the most agree
able general conditions. The second "rainy
season " — that of the autumnal equinox — is over,
and till the disagreeable conditions of early
spring set in nothing mars the succession of
bright, if chilly, days and clear, frosty nights.
Any one visiting Japan in January would stare in
credulously at meteorological tables which affirm
the rainfall in the Tokyo -Yokohama district to
31

Japan's Inheritance
Annual kmnfall
P wnJer if-0 inches 0 SO tb 100 in.
P if-0 li t>0 «. 0 avtT rirx! >„,
A.

Hakodate

Nikko Nagano
Noto Penin
sula

Sendai

Tokyo

Kii Penin
sula

Kagoshima

be 6o to 70 inches annually — more than double
the English average. Had he arrived in June
or September, he would be tempted to condemn
32

Times and Seasons
the statement as below the mark. Between the
climate of Britain and its Oriental namesake
there is, in respect of rainfall, this broad dis
tinction. In the one case it more often drizzles
than rains ; in the other, when it rains, it rains .
England's annual figure is less than half Japan's,
but her " rainy days " outnumber Japan's by
nearly 20 per cent. Scotch mists give place in
Japan to rainstorms, which for persistence and
resultant mischief would be hard to beat. In
September, 1878 — an annus mirabilis for weather
— nearly 7 inches of rain fell at Yokohama in
the space of thirty hours, and 20 inches in the
course of the month. Though this record has
not since been surpassed, it has on several occa
sions been approached. More recently, how
ever, the wet blanket of September seems to have
descended upon August. In 1910, thousands of
holiday-makers in the mountain districts were
cut off from communication with the outside
world. Road, rail, and telegraph succumbed to
the attack of the elements . Houses were flooded,
riverside inns swept away, and in several of the
more crowded resorts a shortage of food sup
plies caused the conditions to approximate to
those of a siege. Nor did the cities of the plain
escape. Floods invaded the low -lying wards of
Tokyo to a depth of several feet, and for the
space of two days and a night some thousands
of the inhabitants lived literally on the roofs
33 c

Japan's Inheritance
of their houses, while relief parties in sampans
passed to and fro, throwing rice-balls and bottles
of fresh water up to the victims of the swollen
Sumidagawa .
The extremes of the Japanese year are known
as the doyo (dog-days) and dai-kan (great cold).
The former is scheduled by the meteorological
authorities fo follow immediately on the nyubai,
or rainy season proper, which in its turn has
the period June 10 to July 7 assigned to it in
the calendar. An elusive and disconcerting thing
is this rainy season. Sometimes a misty cool
ness, sometimes a hothouse mugginess pervades
the land. There is frequent, but rarely torren
tial, rain. In a normal year this is followed by
several weeks of fine hot weather — the time
of all times for travel in the interior. In the
coast districts the thermometer goes up to 85"
or 900 Fj. in the shade ; Europeans who are
compelled to stay at home don their " ducks,"
mosquitoes begin to get troublesome, and the
screech of the cicada is heard in the land. All
who can get away join the general exodus to
the hills — the corps diplomatique and the mis
sionary fraternity leading the way. There, at
any rate, all goes merrily as a wedding-bell —
in a normal year . Unfortunately, the normal and
the abnormal have a trick of changing places—
unaccountably and at short notice. The nyubai
fails to " come off," things go wrong with the
34

A SUMMER SCENE, CENTRAL JAPAN.

A DIAGNOSIS — BY A DOCTOR OF THE OLD SCHOOL.

Times and Seasons
dog-days, troubles descend by way of the river
beds upon highlands and lowlands alike, and
the discomfited clerks of the weather in the
Tokyo Observatory would fain confess themselves
no better than the rustics who say it will be fine
when the tombi (kite) cries of an evening, and
wet when a crow washes his plumes in running
water .
In drawing attention to its eccentricities,
I have given, I fear, a somewhat unfavourable,
almost alarming, account of the Japanese climate .
Nevertheless, let none condemn it as unhealthy
or severe. Even in the most unsettled seasons
there is no month which has not its beautiful
days, and there is no month in which1 the con
ditions put an excessive strain upon a healthy
European constitution. Medical men declare it
to be specially good for children, but not, on
the whole, for ladies, whom it is said to affect
with " nerves." As a similar complaint has been
made of the Far East in general, the blame
should be laid elsewhere than at the door of
the climate.
Like most other countries, Japan looks her
best when she begins to don her summer green,
and, thanks to the ubiquity of the maple, she
probably excels all others in the glorious wealth
of her autumnal tints. The year goes out as it
comes in, in a blaze of colour. Nor, between
whiles, is there dearth of it. The plum and the
35

Japan's Inheritance
cherry lead, azaleas follow to fire the woods,
wistaria to drape the dells and tea-houses. The
purple iris takes up the tale, and late in summer
the lotus, with a fine impartiality, spreads its
gorgeous blooms over landscape garden and
village mud -pond.
" Sere and yellow " is no term to use of the
fall of the year in Japan. As autumn advances
red and white camellias give wonderful effects
to the hill-sides — for all that they are, in Japanese
eyes, unlucky, and untidy in the spreading of
their faded petals. November's is the double
glory of the chrysanthemum and the maple — the
one in the trim garden, the other on the wild
mountain flank. It is the last flash of summer.
As the maple fades from scarlet to russet-brown
the peaks of the interior receive their cap of
snow. And not till June are the high passes
of the West and North clear of their winter's
load. Wherefore the man who feels that he cannot
really see Japan save at the time of the cherry-
blossom will, of course, arrive early in April ;
but he must be prepared for unsettled, not to
say inclement, weather. The man who comes
to climb (and, with all respect to the cherry-
blossom, no one can really see Japan without
climbing) ; to fish in some of the mountain
streams of the interior or in the ground lakes of
Inawashiro, Towada, and Shikotsu ; or to shoot—
36

Times and Seasons
be it bears or ptarmigan— in the forests of the
Alps or of Yezo, will make his arrival coincide
with the end of the nyubai— assuming that that
somewhat erratic season comes when it ought to
come. The man who wants to see as much of
the interior as possible with the exception of
the two last -mentioned districts — and to see it
under the most favourable conditions — will arrive
in the latter part of October. He may then
accomplish, if he will, some of the finest tours
Japan — or, for the matter of that, any country
—can show in ideal touring weather, through
forests and wooded valleys showing unequalled
glories of autumnal foliage. For the beaten
tracks, with their curio -shops, temples, and works
of art, one season is very much the same as
another — barring the doyo, when, in the low
lands, temperature and atmosphere alike are
oppressive. If the visitor is wise, he will not
come in March — which, as a rule, is like the
worst English March, with much cold wind and
rain ; nor in May, which excessive precipita
tion often renders the reverse of merry ; nor
in September, which is par excellence the month
of floods. These times and seasons should he
avoid, and, that disappointment be not his, the
others choose.

37

CHAPTER III
WAYS AND MEANS
Deterrents— The food question— The Japanese bed— Railway
communication — Natural obstacles — Other modes of
travel— The basha — The jinrikisha and its invention
—Life at a Japanese inn — A railway journey in hot
weather — Suwa-ko — The Nakasendo — The Japanese
pack-saddle — Karuizawa and Kusatsu : a contrast in
summer resorts — A grand pass — The Western Sea —
Accidents will happen !
T.wo things deter the average foreigner in Japan
from travel in the interior — Japanese food and
the Japanese bed. In pre-revision days might
have been added a third — doubt as to the
character of one's reception by the inhabitants.
As all will testify who have gone far afield, this
no longer obtains. Then, of course, there is
the obstacle, more imaginary than real, of the
language. Curiously enough, the majority of
residents, well able to make themselves under -
standed of the densest rustic, rest content with
the stock places, where other residents fore
gather. Even the stranger within Japan's gates,
38

Ways and Means
whose vocabulary on arrival is nil, can get over
the difficulty by engaging a guide. Nevertheless
he too seems to be satisfied with the most beaten
of beaten tracks and (as often as not) proceeds
to describe in print, with equal enthusiasm and
superficiality, the very scenes which scores of
travellers before him have described in precisely
the same way.
It is a great grievance to the foreign traveller
that bread, or pan as it is called locally, can
seldom be had in the interior. The Occidental
avoirdupois seems not to prosper on the native
diet of fish, rice, and eggs, and innumerable
changes rung thereon. Nevertheless the food
problem is not altogether insuperable. He that
has no stomach for Japanese " culinary conun
drums " may escape therefrom by organizing a
commissariat of his own. The carrying capacity
of the rural ninsoku is, to the Epicurean, truly
tempting. Many a stalwart brown-skinned wight
clad but in straw -sandals and fundoshi has
bowed beneath the double burden of what his
globe-trotting employer shall eat and what he
shall put on. In the vicinity of treaty ports,
however, and places where they trade, the coolie
becomes corrupted. As the price of his labour
rises, his powers as a beast of burden wane.
One bearer seems to be needed for the 'provender,
another for the raiment, a third, perhaps, for the
photographic outfit. Then there is, of course,
39

Japan's Inheritance
the real master of the expedition — the licensed
guide— and a coolie for the goods and chattels of
the guide. Thus a journey into the interior
begins to resemble the march of a smalLarmy.
If the traveller's purpose is not only to receive
impressions but to make them, a certain measure
of gratification should at least be his.
Still, the thing is possible. No traveller with
a well-filled purse need of necessity plumb to
its depths the " unsatisfying unreality " of
Japanese fare. But from the Japanese bed there
is no escape. No doubt the ingenuity of the
annai with a free hand could tackle the problem
of transporting a " foreign " bedstead, with its
bulky appurtenances, over some parts of the
interior. But no self-respecting proprietor of
a decent inn would permit the infernal machine
to be set up in any of his rooms, to the ruin of
his best tatami. The traveller who is not disr
posed to boggle at trifles in the quest of comfort
could, of course, camp out, bed and all, on the
bonny banks of the lotus pond in the yadoya's
landscape garden ; but of a certainty the police
would not permit it. They have instructions to
keep a parental eye on all foreigners wandering
in the wilderness of the interior — and no one
has lived long in Japan without making the
acquaintance, more or less indirectly, of the
Japanese dorobo (robber). There are parts of
the country— outlying islands such as Yakushima
40

Ways and Means
— where the inhabitants live in a state of idyllic
security and where thieves do not break through
and steal ; but this does not apply to the Empire
as a whole.
Anthropologists assure us that the Japanese
are blessed with less prominent hip-bones and
a less arched spine than the unfortunate white
man. On this account they can sleep, curled
up or prone, upon a flat, unyielding surface,
without experiencing unpleasant consequences.
Not so the foreigner. He quickly ascertains the
weak point of the Japanese bed to be that it has
no " give." The discovery is made at dead of
night, some hours after a fair nesan, gravely
regarding him as a huge but helpless child, has
put him solicitously to bed. A sense of stiffness
oppresses him. Half asleep, he essays to turn —
and snaps his spinal column. The accompany
ing sensations, at any rate, are sufficient to justify
such belief. After a bad quarter of an hour
sleep comes again to the sufferer's relief, but
the process is certain to be repeated twice or
thrice before the appalling clatter of the amado
(wooden shutters running in grooves), flung open
at the peep of day, renders further rest impos
sible .
The remedy — at best a partial one— is to pile
on the futon. These are the thick, wadded quilts,
measuring 6 feet by 3 feet, which compose the
" bed." Beneath them extend the tatami, from
41

Japan's Inheritance
i to 2 inches thick— soft, in a measure, but spread
on inflexible boards. The regulation number of
quilts, I believe, is two; but in my travels I
have always made a point of insisting upon four —
even at the risk of a longitudinal increase in
the formidable strip of tissue paper, beset with
hieroglyphics in Indian ink, which is presented
next morning by way of a bill. The device
mitigates, if it does not remove, the evil of the
" crick," and has the advantage of beguiling the
household with yet another proof of Occidental
eccentricity. Once, indeed, I came across a
foreigner — he had a Japanese wife— who con
fessed that he himself preferred a Japanese bed.
He would not, he said, woo sleep on one of
Maple's creations even if he had the chance —
it was good for the liver and a sovereign safe-i
guard against laziness. But he must have been
an exceptional man, endowed by some trick of
evolution with a Japanese spine.
Access can be had to most parts of the interior
by means of the Japanese railway system. Five
thousand miles of track represents, all things
considered, a fair development for one genera
tion. The principal line in the Empire connects
the metropolitan (Tokyo-Yokohama) with the
chief industrial (Osaka-Kobe) district, following
roughly the course of the Tokaido, or Eastern
Highway, which only leaves the coast to circum
vent the bases of the rugged Izu and Kii penin-
42

Sapporo

Akita

Niigata

Tsuruga

Moji

THE RAILWAY SYSTEM
rv^eolea *\  Tu«-ne11ea Sections*^

Muroran

Sendai

Tokyo

Osaka

Kagoshima

Japan's Inheritance
sulas. This Tokaido railway has been extended
north and south to the extremities of the Main
Island at Aomori and Shimonoseki respectively,
making a trunk line of close on 1,200 miles,
which has been double-tracked over the
380 miles between the metropolis and the Inland
Sea port of Kobe (Hyogo).
From this main line transverse routes have
been opened through the interior to the Japan
Sea. Four cross-country lines lead to the port
of Akita, Niigata, Toyama, and Maizuru, on the
western coast. The first of these, continued
northward to Aomori, makes with the Northern
Railway a loop by which both the Pacific and
the Japan Sea slopes of northern Hondo are
fed. The second follows for a large part of its
course the Nakasendo or Mid-mountain High
way, and, turning north to avoid the formidable
barrier of the meridional Hida range, strikes the
Western Sea at Naoetsu. Thence, by way of the
coast and the lower Shinano Valley, the line runs
north-east to Niigata. The third, following the
Lake Biwa depression, where Hondo is at its
narrowest, opens up communication with the west
coast centres of Fukui and Kanazawa. Where it
reaches the sea, Tsuruga has lately come into
prominence as the port making connection with
the Trans-Siberian Railway at Vladivostock. The
passage in the Russian Volunteer steamers occu
pies thirty hours, as compared with the ten-hour
44

Ways and Means
trip from Shimonoseki to Fusan, the terminus
of the Korean branch of the system. By running
excellent trains and steamers on this " all-
Japanese " route — the last section of which is
represented by the newly opened Antung-
Mukden line across eastern Manchuria — the
Tokyo authorities hope to bring London within
twelve days of Tokyo, and thus secure for them
selves the bulk of the trans -continental traffic
with Europe. Along the 700-mile run from Shim-
bashi (Tokyo) to the straits of Shimonoseki, a
service of express trains, averaging 30 miles an
hour and supplied with dining and sleeping cars,
is regularly maintained. On the cross-country
lines, time is no object. Delays are frequent,
and an average speed of 15 miles is seldom
exceeded. For refreshment the traveller must
needs content himself with the native bento—a.
luncheon-box sold for 5d., and containing rice,
various mysterious products of the Japanese
kitchen, and a pair of brand-new chop-sticks
complete. Despite the lowness of the railway
tariff — first-class rates corresponding approxi
mately with third-class in other countries — the
railway system, which since 1906 has been a
State monopoly, yields a substantial yearly
revenue .
Where the transverse lines encountered the
mountain ranges of the interior, wide detours,
with a view to the selection of low passes, became
45

Japan's Inheritance
necessary, adding considerably to the mileage.
These measures, though they mitigated, did not
do away with the necessity for extensive tunnel
ling. North of the Bandai-Azuma mountain
mass, the Fukushima -Akita line surmounts the
backbone ridge by means of nineteen tunnels —
the highest, at a height of 2,500 feet above
sea -level, with a length of more than a mile.
Forty-one tunnels, one of them 3 miles long, were
required for the Sasago-toge, on the Kofu line ;
twenty-six for the steep Usui-tog£, with its
gradient of 1 in 1 5 ; and a like number for the
newest of the routes, that opening up communica
tion between southern and central Kyushu. Only
in the case of the Osaka-Tsuruga line, which
follows the great depression of Omi — the line
of a future ship -canal connecting the Pacific with
the Western Sea — were these costly embarrass
ments avoided. In this district a difficulty of
another kind presented itself. Most of the
Japanese rivers, on reaching the plains, tend to
raise their beds by excessive deposition of
detritus ; so several streams were here passed by
means of tunnels instead of viaducts. Labour
being cheap and the materials imported for
bridge -building dear, the railway was taken
under, instead of over, the rivers.
Much of Japan's finest scenery and many of
the most popular resorts are not directly acces
sible by rail. The traveller who wishes to see
46

Ways and Means
the real Japan must have recourse, on occasion,
to the " stage coach " or basha, the man -drawn
jinrikisha, or the pack-saddle. Innocent of
springs, and drawn by a miserable superannuated
dwarf of a horse, while six unhappy humans
struggle for space on its hard, uncushioned floor
— such is the native and unadorned basha. In
some more enterprising regions the type has been
improved upon. A roof has been added, which
draws the veil over the sufferings of the inmates.
Springs of a sort deaden to some extent the
succession of jolts and jars, by comparison with
which the " Wiggle -woggle " of the White City
is a mild and playful affair. Narrow boards have
been introduced longitudinally, at a height of
a foot or so above the floor, to serve as seats,
and, despite the fact that one's knees come into
frequent and violent contact with those of the
passenger opposite, this innovation from the West
is a step in the right direction. As for the rate
of travel of the basha, that averages, under
favourable conditions, five miles an hour, and the
stoppages for rest and refreshment — on the part
of steed and driver — are frequent and prolonged.
Sometimes, as on descending from an arduous
mountain climb at a considerable distance from
one's objective, and in the absence of the jin
rikisha, the basha offers that species of relief
which is derived from change of exercise ; but,
as a general rule, it may be questioned whether
47

Japan's Inheritance
the loss of energy involved in the struggle for
existence in the confined interior of the chariot
is not greater than that which might be expended
in covering the distance on foot.
The subject of the jinrikisha — and more
especially of its invention— raises a new issue
between East and West. An American mis
sionary of the name of Goble is said to have
signalized the opening of the Era of Enlighten
ment (called by the Japanese Meiji) by the
creation of the first man-drawn vehicle. The
invention is the kind that does more credit to the
head than to the heart. One is reminded of
the propagator of Christianity — said to have
hailed from Chicago — who conceived the idea
of inculcating the principles of commercial
morality among the Japanese by running a few
stores of his own, sub rosd, in various localities —
and thereby succeeded in solving the problem of
serving at the same time God and Mammon.
However, this distinction of having invented
the jinrikisha is disputed by the Japanese, who
claim that the first man-drawn vehicle was
made and used in 1868 by a Kyoto cripple,
who found the kago (chair) too uncomfortable
a means of conveyance.
Many Japanese themselves object to the jin
rikisha altogether, as inflicting on the Oriental
the stigma of inferiority. No white man, they
point out, has ever drawn a yellow through the
48

IN A HOKKAIDO PORT : SAMPAN GOING
OUT TO STEAMER.
The peak in Hie distance is the ancient volcano
of Usu.

CRYPTOMERIA AVENUE, NEAR NIKKO.
Said to have been planted by a devotee too poor
to offer money at the Shogunls shrine.

BASHA OUTSIDE INN, HOKKAIDO.
The landlord is in the right foreground.

TRAVEL BY PACK-HORSE.
Mother and son on holiday jaunt

To face p. 48,

Ways and Means
public streets. Nevertheless, the profession of
the kurumaya— to use the Japanese term— will
persist. A good rikisha-man makes a profit of
15 to 20 yen a month — too lucrative a trade to
be abandoned for the sake of sentiment. The
introduction of electric trams dealt the rikisha-
man a blow, but not so severe that it could not
be parried by a moderate rise in the tariff. Out
side of the large centres the jinrikisha holds its
own. If anything ever kills the man -drawn
vehicle it will be the extensive development of
motor traffic. But this is a long way off.
Phthisis remains the chief enemy of the man
between the shafts. Over -exertion and subse
quent exposure to cold — on a diet quite unequal
to the drain upon the system — have made the
death-rate from consumption and other wasting
diseases higher among jinrikisha-men than in
any other class.
The Japanese yadoya (native inn) has received
its share of abuse at the hands of globe -trotters,
but people familiar with the ways of the country
prefer it to the " semi -foreign " establishment
provided in resorts favoured by European
visitors, where "English" (as she is Japped) is
spoken, where foreign food, chairs, and beds (of
sorts) are provided, and where (to the delectation
and profit of the guides) the curio-shops abound.
There is no better way of gaining an acquaintance
with the customs and life of the people than by
49 d

Japan's Inheritance
spending a few days in a well-conducted native
hotel. The inconvenience arising from the
absence of tables and chairs will be found to be
more imaginary than real. The soft straw mat
ting, i to 2 inches thick, which covers the floors
of every Japanese house, makes a pleasant
surface on which to live and move and have one's
being. Square wadded cushions serve as seats,
and thick, soft quilts as beds. Of the four walls
of a room, while three consist of sliding paper
screens, one as a rule has some pretensions to
solidity. It contains the decorated recess, or
tokonoma, from the character of whose fine
grained wood, kakemono (hanging screens) or
lacquer-work, the standing of the household can
at once be gauged. In one of its corners rests
a little red or black lacquer stand, perhaps
2 feet square by i foot high, which answers in
itself the dual purposes of dining-table and
writing-desk. With this in front of him, a
zabuton for a seat, and his back against the
wooden upright which divides the tokonoma from
the blank half of the one real wall of his apart
ment — what more can, the traveller want ? It may
suggest a picnic, but such is life, in Japan ! The
queer little snacks put before him by way of
food (of course he will not have forgotten to
bring some " foreign " viands with him) ; the
dainty nesan (waitress) in her best obi (girdle)
kneeling before him — grave without, but hope-
5o

Ways and Means
lessly gay within ; the comedy of the bath, par
ticipated in, perhaps, by half a score of highly
respectable persons besides himself, or even, in
hot -spring districts, al fresco — all these will give
the same impression. The little people of Dai
Nippon are wise in their generation. They
turn the lighter and brighter side of life
towards them, and resolutely refuse to look on
any other.
A journey across Central Japan from the
Pacific to the Japan Sea — taken in easy stages
and without too rigid adherence to the iron road
— would offer excellent opportunities for seeing
the country and sampling the various modes of
travel. The actual distance scarcely exceeds that
from London to Plymouth. Let no one suppose,
however, that it is a matter of four hours in a
corridor train . Among the Japanese, at any rate,
the individual who travelled without a break from
one side of the country to the other would be
regarded with equal admiration and curiosity,
not unmingled, perhaps, with speculation as to
the state of his mind. Even Europeans are
wont to consider the half-way station of
Karuizawa, six or seven hours from the capital,
a fair day's journey. The weather, too, is at
least as important a consideration in Japan as in
other lands. On the occasion of my doing this
trip, in the company of a young Englishman who
had recently arrived in the country, the year had
5i

Japan's Inheritance
been abnormal. Without having been preceded
by the nyubai (rainy season), the doyo (dog
days) were upon us— and this meant trouble later
on. Nevertheless, by all who could contrive the
change, the former treaty ports, sweltering in
the damp heat which makes the Japanese
summer seem so much hotter than it is, were
being forsaken for the hill districts of the
interior. Thus, in our search for coolness, we
found ourselves, one cloudless morning, in a
crowded train, with the thermometer at 900
in the shade.
Being mere males, and thrifty, the second-
class seemed to meet our case. Lady mis
sionaries have been known — with eyes that see
not — to travel "third," but to such heights of self-
sacrifice we did not feel called upon to rise. No
" foreign " ladies were among the thirty -odd
passengers who, with their varied impedimenta,
babies included, filled the long compartment to
overflowing. Perhaps it was as well. Three
Japanese gentlemen at one end of the car, in
anticipation of a hot journey, proceeded with
much sangfroid to exchange their European gar
ments for the cooler and more ample kimono.
None of those present regarded the operation
as anything but normal, and our three gentlemen,
having discarded their boots for soft white tabi,
squatted on their heels on the cushioned seats
and proceeded to discuss a bottle of sake. In
52

Ways and Means
this they were aided by the consumption of
numerous swift -burning cigarettes of a popular
brand, from which, despite their modest price of
ten for one penny, the Tobacco Monopoly Bureau
makes an annual profit of several millions of
yen. Voices soon became loud, faces a dull red,
and the conversation animated to an alarming
degree, when the arrival of the train at the
tunnels served to create a welcome diversion.
The Kuwanto plain, alluvial for the most part
and roughly coincident with the basin of the
Tonegawa, gives place on the west to the Kofu
plateau, with an elevation 1,000 feet greater.
The rugged ridges of eruptive rocks which form
its eastern fringe are pierced by some forty
tunnels in swift succession. We fondly imagined
that these tunnels would afford a respite from
the intense heat, but our hopes were vain. All
the shorter ones were little better than ovens
charged with a particularly dry and stifling air.
By the end of the hour or so occupied in cover
ing this section of the line every woman in the
carriage was in a state of collapse and every
man had his head out of a window gasping for
fresh air.
Once upon the plateau all was well. Cool
breezes and vistas of distant mountains had a
reviving influence. To the south, towering above
the seaward edge of the plateau, rose the level-
crested cone of Fuji, while west and north the
53

Japan's Inheritance
rugged outlines of Kimpuzan and other " granite
giants " filled the horizon. On reaching Kofu
we found that the good resolutions previously
formed as to reaching Lake Suwa the same day
had oozed out of our boots. We had taken six
hours to traverse 70 miles and forty tunnels ;
that seemed enough. Most of our fellow-pas
sengers were apparently of the same mind, and
it was a thinly peopled train that steamed on
towards the western confines of the plateau. For
ourselves, we accepted the hospitality of the
principal inn, whose ample grounds and 100-mat
dining-hall, usually reserved for geisha dinners,
quite annihilated all preconceived ideas as to
the diminutiveness of Japanese hostelries.
Our next day's objective lay some 60 miles
to the north-west, and this we attained under
more pleasant conditions. At an altitude of
about 3,500 feet the railway crossed the water
shed between the Fuji and Tenryu rivers, with
mountains of 10,000 feet on either hand. Most
striking of these was the eight-peaked Yatsu-
ga-take, an extinct volcano whose now verdant
base we skirted till a bend in the line brought us
in sight of a large, almost circular sheet of water,
showing blue in the lap of grassy hills. This
was the far-famed Suwa-ko, source of the
Tenryugawa, Japan's " thundering Spey," whose
grand rapids afford to those descending them
as exciting an experience as could be sought.
54

Ways and Means
On the northern shore of the lake issue some
of those hot springs which in Japanese eyes are
the sine qua nan of a holiday resort. Here at
an excellent yadoya (native inn) we lingered
two days and took the waters, as expected of us.
Enjoyment of this oft-repeated operation was
somewhat diminished by the fact that, the bath
room being on a lower level than the adjacent
street, our ablutions became a subject of absorb
ing interest to apparently the entire population
of the village. One blazing afternoon we spared
for a trip across the lake in a long and narrow
dug-out to the place where the Tenryu issues
unobtrusively enough, despite its considerable
size. From the moment of its birth the stream is
harnessed to do the work of half a dozen silk-
spinning mills, where female operatives create a
record in the labour world by working one hun
dred hours a week and — what is still more
wonderful — thriving on it. In winter, Suwa
presents a different scene. Silent filatures look
out upon a lake sufficiently frozen to stand the
test of skating championships and even of
vehicular traffic, though these are never per
mitted till the gods decree safety by cracking
the ice.
Here, next day, we took to the saddle and
the road. Our route lay along the Nakasendo,
that ancient " mid-mountain highway," origin
ally constructed (if tradition may be believed)
55

Japan's Inheritance
at the time when Agricola was making roads
in Britain. The roughness of the going induced
sincere sympathy for the Daimyo trains, which
in bygone days had footed it so often along the
road, all the way from Kyoto to Tokyo and
back. Our scraggy stallions, however, with their
unwonted burdens of weighty foreigners and
much luggage, breasted the stony steepness of
the Wada-tog6 with marvellous energy, and
even found time, now and again, to snap
viciously at each other, regardless of blows and
curses from the bettos (grooms) trotting nimbly
alongside. The Japanese pack-saddle is a severely prac
tical affair, constructed of the hardest wood
imaginable and fitted with sundry excrescences
from and about which impedimenta may be sus
pended and piled to an almost unlimited extent.
Had we not had the forethought to provide our
selves with a number of futon (wadded cushions ),
with a view to mitigating the concussions in
separable from such a mode of travel, we should
not have lived to tell the tale. As it was, we
were able to behold from the top of the pass,
with a moderate degree of comfort, the panorama
of the Chikuma valley, bounded on the opposite
side by the volcanic range which terminates in
the colossal Asama. By nightfall we found our^
selves comfortably seated in the coffee-room of
a " foreign " hotel, presided over by a Japanese
56

Ways and Means
waiter in regulation evening dress, under whose
majestic eye half a score of nesans shuffled to
and fro in the duties of service. And in our hearts
we blessed the missionaries who bought up land
at Karuizawa and made it, first, a resting-place
for themselves, and from that a popular health
resort for foreigners in general. But Karuizawa
has its defects. It has not enough cold water
and no hot ; and there is a painful dearth of
shade. Still, in the season, it has lectures,
prayer-meetings, tennis tournaments, and tea-
parties ! With many good folk these are the
main things — even in a summer resort !
Another 30-mile journey by pack-horse led us
next day past a silent but still impressive
scene of destruction, where a dense primeval
forest had been cut in two by a flood of molten
rock, the work of Asama's great eruption in
1783. Thence descending, we crossed the
Agatsumagawa, a stream as vivacious as the
other was deadly still, and made our way north
ward across the uplands to a summer resort
whose claims to popularity have more than an
element of contradiction, for at the same time
it boasts the coolest climate and the hottest
mineral springs. Unlike Karuizawa, which is
deserted in the winter months, Kusatsu has a
permanent population, which in cold weather par
boils itself four times a day, with excellent effect,
it is said, on the general health. In July and
57

Japan's Inheritance
August, however, there is as much disease of the
loathsome sort concentrated within the four
corners of this village as, probably, in any other
space of equal area in the world. Lepers are
provided with a separate quarter, but in other
public baths— little more than tanks built round
with sheds — it is a common sight to see sufferers
from Various forms of skin disease submitting
themselves to water at i2o°E., with the sting
of free sulphuric acid added to its torturing
heat. Kusatsu lies at an elevation of nearly
4,000 feet above sea-level, but the pass above
it, which has to be negotiated before the railway
can be rejoined, rises 3,500 feet higher. The
Shibu-tog6, as it is called, ranks as one of the
loftiest and finest in this land of many passes.
On the eastern side the ascent is short and sharp ;
on the west, terraces alternate with steep descents,
giving rise to glassy lakelets on the levels and
grand cascades in the gorges. Near the summit
extends a weird assemblage of mountain pines,
cold and ghostly looking, without a vestige of
bark or foliage. They were blasted some thirty
years ago by the breath of the White Mountain,
a bare cone of volcanic ash, which rises a few
hundred feet above the crest of the pass three
miles to the south. Several times in descending
we were obliged to dismount. In some places
the path was dangerously steep, at others recent
58

Ways and Means
landslides had reduced it to a perilous state, and
the torrent roared between gloomy rock-walls
hundreds of feet below.
We were now fairly on the western slope.
Through the broad valley on which we looked
flowed the largest of Japan's rivers, bound for
the Western Sea. Thirty miles north the imposing
range which flanked the valley on the farther
side sank in bold bluffs and cliffs into the same
smooth sea. The soothing waters of Shibu, one
of the most popular of Japanese spas, gave us of
their virtue that night, assisted by the ministra
tions of an amma-san (blind shampooer). At
sunset the following evening, after a short journey
by basha and rail, we beheld from a long stretch
of sandy shore the sun set red and fierce about
some scattered specks of cloud against the sky
line, which to fancy's eye might have been the
outlines of the Liancourt Rocks, where the
flying remnants of Rodjesvensky's beaten fleet
fell a prey to the watchful Kamimura. It was
the last we were to see of the sun for many
days. Save for a fifteen -hour ride in the train to take
us back to the starting-point, our adventures
seemed at an end. But we had reckoned without
the weather. That night the doyo ended in howl
ing winds and steadily descending rain. Once
in the Tokyo " express," we affected to ignore
the downpour. We even wired to friends at
59

Japan's Inheritance
home to expect us the following morning. To
the accompaniment of much shrieking and
groaning from the engine, we passed Karuizawa
in the gathering twilight and plunged into the
first of the twenty-six Usui-toge' tunnels. Facilis
descensus Averni it seemed, and such, in fact, it
proved. Near the end of the series the train
pulled up with a grinding shock— tunnel No. 23
was down. Assisted by a landslide, the front
of it had collapsed, and the line was hopelessly
blocked. Presently an official in oilskins, from
which the rain streamed like a cataract, en
lightened us as to the situation, and urbanely
offered to guide us, along with the other passen
gers, to the nearest village. The two -mile tramp
over the mountain-side in the darkness and rain
was a weird experience, though our experiences
at the village inn were, in their way, as weird.
The accommodation proved quite unequal to the
strain imposed by this nocturnal invasion of a
hundred unexpected visitors, and after an unsuc
cessful attempt on the part of mine host to induce
us to share the same room as an American pro
fessor, his wife, and daughter (the only foreign
passengers besides ourselves), we were compelled
to share a six -mat » room with double that
1 The size of rooms in Japanese houses is indicated by the
number of mats (tatami) covering the floor. Each of these
measures 6 feet by 3 feet, so that a six- mat room would
measure 12 feet by 9 feet. 60

Ways and Means
number of Japanese. Even so we were envied
of many, for we succeeded in effecting our return
to civilization the next day. Floods swept the
country with extraordinary persistence, and it
was a full fortnight before the next train could
safely come down from the highlands to the
plain .

61

CHAPTER IV
THE TYPICALLY JAPANESE LANDSCAPE
Harmonious curves — Does this mean insignificance ? — Erosive
agencies — The raw material of the Japanese landscape —
Two types of scenery — Soft contours not necessarily
" little "—The " typically Japanese " landscape— Sagami's
pine-clad hills — A rising coast — The sankei — Matsushima
— Miyajima — Ama-no-hashidate — Other " Japanesey "
scenes — Nikko, a microcosm of Japan — Granite hills —
A volcanic group — Fuji's mirrors
Beauty, in Nature, is a matter of harmonious
curves. In most landscapes these are the result
of stream-erosion. Of such Japan has her share
—perhaps more than her share . Over and above,
she has the harmonious curves created by
volcanic force. Logarithmic, Science calls them ;
but their mathematical correctness in no way
impairs their grace. Many a Japanese landscape
has thus a double endowment, from sources dis
tinct in nature and origin. While Beauty
abounds, some of it bears, with all its smooth
ness, a hint of the sublime.
It is not surprising, then, that Japan has been
62

The Typically Japanese Landscape
called a land of " soft contours "—though, as
we shall see, this is not true of the country as
a whole. In consequence of the general and
apparently authoritative use of the term, the " un
pardonable sin " of insignificance has been laid
at the door of Japanese scenery ; and it is further
accused of a lack of variety. These charges
would seem to be based either on a confusion
of ideas or on an acquaintance limited to the
more frequented parts of the country. Let us
hear the witnesses for the defence.
" Caledonia stern and wild " has been apos
trophized as " land of the mountain and the
flood." Japan is much more so. Its narrow
islands are crowded with mountains of more
than average height. On gradients of unusual
steepness heavy and at times torrential rains
descend. Snow lies over a large part of the
interior during the winter months and quickly
melts in spring. Thus are developed a vast
number of streams of high erosive capacity.
When to these agencies are added such factors
as typhoons and monsoonal winds, tidal waves
and destructive earthquakes — all operating in a
climate of considerable extremes of heat and
cold — it will be seen that here, if anywhere,
Nature is mistress of the situation. Every
where in its earth-forms the Japanese landscape
bears " the marks of that which once hath
been; but the scars are bravely worn."
63

Japan's Inheritance
Soft contours are not, however, the sole pro
duct of erosive action. Agents of terrestrial wear
and tear, acting on certain land surfaces, are
capable of producing the boldest outlines. So
much depends upon the raw materials out of
which Nature has to evolve her finished product
— the harmonious landscape — that we must ask
what, in Japan's case, they are.
It has been the custom to compare the
England of the East with the England of the
West in situation. In structure the resemblance
is less marked. The summit of the British anti
cline is in the west, and consequently such
scenery as has a claim to grandeur must be
sought there. The soft contours occur where
strata of moderate age have been deposited over
areas not subjected subsequently to any great
tectonic disturbance — as in our southern Downs ;
and where certain foundation rocks, lying con
formably, have been exposed mainly to erosive
influences — as in the rolling " hog backs " of
Dartmoor. In Japan the summit of the anti
cline occupies the centre, a belt of ruggedness
on either side. The middle-aged strata, so pro
ductive of " soft " landscapes, are hardly any
where to be seen. Over large areas they have
been worn out of existence, and their meagre
remains are not sufficient to affect the scenery
to any appreciable extent. Practically the whole
land surface of the Japanese islands consists of
64

The Typically Japanese Landscape
the oldest rocks — granite and schists — with a
fringe (by no means continuous) along the
coastal districts of Tertiary or recent formations.
In many cases these are only there because they
have been protected by the sea, from which they
have recently risen.
Long before Tertiary times, and again during
that period, wide tracts of the interior as well
as stretches of the coast — amounting in all to
two -fifths of the total area of the country — were
overlaid by volcanic formations and ejectamenta,
which have given, as it were, another face to
the areas in question.
We thus have two distinct types of scenery
in Japan. .Where primeval strata have been sub
jected to violent earth -movements, there is the
grand and rugged — comparable with that of
North Wales or the Western Highlands, but on
a larger scale. Scenery of this type is to be
found in the central parts of each of the four
main islands — more especially in Hondo and
Yezo. Elsewhere are the soft contours— them
selves the product of three different sets of
circumstances. They may be due to denuded
granitic formations, as over large areas in
Western Japan and on both sides of the Inland
Sea ; or they may be the result of volcanic action
— comparatively recent cones, or old ones worn
down into domelike hills — in various parts of
the country ; or, again, they may have been
65 E

Japan's Inheritance
fashioned by erosive action out of the newer for
mations of the coast districts. Mutatis mutan
dis, these last give rise to land -forms not unlike
those of the Hampshire Basin— with this differ
ence, that the deposits out of which the hills
and bluffs have been carved often consist not
of gravel and alluvial soils, but of volcanic tuff.
As an example of the rapidity with which stream
erosion works upon this material, I may mention
the case of a rivulet in the Asama foothills which,
diverted by an obstruction near its source, struck
out a new course for itself and, during one week
of incessant rain, carved out of deposits of
volcanic lapilli a bed 50 to 100 feet in depth.
To the complexities of the Japanese landscape
this brief statement — aided by the key-map — will
serve as a rough-and-ready guide.
The scenery which is " soft," is it necessarily
" little " ? In most countries, no doubt, as
natural features increase in scale, they take on
a grand or rugged mien. It is, however, a
characteristic of Japanese scenery that even when
on a considerable scale it often remains " soft."
Its very shapeliness deceives the eye. This is
the case with such districts as Nikko, where the
" hills " (as people will persist in calling them),
though twice the height of the Grampians of
North Britain, appeal to the spectator rather by
their grace than by their majesty. Similarly
it is difficult toi realize that the grassy knolls
66

The Typically Japanese Landscape
which encircle the summer resort of Karuizawa,
in Central Japan — hills not nearly so imposing as
those about Dorking — rise from a plateau which
itself stands at a greater height above sea-level
than the summit of Scafell.
The scenery which is both " little " and " soft "
has been called " typically Japanese." Gene
rally speaking, it is of Tertiary age. Doubtless
the association of these term's has given rise to
the idea of insignificance. There is no reason,
of course, why such scenery should not be beau
tiful. Proportion, variety and grace of form,
freshness and contrast of colour may — and, in
Japan, often do — combine to produce an effect
of real charm. But another question arises : Is
the scenery described — and often decried — as
" typically Japanese " really so, or has it come
to be so known because it is most frequently
depicted in books and works of art, and has
therefore had the attention of the world drawn
specially to it?
One has not to travel far to find the
" typically Japanese " landscape. It is almost
invariably on or near the coast. The wooded
bluffs and shores of the Sagami Peninsula, south
of Yokohama, furnish numerous examples. On
account of its romantic aspect this region has
come to be known among foreigners as the Plains
of Heaven — though plains there are none. On
one of these fantastic heights, by a giant pine
67

Japan's Inheritance
which commands a view of the coast about the
tidal lagoon of Kanazawa, an old-time Japanese
artist flung his pencil from him in despair, un
able to do justice to the scene. Thence descent
may be made by steep escarpments daintily set
with pines and bamboo grass to the Pacific
at Kamakura ; or, eastward, to the maze of
evergreen hills overlooking the naval station
of Yukosuka, on Tokyo Bay. The wooded
eminence known as Anjin-zuka, which bears
on its crest the tomb of Will Adams, the first
Englishman to set foot in Japan, is as charac
teristic as any. From such a point of vantage
one may peer through gnarled and wind-swept
pine-trunks upon deep-seamed valleys carpeted
with the virid patchwork of ricefields, and flanked
with a few wood-and-paper cottages, picturesque
for all their flimsiness. Above the brown-
thatched roofs graceful bamboo -groves give yet
another distinctive note of form and colour, while
beyond, a line of white, verdure -crested cliffs
merges with the sea, on whose blue bosom a
fleet of ruddy-sailed fishing-boats drifts home
ward with the tide.
An old tradition says that the double-peaked
mountain of Tsubuka, 40 miles inland from
Tokyo, was once washed by the Pacific — as,
indeed, its name suggests. The old tradition is
probably correct, for these coastal districts of
Eastern Japan have for centuries been rising
68

SOFT CONTOURS : " PLAINS OF
HEAVEN," SAGAMI.

GRAVE OF WILL ADAMS AND HIS
JAPANESE WIFE, NEAR YOKOSUKA.

MAN AND WIFE ROCKS : Fl'TAMI, ISE,
The straw rope symbolizes conjugal union.

To face p. '

The Typically Japanese Landscape
from the sea. As a result of this secular move
ment many of the inshore islands have been, or
are being, united with the mainland. At the
Yokohama Bluff and at Nojima, on the east side
of Sagami Peninsula, the unifying process is com
plete ; at Enoshima, on the west, it is still in
progress. The sandbank connecting the latter
with the mainland being partly submerged at
high water, a frail wooden causeway (which does
not seem to have been designed to support
foreign avoirdupois) gives access to the " island."
Equinoctial gales and typhoons are wont to treat
this airy structure with scant respect ; but if
the Japanese possess their souls in patience — a
quality to them as second nature — they will ere
long be able to pass to this favoured spot dry-
shod. With its quaint village, wealth of pines,
and luxuriant undergrowth, Enoshima is pictur
esque enough, but to acclaim it the superior of
Clovelly, as one English writer has done, is rash
indeed. The southern end of the island faces
the Pacific with commendable boldness, but the
cliff is not half the height of Gallantry Bower.
Its base is pierced by a good-sized cave, at whose
inner extremity, redeemed from Cimmerian dark
ness by numerous wax lights, the visitor is intro
duced with due ceremony to a shrine dedicated
to Benten, the Goddess of Luck. From behind
this oratory a subterranean passage is said to
lead to the sacred Fuji, whose majestic form,
69

Japan's Inheritance
in full view from the cliff above, dominates the
western horizon . Close inquiry into the course and
nature of this passage is not encouraged locally.
No landscape from which water is absent finds
much favour in Japanese eyes. If brawling
stream or waterfall cannot be had, then let it
be a wide expanse, smooth and lagoon-like for
choice. Typically Japanese though the scenes
just considered may be, they do not, to the native
mind, attain the ideal. What that ideal is may
be gathered from a consideration of the three
scenes singled out by the Japanese themselves
as the most admirable of all. These sankei, or
three finest landscapes, are Matsushima, in
North-eastern Japan ; Miyajima, in the Inland
Sea ; and Ama-no-hashidate, in the west — all
coastal scenes.
Matsushima (" Pine Islands ") is aptly named.
The shallow bay of Sendai swarms with eight
hundred of them, of all shapes and sizes, varying
in height from a few feet to 300 ; but for the most
part 30 to 50 feet. Soft, white piles of volcanic
tuff, each with its crown of twisted pines, rise
oddly out of blue, placid waters ; and great the
joy of the holiday-making Japanese as he glides
in and out the maze in a gaily decked sampan.
The archipelago is considered to extend as far
as, and including, Kinkwazan — a distance of
nearly 50 miles. Neither geologically, however,
nor from the scenic point of view, does the
70

GRANITE TORII AT MIYAJIMA.

AMA-NO-HASHIDATE (" LADDER OF HEAVEN ").

T'f-— ¦

MATSUSHIMA ("PINE ISLANDS") : SOME OF THE EIGHT HUNDRED.
These three scenes are known to the Japanese as the Saxkei, or Three Finest Landscapes.

To i i=e p. 70.

The Typically Japanese Landscape
famous " Gold Flower " island belong to the
group . A peninsula cuts it off from the bay ;
and its height of 1,500 feet, the ruggedness
of its features, and its structure of granite and
sparkling micaceous schists— whence, in fact, its
name — indicate its kinship with the ancient east-
coast range.
At Miyajima (" Shrine Island ") the religious
element predominates. The island, in fact, is
too sacred for children to be born on it. Every
effort is made to prevent deaths taking place,
and, should such unhappy event occur, corpse
and mourners are removed with all haste to the
mainland. Secure amid the genial surroundings
of the Inland Sea Miyajima lies, a temple garden,
delightful in form and foliage. A torii of
singular, if substantial, beauty, which at flood-
tide stands out of the water, proclaims the
presence of the shrine, dedicated to the three
daughters of Susano-o, " the Impetuous Male."
By night, for a fee which varies according to the
Chief Abbot's diagnosis of his visitor, the lights
may be turned on — that is to say, the tapers in
the myriad paper -lanterns hung all over the
island will be kindled, to the delight of the
assembled multitude on the opposite shore, no
less than to the satisfaction of the visiting
plutocrat himself.
Ama-no-hashidate (" Ladder of Heaven ") is
perhaps the most characteristic and r' Japanesey "
7i

Japan's Inheritance
of the sankei. A Buddhist shrine on an over
looking hill commemorates the story of the pious
sixth-century hermit, to avert whose threatened
death from starvation merciful Kwannon trans
formed herself into a deer. Seen from this
height, a spit of golden sand, dotted with
specks of green — these are the inevitable pines
—all but seals the mouth of a lagoon from
inroads of the sea. Breakers may thunder
without ; but within is the stillness of a mill-
pond. The "ladder" is some 60 yards wide
and nearly 2 miles in length. To walk— or,
better still, to rikisha — along this doubly washed
strand under the storm-bowed trees is to the
aesthetic Japanese the keenest of delights. The
coast in this vicinity is bold and granitic ; there
is no pettiness about Ama-no-hashidate.
Among other scenes scarcely less admired by
the Japanese is Waka-no-ura, on the Kii Channel.
Here a narrow pine-covered peninsula, flanked
by low, grassy islands, gives character to
the charms of a little bay. In a well-known
stanza the poet Akahito aptly indicates the
features which specially appeal to the cultured
Japanese. Mr. B. H. Chamberlain's rendering
is as follows : —
,"On the shore of Waka
When the tide comes flowing in
There being no dry land,
Towards the reedy place
The storks fly cross-wise, crying."
72

The Typically Japanese Landscape
Of a somewhat similar type is the wider
expanse of the Hamana or Totomi " Sea," which
a rude earthquake, by breaking down the slender
spit between, transformed from a lake into a
lagoon. The Man and Wife Rocks of Futami,
in Ise, with a straw rope connecting them as
an emblem of conjugal union, constitute a
favourite scene and art motive. On bolder,
but no less beautiful, lines, the Bay of Enoura
shows volcanic highlands, easing off with many
a shapely cove and headland into alluvial flats.
In the course of a dozen miles one may pass
from the deep land-locked Bay of Heda, backed
by rugged andesitic hills, 2,000 feet in height,
to the smooth dunes of Shizuura, where ancient
contorted pines droop over golden sands and
softly lapping waves.
Should water on an ample scale be wanting,
Japanese taste demands by way of compensation
the presence of striking and fantastic rock-forms .
These are usually supplied by the products of
volcanic action — basaltic columns or curiously
worn agglomerate. The perpendicular pine-
crowned cliffs of Shimokuzan, on the Kumano
River, form a favourite subject for Japanese
artists ; and the extraordinarily weathered peaks
and gorges of Yabakei, in Kyushu, have clearly
suggested the " impossible mountains " so often
depicted on Japanese screens and kakemono .
That the Japanese themselves are Conscious
73

Japan's Inheritance
of the deficiencies in point of scale shared by
their chosen scenes is suggested ' by their own
saying, Nikko wo minai uchi wa, " kekko " to
iu na! (Say not "magnificent" till you have
seen Nikko). According to the popular story,
this famous district owes its name to the Buddhist
saint, Kobo Daishi. In his day — i.e., about
820 A.D. — it was known as Ni-ko-san, or " two-
storm mountain " — an allusion to the biannual
or equinoctial gales which were believed to issue
from a cave on Nantaisan, the principal peak
of the district, just as the winds in classical'
mythology were sent forth by ^Eolus from the
caverns of Etna. The worthy Abbot, however,
changed it to Nik-ko-san, " Mountain of the
Sun's Brightness," and so it remains to this day.
Both names are appropriate enough. Storm' and
sunshine visit Nikko with strict impartiality,
though many an unsophisticated foreigner,
reaching it in the depths of the nyubai (rainy
season) or at the time of the autumnal equinox,
may think otherwise. This much, at least, may
be said. Nikko is terrible enough in time of
rain, with its roar of " waters fast prevailing."
But when its delights of form and colour are
bathed in sunshine, dead indeed must be the
soul that does not say, " Magnificent I "
Like the English Lake District, which in many
respects it resembles, Nikko is of volcanic origin.
There is, however, the difference that, in its case,
74

The Typically Japanese Landscape
the evidences remain almost as they were left.
Time and circumstance have not yet succeeded
in breaking down the soft contours into scarps
and pinnacles like those of Helvellyn and Scafell .
Nantaisan still sweeps elegantly skywards from
the placid shores of Lake Chuzenji, an all but
perfect cone ; and no one would suspect the
mighty dome of Shiranesan, which towers over
Lake Yumoto, of holding in its depths a fearsome
crater, still warm from a destructive outburst
thirty years ago. But Nikko's contours, if soft,
are not small. Take the English Lake District,
double its vertical scale, add verdure in every
conceivable shade, add the wayside Buddhas, the
high-perched tea-house, the sombre touch of the
groves where the Shoguns lie — more impressive
even than their gorgeous shrines — add withal that
eerie but indescribable air of the past — and you
have Nikko.
Soft contours due to granitic formations pre
dominate over the greater part of Western and
West-Central Hondo. They also occur in North-
West Kyushu, and at intervals on either side of
the Inland Sea. Owing to the rapidity of the
denudation, the slopes of the hills are abrupt,
and the valleys narrow. The disintegration of
the granite gives rise to a dry, gritty soil of a
yellowish tint, which affords scant encourage
ment to vegetation. Scrub oak and stunted
pines, with more root than branch, clothe the
75

Japan's Inheritance

open hill -sides. From these parts of the country
the vivid green of the ricefield is to a large
extent absent ; and all except the largest and
best-watered valleys share the sterility of the
uplands. Volcanic formations on a moderate scale often
give rise to scenery of the graceful order. Of
such is the district of Hakon£, between the heads
of the Sagami and Suruga Bays, in Eastern
Japan. Viewed from the sea, it presents a group
of strikingly bold, but at the same time rounded,
peaks. A closer acquaintance shows the moun
tains to be volcanic domes of great age. Traces
of craters may be seen — though not as a rule
on the summits ; and a solfatara has transformed
the flanks of one of the peaks into what the
Japanese call jigoku ("hell"). The highest of
the group, which just falls short of 5,000 feet,
is wooded to its summit. In every direction
the valleys present a wealth and variety of
vegetation which go far to dispose of the theory
that the products of volcanic action furnish an
infertile soil. The whole gorge of the Haya-
kawa — especially in the vicinity of Miyanoshita —
is of great luxuriance and beauty. Although,
a thousand feet up, it vibrates with the roar
and bubble of the " hells," above the wooden
eaves of " the globe-trotters' paradise " it sings
the lullaby of countless brooks and waterfalls.
Suppose the traveller to be set down on the
;6

SOFT CONTOURS IN A VOLCANIC REGION (HAKONE).
The road is the old Tokaido {Eastern Sea road).

THE GORGE OF YABAKEI, KYUSHU.
Where quaint formations have been carved out of deep deposits of agglomerate.

The Typically Japanese Landscape
summit of the pass between the Hakone basin
proper and the valley of the Hayakawa. It is
2,800 feet above the sea, whose blue expanse,
cut by the white Sagami cliffs, fills in the eastern
horizon. Exposed as they are to typhoon and
north-easter alike, the hill-sides on either hand
can boast no better covering than bamboo-grass
and mountain pine, with reeds in the moisture -
holding hollows. A few yards down the ridge
the road skirts the edge of a circular mere,
steeply held on all sides but one. It is a filled-
in crater, eloquent of other days when here
was no road for mortal feet. Near by a huge
rock, 30 feet high, has been fashioned (tradi
tion says, by the hand of Kobo Daishi, in a
single night) into the similitude of Jizo, the
children's god. On and down winds the road
with increasing gradient, till, at a bend, the
eastern half of Lake Hakone, embosomed in
shapely hills, lies blue and smooth below. As
one descends the picture grows, till, when the
margin of the lake is reached, it receives the
finishing touch. The " Sea of Reeds," as
the Japanese call it, is but a mirror for the
portrayal of Fuji's airs and graces. There in
its sapphire depths lies the image of the world's
fairest mountain — dark blue, and limned in fiery
gold. Looking heavenwards, the spectator sees
the mountain itself, and forthwith forgets the
lake. For the splintered crest of the great cone,
77

Japan's Inheritance
based, as it seems, on a rose-tinted sea of mist,
rises 10,000 feet above those still waters, and
no more than 15 miles away as the crow flies.
There is only one thing more beautiful than
this vision of Fuji at sunset. It is the same
vision at sunrise. For choice, let the time be
early winter, when the clear air brings the moun
tain closer, when its streaks and furrows show
in strong relief, and the snow-cap steals far down
the cone. To watch, in those still waters, and then
on the peak itself, the first pink flush of dawn
upon those virgin snows, deepening into crimson
and passing thence to gold, while all the world
below lies in gloom, is to see, under the most
favourable conditions, that wonderful blending of
perfect form and choicest colour which makes
Fuji the most beautiful of all Earth's mountains.

78

CHAPTER V
LAKE AND STREAM
Unruly rivers — Merriment and mischief — Some lordly streams
—The Sandai-ka— Timber-felling— Objection to ferry
ing — Rapids, down and up — River scenery — Waterfalls,
a question of terms — Characteristic cascades — Lakes
of depression — Chuzenji — Fuji's mirrors and their
problems
An unruly and inconstant thing is the Japanese
river. One week a raging torrent, scorning—
to the peril of the country-side — the limits which
Nature and man have set it ; the next a mean
dering brook, scarcely visible amid the waste
itself has 'spread, the wreckage of a hundred
hills. One stream, indeed, which hurries from
the highlands of Kii, has been named Otonashi,
the " Quiet River ",; but this, I fear, is " writ sar-
kastikul." There is only one really well-behaved
river in Japan — the Kitakami, and it can hardly
help being good. For, at bidding of the gods,
it gushed out of a rock to save an army from
perishing of thirst ; and thereafter, being
79

Japan's Inheritance
jealously guided by two parallel ranges of
mountains, makes its way smoothly to the sea.
Nearly all the rivers of Japan are of the
cross-country sort. Rising in the midst, on the
dip of the backbone range, they set their course
transversely for the sea. Not, indeed, as flies
the crow, for they twist and turn amazingly.
Now they drive a headlong gorge, now they
fetch a compass, and even end sometimes by
taking the opposite direction to that in which
they started. That river of heroic origin, of
which I spoke just now, is one among a
thousand ; it runs always with the set of the
islands, not against. The North River, men call
it, with due homage to its individuality, for the
rest are mainly east and west. Straight from
that quarter, indeed, it flows, and so with steady
current to its ocean bourne. Where the sea
ward barrier of its basin ends, there ends it.
Most rivers, in other lands, are wont to mis
conduct themselves in winter. Not so the rivers
of Japan. They make merry in the dog-days.
For heat means the south wind ; and the south
wind means rain — the Black Stream and the
mountains between them see to that. On those
same highlands, too, the locked-up moisture of
the winter is at last let loose, and the six-month
snow-slope descends in boisterous flood. All of
which means high water in the plain. To the
swollen stream, the unnatural ramparts on either
80

Lake and Stream
hand are an insult. For of what do you
suppose they are made? Of huge wicker-
baskets crammed with stones — the very stones
the stream has brought 1 Forthwith it challenges
their strength to hold it. Beyond, as often as
not, lie ricefields, or, athwart, a railway. But
the uprisen torrent is no respecter of either. So
the peasants of the neighbouring gun, who have
toiled to secure the watering of their fields in
moderation, get a destroying deluge. As for
the railway, it collapses. A useless thread of
steel, robbed of its solid piers, is left to be
mocked by the triumphant stream ; trains are
held up, and the Department of Communications
has to come to the rescue in a hurry, and at great
expense. That the Japanese river should take
" a short life and a merry one " for its motto is
no subject for complaint. Unfortunately, the
merriment seldom stops short of mischief.
Yet there are lordly streams. The Shinano
with its 300 miles is such, though a man may
stand on its bar and still have his head above
water. That is but the fault of its bringing more
than it can carry away — or, as our American
friends would say, of its biting off more than
it can chew. In this regard it has numerous
little assistant-streams from the Echigo Moun
tains, which bring down tons of alluvium with
every shower. So that, while in its middle
course it is a noble river with a well-filled width
81 F

Japan's Inheritance
of 1,500 yards, it loses in dignity towards its
mouth, and makes a tame finish amid sand-dunes
on the Western Sea. Look again at the
Tonegawa. When once it leaves the mountains,
between the serrated peaks of Haruna and
Akagi, it pursues through the wide Kuwanto a
course of great respectability — its broad and com
paratively placid waters busy with craft of all
descriptions. True, a bad example was set its
lovely but impetuous affluent, the Agatsuma, by
that violent volcano Asama, whose ill-controlled
eruptions have often dammed its course ; but
these evil communications have not corrupted
the good manners of the Tonegawa. Fifty miles
from its estuary it has volume enough to spare
for a substantial branch, the Yedogawa, which
in bygone days gave name to Tokyo Bay. Nor
is this its final effort. For years innumerable,
helped by the Kuroshiwo and the slowly rising
coast, it has been thrusting itself seawards.
There, in the teeth of the Pacific surges, it has
spread the waste of Japan's widest plain and
made in it a maze of meres — " broads," like
those of Norfolk, on a larger scale. At some
future age the wide acres about its many mouths
—useless now, because so painfully new — will
be enlivened by the flaming petticoats of
Japanese peasant-girls, a-busy in the ricefields.
But perhaps the lordliest of all is the I shikari,
of the severer North. For this is more than a
82

Lake and Stream
stream, it is a system. It has all but the whole
of one of Yezo's " facets " to itself, and, with
the aid of many tributaries, brings more water
to the sea than any other Japanese river. Some
authorities even give it precedence over the
Shinanogawa in point of length. Rising1 high
on the central buttress of the " Northern Cross,"
it flows first, with many a rapid, through a
series of basaltic ravines with precipitous sides,
then through " a park-like plain, bounded on
three sides by wooded mountains," over which
broods " a deep stillness broken only by the
murmuring of distant rapids or the cries of birds
and wild animals." On either bank " grassy
tracts abounding with flowers " alternate with
forests of willow, maple, oak, and walnut, the
fallen timber of which often blocks the current.
At Asahigawa, however, the scene is changed.
The human element comes in, in the shape of
the Seventh Division of the Northern Army, of
which that place is the headquarters. By the
time Sapporo is reached, officialdom pervades
the land — this capital is of the sort that was not
born, but made. Just before, the Chitose affluent
(which swarms with salmon) has swelled the
volume of its parent stream with the overflow
of Japan's sublimest lake — Shikotsu. Thus
reinforced, Ishikari passes through ample
alluvial marshlands to the sea.
In the very heart of Hondo, midway on the
83

Japan's Inheritance
Mid-mountain road, one of Japan's most famous
passes is crowned by a sacred gateway of
imposing size. Men call it, therefore, the
Torii-toge. That the pass should be thus dis
tinguished is fitting enough, for it rises in full
view of a mountain which concedes to Fuji alone
the distinction of being the most sacred moun
tain of Japan. That the torii should be of
granite is also as it should be ; for the peak in
question is one of Japan's fire-born giants. But
nearer than the great mountain, at the spectator's
feet, lies the cradle of the Kiso-gawa, third and
most beautiful of Hondo's Sandai-ka (three
great rivers). So vast a timber -felling industry
is pursued in the forests which clothe its upper
valley, that the river appears to have " more
wood than water." ' The trees, on being felled,
are simply flung into the stream, branded with
their owner's mark. At the mouth of the river,
a hundred miles away, they are collected again.
Quite a number of men find employment along
the banks in thrusting stranded logs back into
the current. In older times, when the forests
belonged to the Daimyo of Owari, it was for
bidden to touch the more valuable hard-wood
trees, hinoki and keyaki, under pain of death.
Chaos descended upon this region at the time of
1 Nearly a million and a half cubic feet of timber, valued
at ^70,000, are felled annually, the profits ranging from 50
to 100 per cent. 84

Lake and Stream
the Restoration, and wholesale deforestation took
place. Now that the forests are mainly Crown
property, due supervision prevails once more,
though without recourse to the heroic measure
of shooting trespassers on sight.
Like most Japanese rivers, the Kisogawa, ere
it meets the sea, lapses into evil ways. Dikes,
embankments, bridges, and what not have been
devised to take the Nagoya-Nara railway across
its mouth ; but the best of them is apt to succumb
to the attack of the Kiso in spate. When all is
said and done, however, this river is virtuous by
comparison with its neighbour, the Oigawa. That
ill-mannered stream has always declined to be
ferried. Before railways came into existence,
its passage formed the most exciting of the
Tokaido Go-ju-san Tsugi (Fifty-three Stages of
the Eastern Highway). Travellers used to be
carried across on small wooden platforms
supported by clothesless coolies, who, it is said,
were wont to choose the deepest parts of the
stream, that, by terrifying their passengers, they
might obtain a larger fee. This was, of course,
at ordinary times. When the 50-yard stream
expanded to a mile — the full width of its stony
bed — passage of any sort was out of the question.
But if most of Japan's rivers are unreliable
as means of communication, and some are even
too swift for ferrying, others are " just right "
for rapids. By rapids I mean, of course, those
85

Japan's Inheritance
that can be shot. And shooting, in faith, it is.
I cannot believe that to be carried on planks
across a river, as in the old days, was really more
exciting than to be whirled down -stream in a
flimsy punt, where a river nears the point when
not even the coolest boatman will take a fare.
In the one case, your safety depended on four
men, and they, after all, within their depth, and
on terra firma of a sort. In the other, the
wholeness of your bones, your life itself, are
absolutely in the hands of the man at the helm.
One false stroke of his long oar, and the boat
will smash, broadside on, against that outstanding
wall of smooth black rock whereon the river hurls
itself, and, beaten, sweeps away in a wide froth-
lined curve to the remoter bank. So swift and
strange is the motion set up by the swoops and
flights of this " brown bird upon the river " as
to give rise at one moment to the giddiness
caused, by vision from1 its edge, of a beetling
cliff ; at the next, to the sinking sensation in
the pit of the stomach experienced in going
down a coal-mine. Then, when the river is all
white and uprising rocks all black, and no sound
can be heard above its roaring, and one is
obviously going downhill, the sensation re
sembles that of descending a water-chute with
out the soothing subconsciousness that you will
be landed safely at the end. Not that there are
many accidents ; quite the contrary. For the
86

-J

RAPIDS OF THE FUJIKAWA.

RIVER SCENE, WESTERN JAPAN.

ONAMI-IKE, CRATER LAKE, KIRISHIMA.
The lake occupies a lateral crater § mile wide, from which the summit-cone may be seen
rising on the left. To face p. 86.

Lake and Stream
sendo (boatmen) know the river to a turn ; they
read its moods like a book ; and, when the
danger-mark is reached, all the gold of Croesus
will not tempt them to try the watery pass.
As a medium for covering distance the
Japanese rapids are not to be despised. Those
of the Tenryu run for 90 miles through some
of the wildest country in Central Japan. Under
favourable conditions, with the aid of the current,
this may be traversed in ten hours, a rate of
travel which leaves the basha (stage-coach) far
behind. However, not every river, in a land
of rapid rivers, is as swift as the Tenryu. The
4 5 -mile run down the Fujikawa and a similar
distance on the Kumagawa (Kyushu) are both
covered in seven to eight hours, a more normal
rate . This, of course, takes the slow with the swift.
While at times the boat, in pace and motion,
seems indeed to have taken to itself wings, at
others a certain amount of pole-work has to
be put in. Still, on the whole, this downward
journey— for the crew, at any rate — is a case of
facilis descensus Averni. To return is another
tale — which the traveller does not hear, but is
expected to pay for. Hie labor hie opus est.
A trip down the Tenryu means, in the end, a fort
night's work for four men, Five pounds — the
usual charge for a private boat — does not, when
thus distributed, seem' an excessive fee.
Are Japanese rivers beautiful ? From the
87

Japan's Inheritance
scenic point of view, as we have seen, they
suffer many things from flood-plains of their
own making, through which they pass, with a
" moaning," out to sea. Rarely do we find a
deep hill -girt estuary like that, for instance, of
the English Dart. True, the placid waters of
the Yuragawa of Tango Province, in the West,
are attended to the last by green hills 2,000
feet high. But this is one of the exceptions
that prove the rule. Rather does the Japanese
river resemble, in its passing, the British Yare
or Humber. Where highlands adjoin the sea
— in the Izu Peninsula, the North-eastern Hondo
coast, and, here and there, in Western Japan —
we find grand bays and fiord-like inlets ; but,
then, the mountains are so near, so all -pervading,
as to prevent the development of streams beyond
the torrent stage.
With the middle and upper courses of Japanese
rivers it is another story. Forest and stream
are close allies in Japan. When mountain peaks
are timbered to their summits, what can we
expect of the water-loaded valleys? For the
quiet pastoral beauty which distinguishes so
many English rivers we must substitute the deep
and densely wooded ravine, whose sides can
barely hold a road, where the " cry " of the
river mingles not with the lowing of kine or
the song of the reaper, but with the primeval
noises of the forest. 88

Lake and Stream
Through the interior maze of mountains the
Japanese rivers have made their way in innumer
able boldly chiselled valleys, where fantastic rock-
forms rise out of magnificent woods which twice
each year are a blaze of colour. Nothing could
be finer in its way than the valley of the Azusa
where it runs between the granite precipices of
the Hida range and a densely wooded 8,000-feet
range on the other ; nothing could be more
pleasing than the romantic land -forms about Ao,
the Japanese Watersmeet. For soft beauty the
valley of the Watarase-gawa, and, for savage
grandeur, those of the Kurobe (" Dark River "),
in Hida, and the Hayakawa tributary of the
Fujikawa, will bear comparison with their
counterparts of any country.
Some wiseacre once set about enumerating
the waterfalls of Japan. Beginning with
the Nikko district — a region, by the way, not
easy to define — he assessed the number in
that area at two hundred. When he had
passed on another (wiser than he) came
upon the scene, and on a similar mission.
His computation was twenty. It is, of course,
a matter of terms and of what amount of water
falling constitutes a waterfall. Pending the
settlement of this knotty point, it may be said
that their name is legion. One might just as
well set about numbering the sands by the sea
shore . 89

Japan's Inheritance
It is almost as bad when one comes to con
sider their height. The Ichi-no-taki, at Nachi,
is popularly reckoned the loftiest in Japan ; it
exceeds the famous Kegon Cascade by a score
of feet. However, that of Kamba, in Western
Japan, is 450 feet. On the other hand, the
^Shiro-mizu (White Water) of Hakusan and an
equally slim cascade in the Taketani l (Bamboo
Valley) of Yarigatake descend through four times
that height. But are these waterfalls? It is
surprising that the fanciful name of " thread "
has not been given them by the Japanese, for
threads they certainly are during most of the
year. The idea is reserved for the more acces
sible Shira-ito ("White Thread") Falls, at the
western base of Fuji. Over the dark and riddled
edge of one of that volcano's lava-flows the
stream — an affluent of the Fujikawa — spreads
itself in a myriad filaments of spray across a
front of 500 feet. Popular fancy has dis
tinguished the largest as father, the next as
mother, the rest their numerous progeny. Near
by, as if in protest, another torrent drops in
a body into a cleft 100 feet deep and half as
wide. By this Otodome Cascade there hangs a
tale. Two brothers of bygone days set out to
take vengeance on the murderer of their sire.
In their search they came the one to the top,
1 Take, "bamboo," also "peak," must be distinguished
from taki, waterfall. 90

Lake and Stream
the other to the foot of the fall, which, respect
ing their pious search, ceased its roaring to
enable them to hold converse. Wherefore to
this day men call it the " noise -stopping "
waterfall .
The same highly prized virtue, filial piety, gives
name and fame to the Yoro Fall, near Gifu. This
time the element of tragedy is absent. Accord
ing to the story, which dates from the eighth
century A.D., there lived in the neighbourhood
a woodcutter, who for many weeks spent his
modest earnings in ministering to his aged
father's passion for strong drink. At length,
in reward for his devotion, some kindly deity
one day revealed to him the existence of this
cascade, which consisted at that time of the
purest sake. As this cascade of Filial Piety is
about i oo feet in height, and of substantial bulk,
the old man's closing years must have been
happy, if brief.
While Japanese opinion favours the Nachi Fall
as the most beautiful, it agrees in awarding to
the Kegon-no-taki the palm for impressiveness .
This vision of tons of water falling from the
lip of a broken crater without hint of impedi
ment 250 feet to its cavernous floor, while foam-
mists eddy into encircling woods, has much to
do with the ascription of " magnificence " to
Nikko. Nor, again, can the Yuno-taki, in the
same district, be dismissed as commonplace.
9i

Japan's Inheritance

Here the surplus waters of Lake Yumoto rush
over the smooth surface of an ancient lava
stream — now inclined at 6o° and with a vertical
height of 200 feet — a more fearsome water-
slide than ever John Ridd climbed to see his
Lorna .
But of the normal sort, the Kirifuri (" Mist-
falling ") Cascade, also in the Nikko district,
is as fine as any — provided you rest not at the
tea-house at the top of the ravine, but follow
the steep rock -path to its foot. A common trick
of the popular fancy is to label the greater and
lesser divisions of a fall " male " and " female "
respectively — as, for example, those of the
Nunobiki-no-taki, near Kobe, where the waters
glide, rather than fall, over two granite rock-
faces, 80 and 50 feet in height. Here the
upper cascade is the "male."
So intent are Japanese rivers on getting to
the sea that they rarely condescend to dally by
the way in lakes and meres. Moreover, the
larger streams are wont to make short work of
any obstructions that essay to block their
course — witness the gorge the Yoshinogawa has
made through the backbone range of Shikoku.
As a consequence, nearly all Japan's lakes lie
athwart the smaller stream's. Even of these the
majority are either craters or lakes of subsidence .
Where water has not directly succeeded to the
heritage of fire, it has occupied depressions
92

Lake and Stream
caused by the evisceration of materials from
beneath the surface — the work of dead or dying
cones near by. According to tradition, Japan's
largest lake, Biwa, five times the size of Winder
mere, owes its existence to a mighty earthquake,
and is even connected in some mysterious way
with the making of Fuji ; but the probabilities
are that its formation is due to simpler and less
sensational causes.
After Lake Biwa, with " eight famous views "
of peaceful beauty, Japan's three largest lakes
show a curious identity of shape, size, and origin.
Each of them forms roughly a circle 10 miles
in diameter, and each may be called a by-product
of volcanic force. The soft beauty of Toya-ko,
with its delightful " sugar-loaf " islands, is
merely emphasized by the towering Usu-dake,
which, with a row of belching secondary cones,
stands between it and the sea. One has only
to remember that Inawashiro laves the foot of
Bandaisan to guess how it came into existence.
Viewed from the flank of that still trembling
mountain, the wide blue lake presents so fair
a scene that it is hard to believe that forces so
terrible lurk about its shores. As for Towada,
in the far North, no one has ever dreamed of
disputing its charms, though they be of the
" soft " order. Not very long ago this lake was
Ashless ; now it swarms with masu, the Japanese
salmon. The priest who tends its shrine makes
93 I

Japan's Inheritance
his living in a somewhat precarious way. It is
the custom of visiting pilgrims to fling their con
tributions of sen (coppers) into the lake. At
the end of the season these are gathered by a
diver, who divides the proceeds with the priest.
Obviously the incumbent should learn to dive.
Two of Dai Nippon's finest mountain streams
drain lakes renowned for their beauty. The
Daiyagawa was but young when, by filling a
lateral crater not far below the, rugged sum
mit of Shiranesan, it made that loveliest of little
lakes — the pine -and -maple -ringed Yumoto. A
few miles on it flings itself by the Dragon's
Fall into the broader basin of Chuzenji. A con
siderable lake this, eight miles long, and with
the remarkable depth of 590 feet — twice that
of Wastwater, deepest of English lakes. To its
leafy banks, under the shadow of the graceful
Nantaisan, the corps diplomatique escapes from
Tokyo's summer heat. Here, at any rate — being
4,000 feet above sea-level — its members find
coolness — and (tell it not in Gath) a few
mosquitoes. Worse than these, however, are
the floods, which have a trick of coming when
officialdom would make holiday. Not only do
they threaten the summer-houses with a horrid
fate, but work havoc on the zigzag road which,
winding painfully up the wooded heights near
the Kegon Cataract, forms the sole line of com
munication with the outside world.
94

-MM

' Ii* Ii ¦ inni»l'a'*}p!i.

CLIFF SCENERY, ENOSHIMA, SOUTH END.

YUMOTO SPA, NIKKO.

KEGON FALL, NIKKO.
The Daiyagawa plunges into an ancient crater.

LAKE YUMOTO AND SHIRANESAN.
The lahe stands 5,000 feet above sea-level ; the
volcano rises nearly 4,000 feet higher.

To face p. 94.

Lake and Stream
The Lake of Hakone occupies the lowest part
of what was once a huge crater, on the eastern
rim of which the present Hakone range was
afterwards built up. A line of heights— prob
ably the remnants of the opposite rim' — inter
venes between this basin and the plain where
Fuji rises in isolated majesty. This separating
wall, however, being of no great height, does
not preclude the Ashi-no-Umi (" Sea of
Reeds ") from' sharing the reflected glory of
the great volcano — though not, of course, to an
equal extent with the four lakes that lie along
the actual base of the mountain on the northern
side. More people, I fancy, go to see the
Fuji-no-Kagami — the reflected image of Fuji in
the " Sea of Reeds " — than to see the lake itself ;
but in truth the mirror has a beauty of its own.
As for the four lakes at Fuji's base, they have
been the subject of some speculation. To begin
with, they are all at the same level — some 3,000
feet above the sea. Probably, therefore, they
once formed one long narrow lake, extending
along a 1 2 -mile curve. But they rise and fall
together ; therefore they are still connected !
Fuji's descending rock-streams indeed divided
them, but not so effectively as to prevent some
very real communication underground.
In point of charm, however, no room for doubt
remains. They gain in beauty as they go west,
to reach, in Shoji, a little world of grace,
95

Japan's Inheritance
in MotQsu, something very like perfection.
Imagine Derwentwater's " concentrated loveli
ness " dominated by a 12,000-foot cone of Fuji's
finished beauty instead of by Skiddaw (shade
of Wordsworth, forgive me !), and you have
Motosu. What need of further argument?

96

CHAPTER VI
THE JAPANESE HIGHLANDS
"Jagged peaks" — The elements of sublimity — Eroded
volcanoes — Effects of contrast — Old rocks and new —
The great upheaval — A grand view — In the wilds —
Queer bridges — The toge of Japan — A remarkable cascade
— Lakes of volcanic make — Rugged coast scenery —
Dammed rivers — A sample of the sublime
A reverend interpreter of things Japanese,
surveying the " jagged peaks " of the mountain
ranges, attributes them to volcanic action.1
Another authority 2 ascribes the " soft con
tours " to the same cause. Truth and error
contend in both these statements. Much of
Japan's ruggedness is quite unconnected with
vulcanological processes ; and the same may be
said of the soft contours. Still, when Japanese
scenery has so often been damned with the faint
praise of littleness, it is something to have estab
lished the fact that there are mountain ranges
with " jagged peaks."
1 Peery, in The Gist of Japan, p. ii.
2 Brinkley, Encyclopaedia Britannica.
97 g

Japan's Inheritance
The sense of sublimity, as Ruskin points out,
depends more upon the form and relation of
objects to one another than upon their actual
magnitude. Many an impressive landscape may
be found amid Britain's 3,000-foot mountains.
Were the Japanese highlands of like modest
dimensions they need not, therefore, be desti
tute of grandeur. The average height of the
principal summits of the Northern Hondo anti
cline is, however, 6,000 to 7,000 feet ; of the
Kuwanto (Nikko) group, 7,000 to 8,000 feet ;
of the Koshu and Hida ranges, from 9,000 to
10,000 feet. True, " eternal snows," in the usual
sense, do not drape the mountain-tops — the heat
and torrential rains of summer see to that — but
many of the remoter valleys of the interior are
never entirely free of their winter's load. Hence
the Japanese proverb about putting off a thing
" till the snows of Hida melt " — equivalent of
the Roman idea of postponement ad Grcecas
calendas. In most districts the Yama-biraki
("mountain opening") is not till the middle of
June, and the climbing season proper does not
begin till a month later.
Such of Japan's peaks as can claim the Alpine
contour are not, as a rule, of volcanic origin.
Though often associated with lofty volcanic
cones, they themselves consist of granite, schists,
and other primeval rocks. Remarkably bold
effects, arising from' the difference of resisting
98

'.,&*«,

PEAK OF HODAKAYAMA, JAPANESE ALPS.
From the summit of the Tokugo Pass (7,000 feci).

KAMIKOCHI VALLEY AND THE AZUSAGAWA.
A beautiful valley, 5,000 feet above sea-level, between
two ranges of the Alps.

Wi^te*

sjj§glSg

ll^i

m

i^^k

*gy- ;di|
ONTAKE'S CRATERED RIDGE (lO,60O FEET) : JAPANESE ALPS,
To face p. ¦
The Japanese Highlands
power in the component materials, are never
theless furnished by certain of the old volcanic
mountains. In some instances the upper part
of the cone has been steepened and the crater-
summit denuded into a sharp peak. In others
the softer materials forming the body of the cone
have been swept away, leaving a framework of
sharp and pinnacled ridges — the upper edges of
lava dykes — radiating, sometimes with astonish
ing regularity, from the axis of the mountain.
The so-called " cathedral rocks " of Myogisan,
in Central Japan, are a case in point, where an
ancient volcano, 5,000 feet high, has been worn
into a rock-ribbed skeleton. On more solid lines,
the eight-peaked Yatsugatake and the grand
cratered ridge of Ontake afford striking illus
trations of the effect of erosion upon mountains
of volcanic build.
There is a lake in Yezo, surrounded by moun
tains rising precipitously to a height of 3,000
feet, whose deep-hued waters give weird glimpses
of submerged crags and pinnacles — broken
remnants of the vast vent to which these
encircling heights, no less than the lake itself,
owe their existence. Near the base of an
ancient cone in Central Hondo one may
emerge from the cool depths of a virgin
forest upon the piled-up rocks, the wild confusion
of a lava stream, by which that forest has been
cut in twain. In another region half a dozen
99

Japan's Inheritance
cinder -spitting cones have reared themselves
along the margin of a lake of exquisite beauty,
over whose placid water they pour a torrent of
noxious ash-laden fumes. Such scenes as these
are more than grand. From them we learn that
Japan can show the beauty of the sun, as well
as that other beauty of the moon— and show
them side by side . Hers not alone the loveliness
of tree -clad mountains, of rivers gliding by moss-
grown banks, of cascades shimmering out of
depths of foliage, and of heaven -reflecting lakes.
Hers, too, the weird sublimity of the hill
"whose grisly top
Belched fire and rolling smoke,"
of mountains that are ashes, of lakes that are
caldrons, of torrents that are rocks — whose fiery
progress (as Coleridge would say) " a mighty
voice " had in a moment stopped.
The mountain system of Japan consists of two
roughly parallel foldings in the earth's crust,
from which the upper and later layers have been
removed, leaving the oldest rocks exposed. The
inner of these two anticlines — the nearer to the
continent — consists mainly of granite, and is con
tinuous throughout the length of the main island,
of which it forms the backbone. In the outer
of the ridges metamorphic schists predominate.
After traversing Kyushu, it form's the main axis
ioo

The Japanese Highlands
of Shikoku, and reappears in the Kii Peninsula.
North of Tokyo Bay, and, again, north of Kink-
wazan, it forms a coast range parallel with, and
close to, the sea. Of the two main upfolds,
the outer or schistose has a slightly inferior
elevation, but yields nothing to the backbone
range in dignity of outline. The sierras of
Shikoku, snow-capped in winter, afford an excel
lent foil to the soft beauty of the Inland Sea,
and strongly resemble the bare, sharp ridges
of Shantung and Eastern Korea, to which, no
doubt, they are geologically akin. Except for a
few sections of its length in Western Japan, the
whole backbone range is associated with volcanic
cones, and its structure, especially in Northern
Japan, is often entirely concealed by their accu
mulated rocks. The seaward schist range, on
the other hand, is comparatively free from
volcanic formations.
In the central and broadest part of Hondo
these main ranges, towards the close of the
Mesozoic era, suffered rude disturbance and
interruption. Attacked from the south-east by
lateral thrusts, both were forced sharply back
towards the north. At the same time they were
subjected to violent upheaval, resulting in an
increase of elevation to the extent, in all prob
ability, of not less than 5,000 feet. Under this
twofold strain the Japanese island-arc gave way.
The result was a vast fracture known to geolo-
101

Japan's Inheritance
gists as the Great Transverse Fault. A well-
marked depression, known as the Fossa Magna,
now indicates the course of this fault, which
extends from the Pacific coast at the western
base of Fuji, by way of Lake Suwa, to the
Himegawa Valley, on the Japan Sea. The de
flected schist ridge became the Aka-ishi (" red
stone ") meridional range, with the Komagatake
of Koshu (10,300 feet) for its highest peak. The
deflected granite ridge became the Hida-Etchu
meridional range, with Yarigatake (Spear Peak),
Hodakayama, and Orengeyama — all over 10,000
feet — as its culminating points. These two
massifs, so far exceeding in height and rugged
grandeur any other mountains in Japan, have
come to be known collectively as " the Japanese
Alps." Though without glaciers and on a some
what smaller scale, Weston puts them above the
Alps of Switzerland in " the picturesqueness of
their valleys and in the magnificence of the dark
and silent forests that clothe their massive
flanks." On either side of this comparatively recent
fissure the mightiest volcanoes in Japan have
risen. Those occupying isolated positions — such
as Fujiyama and the eight-peaked Yatsugatake
— were probably formed after the opening of
the fissure. Those associated with the Hida
granitic range are more ancient. Lateral
pressure threw these ridges into transverse
102

The Japanese Highlands
folds, and in the resulting synclinal hollows the
volcanoes built themselves up. This juxtapo-

Th* Japanese HigWaWs
Gntmcis 3ooo It. ani booa jr.
~\'hssiL PTa'n* H "hs^," Pass.
A, Hic!a(CjriMuiu: ^,<{iMA»ic')R.am^e; ^ Ak»-i slti
fscW); C, As»mit.-S}lvr«ite/(VtrC:)r(M«^e;
3 Nikko (Vole) ; E, KjwJ^nj^ranife)!; ?uj i.
sition, on a commanding scale, of mountains of
upheaval and mountains of accumulation gives
103

Japan's Inheritance
rise to a type of scenery of which Nikko with
all its diversity gives no more than a hint.
The intersection of the Great Transverse Fault
with the main watershed of Hondo is marked
by the Shiojiri Pass, with the relatively low
elevation of 3,160 feet. From this point the
serrated ridges of Hida, less than 30 miles
distant, show finely against the western sky over
the wooded crest of an intervening range of
7,000 to 8,000 feet. This, therefore, has first
to be crossed. A basha takes the traveller to
its foot, but thenceforward neither vehicle nor
pack-horse avails. From bank to bank of a
brawling torrent the rough track winds, ascend
ing between magnificently timbered slopes of
increasing height and steepness. At length,
after a long morning's climb, the gorge seems to
open to the sky : a last stiff pull by zigzag of
1,000 feet and the crest of the toge (pass) is won.
Three thousand feet below the silvery thread of
the Azusagawa winds through a splendidly
wooded ravine away to the south. From its
farther bank, out of a heavy fringe of pines,
the granite precipices of Hodakayama rise full
5,000 feet, to end in a sharp pinnacled peak,
recalling the familiar outlines of the Aiguille du
Dm of Chamounix. Northwards the equally im
pressive " Spear Peak," Yarigatake, fills the head
of the gorge. To the south rises the seared and
rounded form of an old volcano which men had
104

The Japanese Highlands
long considered dead. Yakegatake (" Burning
Mountain ") is its name, and at times it fills
this gorgeous glen with sound and fury. Dense
forests drape it up to 7,000 feet ; for 1,000
more it rears its bald, ash-strewn head above
a fringe of blasted pines. At its foot, near
the murmuring river's side, may be discerned
a faint yellow speck. It is a hut built of
cryptomeria logs — the only habitation of any kind
in the valley. It is, however, more than an
inn ; it is an onsen (hot spring) . There, after
a descent scarcely less arduous than the climb,
the traveller will find not only rest and refresh
ment, but may soak to his content in the soothing
waters which well up from1 the heart of the old
volcano .
On the farther — i.e., the north-western — side
of this main ridge scenery of the most sombre
type is furnished by the gorge of the Kurobe.
The enclosing walls are on the one hand the
Hida range proper, on the other the volcanic
range of Tateyama. Between the two the " Dark
River " roars in a ravine, the sides of which are
so precipitous that, until it debouches on the
strip of plain adjoining the sea, the stream can
only be crossed in two places.
While the southern or Akaishi division of the
Alps consists mainly of schists, eruptive rocks
are not unknown. Witness the extraordinary
obelisks of granite, 50 to 60 feet high, which
105

Japan's Inheritance
form the summits of Hoozan (Phoenix Mountain)
and of the outlying Kinpuzan. These moun
tains yield nothing in magnificence to those of
Hida. From the west the approach is by the
upper valley of the Tenryugawa ; from the east
by the Hayakawa tributary of the Fujikawa.
Buddhist temples, the houses of ko-cko (village
headmen), and woodcutters' huts take the place
of inns. Where the swift rivers cannot be forded
they have to be crossed by tsuri-bashi — hang
ing bridges, composed of flimsy bamboo, and
suspended from precipitous rocks by " ropes "
of the same slender material. An even more
primitive structure has sometimes to be used —
the mannen-bashi, a plank affair fastened to
projecting supports, and so obviously unsafe that
(as the name suggests) the crossing of it seems
to occupy an eternity. By the time Narada,
on the Hayakawa, is reached one is literally in
the wilds. Here, in the cold weather, the
inhabitants clothe themselves in skins ; they have
all the same surnames, owing to intermarriage,
and worship a wondrous reed, the leaves of which
grow on only one side of the stem. There is
even a hamlet where women rule the house
holds — which, for Japan, is saying a great
deal. From the scenic point of view, the toge of
Central Hondo are a revelation. Travellers who,
after " doing " the beaten tracks, assert that there
106

The Japanese Highlands
are " not many wide views in Japan " J should
climb a few of these mountain gateways. Such
closer acquaintance with the interior would serve
also to dispose of the generally accepted belief
that Japan is a land of " lofty summits separated
by low passes." The theory is that the latter
rest on the foundation rocks of the original
uplands, on which the peaks " have been piled
by volcanic action." 2 The corollary of this
proposition would be that all the mountain peaks
are volcanic — which, of course, they are not.
One of the Central Hondo passes — Shiojiri — is
certainly low ; but this is simply due to the
fact that it lies in the track of the Fossa Magna.
Once upon a time it was, without a doubt, several
thousand feet higher than it is now. This, how
ever, is one of the exceptions which prove the
rule. The principal pass leading out of the
Nikko mountains westward is the Konsei-toge,
so named after the god whose shrine marks the
summit. Its elevation is 6,000 feet, as compared
with 8,000 feet of the range over which it leads.
The famous Ten-Province Pass, over the broad
ridge which connects the Hakone mountains with
the highlands of Izu, is almost as high as the
mountains themselves. The Usui-toge — magni
ficent in the days when it was crossed in a kago
instead of a cog-rail train — is only some 1,500
1 Cf. Letters from the Far East (Sir C. Eliot), p. 131.
2 Encyclopaedia Britannica, " Japan," vol. xv.
107

Japan's Inheritance
feet below the peak from which it is named.
North of this the grand Shibu-toge reaches
7,000 feet, or only a few feet below the peak
on its north side, while the volcano of Shirane
san, to the south, is of the same height as the
pass. Several of the Hida mountain passes,
where granite peaks alternate with volcanoes,
exceed 7,000 feet. In the same region we find
the Harinoki-toge (Alder-tree Pass), first
crossed by Sir E. Satow in '87. This is
the loftiest of Japan's passes, with a height of
8,250 feet. Since the opening of the Western
railway this route has been neglected. Land
slides and fallen rocks have played havoc with
the path, which, to all save skilled and active
mountaineers, is dangerous, if not impassable.
In the heart of the Kuwanto (Nikko) moun
tains is a scene with an impressiveness all its
own. The difference in level between Lake
Chuzenji and the village of Nikko is nearly
2,000 feet, over a distance, as the crow flies,
of only six miles. By far the greater part of
this fall occurs immediately on leaving the lake,
so that the road from Nikko has to be carried
up an almost precipitous but densely wooded
slope in a series of zigzags, which suffer severely
after heavy rain. Down this precipitous scarp
the Daiyagawa, with the outflow of two con
siderable lakes behind it, flings itself in one
sheer fall, followed by a series of rapids and
108

The Japanese Highlands
cascades. It is difficult to realize, as one stands
on the fenced edge of the precipice opposite,
solicited by a nesan from the adjoining tea-house
to participate of the inevitable green tea, that
one is looking into an ancient crater over
whose further lip the river incontinently leaps.
The crater is parasitic to the volcano Nantaisan,
on whose flank it lies. Apparently the forma
tion of the cone, by blocking the valley of the
Daiyagawa, led to the formation of the lake.
The remarkable depth of the lake at its lower
end confirms this view. Soon there came a time
when, by its own rising or through subsidence
of the cone, the water reached the summit -level.
Pouring perhaps into a vent not quite extinct, it
produced an explosion which breached the crater
and made a new outlet for the pent-up waters.
The level strip of woodland between the lake
and the waterfall has since been formed by lava
and debris flows from' Nantaisan itself.
The perpendicular drop of the cascade is
250 feet. Its full grandeur— and after the
summer rains the volume is considerable — can
only be appreciated by descending to a point
almost on a level with the basaltic basin which
receives it. The path is steep and tortuous ;
and a notice peremptorily forbids " old persons,
young persons, and persons who have had too
much sake " to descend. Of late years the police
have been compelled to pay more attention to
109

Japan's Inheritance
the other end of the chasm, which seems to
have come into favour (especially among students
from Tokyo) as a place of suicide.
Sublimity is the keynote of the volcanic
landscape. Even when Nature has veiled with
decent green the desolation wrought by subter
ranean force, the resulting scene retains the
stamp of its origin. Such a view, for example,
as that of Lake Onuma from the south contains
more than meets the eye. The lake is not deep ;
many low inlets dot its surface and dainty copses
line its shores. But what is more remarkable,
stumps of trees project in places above its placid
surface, and there are many others just below,
which time has not yet succeeded in sweeping
away. The lake, in short, is new ; and there,
at its northern end, sweeping skywards in magni
ficent curves, culminating on the western side in
a spearlike pinnacle, 600 feet high, is the moun
tain that made it. Similarly, there is something
more than beauty in the vision that greets the
traveller who has struggled up the densely
wooded flank of Nishi-Kirishima, in the extreme
south of the Empire. One does not expect to
find lakes perched on mountain-tops 5,000 feet
above the sea, but here is a still, deep expanse
of blue water, three-quarters of a mile in width,
and circular — a mirror framed, as it were, in
deep and wooded cliffs, whose columnar
structure, topping the fringe of pines, tells
the tale of its origin. no

TOYA-KO AND THE NEW CONES OF USUDAKE.
Six craters were opened, in the eruption of 1190, along the margin
of the lake.

¦^S<rr: .

SOLFATARAS ON AZUMAYAMA, NORTHERN JAPAN.
Eighty sulphur-diggers were here overwhelmed, in 1900, by a sudden
eruption of the crater above.

FUJI FROM THE SOUTH-WEST.
Showing the "hump," cr lateral crater, of Hoehan, formed in 1707. The lower course of the
Fujikawa occupies the middle distance. To face p. no.

The Japanese Highlands
Thanks to the nearness of volcanic highlands,
at least four stretches of the Japanese seaboard
combine grandeur with sublimity. The coast
about Toyama Bay, in the west, strongly recalls
that of North Devon from Lynton to Heddon's
Mouth. With greater luxuriance, it is wilder
and much less accessible — no considerate local
authority has hewn a cliff -path midway along
the heights ! The Oya-shirazu promontory, its
most striking feature, forms a fitting finale to
the great Hida range, which here descends to
the sea. Towering granite precipices, rising from
densely wooded hills, make so awe-inspiring a
scene that (as its name implies) remembrance
even of wife and children is, in vision of it,
impossible. In the background the mighty
10,000-feet cone of Tateyama, with "hells"
about its base, dominates the land for miles
around .
On the Pacific side two stretches of coast claim
distinction as " the Riviera of Japan." Of these,
the eastern septum of the Izu highland, in the
neighbourhood of Atami, is the bolder and more
rugged. South of that sequestered spot, in
whose sheltered chines the orange and the myrtle
grow, stern cliffs of andesite, 1,000 feet high,
now red, now black, confront a sea as wild
and stormy as that which breaks upon the
Bolerium of Old England. The other Riviera,
in north-east Kyushu, fringes the more peaceful
in

Japan's Inheritance

waters of the Inland Sea. Amid greener tones
and softer lines the Bungo Fuji rises to give
the volcanic touch.
Taken all round, the eastern coast of Hondo,
north of Sendai Bay, is unsurpassed for grandeur.
The longitudinal Kitakami range, a schist upfold
5,000 to 6,000 feet high, sends numerous spurs
transversely to the coast. In the fiord-like open
ings thus created extensive granite intrusions and
lava-flows have been laid bare. Jagged head
lands thus alternate with coves and creeks framed
in magnificent cliffs. For fully 100 miles this
iron-bound coast fronts on the Tuscarora Deep,
between which and the Japanese islands a nexus
of submarine volcanoes lies. Sudden and dis
astrous " earthquake waves " from time to time
sweep up the fiords and reduce to driftwood
the little ports which nestle there. The great
waves of 1896 was responsible for the loss of
thirty thousand lives.
There is a stream of whose " soft perennial
flow " the late Emperor was wont to sing,
as symbolizing the unbroken succession of the
Imperial line.i As a rule, it is not safe in Japan
to write of brooks that "go on for ever."
Streams, sometimes of substantial dignity, have
been rudely turned aside, or stopped in their
1 The Isuzu, which flows by the Imperial shrines of Ise,
and which has never, in the hottest summer, been known
to run dry. 112

The Japanese Highlands
course and transformed, in a twinkling, into
placid lakes. Nor are these things confined to
the geological past. In the awe-inspiring
prospect visible from the shattered summit
of Bandaisan, when the spectator can tear
himself from the fascination of the fearsome
spectacle immediately beneath him, he will not
fail to notice scores of tarns in the folds of the
ruined valley — great and small gleaming together
in the light of the declining sun. These are
Japan's youngest lakes, made by the great
eruption of 1888. The largest of them, which
seems to have been born with a wonderfully
developed coastline, measures 8 miles by 2. But
admirable beyond words is the persistence of
that river ! Nothing daunted by the immensity
of the barrier which had been flung across its
path, it immediately addressed itself to the task
of carving its way through the obstructing wilder
ness. And with such success, that its new bed
now lies, in places, 200 feet below the surface
of the devastated area.

"3

CHAPTER VII
FUJI'S LIFE AND LORE
A matter of curves — and of similitudes— Legendary origins
of Fuji — The mountain's miraculous properties — The
story of Jofuku — Ceremonial for climbers — Fuji's
foundations — A self-made mountain — Past history — The
wound of 1707 — An ascent of Fuji — Snow and lava —
The crater — Rest-hut No. 10 — Sunrise from the summit
Lafcadio Hearn once likened the form of Fuji
to that of a lotus -bud, and the simile has often
been quoted with approval. Now the curves
of a lotus-bud are anticlinal, or convex, and to
assert the same of a volcano so normal and
unmarred as Fuji is to fly in the face of theory
as well as fact. If the slopes of the great cone
really resembled those of a lotus -bud, they would
be steeper towards the bottom than towards the
top. As every one who has climbed the moun
tain knows to his cost, the reverse is the case.
The authority who depicted the curve of Fuji
yama as that of " an inverted catenary " — also
a convex curve — cannot even plead the excuse
that he was led astray by a pretty conceit. The
114

Fuji's Life and Lore
intentions of these appraisers are good. Like
Balaam they set out to bless, but the results of
their efforts are not happy. For they rob Fuji
of that glorious shapeliness of youth which is
the secret of its beauty, and give it, instead, the
semblance of broken, denuded age. The most
beautiful thing about the most beautiful moun
tain in the world is its form1. And that is just
what the form of a young, well -developed volcano
should be ; it is the perfection of normality.
Long before Lafcadio Hearn sought to wrap
his adopted land in the glamour of his wizardry
the lotus had been enlisted to aid the popular
conception of Fuji's form. A twelfth-century
writer likens the eight peaks of its summit to
the eight petals of the lotus -flower, and remarks
that from whatever direction the mountain is
viewed, three of these peaks appear. More
homely parallels are nowadays the rule. Thus
the sacred mountain is frequently likened to a
heap of rice ; or, again, to an inverted fan .
From the structural point of view there is much
to commend the first. Fuji is a heap, and were
its component parts so smooth and even in tex
ture as grains of rice, it might to this day be as
" squat " as a heap of the favourite Japanese
cereal, as flat as Mauna Loa itself. However,
there is quite enough of massive framework
within those graceful lines to support the steep
acclivities of the summit. Professor Milne esti-
"5

japan's Inheritance
mates the strength of the cone as equal to that
of a pile of rubble and greater than that of solid
masonry. Certainly, the fact that for many hun
dreds of years it has successfully resisted all
tendencies to subsidence speaks volumes in its
favour. The inverted fan simile of course ignores
the glorious synclinal curves, but, in its justifica
tion, the fact may be admitted that from many
points of view the sides of the cone for some
distance downwards from the summit make out
lines that are almost, if not perfectly, straight.
Perhaps the simplest of all similes was that of the
prehistoric wanderer from Korea, who, when first
the vision of the mountain burst upon him — it
was then, tradition says, new born — hailed it as
" heaven." Legend has been busy with the origin of
Fujisan. According to one of the old records,
the mountain rose steaming out of the sea.
According to others it descended from the sky,
a gift of the gods to their favoured land. At the
time of its descent neither sun nor moon showed
its light and the very clouds stood still. This
legendary Fuji, too, was of heroic proportions.
It was of all earthly mountains the most lofty,
rising to the verge of heaven. Impenetrable
gloom enwrapped its peak, where deities in
numerable disported themselves. Its height was
" immeasurable," the circumference of its base
extended for thousands of ri, and to accomplish
116

Fuji's Life and Lore
the circuit thereof took "countless days." Nor
were these colossal dimensions regarded as in
compatible with the oft -repeated story of its
creation in a single night through the instru
mentality of a great earthquake. By this means
a huge depression was formed in Omi Province,
1 5 o miles away, which in its turn was
immediately made into a lordly lake. By some
mysterious agency, says one writer, the earth of
which Fuji consists was removed from the site
of that lake (Biwa) in great baskets, the drop
pings from which, by the way, gave rise to sundry
lesser hills resembling in form their great
original. Tradition even assigns to this event
a specific date — 294 B.C., according to some,
286 B.C., according to others— in the reign of
Emperor Korei. Later writers find fault with
this theory on the score of the difficulties of trans
portation, and one of these authorities asserts that
" the first Fuji " was a mountain 1,000 feet high,
looking like " a pile of hardened sulphur over
hung with mist."
These reports of the origin of the great volcano
doubtless refer to some unusually violent erup
tion, accompanied, quite conceivably, by an earth
quake whose tremors extended as far as the Biwa
region. We know that in quite recent times
Monte Nuova, near Naples, 440 feet high, was
the product of a single eruption. It is not, there
fore, beyond the range of possibility that the
117

Japan's Inheritance
first Fuji was reared to twice that height in the
course of the outburst referred to. Unfortu
nately for the credibility of his story, the same
writer who gives the first Fuji a height of
i, ooo feet gives it a base as great as it has at the
present day. On the other hand, if we accept
the latter as correct, it means that three hundred
years before the beginning of the Christian era
the dimensions of the great volcano were sub
stantially the same as they are now.
Among many miraculous properties ascribed
to the mountain is the existence of springs on
its surface, the waters of which maintain their
perennial character by ascending during the night
to the place whence they flowed by day. A
similar property is attributed to the " sand " on
the mountain-side, which, carried downwards in
the daytime by the tread of pilgrims' feet, returns
by night whence it came, thus maintaining the
mountain's perfection of form. Of course, to
dream of Fuji, especially at New Year, is the
best of luck for you and yours. It is also said
that the last vestige of the snow which collects
on the mountain's top does not melt till the full
moon of the ninth month, and that on the same
night snow falls afresh. Harmonious sounds are
said to proceed ceaselessly from the mountain —
ministrations, of course, of the good spirits who
possess it ; and from the " Cave of the Womb " on
the north-eastern flank, with its " umbilical cord "
118

FUJI, FROM LAKE MOTOSU.
The parasitic cone in the left middle distance is Maruyama {"round mountain").

To face p. 118.

Fuji's Life and Lore
(a stalactite) and rocks shaped like a woman's
breasts, the god Asama is said to have been born.
An ancient chronicler tells the story of the
ingenious way in which one Jofuku of Shin
evaded the commands of his sovereign Shoko,
King of Korea. Ordered by that potentate to
put to sea in search of the " Elixir of Life," the
courtier sailed far and wide, but to no purpose.
On his return, fearing the wrath of his king,
he fell back upon the resources of his native
wit. He had met, he said, the God of the Ocean,
who, after some demur, led him to " the
Empyrean Mountain, a solitary peak of great
beauty." There, in a vast palace presided over
by a dignitary of celestial men, the secret of the
Elixir was preserved. " But," declared the
Ocean God, " unless you bring hither young
nobles and fair women, as also workmen skilled
in all the arts, none may be yours."
On hearing this, Shoko the King was glad,
and made haste to collect the flower of his
nobility and the fairest women in the land,
together with his best artisans, to the number in
all of three thousand souls. All these were sent,
in a great fleet of ships under Jofuku's charge,
to the land of the Empyrean Mount. They never
came back. Their new surroundings seem to
have appealed to them too strongly. As for their
leader, he entered one of the caves at the foot of
the mountain and was seen no more.
119

Japan's Inheritance
Thus romantically wrapped up, we have doubt
less the narrative of one of the several extensive
migrations from the continent to the Eastern
Islands which took place in early days. That
these old traditions persist to modern times is
suggested by the rules till recently enforced on
those who ascended the mountain. Intending
worshippers at the shrine which, ever since its
foundation by the Emperor Korei in 808 A.D.,
has been maintained at its summit, are expected
to undergo purification for one hundred days,
but this period is reduced to seven in the case of
the men of Omi Province, where (according to
the story) the mountain had its birth.
A document given by the priests at this shrine
to pilgrims successfully accomplishing the ascent
contains the assertion that Fuji is the " source "
of every mountain on the face of the earth, and
that nothing in the sun or moon can compare with
it in grandeur. Nowhere in Japanese literature,
so far as is known, does the suggestion occur,
which one foreign writer has conveyed in verse,
that the creation of Fuji preceded that of the
islands of Japan.
Fuji is essentially a self-made mountain — a
mountain of accumulation, the geographer would
call it_ Not a particle of that vast, cone-shaped
heap but has been shot from the funnel which
now forms its core . Scorias and lava, lava and
scoriae — so the great heap rises to its ragged,
120

Fuji's Life and Lore
black -red crest. True, for ten months out of
the twelve a mantle of snow — reduced to streaks
in the heat of summer — covers all the upper half
of the mountain and spreads over its desolated
sides a veil of peace. But to the twenty thousand
toiling pilgrims who from July to September
trudge upwards through the yielding ash, the
snow-beds are but a pleasant signal that half
their work is done. Underneath and all around
are upheaved rocks, volcanic dust and ashes,
the outpourings of centuries.
The pedestal of Fuji is granite. Ranges of
eruptive rock, 3,000 to 5,000 feet high, and
deeply overlaid with the volcano's outpourings,
encircle it on the east, the west, and the north.
As the valley on the last -mentioned side lies
3,000 feet, and the village of Gotemba on the
east side 1,500 feet, above sea-level, it is evident
that the great volcano has built itself up on a
slope dipping evenly southwards and seawards.
Only on this side is the full curve of the mountain
developed. Here the cone descends with un
broken regular sweep from its summit -crater to
the sea. The distance from the crest of the
mountain to its base on this side is 1 5 miles in a
straight line. Midway, the " angle of rest " is
200, and, near the summit, 350. The average
width of the base of the cone may be put at
2 1 miles, of its apex at half a mile. If Fuji were
truncated at a height of 2,000 feet — the height
121

Japan's Inheritance
of the largest crater-ring in the world, that of
Asosan — its dimensions of i 6 miles by 1 4 would
still retain for it the supremacy. Its height has
been variously computed. The lowest estimate
put forward is 10,712 ft. ; the highest, 14,175.
However, the vast majority of the computations
have ranged within a few hundred feet of
12,000, and the Japanese Geological Survey's
estimate of 12,395 *s commonly accepted as
correct. Some good folk with a taste for
mnemonics make the figure 12,365 — to tally with
the number of months and days in the year. In
the course of time they will be right, for, like all
volcanic cones, Fuji is subject to gradual diminu
tion of height as the result of subsidence.
No summit eruption of Fujiyama has been
recorded for at least 250 years. To this cir
cumstance we owe in large measure that increased
curvature of the sides of the cone which adds
so much to its beauty. For the last 3,000 or
4,000 feet of its height, the lighter materials have
for the most part been removed and the under
lying lava-flows and dykes laid bare. In 1707,
however, the mountain broke out with remarkable
violence at a point on its south-eastern flank,
then overgrown with forest, at a height of nearly
9,000 feet above the sea. The eruption was of
the explosive type, without exudation of lava.
Ashes and lapilli, which accumulated to a depth
of 12 feet on the shores of Suruga Gulf and
122

Fuji's Life and Lore
6 inches in the streets of Yedo, 70 miles away,
were the chief products of the outburst. A deep
hollow was formed, not of strictly crateral shape,
whose outer lip, the " hump " of Hoeizan,
destroys on that side the symmetry of the moun
tain. Steam still issues at times, though in in
significant quantities, from a point on the lip of
the summit -crater on the east side. The heat
thus indicated is purely local. Neither the
summit-crater nor the outer sides of the cone
above 10,000 feet are ever entirely clear of snow.
Fifteen eruptions of Fuji have been recorded
since the beginning of the Christian era. The
closing years of the eighth century and the open
ing years of the ninth marked a period of great
activity, four great outbursts taking place between
781 and 802 A.D. In 937 another memorable
display of energy was chronicled. Old writers
describe the mountain as " burning from head
to foot." Probably about this time small vents
were opened far down the mountain side, result
ing in the formation of the parasitic cones, Ko-
Fuji, " Little Fuji," and Maruyama, " round
mountain." An eruption in 1086 is said to have
been accompanied by severe earthquakes which
led to the fracturing of the cone for several
thousand feet. Then followed a long interval
of quiescence, of 5 50 years' duration, broken only
by a slight outburst in 1331. The last two
eruptions took place in 1627 and 1707 respec-
123

Japan's Inheritance
tively. The mountain is said to have been
violently shaken by " earthquakes " and its cone
fractured as recently as 1854, but on this point
the authorities do not agree.
Fujiyama is a standing example of the truth
that great height is unfavourable to continuance
of activity. The fact that the last eruption on
record (1707) resulted in the formation of a
parasitic cone nearly 5,000 feet below the
summit is only further confirmation of the same
principle. As the presence of Hoeizan on the
flank of the great volcano may be taken as
indicating a decline of its energy, a summit erup
tion of Fuji may be ruled out of the sphere of
probabilities ; but the volcano's perfection of
form is still liable to be affected by lateral out
bursts or by subsidence of the upper part of
the cone. Some still distant age may see Fuji
yama in form a greater Takachiho, its summit-
crater denuded into a sharp peak, with such a
huge lateral crater on its flank as that which now
gives distinction to the terminal peak of the
Kirishima range. Thanks to the strength of the
cone and of its foundations, such a catastrophe
as would finally destroy the beauty of its logarith
mic curves will be the longer delayed, but even
a Fujiyama is not for ever proof against the
levelling forces of Nature.
The season for worshipping at the shrine of
Sengen, on the rim of Fuji's crater, is strictly
124

Fuji's Life and Lore
limited— mid- July to mid-September. To present
oneself at the summit at any other time is to
be lacking in respect towards the deity, who will
certainly show disapproval by storms of wind
or rain or snow . Such, at any rate, is the popular
belief, which has not been shaken by the mis
fortunes which have attended such attempts.
Mr. Weston tells how^ in essaying the ascent in
May, 1892, his party were caught in a snowstorm
near the seventh station and there compelled to
take refuge for three days. They were given
up for lost, and on descending enjoyed the rare
experience of reading their own obituary notices
in the Japanese papers. In the autumn of 1895
Mr. Nonaka, an intrepid meteorologist, accom
panied by his wife, took up his abode at the
summit with the intention of spending the winter
there. After three months a relief party,
organized by friends, went to the rescue. It was
just in time. The scientist and his wife had to
be carried down the mountain in a state of
collapse. This is not to say that winter ascents of Fuji
are impossible. It is all a matter of luck in
weather. Given freedom from snowstorms, there
is no great difficulty for climbers accustomed to
snow work. In January, 1909, a mixed party
of foreigners and Japanese addressed themselves
to the task. On the first attempt they were
driven back by a blizzard, encountered at about
125

Japan's Inheritance
10,000 feet. Returning to the attack a few days
later, they were favoured with clear weather, and
reached the summit in good time.
" He who does not go up Fuji once is a fool,"
says a Japanese saw, " but not so big a fool as
he who goes up twice." There is a certain
amount of truth in the saying, but it fails to make
due allowance for the conditions prevailing at
the summit. Personally, I have escaped the ban
of the first part of the proverb, but if (like many
who have won their way to the summit) I had
seen nothing, I should certainly have gone up
twice. Nothing can compensate the climber for
his pains save the view from the summit. If he
misses that, he will indeed be dumb before the
superior person (not addicted to the evil prac
tice of climbing), who asserts that " the only
way to really see Fuji is to walk (or be carried)
round its base."
Having accomplished both, I shall not be
accused of partiality when I say that, while the
circumventing of the great volcano is a
thoroughly delightful trip, the achievement of its
ascent under favourable conditions will always
rank as one of the experiences of a lifetime.
Gotemba, the little railway town whence the
ascent of Fuji is usually made, has an inn in
Japanese style — the Fuji-ya — where guides,
horses, etc., may be procured. Most travellers
make this the stopping-place for the night and
126

Fuji's Life and Lore
follow the example of the patriarchs of old by
rising " a great while before day." Even then,
it must not be forgotten that from Gotemba to
Tarobo, where the horses are left and the actual
climbing begins, is a good 10 miles — only the
last two of which can be said to be in any degree
interesting. The course pursued in preference
by myself and a friend was to push on overnight
to the foot of the mountain. It is at this point
that one begins to realize that the ascent of Fuji
is not all beer and skittles. The horses are
broken-down hacks, whose sole ambition is to
walk at a pace not exceeding 4 miles an hour,
and to stop for refreshment at every wayside
hut. The saddles are of prehistoric date and
quaint construction. The guide is frequently
behind instead of in front, and, like the horse,
is not averse to stoppages. However, a soul
which is resolved to rise above difficulties, and
is not possessed by a consuming desire for haste,
would make light of these minor tribulations.
Indeed, a fine calm evening and a full moon may
go far towards making this stage of the journey
something approaching to pleasant, as your horse
crunches methodically along the gently rising
cinder-path and finally plunges into the belt of
forest, which on this side skirts the mountain up
to 5,000 feet. But when it comes to the time of
night, and, in lieu of a bed, one has to envelop
oneself in the same unwashed futon which has
127

Japan's Inheritance
warmed the bodies of countless Japanese
pilgrims, in all probability since the last eruption
of Fuji, and when, in the hours of darkness, one
has to wrestle with numerous diminutive and
aggressive foes already in possession of the afore
said futon— well, let us draw a veil over that
experience. Suffice it to say that, whether the
traveller be by practice an early riser or not, it
is with unmixed delight that he hails the first
signs of dawn and calls aloud for mizu wherewith
to wash and refresh himself after the conflict.
It is at the time of sunrise and sunset that the
best views of Fuji are usually to be obtained.
The chances are that as the traveller emerges
from the hut at Tarobo (the first of the ten
stations into which the ascent is divided) he will
be rewarded with a magnificent view of the
stately pile he has to negotiate. The first beams
of the sun light up the tree-tops of the forest-belt
he has traversed, the seams of the great cone
before him, the streaks of snow which mark its
upper surface, and the jagged edges of the crater.
Poor, indeed, is the soul of the man whom this
sight does not inspire to push on without delay
and persevere to the end. A hasty meal is taken,
and a staff purchased for ten sen, to be duly
stamped on reaching the summit, as unimpeach
able evidence of having accomplished the feat,
the coolie straps your goods and chattels on to
his back, and the start is made .
128

Fuji's Life and Lore
The rest-huts now become a prominent feature
of the journey. Rude structures they are, of
stone, built into the side of the mountain at
intervals of 700 to 800 feet. Within, crouching
on the matting which barely covers the floor of
boards spread loosely over the cinders, one may
add the delicacies of rice, eggs, and Japanese
tea to one's stock of provisions. The usefulness
of these huts, in spite of the flea-ridden futon,
is beyond dispute. He would be a man of super
human strength and endurance who could accom
plish the ascent without having recourse to one
or more of them. In stress of weather they are,
of course, indispensable. There are other huts
besides the " ten stations," as the traveller soon
finds out. It is rather trying to his patience
when, as he is congratulating himself on
approaching No. 3, he is informed by the guide
that it is only No. i\ or 2f. These intervening
stations, however, disappear towards the top.
At 8,500 feet the lava crops out in long, black
slaggy ridges. Under their shelter lies the snow
which forms the " streaks " distinguishable from
afar, and which, presumably, have inspired young
lady -poets to sing of Fuji's "bridal veil." On
passing the seventh station, at a height of about
10,000 feet, the effects of the rarefied air begin
to be felt. The traveller has perforce to slacken
pace and rest more frequently. Many at this
point have been overtaken by mountain sickness,
129 1

Japan's Inheritance
and have been compelled to turn back. As a
rule, the mists which usually envelop the waist
of the mountain are now left behind, and the
climber, at last " above the clouds," can look
down upon a mighty sea of billowy, vaporous
forms. The last 2,000 feet, apart from the
increased difficulty of breathing, are most ex
hausting, and one cannot but feel sorry for
the pilgrims if (as one enthusiastic scribe
asseverates) they really " pray all the way up."
The climbing, now on the cone itself, is per
ceptibly steeper. Ashes and lapilli give place
to jagged blocks of lava and erupted bombs.
Fresh waraji have constantly to be strapped on
to the feet, on which the severe exertion over a
rough surface begins to tell. Ere long there
comes a steeper pull than ever, amidst and over
confused heaps of rocks of ever-increasing size ;
the air above and around seems to clear ; the
guide laconically exclaims " Ju-ban" (No. 10),
and the top is won. The traveller stands, gasp
ing but delighted, on the rim of the crater., A
considerate priest hands him a cup of ice-cold
water ; his staff is taken to be duly stamped, and
he has time to survey the scene.
And what a scene it is ! A vast abyss one-,
third of a mile in width and 500 feet in depth,
whose scarred and fire-rent sides sink sharply
into a chaos of boulders red and black,
yawns at his very feet. Here the walls of that
130

FUJI, FROM SHOJI LAKE.

PILGRIM-CLIMBERS ON FUJI.

THE SUMMIT-CRATER OF FUJI.
The peak in the right distance is Kengamine, the highest point of the mountain. To face p. 130.

Fuji's Life and Lore
once unapproachable vent are perpendicular cliffs
of a fierce red hue, there a snow-slope ; here a
talus of fallen stones and cinders, there a
precipice of " abrupt and perilous rocks." Across
the chasm from the east, the crater-wall rises to
its highest in the peak of Kengamine, on the
west. Betwixt the two, from out that sealed
gulf, not many generations since, what clouds
of smoke, what floods of molten rock, what
streams of living embers have not flowed? Such
are the thoughts which instinctively inspire the
traveller's mind as he gazes around him on the
silent, but sacred, waste.
It is usually possible to descend into the crater
—by the talus slope before referred to. The
abnormal amount of snow which still remained,
however, prohibited the attempt. We estab
lished ourselves in No. 10, and after completing
the circuit of the crater, were glad to seek shelter
from the violent and bitterly cold wind which
swept across the summit. At nightfall, while
the good folk in Yokohama were sweltering with
the thermometer at 86°, we were shivering inside
rugs and ancient futon with the temperature
below freezing-point and a wind that threatened
to blow No. 10 into the crater.
The next event of which we had any distinct
recollection was the sunrise. At 3 a.m. there
was a general exit to view the unwonted spec
tacle. We saw the sun rise. We did not see it
I31

Japan's Inheritance
rise over the land. We saw it rise over a vast
rampart of massed clouds which walled the
summit in on all sides round. We might have
been on an island in space, and yon red orb some
distant star — some other sun than ours. The
impression of isolation was supreme. But our
friends the pilgrims were not thus occupied. As
the grey battlements below us flushed red, and
yet more red, and finally the God of Day rose
above them, our devout neighbours muttered
prayers.1 Soon it was all over. The band of
watchers had seen a great sight : they had seen
sunrise on Fuji. Every one hurried back to the
hut — some to sleep, some to eat, some to descend.
This last operation we undertook at 7 a.m. Of
the various routes we chose the most direct — that
on the east or Subashiri side — and with liberal
resort to the glissade made short work of it.
Half-way down the rain came on, but we recked
not. Horses helped us through the forest-belt
at a respectable pace, and at noon, with a sense
of satisfaction at the successful accomplishment
of our journey, we were soaking in that thrice-
blessed of Japanese institutions, a hot sulphur-
bath.
1 The service at sunrise includes the Rokkon Shojo (Ritual
of the Six Senses : sight, hearing, tasting, smelling, loving,
feeling) and the Kuji-go Shimpo (Exorcism of the Nine
Strokes — five horizontal, four vertical — symbolizing the
offensive and defensive attitude of the faithful towards the
powers of evil). 132

CHAPTER VIII
CRATERS, ALIVE AND DEAD
The old records — Volcanoes an object of veneration —
Volcanoes and the supernatural — Activity in the past
— Number of "independent" cones — Distribution of
the vents — Variety of types — Uncommon formations —
Recent activity
The most ancient record of a volcanic eruption
in Japan is to be found in the Hirakiki Jinga
Engi (Record of the Hirakiki Temple in the
Province of Satsuma, Southern Kyushu).
According to this, the volcano of Hirakiki,
now known as Kaimondake — one of the most
beautiful of Japan's many beautiful cones — was
created in the reign of the Emperor Itoku in
a single night. The modern historian is wont
to look askance at Japanese chronology prior
to the Christian era ; but, assuming it to have
some basis in fact, the " Satsuma Fuji," as .it
is called, was " created " about 500 B.C. It
has therefore the advantage of some two hundred
years in age over its greater namesake in Eastern
133

Japan's Inheritance
Japan, to which tradition ascribes an equally
sudden and miraculous birth in the year
286 B.C. However, the geologist, who is no
respecter of traditions, has little difficulty in
showing that both the 3,000-feet Fuji of Sat
suma and the 12,000-feet Fuji of Suruga are
among the youngest of Japanese volcanoes,
and that, even so, they are Vastly older than the
records make them'.
The subsequent behaviour of these and other
volcanoes, and their effect upon the country and
its inhabitants from the Emperor downwards, are
set forth with greater wealth of detail in
chronicles dating from the sixth century A.D.
Thus, it is written of the Satsuma volcano that
" the Hirakiki god was promoted in rank " on
several occasions during the ninth century, when
" thunder roared from the top of the mountain,
flames were thrown up, and smoke filled the
heavens " ; when " ashes fell like rain, day was
turned into night," and farmers living near the
mountain " lost their spirits by fright." These
untoward incidents were noticed to take place
" when the god was angry." Wherefore, by way
of propitiation, governors " cleaned their bodies,"
priests " read the sacred books and presented
offerings of nusa (cut paper) to the offended
deity." Perhaps no more remarkable proof of
the veneration in which volcanoes and their
associated gods were held could be supplied than
J34

Craters, Alive and Dead
by the proclamation of the Emperor Tencho in
the third month of the second year of his reign,1
when the sacred pond on Asosan was reported
to be drying up : —
" The wondrous pond in the district of Aso was never
known to change the amount of its water, even in the time
of drought or during rainy weather. Now, however, it has
dried up about forty jo 2 without any cause. Thinking about
my faults in the government of the country, I am greatly afraid
and have repented. Now I hope to govern the people with
the same kind treatment which my predecessors practised
in olden times, and thus to escape the misfortunes of famine,
plague, and drought. Order the priests at each Buddhist
temple and at each of the Shinto shrines to pray for the
happiness of the people. Show kindness to the poor, to
widows, widowers, orphans, and all old persons. Do not
confound the innocent with the guilty. Lay before every
one my intentions."
In comparatively recent times (1826) the
temple at the base of this cone was destroyed,
but no time was lost in rebuilding it. Four
years later, when the mountain " continued to
roar and shake and to blow up fire and stones,
so that all the villages to the south had bad
harvests," the Government frequently ordered the
priests of Aso " to pray for quiet."
Superstition bulks largely in these quaint
chronicles. Many of the eruptions are asso
ciated with national calamities and deliverances,
1 825 a.d. 2 1 jo = 10 feet, approximately.
135

Japan's Inheritance
invasions, deaths of Emperors, etc. As typical
of the appeals to the supernatural which charac
terized in those days the Japanese treatment of
volcanic phenomena the following extracts will
serve : —
"On the 26th day of the 12th month of the 1st year of
Rekinin,1 about 30 snakes appeared in the miraculous pond
on Mount Aso, and black smoke was sent up and many stones
fell down. In the next year the Emperor Gotoba died."
" In the 7th month of the 4th year of Koan,2 when the
Mongolians came to attack us, a blue dragon appeared in
the sea of Takashimas and a divine wind destroyed them.
On the day of the destruction of the Mongolian ships, the
pond on Mount Aso roared and two warships appeared in it."
Of the five peaks surrounding this pond, the
most rugged and difficult of ascent is Neko-
dake (" Cat Peak "), so called, according to the
writer of the Aso-san-jo reihen-ki, because
" the king of cats lived there, and on the last day of every
month all the cats in the district congregate there" —
an allusion to the belief, common in Japan from
the thirteenth to the seventeenth century, that
the cat was an animal of darkness, in league
with the powers of the lower world, and capable
of changing a corpse into a terrible demon. At
the present day the main approach to every
Japanese volcano is marked by a torii, or Shinto
1 Circum 1239 a.d. * 1281 a.d. 3 Off Nagasaki, Kyushu.
136

VOLCANOES ARE SACRED : TEMPLE AT FOOT
OF DAISEX, WESTERN JAPAN.

TORII MARKING APPROACH TO ESAN VOLCANO, HOKKAIDO.
Beyond this point, in fonncr times, women were not allowed to /viss.

To face p. 136.

Craters, Alive and Dead
gateway, indicating holy ground ; and, until well
on in the Meiji era, the rule forbidding women
to proceed beyond it was rigidly enforced.
Travellers desirous of ascending the Bungo Fuji,
in Kyushu, will find difficulty in obtaining native
assistance, for the belief prevails locally that the
ascent of the mountain provokes a tempest.
Written records apart, there is ample evidence
in the visible products of volcanic action that
the islands of Japan have been in the past the
scene of eruptive outbursts on an enormous
scale. Such cataclysms as those which produced
the rings of the " telescope mountain," Ganjusan,
in Northern Japan, or the mighty caldera of
Asosan, in the South, deserve to rank with any
the traces of which may still be seen on the
face of this planet. Even during the historical
period eruptions have taken place which might
be classed as world-events. Most notable were
those which signalized the close of the eighteenth
century — a time of marked volcanic activity in
various parts of the world. Thus the eruption,
in 1779, of Sakurajima, the island-volcano which
rises so grandly out of the deep waters of Kago
shima Bay, was of such a nature that people
could walk from the mainland to the island, a
distance of 8 to 10 miles, on the floating pumice
ejected from its crater. In 1783 the eruption
of Asama, contemporaneous with that of Hecla,
in Iceland, dealt destruction over an immense
r37

Japan's Inheritance

area ; and, nine years later, the blowing out of
the east side of the wooded cone of Unzen, near
Nagasaki, caused the death of 27,000 people.
Still more recently the outburst on Bandaisan,
in 1888, when one of the peaks of that mountain
was suddenly hurled from a height of 6,000 feet
into the valley below, will always remain one
of the most terrible manifestations of subter
ranean violence.
What is the number of the Japanese volcanoes ?
To answer is not easy. First, one must dis
tinguish between the primary or independent
cones and the many secondary or parasitic — a
far from simple task. Next arises the question
whether a mountain formed of volcanic rock
should be regarded as an independent volcano
or not. Finally, there is the difficulty brought
about by denudation. To what extent should
the rounded hill, deprived of its crater, the
" basal wreck," and the " neck " or " stump "
be included in the list ? Japanese geological
maps show as many as 165 "independent
volcanoes." Professor Milne, in a careful
enumeration made in 1886, arrived at the
figure 129. This includes some twenty unde-
scribed and, in some cases, unnamed cones, as
well as eight or ten islands of volcanic origin
which have neither craters nor issuing steam ;
while an additional nine are classified as
" volcanic nuclei." If, on the other hand,
138

Craters, Alive and Dead
one followed the principle of counting craters,
these figures would need to be increased three
fold ; while, if every " neck " were included, the
total would run into thousands.
Nor is the task of deciding the number of
the active volcanoes any less difficult. Is a
volcano to be regarded as active which has no
remaining sign of that condition but a collec
tion of solf ataras and boiling springs at its base ?
Fujiyama has known no eruption for two hundred
years, and there is nothing on the whole surface
of the great cone which merits the name of a
fumarole ; but, at times, a little steam issues
from the outer rim of its crater. Are we, there
fore, to account Fuji an active volcano? Again,
the records of Japanese vulcanicity make us hesi
tate to describe any volcano as extinct. Cases
have been known of volcanoes which had been
silent for hundreds of years, and even of moun
tains whose origin was in dispute, breaking out
suddenly and destructively. Finally, the number
of volcanoes recognized as active is constantly
changing. Cones which a few years ago merited
inclusion in the active list no longer lend them
selves to such classification ; while others, appar
ently extinct, have assumed the active state.
However, with due allowance for these difficul
ties, it would not be wide of the mark to say
that the Japanese islands support about forty
active volcanoes — including a dozen or so in the
i39

Japan's Inheritance

Kuriles, and regarding as such only those which
display activity at their main, or summit, craters.
Japan's volcanic mountains, alive and dead,
are arranged, not in a haphazard fashion, but
along certain well-defined " lines of weakness "
in the earth's crust. Two of these have a
common starting-point in the bed of the Pacific,
a little to the north of the New Guinea coast.
The western, passing by Celebes and the Philip
pines to Formosa, gives rise, in the Liu-kiu and
Satsuma Islands, to the first of the three Japanese
anticlinal curves, and terminates in Kyushu. The
eastern line of weakness, following the submarine
ridges which divide the Nares and Challenger
Deeps from the still prof o under Tuscarora,
encounters the second, or main, Japanese island-
curve at its point of maximum convexity. In
its oceanic portion this fissure is indicated by
the Marianne, Bonin, and Shichi-to Islands — all
highly volcanic. On reaching the mainland it
merges with the vast fracture known as the Fossa
Magna, or Great Transverse Fault, which strikes
almost at right angles across Central Japan. The
third insular curve — the Chishima ("Thousand")
or Kurile Islands — with numerous but less ancient
vents, serve to link up the Northern Hondo zone
with that of Kamchatka. At three points, there
fore, converging " lines of weakness " impinge
upon the main Japanese arc — (i) Southern
Kyushu, (2) East-Central Hondo, (3) South-
140

Unzendake (4,800)
Asosan (5,200)

Kirishima Zone.
Nishi Kirishima (5,600)
* Higashi Kirishima (5,200)
(Takachiho)
* Sakurajima (3,500)
Kaimon-dake (3,030)

Kurile Zone.
Cha-cha-nobori (7,900)
* Shiribeshi (6,500)
* Tarumai (3,500)
Noboribetsu (1,000)
* Usudake (2,800)

North Hondo Zone.
* Komagatake (3,800)
* Esan (2,000)
Ganjusan (6,500)
* Azumayama (6,500)
* Bandaisan (5,800)
* Nasuyama (6,300)
* Shiranesan (8,8oo)
(Nikko)
* Asama (8,200)
* Shiranesan (7,500)
(Kusatsu)

Fuji Zone.
(Tateyama (9,600)
* Yakegatake (8,500)
Ontake (10,600)
Yatsugatake (8,500)
Fujiyama (12,400)
Amagisan (4,800)
* Oshima (Mihara) (2,500)
* Miyake-shima (2,700)

VOLCANIC ZONES, SHOWING DISTRIBUTION OF PRINCIPAL VENTS.
Active Cones O Extinct • Direction of Non-volcanic Ranges < — >¦

Japan's Inheritance
Central Yezo. Where these converging lines
encounter the zones of the main arc the volcanic
formations are on the largest scale. Witness,
in Kyushu, Asosan, with its enormous Somna ;
in Central Hondo, Fuji, and several other
volcanic peaks of 10,000 feet; in Yezo, the
imposing Shiribeshisan, and other great cones
overlooking Volcano Bay.
In Japan proper the volcanic cones are
generally associated with the main mountain
ranges. Sometimes, as in the case of the
Hakuzan and Chokaisan zones, they have arisen
along fissures running parallel therewith. Here
and there, however, they have been thrown up
along fissures opened transversely from the main
line of weakness. In such places the volcanic
area has been extended into zones of consider
able width, with groups, rather than lines, of
cones. It is in these wider zones, especially
where they approach the sea or any large body
of water, that activity is still displayed. For
in Japan, as all over the world, volcanoes are
performing their natural function of " terrestrial
respiration," giving back to space quantities of
steam which, retained, would make disaster.
Water is the immediate cause of that condition
of a volcano, intermittent and paroxysmal, which
we call an eruption. Water is always present
in the magma of molten rock, and any marked
local increase gives rise to an eruption.
142

Craters, Alive and Dead
Similarly, the withdrawal of the water will
in most cases put an end to the life of the
volcano . Thus it comes that the still active cones
in Yezo are those near the sea or near lakes ; that
Bandaisan and Azumayama and Shiranesan have
once again assumed the paroxysmal state ; and
that the insular or coastal volcanoes of Japan,
as a whole, show the most marked activity.
Striking confirmation of this theory is supplied
by the chain of events of which the eruption
of Bandaisan forms a link. Near the southern
base of this mountain lies the large, nearly
circular lake of Inawashiro. Like several other
of Japan's finest lakes, it owes its formation to
subsidence following on the evisceration of vast
quantities of material from beneath the surface.
The presence of this lake was doubtless the pre
disposing circumstance of the outburst of 1888,
its waters having found their way to the
incandescent regions below the mountain, with
the consequent accumulation of superheated
steam in irrepressible quantities. But, as we
have seen, the explosion of Bandaisan gave rise
to the formation of several lakes in the valley
between it and another volcano (Azumayama),
also deemed extinct. That was in 1888. Five
years later Azumayama broke out in precisely
similar fashion on the flank remote from that
where the new lakes lay. We thus have what
might be called the cycle of volcanic action.
i43

Japan's Inheritance

Eruptions give rise to evisceration ; evisceration
to subsidence ; subsidence to the formation of
lakes ; the formation of lakes to fresh eruptions,
and so on. And the products of these processes
are writ large on the Japanese landscape of
to-day. In the matter of dimensions, the principal
volcanic peaks on the mainland range from 6,000
to 8,000 feet— though exception must be made
in the case of several cones mentioned above.
The purely insular volcanoes show a greater
variation in height. Most of them range from
1,500 to 3,000 feet, though several in the Kurile
chain reach 7,000 feet. Throughout the country
the main, or summit, craters show a remarkable
uniformity in width. Few are less than J mile,
none more than j of a mile, in their longest
diameter. In the disposition and depth of the
craters, however, and in the character of their
floors, there is enough diversity to render this
branch of the subject in itself a fascinating study.
Vulcanologists who have concentrated their
attention on the two most observed of volcanic
mountains — Vesuvius and Stromboli — are wont to
classify all volcanoes by their resemblance to
one or other of these. The Vesuvian type of
crater has occasional great eruptions, with ex
trusion of lava — sufficient to overflow in streams.
The Stromboli type shows an incessant but purely
explosive activity, the result of the bursting of
144

Craters, Alive and Dead
a constant succession of steam bubbles ascend
ing through the lava-column. Among the active
Japanese volcanoes are not a few which it would
be difficult to refer to either class. The type-
eruption of recent years in Japan consists of
a huge, violent, and sudden explosion, unaccom
panied by lava-flow, and succeeded at once by
a state of more or less complete repose . In some
cases the side of an ancient and apparently
extinct cone has been blown away, leaving a
great gaping hollow which cannot be called a
crater in the true sense. It is worthy of note
that in each such case large bodies of water
exist in the vicinity. That the accumulated steam
which provoked the outburst had been derived
from them is, I think, a fair inference. The
solid products of these eruptions do not consist
of finely divided magma, but of fragments of
the mountain itself. Very often these lateral
explosions result in the breaching of an ancient
crater, the resulting debris forming a vast inclined
plane from the summit to the valley below.
Bandaisan, Azumayama, Unzen, the Komagatake
of Yezo, and Esan all exhibit this neither
Vesuvian nor Strombolian type of eruption.
Then there is the geyser-like activity of Shirane
san, where the main crater is occupied by a
steaming lake, i mile in diameter. Beneath its
agitated waters lies the ancient vent from
which a composite cone, 7,000 feet high, has
145 K

Japan's Inheritance
been built upi, and from1 which, at irregular
intervals, violent explosions still take place.
How, too, shall we classify the detonatory
explosions of Asama, the ceaseless but non-
explosive steaming of Nasu, Takachiho, Saku-
rajima, and Yakegatake? As for the new vent
on Asosan, that seems to require a category
of its own. Here we have indeed a crater that
is gradually widening itself by means of a
mighty lateral blast of ash -laden steam ; but
though fast sapping the parent crater of its
energy, it brings neither lava nor scoriae to the
formation of a cone.
In consequence of these varied processes the
Japanese volcanoes present a remarkable variety
of formations. Normality of structure is the
exception. Hardly two are alike in shape or
arrangement. It is a new experience to be able
to walk into a still active crater and survey at
short range the central vent of an ancient cone ;
but this the breaching explosions already men
tioned have rendered possible in several cases.
To be able to view from a sharp summit-peak
the " daily life " of a volcano as pursued with
vigour in a big lateral crater is another experi
ence which no one who has been through it is
likely to forget. The irregularity of Shirane-
san's build has given us the remarkable spectacle
of three lakes in a line along the top of a moun
tain, each in its own crater, surrounded by grey
146

VOLCANIC STUMP, SAMBONTAKE,
ISLES OF IZU.

CRATER-FLOOR OF TAKACH1HO,
KYUSHU, SHOWING THE GREAT
FUMAROLES.

TRIPLE-CRATERED SHIRANESAN (KUSATSU).
The total length of the crater is half a mile. The central, and largest, of the lakes consists of
boiling sulphurous water. To face p. 146.

Craters, Alive and Dead
walls of mingled ash and sulphur. While the
middle lake is boiling, and might be labelled
dangerous, the other two are cold. Their waters
have been said to consist of " hydrochloric acid
with lime and alum ; only needing to be diluted
and sweetened in order to constitute an excellent
lemonade." ' However, some water taken by
myself in 1906 from one of them' was found
to contain a high percentage of sulphuric acid,
which could scarcely do for a beverage. This
linear arrangement of craters on the summit of a
single mountain is repeated in the case of Ontake
(eight craters), Shiribeshi-yama (three craters),
and several other ancient volcanoes. Other
notable examples of the abnormal are Usudake,
in the Hokkaido, and. Yakegatake, among the
Alps of Hida. The former has at its summit
an ample crater, nearly half a mile wide, from
rifts in which steam still issues. Not content
therewith, it opened, in 1 9 1 o, a series of vents
2,000 feet lower down, almost on the shores
of a large lake. For several miles along the
flank of the mountain there now extends an
inferno of high-piled lava-and-cinder cones, of
blasted trees, of asphyxiating smoke, and of ash
deposits, into which one sinks a foot at every
step. On the lofty Yakegatake things are very
different. The whole upper surface of the cone
is thickly coated with volcanic ash, which copious
1 Cf. Murray's Handbook (1907), p. 187.
M7

Japan's Inheritance
rain, attending the eruption of 1909, has con
verted into cement. Consequently, on leaving
the col, 7,000 feet high, from which the cone
is climbed, one has to negotiate, on hands and
knees, a 1,000-feet slope, with an inclination of
35° to 40°— like the face of some huge sea-wall
—looking, the meanwhile, for the smallest gully,
which friendly runnels may have opened through
cracks in this adamantine cap. In fact, if it
were not for the irregularities tlrus set up
in the surface, I doubt if this cone could be
ascended at all.
There has been no lack of activity among the
Japanese volcanoes of late years. An era of
renewed energy was inaugurated in the seventies
by two eruptions in the insular part of the Fuji
line. In the eighties three extinct or dormant
cones in Northern Hondo broke out, more or
less destructively. The volcanoes of the South
then took up the tale, Asosan and Takachiho
erupting in 1894 and 1895 respectively. This
was followed, in the first decade of this century,
by a series of outbreaks in Central Japan and
in the Hokkaido. New vents have been opened
or new craters formed in no less than seven
cases, while four of the outbreaks during this
period have been attended by loss of life. As
a rule, the mountains have broken out on the
flank, forming subsidiary craters ; tuff and scoria
cones have been thrown up, and showers of ashes
148

SUMMIT OF YAKEGATAKE (JAPANESE
ALPS).
The peak is capped with volcanic cement ; below,
on the right, lies the active crater.

OPEN FOR INSPECTION : BREACHED
CRATER OF ESAX.
In the middle distance is the main vent. The
wall beyond slopes 2,oco feet to the sea.

BLASTED PINES ON USUDAKE (1910).
A nearer view of one of the cones shown in plate facing p. 118. The trees, as well as the ground,
are thickly coated with volcanic ash.M

To face p. 148,

Craters, Alive and Dead
laid over wide tracts of land. The only notable
exudation of lava in recent years was from the
summit-crater of Tarumai, in south-west Yezo,
in 1909. The stark and steaming dome of
andesite, a quarter of a mile in diameter, which
reared itself 200 feet into the air from' the crest
of that ancient vent, is indeed a link with the
primeval .

149

CHAPTER IX
SOME TYPICAL VOLCANIC ASCENTS
The island-volcano of Oshima — Difficulty of access — A
grand Somna — Rival theories — The active crater — A
great eruption — The build of the island — Asama-yama
— The form of the volcano — Detonatory eruptions — One
of the periodical puffs — A fatal outburst — A " demon
stration" — The lava stream — Bandaisan — The un
expected in volcanic action — A striking view — A night
on the crater's brink — A case of possession — The Cross
of Kyushu — A mighty Somna — Tradition's explanation
— How was the great ring made ? — Rival theories — What
are the " Five Peaks " ? — The modern cone — A fiery
pit — Shinju
The Island-volcano of Oshima.
Probably no more perfect specimen of the
insular volcano could be found than that of
Oshima, largest of the Shichi-to, or Seven Isles
of Izu. In shape the island is an irregularly trun
cated cone, 10 miles in length and 6 in width,
rising to a height of 2,500 feet above the sea.
Known also to foreigners as Vries Island — after

Some Typical Volcanic Ascents
the Dutch navigator of that name — it lies some
60 miles off the entrance of Tokyo Bay, and
longitudinally— i.e., in a SSE.-NNW. direction—
along the main line of fissure. Stormy straits,
some 20 miles wide, separate it, on the west,
from the peninsula of Izu, and, on the south, from
the pyramidal islet of Toshima, a denuded cone,
1,700 feet high, into whose waist the sea is
eating rapidly, with the resultant formation of
stupendous overhanging cliffs.
Oshima is the most accessible of the Isles of
Izu, but that is not saying a great deal. The
journey, which occupies two days, is con
spicuously devoid of any of the ordinary ameni
ties of travel. The traveller who essays to reach
the island from Tokyo direct must face a night
of horror on a Japanese " coaster " — a diminutive
cargo steamer, odorous, invariably crowded, and
peculiarly susceptible to the motion of the sea.
When at length he is cast up, or out, it is at a
point on the mainland, whence the island which
is the object of pursuit can be discerned
" smoking" on the horizon. Here polite officials
of the steamboat company will smilingly inform
him that another steamer will leave for the
" honourable island " at some time within the
next four days, weather and other circumstances
permitting. If he prosecutes his inquiries with
vigour, however, he will probably learn that a
" post boat," carrying the Imperial Japanese mail,
151

Japan's Inheritance
is scheduled to sail for the island every day.
This (according to the taste and fancy of the
passenger) is a large sampan or a small junk,
and the hour of departure is anywhere from mid
night to 6 a.m., according to wind and tide.
Even when a start has been made it would be
rash to count upon getting to the island the same
day. This venerable post -boat has a trick of
hugging the coast for half a dozen miles and
as many hours, and then disgorging its pas
sengers upon a rockbound coast to make the
best of their way back on foot. Be the sky
never so cloudless, if there is the least suspicion
of a head wind, the crew will elect to cast anchor
"in a craggy bay " and wait all night, if neces
sary, for the wind to veer.
Oshima has but one harbour, that of Habu —
a parasitic crater at the south-eastern extremity
of the island, into which the sea broke in the
year 1 7 1 6, to the accompaniment of an earth
quake and tidal wave. While the entrance is
both narrow and shallow, and the shelter afforded
perfect, the harbour itself is inconveniently deep.
Probably, therefore, either jokisen l or sampan
will bring the traveller to the village of Moto-
mura — which, as its name implies, is 'the prin
cipal one. From this point the ascent presents
no difficulty. Nor need the traveller be sur
prised if a woman should offer her services as
1 Steamer. J52

Some Typical Volcanic Ascents
guide. Practically the whole work of the island
is done by the gentler sex — the men being, with
scarce an exception, " toilers of the deep."
Straight as an arrow, and considerably taller
than the average Japanese woman, the women
of Vries, though not averse to carrying an occa
sional baby on their backs, as in other parts of
Japan, carry their fagots and their vessels of
water — as they will carry the ijinsan's chattels—
on their heads .
Along the coast numerous reefs and promon
tories of a very dark and massive lava, approxi
mating to basalt, project into the sea. They
separate rapidly shelving beaches of clean,
volcanic sand — almost black in places. On
this, the less exposed side, the slopes of the
mountain are beautifully wooded, up to 2,000
feet. From Motomura the path leads through
groves of cryptomeria, camellia, and boxwood
trees into the denser foliage which encircles the
waist of the mountain. Only a thin layer of soil
covers the deposits of ashes and scoriae, many
feet in thickness, in which the track lies deep.
At intervals, through openings in the woods,
delightful views of the surf -fringed shores of the
island meet the eye. Southwards, the lesser isles
of Izu may be discerned rising sheer out of the
sea, while across the channel the rugged hills of
Izu are crowned by the snow -streaked cone of
153

OSHIMA (•*")«. -
CeVfowrs Stop., I ovc j* ,S*oe p.
A VSWOOIAY Stnfmg ft Torn
M flolonvKra N, N=rnesV> H, Haiw.
/,-jA Lava »nA JeVrjs -flows.

Some Typical Volcanic Ascents
Fuji, triumphant over the gloom in which its
sweeping base is lost.
At an elevation of about 2,000 feet the con
verging sides of the cone end abruptly in an
almost circular amphitheatre of cliffs, enclosing
— save on the east— a comparatively level plain
2 miles in diameter — the floor of a vast ancient
crater. From an "abrupt and perilous" brink
the traveller looks down upon this wilderness
of lava, sand, and scoriae, in the midst of which,
nearly a mile away, the present active cone sends
a stream of brazen-tinted vapour floating heavily
to leeward.
The total length of this Somna is about
four miles. Its upper section consists of strati
fied tuffs, agglomerates, and trachytic lava-
sheets ; the lower, of a talus slope of sand,
scoria?, and irregular boulders fallen from the
heights. It attains its highest in the south-east
and in the north-west, where the cliffs rise to
300 to 350 feet above the crater floor, suggesting
greater solidity in the construction of the now
vanished cone along the axial line. From this
line the lava floor falls away slightly to the
north-east and, to a less extent, to the south
west. It is on these two sides that the Somna
has broken down. The entire north-eastern por
tion of the floor is covered with the crags and
hummocks of a great lava-flow, which, issuing
from a depression in the rim of the central cone,
i55

Japan's Inheritance
has carried away the outer wall for a distance of
a mile and a half. Subsequent flows of debris,
partially burying the lava, have made their way
down the steep slopes of the outer cone almost
to the sea. On the south-west, the breach in the
Somna is comparatively small. Here the wall
appears simply to have subsided down the sea
ward slope, to be followed by successive streams
of ash and detritus.
Speaking of this ancient crater wall, Professor
Milne, who made the ascent in 1878 from the
south, or Habu, side, says : —
" The rim of this old crater, though a serious obstacle
on the side of our ascent, is not continuous round the
mountain, and is only to be seen on the south and south
western side."
The only explanation which suggests itself for
this statement is the wet and misty weather which
prevailed at the time of the ascent. Under such
conditions the opposite wall of the exterior crater,
some 2 miles distant, would, of course, be totally
obscured. Dr. Naumann, who accompanied
Professor Milne on this occasion, seems to have
fallen into the same delusion, as his " ideal sec
tion " of the island, here reproduced, shows the
exterior crater on one side only. The diagram
also illustrates the somewhat fanciful theory that
the crater at Habu was the first or original crater ;
that a supposed crater (b), to the north of the
156 '

SOMXA AND CENTRAL CONE OF MIHARA (OSHIMA)
The f holographs (panoramic), taken from the north-west, show the old crater-wall, the nou-eristeuce of wind, on this snlc was assumed by Xaumann fcf. diagram A,
P. l,,l. The length o tins fart ol the Somna ,s about three miles. The south-eastern portion (hidden by the intervening central cone) does not extend for more
than one mile In the ugh distance may be seen the south-weste, n b, each iu the ring-wall; the g, eat eastern breach lies a mile to the cast of the portion shown
m tlu foreground, the central cone, with its incessantly active crater, ,s distant about a mile from the Somna on this side. The course of the main lava flow

To face p. 156.

Some Typical Volcanic Ascents
present one, was the second in the history of
the volcano ; and that the present crater was the
third. In other words, the imaginary cone (b)
was parasitic to the cone (a) at Habu, and the
present central cone, with its enormous dimen
sions, is parasitic to a smaller, and vanished,
cone (b). This involves a reversal of the natural

A. Ideal Section of Oshima (Naumann).
Dr. Naumann supposes Habu, a, to have been the original crater ; an
imaginary cone, b, the second ; c, the present, and third.
B. Section, showing, d, the Somna on the north side, the non-existence of
which was assumed by Messrs. Milne and Naumann ; e,e', e", parasitic
cones to which the northward elongation of the island is due ; /, floor
of ancient crater ; g, Futago-yama.
order of things. The existence of a parasitic
cone implies, as a rule, a diminution of the
volcanic energies, which thereupon tend to break
out at some weak spot on the flank rather than
at the summit. Consequently, a parasitic cone
rarely, if ever, attains to dimensions as great
as those of the original cone. It is more
probable that the present central vent was the
JS7

Japan's Inheritance
original, and always the principal, channel of
activity. By means of a detour to the right, descent can
be made to the ancient crater floor. The cross
ing of its firm, level surface is an agreeable and
rapidly accomplished task. Here a mass of lava
crops out, the jagged end of some once moving
stream ; there a volcanic bomb has exchanged
a position of hot uncertainty in the subterranean
fire -vaults for one of greater freedom On the
wind-swept crater floor. But soon the scoriae or
" cinders " give place to the large angular and
slaggy fragments which strew the steep sides of
the cone itself. From time to time, muffled,
thunderous sounds, which seem to proceed from
somewhere beneath his feet, accompanied occa
sionally by ominous tremblings of the ground,
serve to remind the traveller that he is on the
threshold of the infernal world. A few minutes
more— half an hour suffices for the ascent of
the cone — and he is gazing into the resonant
depths of one of the finest active craters in Japan.
This is a fuming abyss of true crateral shape,
from a quarter to a third of a mile in width, and
from 300 to 400 feet deep. Its walls consist of
sharp-edged, precipitous slopes, varied here and
there by bold, craggy dykes, and sinking to a
comparatively level, boulder-strewn space at the
bottom. In the midst of this yawns the central
vent or chimney — a sombre, funnel-shaped hole
158

A GRAND CRATER : MIHARA (EASTERN WALL).

To face p.

Some Typical Volcanic Ascents
80 to 100 feet in diameter, within which the lava
column rises and falls incessantly. In its black-
red depths, at intervals varying from a few
seconds to a few minutes, loud explosions take
place with a bellowing noise, reverberating
through the whole crater. The escaping vapours,
invisible at first, take shape as clouds of steam
on rising into the air, and form " a pillar of cloud
by day, of fire by night." At times of low atmo
spheric pressure, and after heavy rain, the quantity
of vapour emitted from the main vent and from
the numerous fumaroles in the walls is so great
that nothing of the crater can be seen beyond
the brink.
Such is Mihara's normal state of activity. But
at times it is far otherwise. In the strangely
contorted red and black lava folds heaped about
the vent on its southern side may be seen the
remains of an inner cone formed during the great
eruption. In January, 1878, Professor Milne, who
visited the scene sixteen days after the eruption
began, thus describes what he saw from the rim
of the main crater, after making the ascent from
Habu :—
"We came suddenly upon the precipice-like edge of a
huge black cauldron, roaring, shaking the ground, and eject
ing a dense column of red-hot stones and ashes. . . . We
were able on account of our position to look into the crater.
In the intervals between the ejections the interior could be
well seen. Now and then large masses of the interior side,
159

Japan's Inheritance

which were black, would slide down towards the throat of
the crater and reveal a red-hot interior, showing that the
cone itself was probably red-hot throughout. . . . One side
of the cone had been blown away. . . . Looking down into
the crater on this side, molten lava, approximately level with
the base of the cone, could be seen. At each explosion
it rose in waves and swayed about heavily like a huge
basin of mercury, a little of it being apparently pushed
forwards through the breach to add to a small black-looking
stream upon the outside. . . . The height to which the
column of red-hot ashes and volcanic bombs rose after some
of the explosions must have been nearly 1,000 feet."
This cone was evidently destroyed— by an
explosion, or series of explosions, directed later
ally — in the course of the same eruption as that
which created it. A confused mass of debris
and lava fragments extending along the floor
of the crater for a considerable distance to the
north-east, and the portion of the base still visible
on the opposite side of the vent, are all that
remains of it.
Vries Island is popularly supposed to be un
troubled by earthquakes, and this belief has been
adduced as confirmation of the theory that in the
immediate neighbourhood of active volcanoes
earthquakes are unknown, the reservoir of molten
matter acting as a non-conductor of seismic
waves. In the spring of 1905, however, when
the Tokyo -Yokohama district was visited by a
series of disquieting earth-tremors, the headman
of Oshima reported that a hundred shocks had
been felt there in the course of one week, the
160

Some Typical Volcanic Ascents
volcano at the same time showing a marked
increase of activity. Evidences of subsidence are
visible near the base of the cone on the south
side. Where the crater floor is at its highest,
there has been a vertical drop of 6 to 9 feet, the
line of fracture showing for a distance of a
quarter of a mile. This may be connected with
that period of disturbance, or, more probably,
may be due to the evisceration of the central
portion of the cone.
When it is remembered that the volcano of
Oshima has been built up through deep water
from the ocean floor, its great bulk will be the
more readily appreciated. No doubt, prior to
the cataclysm which resulted in the formation of
its crater ring, the mountain was from 1,000 to
1,500 feet higher than it now is. The andesitic
ridge which forms the eastern flank of the island
may be taken to represent the remains of the
original cone on its emergence above the sea.
Subsequently the present central vent was re
opened, and gave rise to vast accumulations of
volcanic materials, lava-flows predominating over
the fragmental products. By these means the
cone was built up to a height of about 4,000 feet.
Then followed its truncation — in all probability
by a series of tremendous explosions — and the
making of the great Somna. Parasitic craters
were then opened along the axial line, causing
the length of the island to exceed its width.
161 L

Japan's Inheritance
Meanwhile activity was renewed at the main vent,
and the present central cone was built up. Finally,
as the result of the activities of this cone, the
ring-wall gave way on two sides, and from the
gaps thus made poured those great flows of debris
which form so marked a feature of the island.
ASAMA-YAMA.
Only less famous than Fuji itself is the great
volcano of Asama. Its position at the intersec
tion of two lines of volcanic activity doubtless
accounts for the huge bulk of the cone, the un
usual depth of the crater, and its long-continued
activity. Writing at the time of the last great
eruption — in 178 3— a Japanese authority says :—
"The circumference of the crater is about half a ri
(ij miles). It is of unknown depth, and is filled with sulphur.
About five years before the eruption it closed itself up and,
in consequence, ceased to smoke."
These particulars are of interest as showing that
the eruption in question, which has been
described as the most terrible in the history of
volcanoes, did not affect the dimensions of the
crater to any appreciable extent ; and that then,
as now, the cessation of apparent activity was
Asama's danger-signal — the precursor of some
sudden and destructive outburst.
The shape of the best-known and most dreaded
of Japanese volcanoes is abnormal, in that it
162

Some Typical Volcanic Ascents
is rather that of a dome than of a cone. Its sides
make convex, rather than concave, curves.
Popular fancy ascribes the " smooth rounded
appearance " presented by the volcano from a
distance to the age-long accumulation of ashes ;
but the discerning eye sees in this dome-like
shape eloquent proof of Asama's great age
and of the numerous vicissitudes through which
it has passed. At a height of about 3,000 feet
above the tableland on which the volcano has
reared itself — or about 6,000 feet above sea-
level — may be observed the remnants of an
ancient crater which, in its day, must have been
2 miles in diameter. Within this, and some
thousand feet above, runs a second " ring." The
present summit -cone, with its still stupendous
crater, is therefore at least the third in the
volcano's history. It is not the accumulation of
ashes, but these successive truncations of the
original cone, and the consequent subsidences of
the central portion, assisted by the forces of
denudation, that have given the mountain its
present shape.
Asama's modern eruptions may be said to be
of the detonatory order. On several occasions
in recent years the people of Tokyo, nearly a
hundred miles away, have felt a sensation like
that of an earthquake— and yet which was not
that of an earthquake — accompanied by a noise
suggestive of the explosion of some powder
163

Japan's Inheritance
magazine near by. On the morrow, news has
arrived of an outburst of unusual violence from
the crater of the great volcano. So frequently
has this phenomenon occurred in the first week
or so of December, that it may almost be
regarded as Asama's way of ushering in the
winter.1 Those who subsequently ascended the
mountain to behold the work of destruction have
found the upper surface of the cone strewn,
indeed, with fragments of a larger size than usual
— but nothing more. On one occasion, however,
it was found that the cone had been rent, or
split, where before it was whole.
This violently spasmodic action is charac
teristic of Asama. So far as I know, it is not
reproduced in the same manner in any other of
Japan's many volcanoes. The true explanation
will, I think, be found in the depth and configura
tion of the crater. This, instead of being normal,
or bowl -shaped, resembles nothing so much as
a clean-drilled hole in the mountain's top. The
depth, too, is much above the average — having
varied, during the past twenty years, from 700
to 400 feet.2 The combined effect of these un-
1 The latest example of this was on December 13, 1912.
2 One (foreign) writer who claims to have had opportunities
of looking down the crater when comparatively little steam
was escaping gives it as his opinion that the crater is " at
least several thousand feet in depth, and perhaps as deep
as the mountain is high above the surrounding plain."
164

Some Typical Volcanic Ascents
usual conditions must be twofold : the gaseous
products of the explosions are hindered from
expanding, while the vents in the floor of the
crater are more liable to be plugged or choked,
either by the solid products of the explosions or
by fragments detached from the all but perpendi
cular walls. The behaviour of the volcano lends
weight to this theory. When it "smokes" con
tinually, or " puffs " at very frequent intervals,
it may be approached with safety. On the other
hand, to make the ascent when there has been
a cessation — even of a few days — from these
minor symptoms of activity is to run a very
serious risk.
As the old records show, the violence of
Asama's outbursts has been associated, in the
popular mind, with the presence of sulphur. One
writer of the present day, oblivious of the fact
that the deposition of sulphurous compounds indi
cates the decline of a volcano's energy and the
closing stage of its career, describes the floor Of
Asama's crater as " a huge solfatara." There are
many volcanoes in Japan which have reached the
solfatara stage, but Asama is not one of them.
In 1904 I subjected the crater floor to a close
examination with a view to investigating the
question of these sulphur deposits. Such an
examination presents considerable difficulty, even
under favourable conditions, owing to the per
pendicularity of the walls, the appalling rotten -
165

Japan's Inheritance
ness of the crater's edge, and the great depth of
the crater itself. However, the sloping ash-bank
which forms the rim of the crater is broken in one
or two places by solid dykes which, traversing
the bulk of the cone, project a few feet clear
into the abyss. By lying prone upon one of
these unpleasant promontories, the whole of the
crater floor may be surveyed. The process, of
course, is not one that can be recommended for
any one subject to dizziness. My Japanese guide
took the strongest exception to my availing
myself of it. Fortunately, he did not pursue me
down the perilous slope to drag me forcibly out
of harm's way — that might indeed have ended in
disaster. Instead, he contented himself with wild
gesticulation on the summit, punctuated with
shouts of " Abunai! "
The floor, as I saw it on that occasion, lying
some 600 feet below me, appeared a broken,
rocky expanse of ground, strewn with big
boulders and steaming pools. While thus en
gaged, I was favoured with one of the volcano's
periodical explosions. This, as it happened, took
place from a fumarole on the opposite side of
the floor, near its junction with the wall. The
roaring noise which the crater always emits, and
which resembles nothing so much as that of the
sea on a wild night, was suddenly intensified,
while from the aperture on the floor dense
volumes of black smoke poured in a series of
166

ASAMA FROM KARUIZAWA. A "PUFF."
The protuberance on the left is the remnant of
an ancient crater.

ONE OF ASAMAS "UNPLEASANT PROMON
TORIES": A PROJECTING DYKE.
For the most part the lip of the crater is a
sloping ash-bank.

THE LAVA STREAM OF 1783.
The cone rises in the left distance.

Some Typical Volcanic Ascents
rapid explosions, which produced a whirring noise
like that of a mighty electric fan. As the masses
of smoke, which presented the characteristic
" cauliflower " shape, rose into the crater, they
expanded and became white, showing that the
blackness which marked the discharge from the
vent was due simply to the vapours being charged
with volcanic ash. When they rose clear of the
crater, they were swept aside, and as I had taken
up my position on the windward side, I was able
to watch the eruption to its conclusion, which
followed in about two minutes.
Asama is not always in such quiet mood.
There are times when to approach the crater,
still less to attempt to study its depths, would be
foolhafdy in the extreme. Such an occasion
was the morning of August 15, 191 1, when a
party of American missionaries and other foreign
visitors reached the summit at dawn, after making
the ascent — by night, as usual — from' the summer
resort of Karuizawa, some 10 miles from the
foot of the mountain. The leading members of
the party had topped the crater's rim, and were
just about to peer into its sombre depths, when
the volcano gave forth a sudden roar, flinging
into the air a torrent of lava fragments, great
and small. The visitors, of course, turned and
fled with all speed down the steep, cinder-strewn
slopes of the cone ; but a number of them were
struck by the falling bombs — most of which were
167

Japan's Inheritance
at a red heat. One missionary received such
terrible injuries that he expired before he could
be conveyed down the mountain. As fate would
have it, it was the day of the Bon festival, and
a number of Japanese had also undertaken the
ascent, not for sport, but as a devotional exer
cise. Several of these were likewise injured —
one fatally — by this unexpected outburst. A
third victim was a Japanese policeman, Tomita
by name. The reason for the unfortunate
officer's presence on the mountain suggests a
cruel stroke of irony. He had been sent up to
look for the body of a Japanese who had com
mitted suicide the day before by throwing himself
into the crater !
A few summers ago, an American professor
of divinity, with a thirst for notoriety, added
to the gaiety of the holiday-making people
at Karuizawa. There had been several cases of
suicide on the volcano on the part of Japanese
students, attributed by the theologian to the
spiritual darkness in which they walked. Accord
ingly, he announced his intention of descending
into the " Hades " of Asama's crater and return
ing thence unscathed, as a proof of the superiority
of the Christian religion over the forces of the
nether world. With an elaborate equipment of
apparatus, and attended by a goodly company of
the faithful — and, it may be added, of the curious
— the professor repaired to the summit. The
168

Some Typical Volcanic Ascents
volcano was in a quiet state, as it happened, but
the professor deemed it advisable to limit his
" demonstration " to walking down the sloping
ash -bank, at the end of a stout rope, to within
a safe distance of the point where it drops in
a sheer precipice to. 'the floor below. Having
been there photographed, he returned victorious
to the embraces of his friends.
The sequel to this incident was perhaps the
most important part. It took the form of a
thrilling account, in the American Press, of the
professor's " Daring Descent into the Awful
Crater of Asama."
Perhaps the most striking of Asama's external
features is a colossal stream of andesite, whereby
the great eruption of 1783 left its mark for all
time upon this troubled region. From the lip
of the crater on the north side to the right bank
of the Agatsuma, a distance of 15 miles, the
lava torrent flowed, wiping out as many villages
and firing the forests through which it cut its way .
Even after descending the cone itself, the stream
moved at an average speed of i| miles an hour
— a high rate of motion for a stream of non-
basic lava, and eloquent of the high temperature
at which it must have been ejected. The lava of
this stream is scoriaceous, like that of Etna,
and presents a strong contrast to the slaggy
Oshima lavas, which are Vesuvian. Its volume
has been estimated at one -twelfth of a cubic
169

Japan's Inheritance

mile, or some thirty times the capacity of
the crater.
Of late years there has been a marked increase
in the violence and frequency of Asama's erup
tions. Discounting all minor explosions, seventy
considerable outbursts have taken place during
the past five years . Concurrently the floor of the
vent has been rising at a rate which, if maintained
for the next twenty-five years, will bring it level
with the lip of the crater. Judging from the
history and present condition of the volcano, it
is quite within the range of probabilities that a
really great eruption may occur before then. The
mountain is under observation by the Tokyo
authorities ; a seismograph has been set up on
its flank to measure its pulsations, and the in
habitants of the neighbouring villages have been
warned. At any time may come news of another
such outpouring of lava, ashes, and destruction
as that of 1783. Bandaisan.
It is the reward of the climber that he sees
what must be ever hidden from the dweller in
the plain. But the climber of volcanoes has
a recompense which the ordinary mountaineer
knows not. He has not only his view, his ex
hilaration, his inspiration ; he is greeted by a
vision which rarely fails to be of awe-inspiring
170

Some Typical Volcanic Ascents
magnificence— that of the crater whence the
mountain he has just ascended was born. Over
and above all this, the quest of the volcano has
that zest and excitement which comes from a
danger which is none the less real because it
is wrapped in " glorious uncertainty." For in
the history of volcanic action — especially in Japan
— the unexpected has played a conspicuous part.
The climber, therefore, who faces the inferno
of an active crater, studies its fuming depths, and
seeks to record on the photographic film some
impression of its sombre grandeur, may be said,
in a very real sense, to take his life in his hands.
Probably no mountain in the world has illus
trated so effectively this most sinister aspect of
volcanic action as did that ill-omened but withal
majestic mountain, Bandaisan. Prior to 1888
men deemed it extinct. No eruption had been
recorded for over a thousand years. In fact,
the only reference to the volcanic nature of the
mountain is to be found in an old calendar, which
speaks of the " creation " of the volcano by an
eruption in 807 A.D. It was of Bandaisan that
Professor Milne said : " Nowhere does its shape
show any curvature or outline by which its
volcanic origin could be inferred." That was
in 1886. Two years later the great explosion
had occurred — only less in violence than that
of Krakatoa five years previously — and the name
of Bandaisan had become a household word.
171

Japan's Inheritance
The height of the mountain is not great —
5,850 feet above sea -level, or 4,500 above
Lake Inawashiro, from whose northern shore it
looms so grandly. Viewed from the south, it
presents an eminently pacific aspect. The form
of the mountain, indeed, is bold, and the peak,
which forms its summit, sharp ; but its slopes,
steep though they are, conceal beneath a veil
of grass and pine and stunted oak the ancient
lava streams of which they are composed. There
is not a hint of steam, of hissing vents, or
primeval heat. The mountain's frown is re
served for the other side — for the bleak, riven,
devastated north. Much has been said of the
striking contrast presented by the fuming gorge
on one side of the ridge of Ojigoku, in Hakone,
and the smiling valley on the other. But the
prospect to be viewed from the broken ridge of
O-Bandai transcends it immeasurably. On the
one hand, the great blue lake, with its wooded
islets and shapely promontories, the central
feature of a smiling landscape, spread, map -like,
at one's feet ; on the other, the torn mountain,
still reeking from' its deadly wound, the long
rows of stupendous cliffs, the scattered remnants
of the wrecked crater spread for miles over the
country-side, and, gleaming in the distance, the
waters of lakes brought by that outburst into
sudden being. And all this was the work of
five minutes of a summer morning !
172

Some Typical Volcanic Ascents
No one can truly solve the riddle of
Bandaisan unless he mounts to the summit of
its loftiest peak. This will not be achieved
without considerable toil, for the upper slopes
of the cone present an angle of 450; but the
results are well worth the labour. From that
commanding view-point, the ragged brink of a
precipice 1,000 feet high, he will see, and
understand, all. Not only does there lie before
him one of the most extensive — and, taken all
round, most impressive — mountain prospects in
Japan, but near at hand is the record of the great
eruption, written in fractured rock -walls and in
lines of steaming vents. At his feet sinks the
gloomy abyss of an ancient crater, in the shape
of a horse-shoe, its open end towards the south
east. It is half a mile in length and 1,000 feet
deep . Across the gulf soars another peak, almost
as high. To his right the wall is continued in
a third peak ; but to his left, the bend of
the horse-shoe, there is a gaping void. At
7.45 a.m. on the morning of July 15, 1888,
a fourth peak, little inferior in height and size
to that on which the spectator stands, and
adjoining it, constituted this part of the crater-
wall. Five minutes later it had disappeared.
Such, in brief, is the story of the great
explosion .
If one could imagine the peak of Snowdon
knocked away, as by some mighty battering-
i73

The Crater of Bandaisan (diagrammatic).
a. Ancient Crater, b. Modern Crater, formed by the
destruction of Ko-Bandai. a Summit of O-Bandai.
ff. Main lines of fracture, x x Solfataras. The
arrows indicate the direction of the main flow of
debris. The position of the Onsen, or Hut, is indi
cated by a small black circle. The village and lake
of Inawashiro, near which the stream of debris
stopped (after flowing round to the right), lie to the
south of the crater ; Lake Hibara, to the north.

Some Typical Volcanic Ascents
ram, from above Glaslyn, one would have a fair
idea of what happened on Bandaisan on that
eventful day. But Ko-Bandaisan was not merely
knocked away : it was torn up by the roots . A
sharp, broken ridge, but little above the level
of the floor, marks the line of fracture on the
inner side of the crater wall. The real seat of
the explosion, however, from whence its main
force was directed, lies in a deep gully 600 feet
below, on the outer side. The precipitous slope
between these two lines — riddled, to this day,
with steaming vents — was, so to speak, the ful
crum from which the accumulated forces of
imprisoned steam exerted their irresistible power.
The doomed peak was lifted bodily from its
foundations and flung in a myriad fragments,
together with enormous quantities of dust and
steam, in a torrent of mud and rocks down the
steep sides of the mountain into the valley below .
For 8 miles in a straight line this ghastly torrent
rushed with incredible speed, damming up a
considerable river, the Nagase ; and forming
three lakes, one of which, Lake Hibara, is at
least as large as Ullswater. Then, deflected in
its course by the hills opposite, it turned sharply
to the right down the valley. Here its course
was still more deadly. Seven villages were
partly destroyed and four, with their inhabitants
to the number of 461, were buried as completely
as Pompeii and Herculaneum in a.d. 79.
i75

Japan's Inheritance

With all this, it must be remembered, the out
burst on Bandaisan was not a normal volcanic
eruption. There was no discharge of volcanic
ash or scoriae ; no vent was opened to serve
as the funnel or chimney of some subterranean
lava -column ; there was no outflow of lava ; no
building up of a cone. From the presence of
hot springs on the western and northern flanks
of the mountain, however, one of which issues
at a height of nearly 5,000 feet, it might have
been inferred that the original heat of the volcano
still persisted, and at no great depth below the
surface. To these incandescent regions, as the
result of the subsidence of strata about the base
of the mountain, large quantities of water, drawn,
doubtless, from Inawashiro, found access. An
immense accumulation of steam was thus
effected, to which the solid superstructure of
the ancient cone offered stubborn resistance ; and
to that resistance, in its turn, must be attributed
the appalling violence of the final outburst.
That the explosion differed in kind from the
true volcanic eruption is further evidenced by
its brief duration, whereas the latter is often a
matter of weeks and months. The time-table
of the eruption is as follows : —
July 15, 1888.
7 a.m. Rumbling noises, thought by the people to be
thunder.
7.30 „ An earthquake of moderate severity, lasting half
a minute.
176

LAKE HIBARA FROM THE SUMMIT OF BANDAISAN.
Formed by tlie damming of the Xatfascgawa in the eruption of 1888.
lake is eight mites in length.

The

To face'p, 176.

Some Typical Volcanic Ascents
July 15, 1888.
7.40 a.m. A violent shaking of the ground.
7-45 n The eruption began, explosions following in rapid
succession to the number of fifteen or twenty.
Clouds of steam and dust were shot into
the air to a height of 4,000 feet above the
summit of the mountain, with loud thunder
ous noises.
7.46 „ The final and loudest explosion, directed laterally,
dislodged the peak of Ko-Bandaisan.
7.50 „ Pitchy darkness in the vicinity of the mountain,
accompanied by a heavy fall of warm rain.
Immediately afterwards, the avalanche of
rocks and mud overwhelmed the Nagase
valley.
9.30 „ The thunderous noises, which continued to be
emitted from the mountain, but with lessen
ing intensity, were no longer heard.
As might have been expected, the several
onsens, or bathing -huts, on the mountain were
not spared. A curious fate is said to have over
taken the highest of these, the Yamanaka Onsen
(Within-the-Mountain Hut), which happened to
be situated precisely on the line of fracture and
about on a level with the crater floor. The
story goes that one of the two rooms of which
the building consists was carried away by the
avalanche, with, of course, its inmates, while the
other room was left standing and its occupants
escaped with their lives. On my first visit to
the mountain, in 1907, I became acquainted with
a different version of the story. My plan was
177 M

Japan's Inheritance
to follow up the course of the stream of debris
from its termination, near the village of Inawa-
shiro, to its source on the breast of the main
peak. The track leads up the Nagase valley,
past — or, rather, over— Jthe buried hamlets, to the
point where that most energetic stream, issuing
from the recently formed lakes, has made for
itself a new bed in the wilderness of mud and
rocks — over ioo feet deep — in which for a time
it was lost. Here the path turns sharply to the
left and, ascending rapidly, makes between a
double line of stupendous red cliffs in the direc
tion of the great fracture. It was still early in
the season, and the upper part of the mountain,
including the floor of the rift, lay deep in the
winter's snow. On either hand rose the mighty
rock-walls and, right ahead, the precipitous slope
which marked the lip of the fracture. The
lowering cloud -mists overhead completed the
sense of isolation and imprisonment. One felt
as if one were within, not on, a mountain. From
time to time ominous movements of the ground
were felt, which drew from my guide the laconic
comment, " Jisshin" (earthquake); and in their
wake large fragments of rock, dislodged from
the cliffs, clattered noisily to the floor. From
hundreds of steam-vents in the precipitous slopes
before us and to our right there issued not only
torrents of steam and sulphurous vapours, but
a continual roaring as of many vast boilers work-
178

Some Typical Volcanic Ascents
ing at high pressure. The only way out of this
colossal cul de sac was by a treacherous path
which wound its uncertain way up the perilous
slope on the northern face of the ridge. It was
first necessary to traverse a gully at the base
of the cliff, with an ugly-looking bed of snow,
whose inner edges melted into greenish slime
where the solfataras played upon them. With
no small trepidation we did this, and then
scrambled upwards, threading our way with all
caution amidst the hissing vents, each with a
patch of rotten-looking yellow ground about it.
At length, on nearing the crest of the ridge, after
a difficult and somewhat dangerous climb of
twenty minutes, we found ourselves at the
rough -hewn door of a little hut, which seemed
literally to overhang the abyss. It was the
Yamanaka Onsen, occupying the same site as
its famous but ill-fated predecessor.
Beyond this my guide refused to proceed. He
had a dozen reasons to advance by way of excuse,
some of them, as it turned out, weighty enough.
Night was coming on, the other slope of the
ridge was steep, boulder-strewn, and altogether
too dangerous to be attempted by the dim light
of a chochin.1 No course remained but to accept
the hospitality of the Yamanaka Onsen. That
in doing so I, at least, experienced some qualms
was, perhaps, excusable. Ko-Bandai was blown
1 Paper lantern.
179

Japan's Inheritance
away in five minutes : so many things may
happen in a night.
The tenants of this eerie dwelling-place were
a man, his wife, and two sturdy sons of twelve
to fourteen. Their daily fare consisted of rice,
with a piece of salted fish or pickled daikon
(radish), and mugi-yu (barley water). During
the day, of course, it was always possible to
get warm by soaking in the hot spring ; by
night the beds were made up to the edge of
a charcoal fireplace let into the floor, over which
the covering quilt was spread. This latter device
certainly proved a boon. Straw had been freely
used, without and within, between the loosely
bound planks of the hut, " to expel the winter's
flaw " ; but the keen nor'-wester which swept
the mountain that night found numerous weak
spots in the walls of the zasshiki.1 An occasional
whiff of sulphur from the solfataras below, find
ing its way through the cracks, lent pungency
to the chilly air. Physical exhaustion, however,
came to our aid. Neither the earthquake waves
nor the ceaseless roar from the abyss frightened
from us sleep.
Mine host of the Yamanaka Onsen, before
sending us on our way by the morning light
(having exacted the sum of 85 sen for our
accommodation), gave a categorical denial to the
picturesque story of the partial destruction of
1 Guest-room. 180

Some Typical Volcanic Ascents
the hut. The whole building, he said, was over
whelmed, and not one of its twenty inmates
escaped. This version was subsequently con
firmed by an old resident of Wakamatsu, the
nearest large town, who, as proof of the same,
pressed upon me a photograph of the spot taken
as soon after the eruption as was feasible.
The only person who saw the great eruption
from start to finish without feeling himself under
the necessity of fleeing for his life was an old
rustic, who happened to be ascending one of
the neighbouring hills at the time. This good
man, it seems, had chanced to see a fox that
morning ; and foxes, as is well known, have
the power of bewitching mortals, so as to cause
them to see all manner of strange things which
are not really happening. The extraordinary
commotion in progress on the other side of the
valley, he therefore concluded, was but a vast
hallucination prepared by Reynard for his annoy
ance, and the best way of frustrating the
machinations of his wanton enemy was calmly to
watch the performance to the end — which he
did. It was only on descending to the foot of
the mountain that he learned that Reynard, after
all, was not to blame for the affair.
The Ringed Mountain, Asosan.
Accumulated materials from craters still
visible — whether active or extinct — as well as
181

Japan's Inheritance

from many more that are dead and gone, over
lie two-thirds of the whole area of Kyushu. Two
lines of weakness traverse the island from east
to west, one across the waist, the other across
the northern coast. The greater of these forms
a ridge parallel with, and to the north of, the
ancient schist or backbone range, and extends
from Unzen, in the west, to Bungo, in the east.
Midway this zone is intersected by the Satsuma
line, whose course is marked by the noble cones
of Kaimon, Sakurajima, and the Kirishima
range. At the point of intersection stands the
grand volcanic mass of Asosan.
With its great Somna, 40 miles in circumfer
ence, Asosan may claim' to be one of the most
remarkable of terrestrial mountains. The
dimensions of other rival craters or crater -rings
are : —
The Caldera of Palma (Canary
Islands)  9 miles in diameter.
Pantellaria, off Sicily  8x6 „ „
Bolsena (crater lake, Central Italy) 10 x J$ „ „
" Crater Lake," Oregon  8x6 „ „
Papandyang (Java)  15x6 „ „
A German explorer in East Africa has dis
covered, south of Kilima-Njaro, an ancient crater
measuring 35 miles in circumference, for which
a claim of superiority has been set up ; but
Asosan still remains unequalled, with its dimen-
182

Some Typical Volcanic Ascents
sions of 14 miles by 10, the longer diameter
running north and south.
The slopes leading up to the brink of the
exterior wall are gentle, with an average inclina
tion of 6 to 8°, but their origin — apart from their
contour — is clear. They are composed of a
succession of lava-flows, several of which are
of great thickness, and show the characteristic
columnar structure. Where they end abruptly in
the edge of the old crater their height above sea-
level is from 2,000 to 2,500 feet. Indeed, the
whole girdle of cliff and escarpment, considering
its extent, is wonderfully uniform in height . The
crater is entered by the only gap in its circuit
— a rocky gorge, 600 feet deep, which forms an
outlet for the river Shirakawa. Once within
the crater — the lower portions of whose floor are
cultivated and support a population of 4,000
to 5,000 people, distributed over a score of good-
sized villages — the gentle upward slope begins
again, and culminates in the centre in a rugged
group of five peaks. At the base of this central
mass, in a comparatively low and small cone,
the life of this ancient monarch among volcanic
mountains is still preserved.
According to tradition, the whole ancient
crater was formerly occupied by a lake, out of
which the central peaks emerged as a steep and
rocky island. It then occurred to the god of the
mountain that here much good land that might
183

Japan's Inheritance

be available for cultivation was being wasted.
So he kicked a breach in the containing wall and
thus drained the crater.
This story has probably arisen through con
fusion with that of the " Wondrous Pond on
Mount Aso," of which the old records have so
much to say. This pond, which was given to
" roaring " and ejecting stones, probably occu
pied the site of the modern central cone. Its
dimensions are given by one authority as 4,000
feet, or nearly three-quarters of a mile, in length
— which corresponds roughly with the aggregate
length of the present crater. No doubt this pond
showed a geyser -like activity like that of the
central lake on Shiranesan. When the crater
preceding the present active one was breached
on its western side the lake, of course, was
destroyed. In its place, as the result of a pro
longed period of activity, the modern active cone
has been built up.
By what forces and processes has the present
form of the mountain been produced? Three
theories have been put forward to account for
the great crater-ring — first, what may be called
the lunar theory ; second, the eruptive theory ;
and, thirdly, the theory of subsidence. Accord
ing to the first, the central mass represents the
original volcano, from which, in a series of
eruptions of approximately equal force, quanti
ties of debris were discharged in all directions,
184

¦"
- 4*j7|
1
% ' JBiiH
' 1
|Kuu
w*^
^c
'r
H
'^W^
r
'*
SL>
astiS^
~>^ ^
MAIN CRATER OF ASOSAN : AN EXPLOSION.
Depth of crater, 200 feet. The pliotograph shows well the characteristic ''cauliflower" steam-
clouds charged with volcanic ash.
To face p. 18.
Some Typical Volcanic Ascents
and their accumulations gave rise to the crater-
ring. This theory, however, is demolished by
the presence in the ring of solid lava which has
cooled in situ, as an examination of the strata
in the breach already mentioned shows. The

THE STRUCTURE OF ASO-SAN
& Riwt Shirakawii y. ViTUge of Bojw-
The broken line suggests the original form of the cone. Dimensions of the crater-ring,
10 miles by 14,

gently inclined slopes which rise from all direc
tions to the rim of the exterior crater form part
of the flanks of the great original cone from
which the lava flowed. What, then, has become
of the original cone, which in its prime must
have had a height of 10,000 feet? Either it
185

Japan's Inheritance

has been blown away by some cataclysmic ex
plosion, or it has been engulfed in the vast
hollows produced by the removal of materials
from beneath the base of the mountain. As
the bulk of the part of the cone removed was
not less than 28 cubic miles in volume — a mass
equal to two and a half mountains like Vesuvius
— it should be possible to find irregular frag-
mental masses or deposits of agglomerate in the
vicinity of the mountain. None have as yet been
found — and, on the strength of this, there is
certainly a prima-facie case in favour of the
subsidence theory. But an explosion may be
so violent as to blow a mountain into the finest
dust. This actually happened in the Krakatoa
outburst of 1883, when the minute particles re
sulting from' the explosion were sent all round
the world, affecting the colouring of sunsets
in Europe for two or three years afterwards.
Since an explosion sufficient to remove so great
a mass as the upper part of Asosan — assuming
that such an explosion took place — must have
been much greater than even the Krakatoa out
burst, is it inconceivable that a similar result
was produced in the case of the great Japanese
volcano, or that some of the finer -bedded tuffs
in the central portion of Kyushu owe their origin
to such an event? It only remains for some
one to find, on or near the outer slopes of the
ancient crater of Asosan„ a lump or two of
186

Some Typical Volcanic Ascents
volcanic agglomerate — as Dr. Tempest Anderson
did on the edge of Crater Lake, Oregon — to
establish the theory that the vast Somna of Aso
owes its existence to one colossal explosion.
Advocates of the subsidence theory presup
pose " the escape of vast quantities of lava from
points far below the summit of the cone, leaving
a cavity large enough to engulf the whole of the
unsupported mountain mass .... The completed
work probably left the whole of the sunken
mountain melted in a leval lake within the great
cauldron." ' If it be granted that the explosion
theory as yet lacks proof, it may still be main
tained that the rugged peaks which occupy the
centre of the ancient crater represent a part of
the original cone which sank to its present level,
but was not engulfed. The lava of these peaks
is, like that of the Caldera, andesitic. They are
disposed, not in a straight line, but in a curve
about the present active cone, which is situated
at their base. From the open side of the curve
— that on which the modern cone lies — a series
of mounds and ridges extend in the direction
of the Yuno-tani geyser and of the distant
breach. These mounds are suggestive in their
form of two things : ( I ) irregular heaps of
debris, such as might have resulted from the
breaching of the original cone after its subsi-
1 Cf. a paper by Mr. Robert Anderson, of Washington, in
the Popular Science Monthlv, 1907.
187

Japan's Inheritance

dence; or (2) subsidiary cones and craters now
overgrown. Further, all this accords with the
trend of the transverse line of weakness, which
passes, under the gap westward towards the
Shimabara Peninsula and the ancient volcano of
Unzen .
The modern cone of Asosan, whose height
does not exceed 300 feet, contains five craters,
divided by mud and ash walls, like those of
Shiranesan (Kusatsu), Of these, the two
northern only are active. The average depth
of the craters is 200 feet. At the base of the
cone, on the opposite (south) side, a new vent
was opened in 1907. This is an oval pit — at
first 10 by 16, now 30 by 50 feet, and steadily
increasing in size. The rocks composing its walls
are wholly at red heat, and masses of lava are
piled against its outer lip. From it dense
volumes of smoke are discharged, laterally and
incessantly, with a thunderous noise. The lower
folds of smoke, or rather steam, are darkened
by innumerable particles of black ash like grains
of gunpowder, and appear to contain tongues of
flame. This is merely the reflection from the
incandescent walls of the vent. Flames are un
known in volcanic phenomena, except in the rare
cases where lava charged with steam at a high
temperature has been known to effect the
chemical decomposition of the latter, when the
liberated hydrogen, as it escapes, takes fire.

THE NEW VENT ON ASOSAN.

Opened in 1907; the sides of the vent are still at a red heat. The rugged heights in the back
ground are part of the encircling " Five Peaks of Asosan " — see diagram on p. 185.

GORGE OF THE SHIRAKAWA, ASOSAN.
The river has made a breach— the only one— in the great crater-rim; (see p. 183).
The sloves of the. inner rnnp ruWimisrf ;¦» t._  ¦ ¦¦:eSj rise on the left. To face p. 188.

Some Typical Volcanic Ascents
The heat from this newly opened vent is hardly
bearable at a distance of 20 yards, and the roar,
which can be heard two miles away, is like that
of a mighty blast furnace.
The new vent is of interest as illustrating the
initial stage in the formation of a parasitic cone,
though the blast is at present too violent to allow
of the deposition of materials near the vent.
It has already had a marked effect upon the
main crater. The activity of the latter has been
substantially reduced, and its extinction may be
expected to follow at no very distant date. This
will in all probability give rise to increased
activity at the vent, which will tend to widen
itself upwards along the flank of the cone. This
in its turn may cause obstruction of the vent,
with a subsequent outburst of great violence,
accompanied by the formation of a crater of sub
stantial dimensions. Aso's career has been long
and chequered ; but we are not yet at the end
of it.
Certain of Japan's volcanoes seem to make
a dangerous appeal to that morbid and un
balanced type of mind which is found with dis
tressing frequency among Japanese students.
The most terrible of Japanese craters have
frequently been chosen as a place and means
of suicide. Asosan has an evil reputation in
this respect. It is not the vast crater -ring, with
its mighty cliffs, nor even the modern active
180

Japan's Inheritance
crater, with its incessant clouds of steam, that
appeals to the Japanese student weary of life ;
it is this red-hot vent, recently opened on the
flank of the cone. On the occasion of my last
visit to this magnificent mountain, in 1907, after
leaving the temple and torii at the base of the
cone, I approached the new inferno. About
twenty yards from its brink lay a large ejected
rock, weighing, perhaps, a couple of tons.
Nearer than that it was not possible to go with
out having the hair scorched from1 one's face.
Behind this boulder, watching with strange in-
tentness the billowy vapours, mixed apparently
with flames, crouched a Japanese student. It was
with mingled feelings that I covered as hastily
as possible the intervening space, and, taking
up my place behind the sheltering rock, engaged
the youth in conversation. He responded
courteously enough, but a few minutes later
rose and retraced his steps towards the temple.
He had given me no indication of his inten
tions, but my guide vouchsafed the opinion that
the young man had been meditating shinju
(suicide) .

190

CHAPTER X
EARTHQUAKES
The Japanese earthquake a serious thing — Tantrums of a
subterranean dragon — Earthquakes and " nerves " —
Effect on the Japanese character — Earthquake super
stitions — A mischievous canard — Quakes great and small
— Historic shocks — Source of Japan's quakes — Horizontal
and vertical motion — Causes of earthquakes — Their pre
diction — Is the Japanese house " the offspring of the
earthquake " ? — Other reasons for its design — Earthquake-
proof buildings
The story is told of a European lady who, at
dead of night and clad in gossamer attire, ran
at incredible speed along the main road of one
of Japan's foreign settlements. Like Abraham,
she went not knowing whither, and might have
thus continued to this day had not a friendly
Japanese policeman firmly but kindly arrested her
headlong flight with the query, " You run why?
It is finished! "
Then there was the American merchant,
recently arrived in the country with the fixed
191

Japan's Inheritance
intention of " getting rich quick," who jumped
with strange precipitance from a first-floor
window, broke his leg, and returned per first
steamer whence he came, cursing volubly. By
way of excuse for this victim, it may be men
tioned that he had passed through an unpleasant
experience of a somewhat similar character at
'Frisco not long since.
These two incidents should convince the in
credulous stay-at-home Occidental that the
Japanese earthquake is a serious thing. If not,
it should suffice to mention that a Chair of
Seismology has been established in the Tokyo
University, and that the Japanese Education
Department includes an " Earthquake Damage
Prevention Committee."
The ancients of the Western world believed
that earthquakes were caused by subterranean
winds essaying to burst their prison doors. In
the East, these phenomena have been more
generally attributed to the tantrums of a subter
ranean dragon, whose tail, in moments of excite
ment, comes into more or less violent contact
with the superincumbent land. At Kashima, in
Eastern Japan, pilgrims are ceremoniously in
troduced to a pillar of stone which some con
siderate deity is said to have driven an immense
distance into the earth with a view to restrain
ing the monster. Japanese writers, of no very
remote period, have even ventured to assign
192

Earthquakes
definite proportions to this formidable creature.
His head lay beneath the centre of Northern
Hondo, his tail extended midway between the
two capitals — the basis for this theory being
that the last -mentioned district was peculiarly
subject to these destructive visitations. In more
recent times the attempt has been made to lay
the blame for these calamitous upheavals at the
dooT of volcanic force. Many are the impre
cations which ignorance has hurled at Fujiyama
— the type-mountain of volcanic iniquity — for
disasters with which that silent peak has not
the remotest connection. Even a standard work
of reference hazards the suggestion that the
Tuscarora Deep, apparent source of most of the
seismic waves that quiver through Japan, is
nothing more or less than a vast subterranean
crater. According to the traveller Humboldt, the in
habitants of countries troubled by earthquakes —
such as certain parts of South America — some
times have a presentiment of their advent. The
good folk of New England were on several
occasions forewarned of the approach of an
earthquake by an uncomfortable sensation in the
pit of the stomach. In Japan it is common to
speak of a sultry and oppressive state of the
atmosphere as " earthquake weather." A modern
physician would probably diagnose this " pre
monitory sense " as " nerves." The repeated
193 N

Japan's Inheritance
occurrence of earthquake shocks undoubtedly
reduces quite unneurotic persons to a very
" jumpy " state. Cases have been observed of
people who, having lived for some years in a
country subject to earthquakes and having
subsequently returned to one where such move
ments are unknown, have nevertheless retained
the special sensitiveness to tremors implanted
in them by their past experiences. The vibra
tion caused by a passing train or by some heavy
vehicle has been sufficient to reproduce the
peculiar sickening sensation set up, in years
gone by, by a genuine earthquake.
A study of earthquake averages shows that
every inhabitant of the Japanese islands must
expect to encounter at least one catastrophic
earthquake in the course of his life. Never
theless, it must be admitted that this nervous
expectancy of which we have been speaking
characterizes rather the stranger in Japan than
the people of the country. The Japanese are
too practical, and at the same time too insouciant,
thus to meet trouble half-way. Perhaps an innate
fatalism — a certain carelessness of life— contri
butes in their case to greater evenness of mind ;
or it may be this very fatalism is itself the
creation of the earthquake. Cynics have repre
sented this stoicism of the Japanese as more
apparent than real, as merely the result of the
superior ease with which they conceal their
194

Earthquakes
feelings, and even as due to a lower physical
development ; but the above is, I think, the
true explanation. Nor has a modern Humboldt
succeeded in discovering among them the
existence of a premonitory sense, though appre
ciable progress has been made in the direction
of scientific prediction of earthquakes. This is
not to say, of course, that the advent of an
obviously violent shock does not produce alarm
and even panic among the whole population
affected. On the occasion of the great earth
quake of 1830, which destroyed a large part
of Kyoto, it is on record that the inhabitants, as
a whole, were completely unmanned by the
catastrophe. For three days and nights they
lived and slept on straw mats spread in the
streets, not lifting a finger to repair the damage
that had been done, but praying to the gods
for mercy and relief.
Despite the educational efforts of the Seis-
mological Society and the Mombusho,1 super
stition regarding earthquakes retains a place in
the popular mind. Much of it finds embodiment
in weather-predicting rhymes on the lines of
" A red sky at night is the shepherd's delight,"
but with a smaller percentage of truth. Pro
fessor Chamberlain's rendering of one of these
runs as follows : —
1 Department of Education.
195

Japan's Inheritance
At twelve o'clock it means disease,
At eight or four 'tis rain ;
At ten 'tis drought, while six and two
Of wind are tokens plain.

There is in Tokyo a certain well, said to be
the deepest in the city, which has never been
known to dry up save once — and that was im
mediately before the great earthquake of 1855.
Another widespread belief is that while bad
earthquakes are supposed to occur once in every
twenty years, the really cataclysmic shock comes
once in fifty. In the spring of 1906, when the
public mind had been somewhat disturbed by
several disquieting shocks, the report got abroad
that the famous well had suddenly dried up !
Some heartless wretch had conceived the idea
of combining the two traditions into an ominous
whole. If his object was to destroy public
equanimity, he certainly succeeded, for never
was belief in an impending calamity more widely
held. Fortunately, nothing happened — save that
the well theory received its quietus.
At the time of Prince Arthur of Connaught's
Garter Mission to Japan, in similar circumstances
of public disquietude, a cleverer miscreant got
to work. Several nasty jars had occurred during
the night, and it was an uneasy audience, in which
official Tokyo was largely represented, that
assembled for a gala performance at the Uyeno
196

Earthquakes
Park Academy. The entertainment had not long
begun, when a message reached the directors
that an urgent " earthquake warning " had just
been issued from the Seismological Observatory.
Word was passed to Sir Claude MacDonald, then
British Ambassador, who, fearing a panic and a
dangerous rush for the doors, quietly intimated
the purport of the communication to the dis
tinguished guests.. The royal party and corps
diplomatique left their seats with as much dignity
and deliberation as the circumstances permitted,
and within five minutes the theatre was empty.
The "warning" — a canard, of course — was
believed to have been engineered by a gang
of thieves, who hoped in the confusion of the
ensuing sauve qui peut to reap a rich harvest.
For the ordinary person, unblest with a seis
mometer, it is hard, in all conscience, to draw the
line between tremors just strong enough to be
felt and those severe enough to make men edge
instinctively towards the door or rise hastily
from their beds ; between shocks which stop
the clock, throw ornaments from the mantel
piece, and break bottles in the cellars, and those
which open ugly cracks in walls, strip roofs of
tiles, and bring brick chimneys crashing through
the house-top. In other words, it is difficult to
say what measure of vibration — horizontal or
vertical (a little of the latter goes a long way) —
and what amount of subsequent damage, con-
197

Japan's Inheritance
stitute a " severe " earthquake. Thus, when the
sceptic Occidental reads in works of reference
that there have been only two " severe " shocks
in the last fifty years, he is apt to conclude
that a great deal too much is made of this earth
quake business. An eight years' residence in
the country has given me recollections of four
distinct occasions when the community as a
whole was for several days together in a
thoroughly nervous state ; and at least three on
which all who could get out of their houses did
so, regardless of appearances and with the least
possible delay ; while those who could not, made
haste to bestow themselves under tables, beds,
and door-lintels. Nor were they ashamed after
wards to confess it.
At such times earthquakes, and what to do
when they arrive, are the sole topic of conversa
tion. To run out of one's house is held to be
a mistake, because of the danger from falling
tiles, copings, and chimney-stacks. Neverthe
less, to remain indoors calls for some courage.
I have heard more than one man express the
hope that when a bad shock did come it would
find him in club or hotel, where he could take
refuge under the billiard-table. I once was
dining in a friend's house when an obviously bad
quake commenced. The low roaring sound,
and an alarming rattle of the windows in their
frames, betokened an unusual amount of vertical
198

Earthquakes
motion. Every one rose from the table, and
my hostess, in great distress, implored me to
save her little boy, who was asleep upstairs. I
performed the mission as expeditiously as
jammed doors and swaying stairs permitted, and
rejoined the party, to find the fond parent on a
garden seat in a state of collapse and the others
watching the rocking house, in doubt as to
whether its downfall or my emergence would
be the first to occur.
Two of these anxious times were in early
spring — the early part of April seems a par
ticularly " busy " season from the seismic point
of view — one in midsummer, and the other at
the beginning of winter. The earthquake of
March 13, 1909, which apparently had the
approach to Yokohama Harbour for its epicen-
trum, was unquestionably the worst. Accurate
measurements of this quake are not available, as
one of its earliest misdeeds was to throw the
local seismograph out of gear. The maximum
amplitude was, however, found from other data
to have been four-fifths of an inch, while the
oscillations lasted eleven minutes. Many of the
foreign-style houses on the high ground of the
Bluff, as well as on the low " made " ground
of the settlement, suffered serious injury.
Several lives were lost as the result of falling
walls, and many a good man thought his last
hour had come. But, as Oom Paul would have
199

Japan's Inheritance

said, the moral and intellectual damage exceeded
the material. A wilderness of shattered nerves
was left in the wake of that seismic wave.
However, things are not so bad as they might
be — or, if we may accept the old records, as they
were. Destructive earthquakes occurred more
frequently a thousand years ago. The ninth
century A.D. seems to have been a particularly
undesirable time for residence in Japan. After
the shock which annihilated Kyoto in 797, there
were quakes of scarcely less intensity in 818,
827, 830, 841, 850, 856, 857, 864, 868, 869,
and 877. Several of these were accompanied
by tidal waves, and two, at least, synchronized
with great volcanic eruptions — at Bandaisan
(841) and Fujiyama (868). One of the earliest
on record, and probably the most destructive
of all, so far as the surface of the country is
concerned, was that which devastated Southern
Shikoku in 604 A.D. On that occasion a strip
of coast over a million acres in extent disappeared
bodily into the sea. Among cities, Kyoto and
Tokyo have suffered most. Yedo, as it was
then, has twice been laid in ruins. Japanese
authorities put the mortality in the one case
(1703) at 200,000, in the other (1855) at
100,000; but these figures must be received
with caution. On both occasions winter added
its rigours to the scene. Fires starting in all
parts of the city turned night into day and
200

Earthquakes

completed the work of destruction. After -shocks
constituted a feature of these, as they do of all
great, earthquakes. Recurring at intervals of a
few hours, they continued sometimes for a month,
to the number of a hundred or more, keeping
alive the terror of the inhabitants. The same
phenomenon characterized the very violent
quake of 1891, in the Gifu district. Palpable
" echoes " of the main shock continued for six
weeks, and the seismograph recorded 4,000,
spread over the space of ten years. While the
tale of disastrous earthquakes is not what it was,
shocks are still numerous enough. Since the
systematic observation of seismic phenomena was
commenced in the early eighties, the average
of earthquakes perceptible without the aid of
instruments has worked out at well over 1,000
per annum for the whole Empire. For Tokyo
alone the average is two earthquakes a week.
Scientists take comfort in the number of these
small shocks, just as they do in the frequency
of volcanic explosions on a small scale. The
former imply a gradual settling of the strata
into a state of equilibrium not easily upset by
ordinary movements ; the latter involve a gradual
dissipation of subterranean energy which, if
suffered to accumulate, would spell disaster.
Observation of the direction followed by the
seismic waves which traverse Japan shows that
the great majority of them have their origin in

201

Japan's Inheritance
the Pacific, not far from the Japanese coast.
The gradient of the slope from the crest of the
Japanese anticline towards the ocean-bed,
namely, i in 25 — as compared, for example, with
the 1 in 200 off the eastern coast of South
America — makes it one of the steepest on the
face of the globe. Its total vertical height of
40,000 feet — from the summit of the Hondo
highlands to the depths of the Tuscarora — renders
it at the same time one of the highest. Here we
have the prime cause of Japan's multitudinous
quakes. For, as Dr. Knott puts it, an earth
quake is " a yielding to stress " — that is to say,
a point is reached at which rock -beds subjected
to enormous thrust-pressure suddenly give way.
This fracture sets in motion horizontal " earth-
waves " ; and, if it be accompanied by much
displacement or subsidence of rock -masses, ver
tical motion of a jolting or jarring sort is set up,
adding greatly to the dangerous character of the
disturbance. A shock whose amplitude — that is,
say, the extent of its back-and-forth horizontal
motion — attains one inch, is sufficient to bring
down any but the strongest buildings, while a
vertical movement of the twentieth part of an
inch is equally dangerous. The great Gifu
earthquake, which had its origin in a huge fault
or fracture, probably at a considerable depth,
extended to the actual surface, where it formed
a scarp 20 feet in vertical height and 50 miles
202

Earthquakes
in length. The amplitude of the shock was
estimated to have been from1 9 inches to a
foot. Professor Omori, of Tokyo, attributes the
proportionately low mortality (7,000), as com
pared with that of .the Messina earthquake of
December, 1908 — which, judged by movement,
was less severe — to the fact that the Japanese
buildings, being of light construction, caused less
damage by their fall.
The position and conformation of the Japanese
island-arc renders it a " seismically sensitive "
region. The strata of its anticline, under
enormous pressure, are known to be slowly rising
on the one side and sinking on the other, as the
result of secular movement. In them, there
fore, there is liable to occur, on comparatively
slight provocation, that sudden yielding to stress
which means an earthquake. The causes which
may constitute that slight provocation may be
either : ( 1 ) tidal stresses ; ( 2 ) the gravitational
influence of the sun, moon, or other planetary
bodies acting in conjunction with them'; (3)
modification of surface stresses as the result of
accumulation of snow, rainfall, and of con
sequent denudation and transportation of
material; (4) the long-period oscillation of
the earth's crust due to variations of baro
metric pressure. Any one of these may be
the " last straw " which breaks the back of
the overstrained anticline. In Japan's case,
203

Japan's Inheritance

the last two causes assume special import
ance. The heavy annual snowfall on one
side of the Japanese ridge, and the prevalence
of a high barometric pressure on the other, are
sufficient in themselves to account for the winter
frequency of earthquakes in Japan. Observa
tions have proved, on the one hand, that the
number of shocks actually varies with the amount
of the snowfall ; and, on the other, that earth
quakes are usually followed by a lowering of
barometric pressure, accompanied by rain. Con
sequently the period mid-November to end of
December, when these conditions come into play,
and that from the middle of March to the middle
of April, when the operation is reversed, are
the times when Japan as a whole is more
susceptible to earthquake shocks. In practice,
moreover, it has been found that certain parts
of Japan are more liable to earthquakes than
others. Two lines of seismic activity intersect
a little to the north-west of Tokyo Bay. It
will readily be understood that by precise defini
tion of these localities, study of periodicity of
earthquake movements, calculation of the dates
of maximum terrestrial stress, and, finally, by
the detection of preliminary shocks with the aid
of instruments, a fair approach to the prediction
of earthquakes can be made. Cases of success
ful forecasts are, indeed, on record — notably
Omori's prediction of the great Formosan earth-
204

Earthquakes
quake of 1906, and the calculation by an
American seismologist of December 28, 1908
— the date of the Messina catastrophe — as " a
probable earthquake date." An attempt at what
might be called long-period prediction has also
been made by the Japanese expert. Observing
that Japan forms the meeting-place of two great
earthquake zones — the Eurasian, extending from
the Mediterranean by way of Turkestan and the
Himalaya to Formosa, and the Americo -Pacific,
extending from the Aleutian Islands along the
western coast of the New World — and observing
also that both these zones have within recent
years been simultaneously shaken by a number
of great shocks, while the Japanese islands have
escaped, Professor Omori infers that the earth
stresses have been shifted from the North Pacific
link between the two zones to the arcs of the
zones themselves, and that in consequence the
Japanese islands will be free from' any disastrous
shocks for " some dozens of years to come."
We shall see I
Some twenty years ago the Japanese house
was labelled " the offspring of the earthquake."
The idea was plausible, the phrase picturesque,
the manner appropriately dogmatic — so the label
remained. As a little reflection will show, other
considerations have had as much, or more, to
do with the evolution of the Japanese house.
Cheapness and the character of the materials
205

Japan's Inheritance
available are among the chief. Soft wood and
the accommodating bamboo lay ready to hand
in abundance ; why quarry the hills for stone ?
No doubt, if the rugged slopes of Shantung or
Korea (where there are no earthquakes) were
profusely wooded, we should there find airy
structures of wood and paper instead of hovels
of rock and mud. The artistic temperament of
the Japanese, which prefers the light and
" natty " to the solid and ponderous, as well as
their proverbial passion for light and air, have
also played a part in fixing the style of their
domestic architecture. Certainly it is not regard
for the earthquake that makes the Japanese
builder put a preposterously heavy roof of tiles
upon his " wicker-basket " of a house. Unless,
indeed, he wishes to ensure being killed outright,
when the crisis comes, instead of merely bruised
or maimed ! Nor would it permit him to add
one or two stories to the one-floored " offspring "
— which he frequently does. Then again, as a
destroyer of Japanese dwelling-places, the fire-
fiend is far worse than the seismic wave. Once
in twenty years, perhaps, a destructive earth
quake brings down 10,000 houses. But five
times that number are destroyed every year by
fires. If the style and pattern of the Japanese
house were dictated by external dangers, this
highly practical people would long ago have hit
upon some better medium than paper stretched
206

Earthquakes

on wooden frames. They would, in other words,
have fought the fire rather than the earthquake.
Finally, large sections of the country — notably
on the western slope — are unaffected by these
shocks, yet there, as elsewhere, the " offspring
of the earthquake " flourishes, and has from the
beginning. The fact of the matter is that the Japanese
house provides no better refuge in a really severe
earthquake than any other type of building.
Indeed, a two-storied Japanese house with heavy
tiled roof is about as bad a place as one could
be in. Where the Japanese building scores is
that all the varying degrees of shock, up to
the really dangerous, fail to leave their mark
upon it. No weakened foundations, tottering
chimneys, cracked walls, or pendulous plaster
remain to haunt the tenant's mind. To all the
minor movements, the non-rigid, unstrutted
framework of the Japanese building yields ; like
the reed before the wind, it bends, and so is
saved from breaking. But when the visitation
looks to be catastrophic, your good Japanese will
take to the street and leave the offspring of the
earthquake to be devoured by its own parent.
And small blame to him !
In another earthquake-infested region — that of
Guatemala — a primitive and inexpensive type of
building has been evolved by the natives, and is
thus described by Mr. W. S. Ascoli : "Stout
207

Japan's Inheritance
wooden uprights are driven into the ground at
intervals along the proposed walls. These posts
are then bound together by thin laths of strong,
flexible wood, running horizontally, and securely
fastened by palm-fibre, thereby forming a
skeleton wall. Sometimes, for greater rigidity,
additional laths, running diagonally, are added.
This is then filled up with slabs of ' adobe,' or
baked earth. The surface can then be covered
with stucco and whitewashed." While the
framework of such a house has the advantage
of elasticity, the great objection would be the
crumbling of the walls after any severe shock.
Professor Milne's recipe for a safe house in an
earthquake country is " a one-storied, strongly
framed timber house, with a light, flattish roof
made of shingles or sheet-iron, the whole rest
ing on a quantity of small cast-iron balls, carried
on flat plates bedded in the foundations." It
is to be feared that these precepts are seldom
followed, even in the case of private houses,
and when the visitor who has heard much of
" the offspring of the earthquake " contemplates
the huge brick -and-stone structures which have
sprung up on the " made " ground about Hibiya
Park, in the centre of Tokyo, he will be at a
loss whether to admire more this defiance of
the earthquake or the readiness with1 which the
Japanese adapt themselves to the demands of
modern civilization, earthquakes notwithstanding.
208

CHAPTER XI
THE SPAS OF JAPAN
A volcanic legacy — Composition and distribution — Legendary
use and origin — A much-prized boon — Conventions at
a discount — The question of temperature — Fashionable
spas — Classification of the waters — Chalybeate springs
— Seaside spas — Bathing au grand serieux — Boiling
pools for suicides — " Hells " in an Eden — A typical
mountain-spa
Not the least of the legacies bequeathed by
volcanic force to the land of Yamato is the
mineral spa. Hot springs enrich most of the
highland districts. Without being confined to
the interior, they issue, as a rule, at heights
varying from 1,000 to 4,000 feet above sea-
level, often amid the most romantic surround
ings. Sometimes they emerge on the sea -shore
— the steam of the spring mingling, literally, with
the surf of the breakers. Generally speaking,
these " mountain waters " — as the Japanese call
them — issue from the base of extinct or quiescent
cones. One of the symptoms of declining sub-
209 o

Japan's Inheritance

terranean energy is the solfatara. The thermal
spring is its almost invariable concomitant. It
is the gift of the volcano that is marked to die.
Some writers have maintained that most of
the mineral springs in Japan are indifferent in
composition and show no connection with the
volcanic areas. Recent research leads to the
opposite conclusion. All the recognized varieties
— alkaline, acid, saline, chalybeate — are repre
sented. Over and above these a large number
contain sulphur in one form or another. The
presence of sulphuretted hydrogen in greater or
lesser quantity is indicated by its characteristic
odour ; sulphur dioxide gives rise to deposition
of sulphur, called by the Japanese yu-bana,
while the trioxide gives rise to the presence of
free sulphuric acid in the water. As to the dis
tribution of the springs, the only notable ones
issuing in a non-volcanic district are those of
Arima, in Settsu, and two or three in the Kii
Peninsula. The rest, without exception, are so
obviously connected with one or other of the
volcanic zones that to dissociate them from their
common source would be, as it were, to put
asunder those whom Nature hath joined.
Many of the Japanese spas are of great
antiquity. Legend has busied itself both with
their origin and their use. Judged by the
test, the oldest baths in Japan are those of
Dogo, in north-western Shikoku. Here Onamuji,

210

The Spas of Japan
who, as directly descended from Susano-o, " the
Impetuous Male," ranks as one of the aboriginal
deities of Idzumo, Sukuno-bikona, his diminu
tive coadjutor, and five of the legendary Mikados,
including the famous Jimmu Tenno, disported
themselves in the slightly sulphurous waters.
The baths of Nasu, in Northern Japan, became
famous in the Jomei era (629-641 A.D.), and
those of Kinosaki, in Western Japan, date from
the sixth century. The principal spring at the
latter place, so the story goes, owes its discovery
to the prescience of a stork. For several days
in succession the bird, suffering apparently from
pain in its legs, was observed by a peasant to
visit the same spot and scrape a hole for itself
in the ground. The malady with which it was
afflicted abated, and at length the stork flew
away cured. On this the peasant examined the
place and found a mineral spring, over which,
with the aid of his neighbours, he built a
bathing -hut.
By a people with whom bathing is the grande
passion the boon of mineral waters is highly
prized. In Japanese eyes the summer resort
without a hot spring is nothing worth. Holiday-
making Japanese do not flock to the seaside —
unless, indeed, they happen to be within easy
reach of a " marine spa " like Atami, in Izu,
or Beppu, in the far south. For this reason, too,
resorts most popular among foreigners— such as
211

Japan's Inheritance
Karuizawa, in Central Japan, and the village of
Hakone, on the lake of the same name — are not
much patronized by the Japanese. Even Nikko,
with them, is less a holiday resort than a place
of pilgrimage: On the other hand, the seques
tered onsen— the hotter the better— is thronged
throughout the season. The approach may be
toilsome, the accommodation poor ; but these
are of secondary importance : the bathing is the
thing. Dozens of folk of all sorts and conditions
— young men and maidens, old men and children,
pilgrims, students, sufferers from life's ills — will
pack into a third-rate hotel, covering the musty
tatami like leaves in Vallombrosa, rather than
forego their midsummer soak. Is it not on
record that a miserable hut, 5,000 feet up on
the flank of Bandaisan, was harbouring a score
of souls when the great eruption took place ?
Recourse to a " cure " in the Western world
is costly. The thermal waters, captured for
exploitation by a syndicate, are encased in a
pump-room, or a kursaat, and society flocking
thereto is forced to keep up the conventions and
artificialities of everyday life. In Japan the
presence of the hot spring is seldom marked by
anything more than a foliage -embowered collec
tion of rough huts, above whose shingle roofs
float wreaths of steam and sulphurous vapour.
Usually the large wooden tanks which constitute
the baths themselves — often with little more than
212

"^•f^^Wfe

GENESIS OF A MOUNTAIN SPA : NOBORIBETSU.
In the foreground, the crater ; beyond, the solfataras; in
the distance, the roofs of the village.

ASHINOYU SPA : HAKONE.

1 left, lies the Lake of Hakone. To face p. 212.

The Spas of Japan
a roof for shelter — are free to every passer-by.
In remoter regions, despite the efforts of official
dom to quench it, a state of almost idyllic
naturalness prevails. The degree of civilization
attained at a spa may, in fact, be gauged by
the customs pursued. While in more enlightened
places wooden partitions have been put up, on
one side of which is written " ladies," on the
other " gentlemen," in others a bamboo-pole laid
across the water answers the same purpose. In
others, again, no pretence at division is made.
Promiscuous bathing of the sexes proceeds as
from time immemorial and without offence.
Sometimes the waters are taken al fresco. A
favourite process, after a preliminary soak, is
to stand at the foot of an open bank or wall
and receive from overhead— conveyed thither in
bamboo -pipes — a small cascade, hot to a degree,
but highly invigorating. " The great drawback
to a stay at one of these places," naively remarks
a well-known handbook, " is the danger of meet
ing naked bathers." Possibly; but any one
who wishes to avoid this peril can easily do
so. He has only to approach this rural
Gomorrah in the company of the local junsa
(policeman). Conceivably, he may catch
glimpses of discarded garments hastily donned
behind some friendly corner, and of nude figures
surreptitiously betaking themselves to their
proper compartments ; but, beyond that, his
213

Japan's Inheritance

Occidental sense of propriety will suffer no
irreparable shock.
The temperature of the bath is an important
point. Your Japanese likes not the cold tub.
To him the " hot " bath, as understood in this
country, would be nuroi (lukewarm). Medical
men in Western countries discourage the taking
of baths the temperature of which exceeds to
any appreciable extent that of the body — a more
than probable explanation of the fact that so
many people take cold after a " hot " bath. With
the Japanese a favourite temperature is 1 1 o° to
1 1 5° F. After a half -hour's soak in water of
that heat, bathers will sally forth on a freezing
night clad in a thin kimono, or even the spare
fundoshi (loin-cloth), and walk scatheless to their
homes .
Of the alkaline waters, the best known are
those of Atami and Shuzenji — the one on the
coast, the other in the interior, of the Izu Penin
sula ; Ikao, in Central Japan ; Shiobara, on the
flanks of the Hondo anticline ; and Shibu, in
the Shinano Valley, on the western slope.
Shiobara, with numerous springs set apart
for rich folk and poor respectively, is one of
the most fashionable of Japanese spas, and has
been patronized of late years by members of the
Imperial Family. There are baths here for all
grades of society, just as, at a Kyushu spa,
the tanks are labelled first, second, and third
214

The Spas of Japan

class. At Shuzenji one of the springs emerges
in the bed of a river. To reach the super
structure of a bath-house in midstream bathers
have " to walk the plank." A special distinc
tion is conferred on Atami by a powerful inter
mittent geyser, which discharges at intervals of
four to six hours for half an hour at a time.
Should it fail to explode at the proper time —
which it sometimes does — there is consternation
in the village. For the geyser is the making
of the place, and to lose the many pulmonary
patients who come hither in winter would mean
disaster. The four main islands of Japan are said to
contain well over four hundred mineral springs,
classified as saline, alkaline, chalybeate and in
different, or pure. Some of the saline or chaly
beate springs contain, in addition, an appreciable
amount of sulphur. At Kusatsu, in Central, and
at Nasu, in Northern, Japan, owing to the
presence of free sulphuric acid, the waters are
classed as " acid." At the point of emergence
the quantity of sulphur in solution is sufficient
to give them a milky colour ; but, in their further
progress, some of this mineral is deposited, iron
and other constituents are taken up in exchange,
and the temperature falls. Similarly, in the
Hakone district, the highest springs — those at
Ashinoyu (2,800 feet) — are stronger and hotter
than those of Miyanoshita, three miles down the
215

Japan's Inheritance
valley. By the time the waters reach Yumoto,
four miles farther on, their temperature has fallen
to ioo°, and they are indifferent.
Of the spas which lie west of the great
meridional range, Arima, in Settsu, some fifteen
miles north of Kobe, is the most frequented.
This is one of Japan's best chalybeate springs.
Analyses of its waters show one litre to contain
1 4' 7 grammes of sodium chloride, i'28 of
potassium oxide, 2*9 of calcium, and C24 of
magnesium, with C246 of peroxide of iron.
Deposits from one of the springs at the base
of Hakusan are strongly impregnated with iron,
and find a ready sale as yubana on that account.
At Yumomine, in Ise, the waters gush out in
the midst of the village at a temperature of
2000 F., and — the presence of sulphur notwith
standing — are used by the women of the place
to cook their vegetables. Visitors make a
practice of leaving teapots, etc., to be encrusted
with the mineral ; and the principal image in
the adjoining temple is fashioned from a stone
thus adorned. As examples of the alkaline -
chalybeate type may be mentioned the hot spring
of Oshiu, near Wakamatsu, and a cold spring
at Arima, the ferrous compound being associated
in each case with bicarbonate of soda. All the
springs of this class contain an appreciable
amount of carbonic acid gas, but that of
Takaradzuka, near Kobe — a cold spring — is
particularly rich in this constituent, and
216

AN ALFRESCO " SHOWER " • NOBORIBETSU.
The hot water is conveyed from the springs in
bamboo pipes.

BATH-HOUSE IN MID-STREAM : SHUZENJI, IZU.
The hot springs emerge in the river-bed, and are reached by means of a plank bridge.
To face p, 216.

The Spas of Japan

makes a most palatable table-water, known
as tansan.
It is not always the fate of the hot springs
born of Japanese volcanoes to be harnessed in
bamboo-pipes or gathered into public bathing-
tanks. At the base of the island-volcano of
Sakurajima, which rears its seared and imposing
form out of the deep waters of Kagoshima Bay
to a height of 3,500 feet, the thermal waters
find their way out on a sandy beach, secluded
from all winds save the south. The inhabitants
of the neighbouring village can therefore pass
from a hot -spring bath — made by the simple
process of hollowing out a place in the sand —
into the more vigorous embrace of the sea, and
vice versa. Even in mid-winter, when the sun,
as a rule, shines genially from a cloudless sky,
the children of Arimura may be seen disporting
themselves on the steaming shore or soaking
to their chins in a sand-bath within a few feet of
the icy spray of the breakers.
For baths on a big scale one must go to
Beppu, a seaside spa, or to Kusatsu, one of the
coolest of Japanese summer resorts, nearly
4,000 feet above sea-level. At the former place
the public baths accommodate eight hundred
people in two huge sheds. Formalities depend
ing upon sex are entirely dispensed with. The
tanks, sunk into the ground, are arranged in
strengths to suit the various diseases of the
patients, who are warned " not to kill the ox
217

Japan's Inheritance
while straightening the horns " — i.e., not to sacri
fice their constitutions for the sake of a local
affection. On the beach are baths more public
still. During the season, which is early spring,
the foreshore at midday is studded with human
heads, the bodies appertaining to which are
being steamed below the surface. Dozens of
springs, alkaline, ferruginous, and strongly
charged with carbonic acid gas, percolate sea
wards through the sand. Nor is there any
failure in point of temperature, for that varies
from 1 1 o° to 1 3 2° E.
At Kusatsu, high on the flank of the vener
able Shiranesan (White Mountain), in the West
Central District, bathing is pursued au grand
serieux. Therapeutics, not pleasure, is the end
in view. Here the waters, with a temperature
ranging up to 12 8° E., are sharpened by an
appreciable percentage of free sulphuric acid,
and contain, in addition, traces of iron and
arsenic. They possess special efficacy for gout,
rheumatism, and all manner of skin diseases, in
cluding leprosy and syphilis. Such is the torture
inflicted in cases of cutaneous affections that the
patients submit to a species of drill, under a
bath-master, who keeps time for them, and sees
that each pours upon his head 250 dippers— the
regulation number — of the scalding water to pre
vent congestion. Sufferers in an advanced stage
are allowed to swathe their wounds in cotton
wool — no mean concession when it is remem-
218

The Spas of Japan
bered that the period of immersion lasts three
or four minutes. A course at Kusatsu involves
the taking of 120 of these baths, spread over
a month, after which the patient proceeds to
Shibu, on the farther side of the range, or to
some other spa where the waters are soft.
Japan's pure or indifferent springs are found
to possess a roughly uniform temperature, ioo°
to 1050 Fj., which suggests that they originate
in strata of similar composition — probably the
fundamental schists — or from a uniform depth.
On the other hand, the sulphur springs show
every variety of temperature up to the boiling
of the jigoku ("hells "). Many of them issue
directly, in surface-streams, from' ancient
breached craters, which, despite their decrepi
tude, present scenes of the liveliest activity. The
O jigoku (" Big Hell ") of Tateyama, on the
north-western flank of the Hida-Etchu range,
includes a pool, 150 feet across, in a state of
violent ebullition. On its banks quantities of
sulphur are continually being deposited. Some
of the solfataras have received fanciful names.
The boiling pools of Unzen, in Kyushu, the
fiercest of which contains a geyser, is called
the " Pool of Loud Wailing." In the Tonami
Peninsula, which forms the northern extremity
of Hondo, a group of boiling springs lies cheek-
by-jowl with a placid crater-lake on the hollow
breast of a peak known as " the Mountain of
219

Japan's Inheritance
Dread." Such places as these — and, in parti
cular, a deep green pond called the " Sea of
Hell," near Beppu, which, for all its heat,
preserves an uncanny stillness — have often been
profaned by suicide.
Perhaps the most striking feature of these
solfatara-spas is the amazing verdure which
surrounds them. Roaring, bubbling, hissing
cauldrons are hedged about with virgin forests.
Up to these slope stark, scarred cliffs, stained
red, yellow, white ; into them fades the steam
of innumerable geysers and fumaroles, surging
from a floor in many parts of which it would
be death to walk. The tout ensemble is start
ling ; the effect most weird. Such a scene may
be witnessed at or near the base of several of
Japan's played-out volcanoes, but nowhere to
better advantage than at Nobori-betsu, in the
Hokkaido. There, at an elevation of 1,000 feet,
the noise of the Pacific breakers might be heard,
were it not for the ceaseless din near by. The
source thereof is a huge double crater, each of
its divisions a third of a mile in diameter. On
the one side steaming water overflows out of
boiling lakes into a trackless forest ; on the other
into the inns and bath-houses of a thrice-blessed
village. The craters resound with the wild com- t
motion of a score of " hells," fumaroles, and
fountains of boiling water. But the whole
inferno is girt about with richest green. The
220

The Spas of Japan
very ridge dividing it in twain, crowned in part
with densest foliage, carries a fearsome pit,
70 feet long, filled with rolling, seething mud.
Of a very different type, the little onsen of
Eino lies high on the flank of Kirishima, in
Southern Kyushu. To reach it neither basha
nor jinrikisha avails. He who would know this
choicest of Japanese mountain spas must needs
climb . The range which marks the route begins,
continues, and ends with craters, domes, and
peaks. But for the occasional glimpse of a
majestic cone, with a mass of vapour swelling
from its crest, the densely wooded flanks might
be those of Vosges or Malverns — magnified, and
with a greater wealth of foliage. A picturesque
village nestles at its southern extremity ; but
the prudent traveller, seeing that this is one of
the haunts favoured of pilgrims, will push on
to the little spa whose waters come direct from
the bowels of the mountain instead of from the
bathroom boiler.
So on the occasion of a visit in the autumn
of 1907 neither my friend (who, doing " the
grand tour," was new to the country) nor myself
surrendered to the blandishments of a well-
favoured nesan (waitress) at the inn near the
temple, who proffered green tea for our delec
tation. The deep tones of the temple bell sound
ing the vesper hour reached us out on the hill
side as the cryptomeria groves which hid the
221

Japan's Inheritance
village were fading into the distance. To the
right, for 2,000 feet, rose the bold shoulder of
the range. To the left, as many feet below,
lay the outspread plain. Lava and tuff were
the hillocks and ridges that diversified its
surface ; lava and tuff were the beds of its
streams and meres. But over all, as upon the
slopes above, lay a mantle of Eden-like fer
tility. The very craters along the summit -line
were silent, cold, and lake-filled : while the bene
ficent waters for which we were heading issued
from beneath the greatest and deadest of
them all.
For two hours our ninsoku (coolie) stolidly
led the way, looking neither to right nor left.
Now some projecting spur of the range had to
be negotiated, now some densely wooded rift ;
but always, on the whole, the path ascended.
At length, on rounding a bolder bluff than any
yet encountered, there came into view a stately
gorge, which reached the very heart of the range.
Woods that might have passed for primeval lined
its steep sides. Into it, out of the west, poured
the level rays of the sun, turning to flame the
glassed-in fronts of a little cluster of " toy "
houses daintily set upon a platform1 at its head.
From between the shingle roofs floated tiny
wreaths of vapour, showing white against the
dark background of foliage before they vanished
into the twilight air.

The Spas of Japan
In this sequestered gorge the junsa ceased
from troubling. So about the open tanks, with
their greenish steaming water and yubana,
bathers of both sexes and of all ages were
scrubbing themselves on the sloping floors, soak
ing to the neck, or taking the " shower " on a
rocky ledge well supplied with descending
streams. Nightfall, following hard on the gloaming,
found us established in a soft -matted, paper -
walled room, which was Elysium to our wiay-
worn frames. It had been assumed, as a matter
of course, that we would take the water while
sustenance was in preparation for the inner
man. A few minutes later — their travel-stained
garments replaced by the yukata l — the " honour
able foreigners " were (like the rest of the
population) up to their necks in water of a tem
perature undreamed of at home, responding as
best they could to the courteous inquiries of a
venerable old man on the one hand, and a
charming daughter of the soil on the other, as
to their age, nationality, business, past history,
and intentions for the immediate future.
This ordeal ended, we removed our parboiled
bodies to the cool seclusion of the straw-and-
paper zasshiki, where a repast had been pre
pared, in which raw fish, fried chicken, and egg-
soup formed the major items. Sake and
1 A thin crepe kimono used in going to and from the
bath. 223

Japan's Inheritance

cigarettes followed, until the nesans invaded the
apartment to prepare the beds. Had four deal
planks been piled upon the tatami for a resting-
place, instead of as many wadded quilts, we
would have slumbered and slept. The " moun
tain water " had charmed all weariness from our
limbs, and repose alone was wanted to complete
the cure. Just as this much-wished-for con
summation was about to be effected, a piercing
cry, of feminine origin, fell from without upon
our drowsy ears. My companion started to his
feet, and, rushing to the nearest amado, un
barred and flung it wide. Now, the house across
the way, it seemed, belonged to the kocho
(village headman), who was celebrating, in an
appropriate manner, the anniversary of some red-
letter day in the ancestral record. To give lustre
to the occasion, a geisha had been engaged from
the prefectural town ; and it was her shrill nasal
voice, rising in minor key high above the strains
of the accompanying samisen, that had aroused
the chivalrous instincts of my friend. A few
moments' listening convinced him of his error.
Disgusted', he shot the amado back into its groove
with quite, unnecessary violence, and hied him'
without a word to his wadded quilts. Long did
the revel last, but between the snatches of
" song " could be heard the " soul-like sounds "
of the encircling woods, the babbling of cold
waters, the bubbling of the hot.
224

CHAPTER XII
THE GATEWAY OF THE SOUTH
An eventful past — Saigo's harakiri — Occidental influence —
Kyushu and Korea — The rise of Moji — Creditable ship
building — Matsuri — The return of the spirits — Fantastic
landscapes — Shimabara and its ignis fatuus — A great
sea-loch — The Horse's Bone and the Heavenly Spear —
Isolation ended — Tobacco culture on volcanic soil
KYUSHU, so Science tells us, was originally one
with Hondo. An isthmus linked it to the
Korean Peninsula, where now the shallow straits
of Tsushima lie. Before it became one of the
main islands of Japan — the most uneven in its
surface, the most splintered as to its coast — it
was the road by which the primitive forms of
life passed eastwards from the continent. In
the alluvial beds of Northern Kyushu, as well as
those of Kuwanto, skeletons of elephants and
other mammals of Indian origin have been dis
covered. Nor did insulation make an end of
Kyushu's role as a half-way house. By this
same road the civilization, the arts, the wisdom
225 p

Japan's Inheritance
of the East travelled to Old Japan . Most notable
of these invasions, and fruitful in its effects,
was that which took place towards the close of
the sixth century, when the arrival of many
priests paved the way for Buddha's peaceful con
quest of Japan. Not only did the nation as a
whole turn to " the Light of Asia " — which to this
day retains its hold on all but the higher classes
—but with these first missionaries came Chinese
institutions of various kinds — the ideographs, the
study of the Confucian classics, the methods of
reckoning time — and, not least, the secrets of
those keramic arts and industries which, persist
ing to the present, have made household words
of Hizen and Satsuma.
Kyushu has been associated with most of the
great events of Japanese history. It was from
the southern island that Jimmu Tenno set out to
establish himself in Yamato. Tradition accords
the little harbour of Mimitsu, in Hyuga, the dis
tinction of being the actual point of departure.
In its turn, too, the southern island was the sally
port whence warlike expeditions like those of
the half -mythical Empress Jingo in the second
century and of Hideyoshi in the fourteenth — not
to mention quite recent excursions — were
launched against the adjacent parts of Asia. It
was off the north-western coast of Kyushu that
Japan met and defeated her Armada — the fleet
of the formidable Kublai Khan — just three
226

The Gateway of the South
hundred years before England repulsed a similar
attack upon her liberties. The annihilation of
that Mongol host — aided, it is said, by a divinely
prepared storm — gave undying lustre to the name
of Ho jo Tokumine. In more recent times, it
was from the southern port of Sasebo that the
invincible Togo set out to do battle with the
Russian fleet, almost within sight of the bold
headlands of Hizen.
The sympathetic attitude of the people of
Kyushu towards foreign influences has not
deprived them of independence or of indi
viduality. When, in the Meiji era, Eastern Japan
became the main channel for external influ
ences — Occidental now, not Asiatic— there was a
tendency to leave the men of the south on one
side. The resentment thus aroused led to the
outbreak against the Imperial authority known
as the Satsuma Rebellion. The bullet-marked
walls of Kagoshima Castle, where Saigo Taka-
mori performed harakiri when all was lost, are
the last evidences of internecine strife in Japan.
Occidental influences likewise came first to
Kyushu — and never left it. Portuguese priests
and traders arrived in the middle of the sixteenth
century ; after them, the Spaniards, and then
the Dutch. Here the earliest seeds of Chris
tianity were sown, to bear, within a century, a
bitter harvest. Some imprudence on the part of
the padres, much prejudice on the part of the
227

Japan's Inheritance
Shogunate — and there ensued the terrible scenes
at Amakusa, Shima, and Takaboko (Pappen-
burg), where in all a hundred thousand Japanese
converts to Christianity, refusing to trample on
the Cross, proved " faithful unto death." But
there were places, such as Urakami, where the
Roman Catholic Church kept green the memory
of St. Francis Xavier, and can show an unbroken
record from 1542 to the present day . All
foreigners were driven from the country, save
a small colony of Dutch traders, who remained
on sufferance at Deshima, Nagasaki's island-
suburb, and for two and a half centuries Iyoyasu
and his successors cut Japan off from the outside
world. To some extent, in her own island-story,
Kyushu has shared the fortunes of the neigh
bouring continental States. When, in our
Middle Ages, Korea reached her zenith as a
civilized nation, Kyushu profited thereby. The
decrepit state into which the peninsula had
fallen, in recent times, undoubtedly reacted upon
Kyushu. With some confidence, therefore, we
may expect the resuscitation of the Hermit King
dom under Japanese guidance to enure to the
good of Nine-Province-Island. The nearness of
Kyushu with respect to the continent has given
it an eventful past ; now that the remotest ex
tremity of the island has been brought into touch
with the current of world-travel, that position
2-28

The Gateway of the South

Korean (¦^,)and manchurian C****) railways.
l,fc.R. Im*evix] Ckinase Railway, C.E.R. Cltm«« Esisfcvni
cotv-zu-cIUvj «.t HjitWhCM) WilhT.S.R.lTir*ns-Si'bfcviaia.
F 3iuo/n. •, It«, rltfkfw ; D Stwll : Cr, qtng«A-, A, Antiuig
M liuijMi^Tn.^HsKRuHine*; N, NfewcWa/ng. -, K, KiVlvi
R RyojunCfixtt Att'ku.TV.y/.Wei-'ha.i-ioei., K,,Ki«i>-c>ioi».
promises no less to give it a future. True, to join
the Korean railway system, the steam-packet
leaves Shimonoseki — and this, being on the north
229

Japan's Inheritance
side of the tortuous channel, is not in Kyushu.
But the strait is only three-quarters of a mile
wide, and steam-ferries plough its waters from
morn to dewy eve. So that Moji and Shimono
seki are very much the same thing ! To Fusan,
across the ample but shallow Tsushima Straits,
is a journey comparable with that from Plymouth
to Cherbourg — a matter of ten hours in modern
paquebots. Of the three ways of reaching
Harbin, on the Trans-Siberian system, from
Japan, this offers the shortest sea-passage. Now
that the 3,000-feet bridge over the Yalu at New
Wiju is completed, one may travel without change
from Fusan to Chang-chun, where Japanese
control of the Manchurian railway ends. This
has been rendered possible by the enterprise of
the South Manchurian Railway Company in con
verting the narrow-gauge Antung-Mukden line,
built originally for military purposes, into a sub
stantial 4 feet 8| inch road, at a cost of two and
a half millions sterling. The policy of the Tokyo
authorities is to encourage passenger traffic
through Chosen, while developing freight-
work on the Dairen route. With this end in
view, passenger fares on the former line are kept
at a moderate figure, but freight rates average
four times those on the South Manchurian line.
In mileage the Tsuruga-Vladivostock-Harbin
route has the advantage — with, roughly,
950 miles as against 1,200; but the Fusan,-
230

The Gateway of the South
Mukden route, thanks to the short sea-passage,
has an advantage, in time, of half a day .
Recent years have witnessed a shifting of the
centre of gravity from the southern to the
northern end of the island. The loss of trade
suffered by Nagasaki in the sequel of the Russian
War and the successful working of coal-measures
on the northern flank of the Tsukushi range
were mainly responsible for the change. At
Moji may now be witnessed scenes which used
to be specially associated with Nagasaki — gangs
of young women stripped to the waist doing the
active part of the operation of " coal ship " by
passing the light wicker-baskets from hand to
hand with marvellous deftness. The record far
exceeds any established in the Royal Navy — it is
1,200 tons in 3| hours. Often the operation is
carried out by night, with the aid of naphtha
flares, when it seems weirder still.
This is not to say, of course, that the coal-
measures of Takashima are played out, or that
Nagasaki, depending thereon, is on the verge
of extinction. The largest of Japanese ship
building yards — the Mitsubishi— is here. A port
that can turn out so fine a specimen of marine
architecture as the Chiyo Maru—a. turbine steamer
of 14,000 tons — is still very much alive. The
predecessor and sister of the Chiyo — the Tenyo
Maru — indeed came in for some criticism when
she first made her bow to the Pacific trade.
231

Japan's Inheritance
' Too much top -hamper " was the charge, and
the " old hands " called her sea -worthiness in
question. The criticism was treated with respect.
The superstructure was lightened, a few feet
taken off her funnels, and the Tenyo, riding more
easily, is no longer the source of qualms.
At Nagasaki may be seen to the best advan
tage one of the most charming and characteristic
features of Japanese life — the yearly festivals,
or matsuri. Some are peculiar to the city ; others
are celebrated here with special elaboration, cere
monial or gusto, as the case may be. On the
occasion of the Suwa-no-Matsuri, in honour of
the gods of the Shinto Suwa temple, the entire
population gives itself up to festivity for three
days (October 7th to 9th) — the orthodox period
for a "great" festival. Even the Yoshiwara
wards are represented, by geisha, in the opening
and concluding processions, when the images of
the gods are borne through the city in costly
lacquered palanquins. Gaily dressed children
take part in dances witnessed by the municipal
and prefectural officials. The final scenes of
the celebration are of a Bacchanalian order. Fun,
fast and furious, gives a strange aspect to the
temple steps. Up and down the gilded shrines
are rushed by half -crazy devotees, till sometimes
night is made hideous by wild riots, which end
in severely taxing the resources of the city
hospitals. 232

The Gateway of the South
Though the Bon Matsuri is not peculiar to
Nagasaki, its celebration is, or was, here con
ducted on the most picturesque lines. At places
on the coast this festival is held in the middle of
July, a month later in the interior, where the old
Chinese calendar is still followed. The spirits
of the dead, who at this season return to visit
their loved ones, are believed to come over-sea.
And when they come, they are hungry. Food is,
therefore, the chief of the votive offerings placed
on their last resting-place by those of the loved
ones who are still in the flesh. Kind hand's
decorate the graves and tender hearts linger
beside them in devotion. At night not only is
every hill -side cemetery gay with coloured lan
terns, but lights are placed along the winding
way to guide the returning spirits. As mid
night of the 1 5th approaches the spirits' time
is up. With Hamlet's father they might say —
" Mine hour is almost come
When I to sulphurous and tormenting flames
Must render up myself,"
were it not that Japanese creeds hold out no
such gruesome prospects to their votaries. At
any rate, the spirits must return to their long
home, and the whole city turns out to give them
a pleasant send off. Thousands of little boats
of straw and bamboo, containing food for the
journey and lanterns to light the way, are sent
233

Japan's Inheritance

afloat from the harbour strand, to drift with their
ghostly freight out to sea, while friends left
behind wave farewells from the shore.
In the case of towns situated on or near
estuaries, the illuminated spirit-fleet is launched
upon their current, to be carried out to sea.
Hence the kawa-baraki (" river opening ")
festival, which for the nonce transforms the
strictly utilitarian Sumidagawa of Tokyo into a
fairy scene. In the country districts dances by
geisha take the place of the aquatic fete. It is a
pretty idea these Matsuri embody, helping to rob
death of some of the terrors with which Western
civilization has enwrapped it. But it is more.
It keeps alive the belief in ancestor-worship—
one of the corner-stones of the Japanese polity.
It will be a bad day for Japan when the iron
of " rationalism " will so far have entered into
her soul as to render these festivities things of
the buried past . It is even a matter of regret that
consideration for the safety of junks at anchor
in the bay has led the authorities to interfere
to some extent with the effectiveness of the
spectacle by compelling the destruction of the
miniature boats soon after launching. That
the worship of ancestors is, for the Japanese, no
empty <form may be gathered from the unvary
ing custom of paying public homage to those
who have fallen in battle. Immediately after
the capture of Port Arthur, the entire army
234

The Gateway of the South
attended a service of this kind, in which the
Commander-in-chief took a leading part. In
the following lines, contributed at the time to the
Japan Mail, I have paraphrased the substance of
General Nogi's Invocation to the spirits of those
who had fallen, whether by land or on water,
during the siege : —
Ye spirits of the dead, whose mortal clay,
Here on the stricken field, there in the deep
And hollow breast of ocean, night and day,
Dear to its country, sleeps its endless sleep,
We give you reverence. Two hundred days
Ye fought, and, fighting for your country, fell —
The clash of steel, the storm's wild song of praise
Rising o'er battle's din, your passing bell.
But not in vain ! From radiant Eastern hills
Your stirring deeds e'en to the sunny West
Have spread eternal fame — these rocks and rills
We gaze on with your blood for ever blest.
Immortal race, extolled yet not unwept,
Draw near us and our reverence accept.
Kyushu can bear comparison with any of the
other main islands in point of scenery. Materials
ejected from volcanic vents overlie three-fourths
of its surface. While in some places, such as
the Osumi Province, this has given rise to a
levelling up of large areas, in others, where
water-erosion has had free play, landscapes of
the most fantastic character have been fashioned
out of deep deposits of tuff and agglomerate.
The gorges of Yabakei, on the Takasegawa in
235

Japan's Inheritance
Buzen, present, as Chamberlain points out, those
" impossible " land-forms so often depicted in
Chinese and Japanese works of art. The scenery
of Takeda, farther inland, is also of a most
romantic type. Great sheets of lava have been
broken up into the quaintest hillocks and valleys
lined with basaltic shafts. Over one of these
lava sills, of considerable height, rushes a water
fall, which in olden days was the scene of a
species of trial by ordeal. Prisoners believed
guilty of the gravest crimes used to be flung
over the precipice ; if they survived the test, they
were pardoned.
Kyushu's two largest sea-lochs are dominated
by ancient volcanic piles, which, within the past
two centuries, have been scenes of colossal and
destructive outbreaks. From the summit of
Unzendake (" Hot-spring Peak ") one looks upon
a scene of extraordinary, fairy-like beauty — the
island-studded bay of Shimabara. On the one
flank, encircled with woods of the darkest green,
are a " Hell " and a " Valley of Loud Wailing "
— solfataras and boiling fountains which fling
their pungent waters 10 feet or more into the
air ; on the other, a vast array of precipices
formed in a twinkling as the result of a landslip
induced by the eruption of 1783. But the bay
is more than beautiful ; it is mysterious . It
boasts an ignis fatuus which so far has baffled
investigation. Strange lights — " unknown fires "
236

The Gateway of the South
the ancients called them— play upon its surface
twice every year, in July and December, in the
small hours of the morning. Phosphorescence
is no doubt the cause of the phenomenon ; but
its localization and periodicity remain to be
accounted for.
In the far south, Sakurajima, rising sheer out
of the land-locked Kagoshima Gulf, presides over
a scene where boldness is the prevailing note.
The scarred and rugged cone, equal in height to
Snowdon, holds two deep craters with a shallow
depression, making a third, between them. The
lip of the southern vent — still steaming, despite
the grass which clings in places to its precipitous
sides — offers a prospect ranging from the blue
Pacific, where the shapely cone of the Satsuma
Fuji ' stands sentinel-like at the entrance of the
gulf, to the io-mile ridge of volcanic piles called
the Kirishima Range, and, beyond, to the rough
sea of mountains which fills the centre of Kyushu.
I question whether Mother Earth has anywhere
a finer combination of land and sea scapes than
this prospect from Sakurajima's splintered
crest. Thirty years ago Asosan was the only active
volcano in Kyushu — understanding, by this term,
one displaying activity in its main or summit
crater. So wrote Dr. J. J. Rein, after his ascent
of the peak of Higashi Kirishima, also known
1 Kaimondake. 237

Japan's Inheritance
as Takachiho, a mountain hardly less revered
among Japanese than Fuji itself. At that date
the ground on the north-western side of the
mountain was " warm," and " the smell of hydro
gen sulphide came from the crater," whose
dimensions were estimated, by the German
authority, at 250 yards in width and about 30
in depth. Things have changed since then. The
crater has doubled its width and increased its
depth threefold. Next to that of Asama, it is
now the most active in Japan. The transforma
tion took place in October, 1895, when a violent
eruption occurred. At the present time the action
of this cone resembles that of the great volcano
of Central Japan — periodical " puffs " and, when
these are interrupted, more or less violent out
bursts. Lava in the liquid form' is less in
evidence. Takachiho has a preference for
stones. Owing to the considerable number of
jagged fragments ejected from the two roaring
fumaroles in the floor, the height and steepness
of the walls have been greatly increased. One
particularly knife-like part of the crater's lip is
locally known as the Umankone (" Horse's
Bone "). On the occasion of my visit, in 1907,
the crater was at first too full of steam to see any
thing beyond its clean-cut brink. A few minutes
later, this cleared away, revealing a finely shaped
depression, with precipitous walls, and, in the
floor, two large and many small fumaroles, from
238

ISLAND-VOLCANO OF SAKURAJIMA (3,500 FEET), KAGOSHIMA BAY.

"THE HORSE'S BONE '

TAKACHIHO.

So called from the narrowness of its wall ; the crater has a width, from rim to rim, of 500
yards. It lies on the flank of the main peak (cf. plate facing p. 14).

To tace \i. 2j!

The Gateway of the Souths
which, amid dense volumes of steam, lapilli and
bombs of various sizes were frequently hurled
into the air. I had difficulty in securing photo
graphs owing to the nervousness of my guide.
Finding his efforts to dissuade me useless, he
retired as quickly as might be to a safe distance
and left me to my fate.
This, of course, is not the original crater. It
is parasitic — a final but still magnificent effort.
The original vent stood — who shall say how many
aeons ago? — 1,000 feet higher up the mountain.
There may now be seen a cairn of stones which
men, not Vulcan's satellites, have piled. This
cairn, too, if legend be believed, must be of
a ripe old age. Into it the grandson of the
Sun-goddess, when he descended to earth, thrust
his Heavenly Spear — in truth it resembles an
old-fashioned English pike — and none durst
now remove it. To hang such a legend on the
peg of an historical date seems sacrilege, but
Japanese Shintoists have the hardihood to do
so. At any rate we know, on the strength of
the story, that the peak which forms so admir
able a feature in the relief of Southern Kyushu
must have lost its summit crater at least seven
centuries before the opening of the Christian
era. And that is something to the good.
The seclusion which Southern Kyushu— that is
to say, the Satsuma and Osumi Provinces— so
long enjoyed, is the result of a formidable natural
239

Japan's Inheritance
barrier. This is an' ancient schist range which
tectonic force has failed to break. Running
across the northern end of the Kirishima ridge,
it effectually cuts off these provinces from the
central part of the island. Short of a sea-passage
— and the Japanese " coaster " is a thing of terror
— there was no way of going from Kagoshima to
Kumamoto save by basha over a fearsome pa|ss
2,000 feet high, and thence for some 40 miles
in flat-bottomed boats down the Kumagawa
rapids on to Hitoyoshi, where the railway could
be joined. It is an interesting journey, once
the long climb has been accomplished, causing
the traveller to wonder which of the twain were
keener — the thrills imparted by the wild career
of the rickety stage-coach down a completely
unfenced gorge, or those aroused by the whirling
of a frail punt along a foaming torrent, missing
by inches jagged promontories of basalt hun
dreds of feet in height. Now, however, the
railway has crept up where erstwhile the river
had things all its own way, and has pierced
the dividing range in a tunnel nearly 2 miles
long. Satsuma is thus at last brought into direct
communication with the rest of the Empire — and
the world. One may travel from one end of
Kyushu to the other by the iron road.
Southwards from the schist range, the whole
country is overlaid with ejectamenta and beds of
tuff from the Kirishima craters. Curiously flat-
240

The Gateway of the South
topped hills of uniform height surround the head
of the Kagoshima Gulf. Columnar structure
shows their upper parts to consist of a lava-flow
of unusual width from the same source. While
the slopes of the range itself carry the finest
timber in Japan, the hollows of the lower levels
are given over to tobacco culture. Tobacco is
also grown on a large scale at the foot of Nasu-
yama and at Nihon-matsu, at the foot of Adatara-
san in Northern Japan — both active volcanoes.
Soil derived from volcanic material seems to be
specially adapted for the cultivation of tobacco.
Thirty years ago, the German authority already
quoted pointed out that dolerite disintegrates into
" a fertile loam." The infertility which marks
the soil in certain districts is due, not to
volcanic products, but to disintegrated granite
and crystalline schists. The amazing luxuriance
of Nikko, these gorgeous woods of Kirishima,
the fertility of the Kuwanto Plain, the presence
of ricefields within the ancient crater of Asosan,
and the cultivation of tobacco at the foot of
still active cones, ought to be sufficient to confirm
this view. Still, the old fiction dies hard. Miss
Semple, in a paper on " Agricultural Conditions
in Japan," recently read before the Geographical
Society, has endeavoured to give it another lease
of life — and has thereby furnished one more
example of the danger of making generalizations
on the strength of a hasty survey.
241 Q

CHAPTER XIII
ACROSS THE STRAITS
A new land — The Japanese " Gib " — Wintry rigours —
Flora and fauna — Ainus and pit-dwellers — Structure of
the island — Communications — A trip in a coaster —
Sulphur trade — A remarkable peak — A succulent
weed — Volcano Bay — Creeping vines — The dome of
Tarumai
Many islands, many straits. The corollary, of
course, applies with special force to Japan. Has
not the famous Inland Sea been designated
" The Sea between the Straits " (Seto-no-Uchi-
no-Umi) ? This, by the way, is quite a modem
name, intended to corresppnd to the foreign
expression " Inland Sea." Japan's Mediter
ranean was not recognized as such till travellers
from the West, threading in ocean liners its
island-studded " narrows," began with one
accord to sing the praises of its scenery.
These, however, and the innumerable other
passages within the four corners of the Empire,
seem rather to serve as bonds of union — dividing
242

Across the Straits
only, as it were, to bind. With the straits that
mark off the North Country from the rest, it
is a different matter. They are straits indeed.
Beyond them, Japan is another land.
Leaving Aomori, the steamer glides out the
ample harbour past the Mountain of Dread.1
Nor does it take long, as the N.Y.K. have some
20-knot turbine boats on this run for the benefit
of the numerous officials who pass to and fro.
Somehow or other, one feels as if an old land
were being left for a new. As the vessel nears
the Japanese " Gib " — the bold headland behind
which Hakodate spreads itself delightfully on
a crescent bay recalls the famous Rock — one
realizes that scenes unlike those of " Old " Japan
lie ahead. From that headland, indeed, for thirty
miles eastward to the Esan promontory, the coast
recalls that of northern Ireland from Dunluce
to Fair Head. Towering basaltic cliffs alternate
with tiny green -backed coves, and more than
one black lava tongue runs down in hexagonal
columns to a stormy sea by way of reminding
us that " Giant's Causeways " are no monopoly
of the Antrim coast. Fair Head as a terminal
point is magnificent ; replace it by an active
volcano 2,000 feet high, and you have, I trow,
something more imposing still.
Along the deep Tsugaru Straits, with their
strong cold currents running ceaselessly Pacific -
1 Ozoresan, in Tonami.
243

Japan's Inheritance

wards, the naturalist has drawn a line. By this
he marks off Yezo from the rest of Japan. To
begin with, no one would venture to call the
climate of this North Sea Circuit — as its
new name, Hokkaido, implies — sub-tropical.

Contours3,000 ft. and
6,000 ft.

HOKKAIDO (YEZO)
A, Aomori ; H, Hakodate ; E, Esan Pro
montory ; K, Komagatake ; V, Volcano
Bay ; M, Muroran ; T, Tarumai ; S,
Shiribeshi-dake.

Hakodate lies on the same parallel as the Isle
of Wight. It would be difficult to picture the
genial " Garden of England " under two feet of
snow all winter long. And this is Yezo's farthest
south ! Six to eight feet are the figures for all
the island north of the Uchi-ura (Volcano Bay).
244

Across the Straits
To such rigours does Yezo's nearness to the
Siberian plains condemn it. Nor does the kindly
Kuroshiwo, but, instead, the chill Naka-no-shiwo,
lave its shores. It was with ready sympathy
that I listened, late one summer, to the plaint
of the manager of a match -factory in the Toma-
komai district. He had come from some balmy
sun-slope on the Inland Sea, under a three years'
agreement. Not half of his term had passed,
but he was counting the days to his release.
It was then mid -September, and though the sun
shone warm during the day, there were frosts
at night ; and the factory staff were busily pre
paring for the snow -pall to descend.
In Yezo, north of the naturalist's line, oak
and ash displace pine and maple from their
supremacy. The bamboo vanishes ; vegetation
becomes less diffuse, more concentrated ; the
hills wear a more open look, and creeping vines
turn the woods into a nightmare of entangle
ment. Hands and feet do not suffice to take
the traveller through an unopened Hokkaido
forest, and when he succeeds in cutting his way
he will see no monkeys. The Tsugaru channel,
through ages past, has been too much for them.
To dub any slender steel-bridge here a saru-
hashi l — like the famous viaduct on the Kofu line
— would be more than a misnomer. It would
be to fly in the face of zoology.
1 Monkey's bridge.
245

Japan's Inheritance

The existence of Yezo seems to have been
unknown to the Japanese of the Middle Ages.
At the time when William the Norman was
establishing himself in England, Japanese
generals were engaged in driving the aboriginal
Ainus towards the northern fastnesses of Hondo.
It was in the course of one of these campaigns
that the heroic Hachiman Taro Yoshiiye was
miraculously saved with his army from perishing
of thirst. Not until the seventeenth century did
Yezo come under the official ken. It then re
ceived somewhat Vague recognition as part of
the Shogun's dominions; and when, in 1868,
the Shogunate collapsed, the northern island
actually became, for nearly one year, a republic.
It seems fair to conclude that Yezo was a new
land even to the hairy Ainus— who now form
a small and fast dwindling section of the popu
lation. To reach that haven of refuge from the
advancing wave of Japanese assimilation it was
worth braving the peril of the straits. The
chances are, however, that when " the bar
barians " reached their Canaan they found the
even more primitive race of Koropok-guru (pit-
dwellers) in possession.
There are forests in the heart of the North
Country where none but Ainus have penetrated ;
there are streams and lakes where none but these
hairy, thick -set dwarfs have fished from queer
dug-outs, propelled, not by the yulo, as else-
246

Across the Straits
where in Japan, but by rudimentary oars worked,
not in unison, but alternatively. In trackless
woods, too, the aborigine still hunts the bear
with flint-headed spear and arrows, as in
the Age of Stones. At Kushiro and several
places in the interior hill -sides are riddled with
the cave-dwellings of the Koropok-guru, and the
crests of isolated eminences bristle with rude
earth-forts, such as the ancient Britons might
have built. Even in a " modern " Ainu village
the houses are of rough stone-and-mud work,
with heavily thatched roofs, forming a strange
contrast to the lightly framed " boxes " of the
Japanese. But all these are the final symptoms
of a passing age. By dint of official encourage
ment, Government colonization schemes, and
what not, the Tokyo authorities have succeeded
in raising the population of Yezo to nearly a
million. Thus the Ainu folk are effectually
swamped. With their 15,000 they represent a
feeble — and an ever feebler — few.
As in Japan's southernmost island, so in the
north land ; an ancient schist range is inter
sected by a line of volcanic formations, of more
recent date. The Saghalien and Kurile chains,
crossing in the midst, give the island its diamond
shape. The structure should in consequence be
fairly simple — but there are complications. Vast
intrusions of granite give ruggedness to the north
and south uplift ; equally vast effusions of
247

Japan's Inheritance
trachyte give character to the east and west.
The last-mentioned extremity has been taxed, as
it were, beyond endurance. Here the Hondo
volcanic zone encountered that of the Thousand
Isles, and terrestrial convulsion was the result.
Hence the broken, contorted shape of this part
of the island ; hence the grand Volcano Bay,
where some thousands of square miles retired
beneath the waves by way of protest — not, how
ever, without leaving behind them a wealth of
striking and uncommon landscapes.
The Hokkaido railway system is excellent, so
far as it goes ; but a glance at the convolutions
of the south-westerly extremity of the island will
suffice to show that ample scope exists for the
coasting steamer. Now, a few trips in real
Japanese " coasters " — I do not refer to the well-
equipped N.Y.K. and Osaka S.K. boats — would
be an admirable tonic for the disturbed mental
condition of the globe-trotter rabidus, who calls
upon heaven and earth to witness the rosy per
fection of all things Japanese. In truth, if pro
longed exposure to the sea-air is good for the
system generally, such excursions would be a
tonic in more ways than one, for confinement
" 'tween decks " is out of the question. Ninety-
nine persons in a hundred would rather keep
company with the night, the waves, and the stars
than face the horrors of the general cabin. And
the hundredth, who did not so, would surely
repent it. 248

Across the Straits
When the trip can be done by day — even
though it may begin or be announced to begin
at a startling hour — and when the weather is kind,
there need be no harrowing experiences. To ex
pect anything like adherence to a time-table, or
even to the route prescribed, would, however, be
vanity. I remember once booking a passage on
one of these craft at Hakodate. My intention
being to explore the remarkable coast about the
Esan promontory, a journey by steamer seemed
more expeditious than a 30-mile up-hill, down-
dale jog on a Hokkaido horse with a wooden
saddle. The hour for departure was compara
tively reasonable — 2 p.m. — and the start punctual
enough. We were well out of the harbour, and
on the point of putting about to the east, when
a junk near by, more or less becalmed, entered
into vociferous communication with our skipper.
For the fishermen two questions were at stake :
that of getting across the current -cursed strait
without recourse to a night of hard yuloing, and
— the price. The latter involved some haggling,
but after some lusty exchange of words the
necessary rope was forthcoming, and the
SS. Hakata Maru headed sou'-sou'-west instead
of east, at half her previous leisurely pace, while
the crew of the junk took their ease. The
feelings or convenience of the half -dozen
passengers caused not a thought to any one
on either craft. This went on for four hours
249

Japan's Inheritance
or so, and when at last the rope was cast off
and our coaster put about, we were nearer the
Tonami Peninsula than the Esan promontory.
It was midnight when we reached the little port
for which we had set out. The village was asleep
— and seemed to have been so for hours. As
the shrieking of the siren produced no apparent
effect, the yells of the skipper and his crew,
now singly, now in concert, were added thereto,
making night hideous and awaking strange
echoes in the hills. At length two drowsy fisher
men put out in a sam'pan, and, after further
parley, the " mails " and passengers were landed
— the former (it must be confessed) in vastly
better condition than the latter. It was past
i a.m. when the people of the only inn in the
place were knocked up to give us bed and board,
which, it mUst be confessed, they did with an
excellent grace.
The existence of a dozen little ports along
this rock -bound coast is bound up with the
sulphur trade. From solfatara orifices, the beds
of sulphurous streams, and the craters of old
volcanoes the raw mineral is gathered with pick
and spade. It is then roasted in iron cylinders
over a slow fire in kilns, packed in strawbound
bundles weighing 50 to 100 kin apiece, and
stored in godowns on the beach for shipment.
Such of it as does not find its way abroad is
used for match-making — one of Japan's most
250

Across the Straits
successful industries ; and, to save the cost of
transport, factories are often erected in the
vicinity of the diggings. The arrangement is
convenient, but sometimes costly in the long run.
A match-factory erected on the lip of Shirane-
san's crater was destroyed by a sudden eruption
in 1885. Another, situated on the floor of one
of the supposed extinct basins of Asosan, met,
more recently, with a similar fate ; and, on
Azumayama, in 1900, eighty sulphur-diggers
were killed by a sudden outburst.
Not far north of Hakodate is a study in magni
ficent curves — Komagatake upsweeping from the
still waters of Onuma Lake. In a land where
splendid curves are common, what gives the
mountain its distinction? Of itself, the flank-
line is perfect — unbroken, logarithmic ; unex
celled even on Fuji, or on the eastward face
of the Peak of the Heavenly Spear. What
arrests the eye is the strong contrast of its
terminal points. Landwards, it ends in the
wooded fringe of a lake ; skywards, in a huge
pinnacle— jagged, precipitous, and 500 feet in
height, which only two intrepid men, taking it
on the easiest side, have dared to climb. And
what is that pinnacle? Merely the outstanding
fragment of an ancient crater-wall. Beyond and
below it lies a different scene. Komagatake is
dying. Many, many years ago it made that
pinnacle, and, in the same outburst, flung the
251

Japan's Inheritance
rest of its summit-basin seawards in a stream
of shattered rock. There to this day it lies —
an inclined plane, 4 miles in length and as
many thousand feet in height, straight from the
simmering crater to the Pacific surf. That was
the Saddle Peak's last great effort. Fifty years
ago, indeed, with a blast of red-hot ashes it set
the forests on its farthest slopes in a mighty
blaze ; but that was a detail . Komagatake has
resigned itself to the inevitable — a harmless
senility. Unthinking tourists may now tread its
crater floor at no greater risk than that of
stumbling into a crevasse (of steam and sulphur,
not of ice and snow), or thrusting a careless
foot through the treacherous crust of one of
the many heat-blisters on its floor.
On my visit to this district in 1907 I found
the inns at Onuma full, and therefore took boat
across the larger lake to a little onsen on the
shore of Junsai-numa, the smallest and most
pleasing of the three sheets of water. It was
a humble inn, with still more humble fare ; but,
by way of atonement, mine host offered me a
dish of the famous junsai, fresh taken from
the lake. This much-esteemed delicacy is as
palatable as it is difficult to describe. Botanists
have, of course, a name for it — Limnanthemum
peltatum, if I am not mistaken ; but how many
have experienced the pleasant thrill of tasting
it? The stem of the weed (if so prosaic a term
252

KOMAGATAKE, FROM OXUMA LAKE.
The margin of the lake has been made into a "landscape garden.'

LAVA DOME OF TARUMAI.
A mass of andesite, extruded to a height of 200 feet in 1909.

Across the Straits
be permitted) consists of a jelly-like substance,
clear as crystal, succulent, delicious. As for
the taste, that is beyond my capacity to describe ;
but a friend of mine seemed to be pretty near
the mark when he declared it to be " something
between sugar-cane and an oyster, with a hint
of calves'-foot jelly thrown in." I commend
the Limnanthemum peltatum, from' Junsai-numa,
to the notice of epicures.
It is magnificent, this Uchi-ura, with imposing
volcanic cones disposed sentinel -like about its
shores. Most imposing of all is Shiribeshi-dake
— so imposing, indeed, as to give rise to the
belief that it is the highest mountain in Yezo—
which it is not. Flat-topped, by reason of its
three craters, it rises, Fu'ji-like, in isolated
grandeur. How simple to negotiate (from a
distance) seem those gentle blue slopes, despite
an ever -increasing steepness summitwards ! But
distance lends enchantment. Those innocent -
looking slopes are virgin forests, bent on resist
ing your invasion. Half-way up creeping vines
take possession of the mountain ; and the
" devil's punch-bowl," at the summit, with its
chaos of andesitic boulders, can only be won,
liferally, at the point of the sword. But the
fight is worth while. South-western Yezo lies
at your feet, magnificent in defeat. On every
side the skyline meets the sea, save that on which
you look over the bluff shoulders of Eniwadake
253

Japan's Inheritance

at that steaming mountain Tarumai, and even
so you must look across the gloomy reservoir
of Shikotsu.
A weird mountain, in truth, that Tarumai.
In March, 1909, it greatly alarmed the people
of the villages between itself and the sea. Many
fled for their lives to Muroran, so terrible became
the aspect of the mountain beneath its gleam
ing pall of smoke, so unpleasant the ceaseless
rain of lapilli. When after some weeks the com
motion was over, a strange thing was seen to
have happened. Some demon beneath the
mountain — or, perchance, some dragon — had
squeezed the mountain from below, or by
the waist . For a vast mass of solidified tar (or so
it seemed) stood up through the floor of a crater
that, if not dead, was at least decrepit. When
the great men — seers, astrologers, and what not
— came up from Tokyo to " inspect " the moun
tain, they pronounced this squat, bristling column
of infernal origin an effusion of andesitic lava,
too viscous, too consistent to flow. Wherefore it
had reared itself on high, and remains, stark
and steaming, to this day. Had it risen higher,
snapped, and toppled over into Shikotsu, 2,000
feet below, there would have been trouble.

254

CHAPTER XIV
COUNTRY LIFE IN JAPAN
A change of status — Is it the fault of the land ? — All work
and no play — The system of tenure — The capitalist
owner — No live stock — The rice-harvest — Tea and silk
— Where women are welcome — Travel-clubs — Their
educational value — Superior physique of the country
folk — The fishing industry — Grievances of the fishermen
— Men of moods
Three-fifths of the people of Japan live " on
the land." In feudal days they were, after the
samurai, the most looked upi to of the whole
population. Things have changed since then —
are changing still. The farmer and the hiya-
kusho (field -worker) are now as a class either
pitied or despised— for reasons we shall see.
Agriculturists, as a whole, labour under great
disabilities, and often their labours are econo
mically vain. It is not surprising, therefore,
that recent years should reveal the growth
in Japan of a symptom which causes disquiet
in so many other nations — a shifting pf population
from the country to the town. In the last decade
255

Japan's Inheritance
the decrease has been 5 per cent. — from 63 to
5 8 ; but the rate of decrease shows signs of
increasing rather than diminishing. This is a
movement which can, and should, be checked.
Japan's country-folk are physically the best of
the race. She cannot afford any impoverish
ment of the land nor any decline of her rural
population. Goldsmith's most weighty lines
might well be written over the portals of every
Kencho J and State department : —
" Princes and lords may flourish or may fade,
A breath can make them, as a breath has made ;
But a bold peasantry, their country's pride,
When once destroyed, can never be supplied."
Why are these things so in Japan? Is it the
fault of the land, or of the people? Or must
we set it down to the operation of , a set of
artificial conditions which have grown up about
them? There are some who blame the land. Too
small a proportion of it is cultivable, they say,
and that which is cultivable is not as fertile as
it should be. Some twelve million acres, re
presenting an eighth of the total area, are now,
as a matter of fact, under cultivation. Much of
it, too, has only been rescued from' sterility at
the cost of infinite toil. Still, the worst part of
the work has been done. Whatever might have
1 Prefectural office,
256

Country Life in Japan
been amiss with the farmer's raw material in
the beginning, it has, by irrigation, manuring,
and liberal use of the hoe, been brought to a
fair state of productivity. The introduction of
modern agricultural implements and the use of
artificial manures might increase the yield to
a slight extent ; but, taking things as they are,
there is not much more to be got out of the land
than is now actually got from it. Climatic con
ditions, also, are on the farmer's side. Thirty
per cent, of the whole cultivated area bears
a double harvest every year — a circumstance for
which the kindly Kuroshiwo is mainly respon
sible, and which more than counterbalances the
mischief wrought by floods, typhoons, and other
untoward happenings.
Nor is there anything wrong with the people.
No more industrious and thrifty soul exists on
this planet than the Japanese peasant. " All
work and no play " is his lot from one year's
end to another. Soon after sundown a hush
falls over street and house. A " tub," a frugal
meal, a pipe, and the people are aisleep. Which
is not surprising, seeing that they rose with the
dawn and have toiled in the fields ever since.
There is no social life in the Japanese village,
because there is no leisure. Wife and daughters
are busy in the " paddies " with father and the
boys. Squires and country magnates are in
stitutions unknown in Japan — though now looffi-
257 R

Japan's Inheritance

ing, in a dim sort of way, on the horizpn. On
feast-days, with bell and rosary, the long-robed
priest comes to the humblest door to solicit alms ;
but rare indeed is the parson with a thought
for the social welfare of his cure. Occasionally a
matsuri arrives to break the monotony, when one
may dance with departed spirits in the twilight ;
but every labourer with a few sen to spare will
trip it to the nearest city — if that be not far —
where things are done on a larger and brighter
scale than a country village could possibly
contrive .
Nevertheless, this humdrum, all-work -and-no-
play existence does not make the Japanese Jack
a dull boy. He is, as we shall see, the reverse
of a clod — and cheerful withal. But the main
point is that there is no shirking, no idling, no
folding of the hands. The unsatisfactory con
dition of agriculture in Japan — the fact that there
is a land problem — cannot be attributed to
indolence on the part of the peasantry.
Under the system1 which has prevailed since
the restoration, the land belongs nominally to
the Emperor, to whom it was surrendered by the
great landowners, the Daimyos. In practice it
belongs to the people. The estate of broad
acres is now the exception ; small holdings are
the rule. An average size is three or four acres
— divided into a multitude of " fields " no larger
than a drawing-room, and carried far up the
258

Country Life in Japan
hill -sides in terraces. From such a farm the
annual yield usually suffices for the modest needs
of a family of five or six members, all able to
work. Often it has to be supplemented from
other sources.
This is an ideal system, you will say. It is
peasant proprietorship, it is " living on the land."
Unfortunately, it does not work out well in
practice. Taxation is the cause of the trouble.
In the old days, when the Daimyo was the owner,
rent was paid in kind — so many koku per annum
of rice, barley, or millet, as the case might be.
Nowadays the Government levies a special land-
tax, which (1890) has risen from i\ to 8 per
cent., on the value of the land; and there are
other burdens amounting in all to 15 or 20 per
cent, of the total yield. The farmer, finding him
self unequal to the demand, has recourse to a
mortgage. The process is repeated, and, finally,
the land passes into the possession of the money
lender. Thus the peasant proprietor becomes a
tenant farmer, and sometimes even a labourer,
on the farm he once owned.
In the purely agricultural, as distinct from
the tea and silk-growing, districts, such cases
are numbered by the thousand. There has thus
come into existence a new class in the Japanese
rural world — that of the capitalist owner. In
course of time this may give rise to a class of
landed gentry, who will be able to do more for
259

Japan's Inheritance
the land in the way of development than the
impecunious smallholder could have done, and
who will play the part in the social life of the
district that the squire does on the English
country-side. But in the meanwhile the change
is reacting unfavourably on the state of agri
culture in Japan. It is undermining the health,
independence, and contentment of the sons of
the soil, and is causing a steady flow of the
population from the country to the town.
The Japanese farmer does not keep live stock.
Horses are not used for ploughing, except some
times on wheat and barley fields. As a rule,
the fields are too small . The stranger who wants
to picture to himself the Japanese rural landscape
must dismiss from his mind all thought of grass-
grown meadows peopled with sheep and oxen.
Grass there is, but it is bamboo-grass — dry and
sharp and spiny. At best it is not very green,
and would be death to any sheep. Cows are
kept on the outskirts of large towns, but they
do not graze on the meadows or hill -side. Their
food is brought to them in the sheds. Experi
ments in stock-raising have been made, with
Government aid, in the Hokkaido, and horse-
breeding has been begun on some of the Crown
lands in Central Japan ; but in no other part of
the country does the slightest inducement offer
in this direction.
Five cereals constitute the Japanese farmer's
260

Country Life in Japan
stock-in-trade — rice, barley, millet, wheat, and
beans. Of these, the first is by far the most
important. The yearly national Budget turns
on the success or failure of the rice-harvest,
which in its turn depends to a great extent on
the weather of September, the critical month.
Too much rain or too little, a flood or a typhoon,
at or about the 210th or 221st day (i.e., from
the date of planting) may mean financial ruin
to many farmers and a new crop of capitalist
landlords. For several years past the average
yield for the whole country has exceeded
50,000,000 koku, which supplies the needs of
the nation and leaves a substantial balance for
export. Rice is not, however, the staple food
of the poorer classes. To them it is a luxury,
used only on festive occasions, such as New
Year, and for invalids. They have to subsist
on millet and the satsuma-imo (sweet potato) —
unknown in Japan two centuries ago, but now
extensively grown in all the southern parts of
the Empire.
In Northern Japan and the upland districts
of the south, wheat and barley take the place
of rice. Sometimes in the same districts the
floors of the valleys, with richer soil and more
moisture, are occupied by rice, the slopes by
the more hardy crops. In such regions, when
the lower levels are bright with the virid patch
work of the rice-plots, the hill-sides seem bare ;
261

Japan's Inheritance
but in early winter the latter are gay with crops,
while the " paddies " present a dreary waste
of mud and stubble.
A line from Fuji to Fukui on the west coast
marks off roughly the tea and silk districts from
one another. South and west of this line lie
the tea districts ; north1 and east, the silk.
Just west of this line, Shizuoka is the qentre
of the tea-trade. As most of the " black," i.e.,
the fired, tea is sent to America, Shimizu 1 has
been made a port of call for steamers bound
for the Pacific Coast. The greater part of the
green tea is kept in the country, and makes an
excellent passe-temps for the visitor or customer,
to whom' it is always proffered as a matter of
course. If, at a hotel, black tea is wanted, one
must ask for Nankin o-cha (China tea). The
first pickings of the plantations are sent for the
most part to Tokyo and Kyoto, where they are
sold at fancy prices to Japanese of means.
Formosa (Oolong) tea, with a well-marked
flavour of its own, is being pushed by " the
authorities " with a view to developing the
prosperity of that island colony.
Central Japan is the chief home of sericulture
— the foremost and most profitable of Japanese
industries . Large areas in the highland provinces
of Shinshiu and Kai are given over to the rearing
of the worm's and the winding off of the silk
1 The port of Shizuoka, with a somewhat shallow harbour.
262

Country Life in Japan
from the cocoons — either by hand or by looms
worked by water-power. In the towns adjacent
to these districts, the making of habutae and
other silk fabrics occupies many hands.
Mulberry-trees are grown extensively, the
Government giving an annual grant of
Y. 80,000 for the purpose — and many of the
houses have an upper story, the floors of
which, strewn with freshly gathered leaves,
are given up to the precious worms. Raw
silk for export, when wound off from' the
cocoons, is made up in small bales worth Y. 1,000
apiece . As such, it finds its way to the Yokohama
godowns, and so to the hold of the trans -Pacific
liner. That for home manufacture is sent to
the filatures at Mayebashi, Nagano, Fukui, and
other spinning centres. The annual value of
the raw silk produced is about 170,000,000
yen, of which nearly 90 per cent, is exported
in bales. A slight set-back due to inferior
quality was noted in 1909, but the ground then
lost has been recovered. Speaking generally,
and of the industry as a whole, it may be said
that the total production has increased in value
by 30 per cent, during the past seven years,
and promises to continue in that way.
The country-folk engaged in the production of
tea and silk wear an air of prosperity to which
the kiyakusho and the farmer proper cannot
aspire. The houses are on a larger and more
263

Japan's Inheritance

substantial scale ; men, women, and children are
better dressed. Though women do excellent
work in the ricefields throughout the country,
their deftness renders them specially useful in
tea-picking and silk-spinning. Consequently,
while in most parts of Japan the old Chinese
prejudice against female offspring still in a
measure survives, daughters are welcomed as of
distinct economic value in the Shinshiu and
Shizuoka districts. Large families in favour
ably situated districts sometimes take up silk-
rearing in addition to the ordinary field-work,
but both of these are essentially summer in
dustries. The winter in the highlands is a
veritable night, " when no man can work."
As has already been suggested, the Japanese
Hodge, for all his lack of play, is no clod. This,
I think, may be attributed to the fact that he
possesses a strong instinct for travel, and, when
possible, obeys it. As funds do not permit of
his doing all in this direction he would like, he
summons the co-operative principle to his aid.
Every rural district has its travel club, based
partly on religious, partly on social, sentiment.
Its members call themselves pilgrims, but do
not debar themselves from a fair share of con
viviality. Each subscribes a few sen a month,
and when the doyo comes, lots are cast for a
company representative of the village and com
mensurate in numbers with the funds. A leader
264

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t ^^c^
Sw '* 1
Er I&4
W^MtSkMMM vxSIL
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si
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— V«
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.-_ fc25' 1
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':^Htt
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Hi
' DARBY AND JOAN.
IN THE RICE-FIELDS : PLANTING OUT.
A FISHING VILLAGE, IZU COAST.
A RL'KAL POSTMAN.
To face p. 264.
Country Life in Japan
(sendachi) familiar with the route is chosen, and,
staff in hand, attired in white, easily washed
cotton shirts and " breeks," with big, wide-
brimmed hats and a strip of matting hung over
their backs to serve both as sunshade, waterproof,
and bed, they set forth to tour the holy places.
Such shrines as Ise and Ikegami apart, moun
tains constitute most of these. Fuji is ascended
by 30,000 of these pilgrims every July and
August, Ontake, Oyama, Daisen, Nantaisan, and
Takachiho by scarcely inferior numbers.
The educative and social effect of these tours
is considerable. Rarely do we find inhabitants
who, like so many Occidental rustics, have never
left the neighbourhood which gave them birth.
' The frog in the well," says a Japanese proverb,
" knows nothing of the great world outside."
These travelling clubs go far to eliminate the
narrowness and parochialism which characterize
rural life in other countries. They inculcate, too,
a genuine love of Nature and of the beautiful in
Nature, and so, the love of country. These
pilgrims see things, they get new ideas, they
light upon some new invention or labour-saving
device. All these — the fruits of their journeys —
are taken back to their sequestered village and
placed at the disposal of the community.
Physically, the country-folk of Japan, taken
all round, are much superior to the townsmen.
Observations of the people in the various parts
265

Japan's Inheritance

of the Empire have led me to the following
conclusions : ( i ) the inhabitants of the mountain
districts are superior to those of the lowlands ;
(2) the inhabitants of Northern Japan are
superior to those of the south; (3) the fisher-
folk in general— and especially those of the
north — are the best developed of all. The
deficiency of stature under which the majority
of Japanese labour is the result not of smallness
in the trunk but of shortness of the lower limbs.
From the fact that fishermen and those who live
" the open life " in the mountain districts are not
thus hampered, we may attribute the deficiency
to the habit of squatting on the feet for a large
part of every day — a practice from which, for
the bulk of the population, there is no escape
under present conditions. Then the sendo (boat
men) do a great deal of yulo-ing — a far finer
form of exercise than rowing, in that it brings
all the muscles into play, with the body in an
erect position.
A million and a half of the Japanese people
are engaged in the fishing industry. This is
about twice as many as are engaged in seri
culture, and about a third as many as those
engaged in farming. The number of boats in
use averages about one for every three persons
engaged, but 90 per cent, of them are of the
sampan order, and under 30 feet in length. The
number of fishermen shows in recent years
266

Country Life in Japan
the serious decline of I 5 per cent . They do not
indulge in the luxury of Royal Commissions in
Japan ; but here, if anywhere, is a case for
inquiry. The main grievance is the same as
with the agricultural labourer. The fisherman
does " business in great waters " — much busi
ness, and often at peril to himself ; but his return
is small. The average proceeds of a year's
fishing work out to no more than 5 yen a
month per head, side by side with which hard
fact must be put another — that, in a bad year,
from eight hundred to a thousand of those who
" go down to the sea in ships " never come back.
Another cause of the decline in the number
of those engaged in the fisheries is the
advent of the steam-trawler. In 1898, with
a view to extending the fishing areas, the
Government offered a bounty of from 30 to
40 yen per ton on vessels of not more than
200 tons gross. As far as deep-sea fishing
went, excellent results were obtained. The
tonnage thus engaged rose in ten years from
500 to 1 1,000, and the " catch " by some 60 per
cent. The sealing industry made such headway
that, in 1908, the bounty for sealers was with
drawn. Difficulties, however, arose with the in
shore men, who had been accustomed to venture
well out to sea and regarded the trawlers as
poaching on their preserves. Vessels in receipt
of the subsidy were thereupon restricted, under
267

Japan's Inheritance
substantial penalties, to certain areas, and steam-
trawlers are no longer eligible for Government
aid. The whalers, however, whose field in the
summer extends from the south of Tokyo Bay
northwards as far as Kinkwazan, and in winter
off the Tosa and Osumi coasts of Southern Japan,
continue to enjoy the bounty, and to such purpose
as to have driven Russian and other competitors
off the field. The zeal with which the thirty-
odd sealers which yearly issue from1 Japanese
ports have pushed their operations has more
than once brought them into collision with
Russian and American sealers off the Kamchat-
kan and Alaskan coasts.
Sardines and bonito are the most valuable of
the in -shore takings, though tai, mackerel, and
cuttlefish are not far behind. Of the pelagic
catches, whales, seals, and tunny give the best
returns. All together, and including shellfish,
seaweed, and other marine products, the annual
value of the fishermen's winnings from the
great waters exceeds a hundred million yen.
Shizuoka, Chiba, and Nagasaki prefectures lead
the way in the value of their takes, while the
Hokkaido itself furnishes 10 per cent, of the
whole .
Though women can and do play a large part
in most of Japan's rural industries, they are at a
discount in the fisheries. Most of the men, how
ever, have their little plot of ground adjoining
268

Country Life in Japan
the houses, which the enterprising house-wife
will make the basis of a little market -gardening.
In some parts of the islands, in particular, every
bit of the land-work is left to the women, and
even when bad weather prevents junk or sampan
from putting out, their lords and masters lead
a life of ease and pleasure.1 Your Japanese
fisherman, too, is a man of mood's. He has
managed to earn for himself a quarrelsome
reputation. Police who endeavour to enforce
the regulations of a paternal Government have a
hard task with the men of the sea. Serious
conflicts took place a year ago in the Osaka
district. Sometimes, unfortunately, the fisher
men fall out among themselves. Recently,
in the Tokyo Bay district, a number of boats
belonging to a neighbouring town were deemed
by a rival community to have transgressed their
proper limits. Protests having failed, sterner
measures were resorted to. The objectors came
out in force, armed with stones, sticks, and
knives, and a pitched battle between fleets of
twenty-odd sampans apiece took place upon the
high seas . And in this heroic fashion the dispute
was settled.
1 The same applies — in all weathers — to the Shima
province of the Kii peninsula, where the women work as
divers. Proficiency in the art is here a necessary preliminary
to marriage. 269

CHAPTER XV
CENTRES OF POPULATION
Density of population — The fortress at the " Estuary Gate "
— Osaka and its atmosphere — Earthquakes and
"shanties" — Foreign influences — Locomotion and
"magnificent distances" — Tokyo's parks — The "social
evil " — A city uniquely planned — The former treaty
ports — The typical city — Earthquakes and conflagrations
— A city fire
Japan proper — exclusive, that is to say, of For
mosa, Chosen (Korea), and South Saghalien —
is the third most densely populated country in
the world, being exceeded in this respect by
the British Isles and Belgium. When it is
remembered that practically the whole of its
population of fifty millions lives on the eighth
part of the area of the country, the actual density
will be seen to be far greater than the figure
— 340 to the square mile — implies. A Japanese
requires, or at least uses, less room wherein to
live and move and have his being than does
the European. Houses being smaller, streets
narrower, sidewalks for pedestrians virtually un-
270

Centres of Population
known, and open spaces few and far between,
the cities of Japan cover a smaller area in
relation to their population than do those of,
probably, any other country.
Japan's two largest cities — Tokyo and Osaka
— present an instructive contrast in this respect.
The area of the Japanese metropolis is, roughly,
ioo square miles, and its population at a liberal
estimate two millions . Osaka, on the other hand,
though its inhabitants number well over a
million, covers no more than 10 square miles.
The great commercial centre of the Japanese
Empire is therefore four or five times more
densely crowded than its capital.
It would perhaps be scarcely fair to take
either Tokyo or Osaka as a typical Japanese
city. Yedo (" Estuary Gate "), as it used to
be called, was meant to be a fortress, not a
great city. The strategic value of a place at
the head of a deeply penetrating bay, where
the northern and central parts of the island meet,
was first recognized by a certain warrior, named
Ota Dokwan, in the middle of the fifteenth
century. His idea was to guard, at this point
of vantage, the approaches to the wide and
fertile Kuwanto Plain from the sea and from
the north, just as the old feudal fortress of
Odawara guarded it where the Tokaido (Eastern
Highway) debouches from the mountain barrier
which forms its western fringe. In this view
271

Japan's Inheritance
Hideyoshi and, subsequently, Iyeyasu concurred ;
and, when the victor of Sekigahara made him
self Shogun, at the beginning of the seventeenth
century, the fishing village at the Estuary Gate
became his capital. Ota's fortress was con
verted, at immense toil, into a castle on a magni
ficent scale ; and on the site of this castle, in
happier days, stands the Emperor's palace.
Meanwhile, its adoption as the seat of the
Shogunate during two and a half centuries had
been the making of Yedo. For every one of
the great Daimyos had been compelled to take
up his abode, with due pomp and state, in the
Shogun's capital during half of the year, or
during alternate years. With them', of course,
came many of their samurai retainers, and in
their train traders and artisans. The transfer
ence hither of the Imperial Court, in 1868, gave
a further impetus to the growth of the city,
which, during the Meiji Era, has also shown
remarkable commercial development. Tokyo
still remains, however, the official and social,
rather than the industrial, centre. Osaka, on
the other hand, though it too can boast a fine
feudal Castle, has always been in the main a
business centre, built and conducted on strictly
utilitarian lines. Such monstrosities as factory
chimneys are not unknown in Tokyo, but they
are numbered by the hundred in Osaka. The
atmosphere has long since lost that limpid sweet-
272

Centres of Population
ness which the divine creators of Nippon intended
to be its characteristic property. It has
therefore become, in more senses than one,
un-Japanese— resembling rather that of the
prosaic English " Cottonopolis." From this
most materialistic milieu of swarming streets and
canals, alive with trading craft, feudalism has
deemed it the better part to flee. Here, if
nowhere else in Japan, officialism hides its
diminished head, and even the old castle has to
do duty as the municipal waterworks.
Japanese cities in general have been described
as " collections of shanties." That there is
justice in the reproach those of the Japanese
who have travelled in the West are prepared
to admit. But there is reason on their side.
' The four great factors of everyday life," says
a Japanese saw, " are earthquakes, thunderbolts,
fires, and fathers." In the matter of civic and
domestic architecture allowance must certainly
be made for the influence of two, at any rate,
of these portentous forces. The daily and hourly
possibility of an earthquake has dictated the con
struction of flimsy wooden buildings which yield
a little to the movement and thus, peradventure,
escape destruction ; yet which, if destroyed, can
be replaced easily and at small cost. But these
same flimsy buildings, forbidding alike architec
tural effort and effect, are veritable food for
flames. Thus the factor of the earthquake puts
273 s

Japan's Inheritance

the Japanese builder upon the horns of a
dilemma. In the circumstances it is not sur
prising that the line of least resistance should
be chosen, and a building made which, if it
collapses, will neither utterly destroy nor be
utterly destroyed, and out of which the tenant
can escape at a moment's notice, with most of
his chattels in his hands.
In one respect Tokyo offers a decided con
trast to the provincial cities. Being the seat
of a Government conducted on Western lines,
it has, amid its " shanties," some stately piles
of brick and stone, homes of naval, military,
and other departments of State. There have
also arisen, though hardly to the city's advantage,
not a few specimens of a hybrid " semi-foreign "
style — specially noticeable in the Ginza, the
principal shopping thoroughfare in the busy com
mercial district which has sprung up between
the Palace and the mouth of the Sumida River,
where Japanese storekeepers have taken to the
previously unheard-of practice of displaying their
choicest goods behind capacious plate-glass
windows. In some provincial centres, it is true,
rectangular wooden structures in " foreign "
style, but ungainly to a degree, have been erected
to do duty as police-stations, local government
offices, and schools. Foreign influence may also
be traced in the former treaty ports, where it
is not an uncommon thing to find native hotels
274

A TOKYO THOROUGHFARE : NEAR NIHONBASHI.

OUTSKIRTS OF YOKOHAMA, LOOKING SOUTH.
The cherry-trees in the foreground form part of a temple garden occupying the slope of the hill,
To face p. 274.

Centres of Population
of two or three stories in height, with, however,
the Japanese style retained — the most dangerous
combination of all, whether in respect of earth
quake or of fire. But the strictly provincial
city adheres to the native style ; and the sole
relief from the mean and monotonous aspect of
the streets is provided by the sweeping, graceful
curves of some outstanding temple-roof.
It used to be said of Tokyo that, as the result
of fires, the city was renewed every twenty-five
years. This somewhat picturesque statement
must be taken as applying to the five wards,
out of the fifteen into which the city is divided,
which lie on either bank of the Sumidagawa.
Built on low marshy ground, much of which has
been reclaimed from the sea, this section of the
city is the busiest, the poorest, and the most
crowded. In the sequel of the oft-recurring con
flagrations, the authorities widen and improve
the streets, but as the character of the houses
remains the same, the lack of dignity is not
remedied. The remaining wards, disposed in
a great ring about the central or Kojimachi ward,
which in its turn surrounds the moated enclosure
of the Palace, are mainly residential, and laid
out with less economy of space. It is here, if
anywhere, that the " magnificent distances " said
to be characteristic of Tokyo are to be encoun
tered. The distances, indeed, do not admit of
dispute — there is no lack of mileage in Azabu,
275

Japan's Inheritance

in the one direction, or in Hongo, in the other.
Whether they are magnificent is another matter.
It is in the consideration of these distances
that Tokyo's deficiencies in the matter of com
munications become apparent. There is, of
course, the humble jinrikisha — and it must be
admitted that the up-to-date variety of this man-
drawn vehicle, with pneumatic tyres and ball
bearing bicycle-pattern wheels (improvements
strenuously opposed by the men themselves, on
the score of cost), marks a great advance on
the original types. Of hackney carriages there
are a few ; and motor-cars — private, not public
— begin to thread the streets, to the great peril
of baby-carrying children, who from time im
memorial have regarded them' as their play
ground. For the rest, there is an electric
tramway service, with a tariff so jealously
guarded by its myriad patrons that efficient work
ing is almost out of the question. The most
serious riots which Tokyo has witnessed in
modern times have arisen out of a proposed
increase of a farthing in the fare for a 4-mile
route. Of railway communication within the city
itself there is none. " Tubes " are unknown
in the Japanese metropolis. In the busiest part
of the city the ground, " made " as it is, as
well as intersected by numerous creeks cut with
a single eye to the filling of the Palace moats,
276

Centres of Population
would hardly lend itself to tunnelling. The
principal line of railway in the Empire, the
Tokaido, enters the capital on the south, termi
nating at the Shimbashi station. The Northern
Railway leaves it at Uyeno, at the other end of
the city. A third line, feeding the provinces
due east of Tokyo Bay, leaves from the Ryogoku
terminus, in Honjo-ku, on the farther bank of
the Sumida. Between these several termini there
is no direct connection by rail — a grave defect,
for which the obvious remedy is a central station
at or near the Nihonbashi — a famous spot, which
is not only the heart of Tokyo, but the topo
graphical centre of Japan, and the official
starting-point for the measurement of distances
in every direction. In addition to this project,
now under contemplation, a scheme has been
mooted for the construction of an overhead rail
way, linking up the principal parts of the city.
When these two schemes have reached fulfil
ment, but not till then, Tokyo will be able to
boast a system of communications worthy in
some measure of its size and importance.
From the foregoing it will appear that the
stream of Tokyo's life and traffic runs north and
south rather than east and west. The medial
position of the Imperial Palace, indeed, presents
an insuperable obstacle in the latter direction.
At either end of what might be termed the axial
line lie the city's parks and pleasure resorts.
277

Japan's Inheritance
These certainly present as much contrast as could
be wished. Shiba, in the south, with the tombs
of seven Shoguns and as many solemn temples,
has a gravely beautiful aspect. Hibiya, more
centrally situated, is aggressively modern, with
band-stands, base-ball grounds, and — most re
markable of all — " foreign " flower-beds in place
of the eternal landscape garden. It is the
Trafalgar Square and the Hyde Park of Tokyo
in one ; Socialists would there hold demon
strations, if they dared. On the northern out
skirts of the city and on rising ground com
manding it is Uyeno, the largest of them all,
and not many years ago the property of a
Shogun. Over it hangs the air of learning and
the fine arts ; and, appropriately enough, it has
been the home of numerous exhibitions. From
its shady heights one looks due east, and down
wards, upon Tokyo's real playground — Asakusa
Park. Here may be seen two famous Buddhist
temples — the Higashi Hongwanji, with its 140-
mat nave, and the popular Asakusa Kwannon,
with encircling pleasure-grounds, where people
at prayers and people at play jostle one another
from morn to dewy eve. Neither their pleasure
nor their religion do the Japanese take sadly.
One need only go to Asakusa to be convinced
of the truth that " the most popular form of
worship in Japan is the festival."
A little beyond Asakusa may be seen in nightly
278

Centres of Population
operation Japan's attempt at the solution of the
problem, known as the social evil, which through
all time has vexed humanity Every Japanese
town has its Yoshiwara, but in Tokyo that quarter
constitutes in itself a town of between forty and
fifty thousand inhabitants. A high wall sur
rounds the district, with formidable gates at
intervals, where policemen stand on guard — a
visible intimation of the fact that the system
flourishes under municipal surveillance. The
houses, many of them of palatial dimensions,
are brilliantly illuminated at night. The un
fortunate inmates are literally sold into slavery—
often by their parents — under contract for a
certain term of years, though the proprietor of
the establishment usually finds some very cogent
reason why the actual termination of the con
tract should never come. On the ground floor
of the houses — three-storied buildings are here
the rule rather than the exception — the inmates
sit, gorgeously attired, painted and bedecked,
with nothing but wooden bars between them and
the stream of passers-by. While the system has
the advantages, claimed for it by its defenders,
of circumscription of the haunts of vice and of
medical supervision of its chief victims, it may
be questioned whether either of these measures
is as effective as is generally supposed.
The growth of Tokyo, for reasons already
stated, is not like that of London, in an east
279

Japan's Inheritance

and west direction, but rather towards the north
and south — i.e., along the river and the coast.
Especially is this the case towards the south,
where Shinagawa and Omori, on Tokyo Bay,
formerly separate townships, are now virtually
suburbs of the metropolis. Enthusiastic Japanese
ibok forward to the time when Tokyo and its
ocean-port, Yokohama, 18 miles to the south,
will be, to all intents and purposes, one vast
aggregation of streets and houses. The railway
line between the two places is already the best
served in the country — express trains covering
the distance without a stop in twenty-seven
minutes ; an electric railway also connects the
outlying districts of both cities. Other projects
in the same direction are a steamboat service
on up-to-date lines and a ship canal.
While the Japanese are intensely proud of their
capital and speak, almost with adoration, of
" ascending " to it — just as Englishmen, in
direct contradiction of physical realities, speak
of going " up " to London — they are wont to
point to Kyoto as the typically Japanese, as well
as the most beautiful, of Japanese cities. In
a sense, of course, Kyoto — or Saikyo (West
Capital) as it was officially renamed when, in
1868, Yedo's name was changed to Tokyo — is
unique among the cities of Japan, for it has
been laid out with mathematical precision on a
definite plan, borrowed, they say, from Peking.
280

Centres of Population
This is the work of the Emperor Kwammu, who
moved hither his capital from Nara in 782 ajd.
The city, rectangular in shape, measures 17,530
feet by 15,080, the longer dimension running
north and south. A thoroughfare 280 feet wide
divides it into an eastern and a western half,
practically equal in area ; each of these is
divided into 9 jo (districts) of equal size, and
each jo into 4 squares, 16 divisions, 64 streets,
and 256 " rows," each row containing 8 house-
lots measuring 100 feet by 50. In the middle
of the northern face of the rectangle the Imperial
Palace occupies a space equal to the one-fifteenth
part of the whole. Here, for well over a
thousand years, seventy-seven Mikados held their
court ; though the establishment of a military
feudalism in the twelfth century deprived them
of all real power.
Through force of circumstances, however,
Kyoto has not been able to live up to the
large designs of its founder. During the two
and a half centuries of the Shogunate, Tokyo
being the real seat of government, pelf as well
as power passed from the West Capital- to the
East. The comparative penury of the Mikado's
retainers found expression in the meanness of
the houses, which the ample dimensions of the
streets only served to emphasize. Kyoto's
present population is but half of what it was
in the days of its prime, and the shrinking pro-
281

Japan's Inheritance

cess is not at an end. Nevertheless, though the
ancient capital is out of touch with the bustling,
materialistic life of the New Japan, time cannot
rob it of the riches of its historical and religious
associations, nor of the natural beauties of its
situation. Meanwhile it remains, as it has been
for centuries, the principal home of Japanese
art in its most familiar forms — cloisonne, netsuke,
lacquer -work, faience, and sword -making ; and
many are the treasures of its 1,080 temples, not
the least interesting of which is the Sanju-
san-gendo, the venerable home of the 33,333
Buddhas. The ports opened by treaty to foreign trade
and residence some fifty years ago, being favour
ably situated both from the commercial and from
the residential point of view, have attracted a
considerable population, which, moreover, is con
tinually on the increase. Yokohama and Kobe",
the two chief of these, have each an aggregate
of about 400,000, included in which are the
two largest foreign communities in Japan. While
the first of these ports serves as the outlet for
the Tokyo district, the other fulfils a similar
function for Kyoto, Osaka, and the Gokinai, or
" Five Home Provinces " of Old Japan, which
lie grouped about the head of the Idzumi Nada,
at the gates of the Inland Sea. Appropriately
enough, both Yokohama and Kobe", disregarding
the natural trend of the coastline, look towards
282

Centres of Population
their respective sources of growth, and from an
equal distance. Yokohama, on a bay opening
south, occupies the northern side of a projecting
spur, and thus faces the capital across some
20 miles of sea and tidal foreshore. Kob£, on
a bay opening westwards, looks to the east across
Osaka Bay, towards the city of that name. In
either case the former " concession " or " settle
ment " occupies the central position on the sea-
front, with a " bund " and a few parallel streets,
in foreign style, flanked by hotels, consulates,
clubs, business premises, " godowns," and shops,
while behind and about swarms the native city,
relieved by a few official buildings. In Yoko
hama, occupying as it does a level plain — once
a marsh, pure and simple — between two parallel
ridges or " bluffs " running towards the sea, the
demarcation of the foreign from' the native part
of the town is more evident than at Kobe. In
the case of the northern port the entire " bluff "
on the one side has been taken up by the foreign
community as a residential quarter, while the
whole of the other is covered by the compara
tively insignificant houses of the Japanese. The
situation of Kobe does not permit of any such
arrangement. The city rises evenly — and with
excellent effect — from the shore of a crescent-
shaped harbour along the slopes of a wooded
3,000-feet range of granitic hills ; no natural
division between the two communities exists.
283

Japan's Inheritance
However, the strategical advantages (as they
might be called) enjoyed by the former settle
ment at Yokohama are, in these post -revision
days, the subject of a not unnatural envy on
the part of the Japanese, whose policy it is to
abolish even the appearance of privilege.
Accordingly, the celebration, three years ago,
of the jubilee of the city's opening to foreign
trade was signalized by the ejection of the
foreigners from their cricket -ground — a beauti
ful sheet of turf in the centre of the city, which
for a generation had been their pride and joy
— on the score that the ground was required
for municipal purposes.
Though all parts of the Japanese Empire are
now open to foreigners for purposes of resi
dence, it is not in the least likely that the future
will again witness such aggregations of foreigners
as those at Kobe" and Yokohama. While the
foreign population at these places is stationary, the
number of Japanese is steadily on the increase.
Nagasaki, however, furnishes an example of an
all-round decline. The development of trans
continental traffic, and of Shimonoseki and Moji
— the one as a steam-packet station for Korea
and the other as a coal port — have left the third,
and the most beautiful, of the old treaty-ports
somewhat behind. On the other hand, ports
which have made headway in recent years are
Yokkaichi, on Owari Bay, near the busy manu-
284

Centres of Population
facturing centre of Nagoya ; Shimizu, near
Shizuoka, on the Gulf of Suruga, outlet for the
chief tea-growing district of Japan ; Tsuruga,
on the West Coast, the point of departure for
Vladivostock ; and — in Yezo or Hokkaido—
Otaru, near the official capital, Sapporo, and
Hakodate on the strategically important Tsugaru
Strait, a place which is both a port and a fortress,
recalling in its physical configuration the water
ing-place of Llandudno, and, from' another point
of view, Gibraltar.
While, then, Tokyo may be said to be repre
sentative of the many-sided activity of present-
day Japan — from officialism and la haute
politique to a wrestling match at the Ekoin
Temple and the viewing of the cherry-blossoms
at Mukojima — nevertheless, as a city, it cannot
be called typically Japanese. Neither can
Kyoto, the uniquely planned, be so considered ;
nor, indeed, can Osaka, with its all-pervading
commercialism ; still less any of the open ports,
which have come to a greater or less extent
under foreign influence. To find the city which
sets forth that large part of the national life
which is neither ultra-modern nor hopelessly
behind the times, which, while cognizant of up-
to-date ideas, has not yet parted with the old,
we must look in those provincial centres which,
not many years ago, were the headquarters of
some great Daimyate, or clan, and thus retain
285

Japan's Inheritance

amid the commercial activities of their heimin
a feudal aristocracy of their own. Of such are
Kagoshima and Kumamoto, in the south ; Hiro
shima and Kanazawa, in the west ; Kofu and
Mito, in the east ; Sendai and Wakamatsu, in
the north. These are considerable towns, with
populations ranging from 60,000 to 130,000.
Each has its characteristic industry and its local
colour ; and over each frown the ruins of a
Daimyo's castle, the grounds surrounding which
a paternal Government has turned into public
pleasure-gardens .
The fires which so frequently devastate
Japanese cities are commonly set down as
an after-effect of earthquakes. In point of fact,
the percentage of fires indirectly attributable to
earthquakes is comparatively small. When the
use of the andon — a frail wooden stand-lamp,
with paraffin-oil for the illurninant — was well-
nigh universal, it was doubtless the case that even
a slight earthquake sometimes gave rise to a
conflagration. But a playing child or a restless
sleeper constituted just as great a source of
danger. Nowadays, however, hanging -lamps
are nearly always used, while in all the principal
cities — and even in comparatively remote villages
where water-power is available — electric lighting
is the rule. Among the causes of fires in
Japanese cities, unfortunately, incendiarism ranks
high, and the motive for the crime — despite the
286

A FIRE BRIGADE DISPLAY.

STREET SCENE : KOBE.

Centres of Population
fact that the law permits its punishment, in
extreme cases, by death — is only too often a
mercenary one. The privations of the daikan
(cold season) have at least as much to do with
the numerous conflagrations at that time of the
year as has the so-called " winter frequency "
of earthquakes.
The writer has vivid recollections of a serious
fire in Yokohama a few years ago, which laid
in ashes some five hundred houses, his own
narrowly escaping inclusion in the number. Fed
by a strong north-westerly wind, the flames
carried all before them, and nothing but a broad
creek which lay athwart their track prevented
them from driving a fiery plough across the city.
As is usual on these occasions — despite the hour,
two in the morning — almost the entire popula
tion, and certainly all the thieves, found them
selves in the vicinity. Through the crowd long
lanes were kept by the police, along which
hurried a stream of fugitives from the threatened
houses, bearing bundles of futon l and other
household goods to some place of safety. Among
the onlookers on the opposite bank of the creek
— the most favoured and the safest point of
vantage — was the proprietor of a large three -
storied hotel which fronted on the waterway, and,
being clearly doomed, had long since been aban
doned. Practically everything of value had been
1 Wadded quilts used for bedding.
287

Japan's Inheritance
removed— the building was, of course, insured ;
the firemen were impotent, and it only remained
to watch the end. This the owner, with the
characteristic nonchalance of his race, prepared
to do. I have to this day a lively remembrance
of the manner in which the Moloch of Japanese
civilization set about devouring the choicest
morsel it had encountered that night. From
the roof of an adjoining house the flames literally
leaped at the doomed hotel, taking it, as it were,
by the waist — i.e., in the first floor. To get
well through the wooden outer wall was the work
of, perhaps, a minute. Thereafter it became
indeed a " royal progress." From one karakami
(paper partition) to the next, across yellow
tatami, gleaming in the fierce red light, long
tongues of fire flung themselves faster than
human feet could fly. In five minutes every
wall, whether of wood or paper, had vanished,
and the whole building stood, a skeleton of
blazing beams, bearing aloft the only solid part
of a Japanese house — the heavy -tiled roof. In
another five minutes this fell in with a resounding
crash and a mighty shower of sparks. I turned
to the proprietor, with whom I had a passing
acquaintance. He was unconcernedly discussing
with a neighbour the origin of the outbreak,
which, it appeared, was already common know
ledge. The fire had been started in the three-
roomed dwelling of a sumi-ya (charcoal dealer)
288

Centres of Population
a little way down the street, with the aid of
a few rags soaked in paraffin-oil, and in the
hope of securing the princely sum of yen ioo,
for which the said shanty had been insured.
Instead, however, the courts decreed him twenty
years' penal servitude.

289

CHAPTER XVI
EDUCATION AND RELIGION
The child and his sovereign— The child and his parent —
The child and his teacher — Education and the ideograph
— The educational system — The teaching of English —
The missionary and the student — Are the Japanese
religious ? — Religion and the State — Christianity in
Japan — Foreign irreligion — " Morals " and the Rescript
— Morality a relative term — Different points of view —
The yujo and the geisha — Do geisha dance ? — Womanly
women
" What will you give the Emperor, the Lord of
Heaven ? " So runs the first question of a
Japanese child's catechism. And the child
makes answer, " All my possessions, and my life
when he requires it." In a Christian home of
the West, the child is taught to- regard God as
the Giver of all good. So is the Japanese child —
only his God is the Emperor.
By the Confucian code of ethics, which holds
sway in China, obedience to parents is given the
place of honour among the virtues. Loyalty to
the State comes next. In Japan this order is
290

Education and Religion
reversed. The distinction is significant. Would
it be too much to attribute to this alone the differ
ence in worldly position which now exists between
the two countries? Hardly.
Now filial piety and devotion to the Sovereign
rest, for their force as motives, upon the same
principle — that of ancestor-worship. Hence the
two may be regarded as part of one whole — and
that a deep-laid, all-embracing patriotism. " My
country right or wrong " is the first article in the
creed of others besides Japanese citizens, but
here, as in no other part of the world, that
country is identified with its Imperial Head, so
that the national welfare and advancement, the
successes of Japanese arms in the stricken field
and on the ocean wave, are all ascribed to the
virtues of the Heaven -born Emperor.
Education and religion are, therefore, more
closely connected in Japan than, probably, in
any other country. More definitely, too, than in
any other country are they used as a means to
an end. That end is patriotism. One might
even go further, and say that, with the Japanese,
to all intents and purposes, patriotism' is religion .
At any rate, if their patriotism — I use the word
in its widest sense — be taken from' their religion
the residue is a poor and thin affair.
Japan has been called " the children's Para
dise." " The children are never punished," says
one globe-trotter ; and the next, to go one better,
291

Japan's Inheritance
explains that " they do no wrong." Neither, I
suppose, had ever heard of that mischievous
twelve-year-old rascal of whom Mrs. Hugh
Fraser tells, who crowned a series of practical
jokes upon his paternal grandmother by nailing
a dead crow to her shutter and calling her to
see the beautiful procession that was passing.
" Itazura desu ne! " is probably the most frequent
expression on the lips of a Japanese mother with
respect to her offspring, and, quite properly, it
is often accompanied by some practical mark of
disapproval. When living for some months in
the interior, in a Japanese house, I was much
concerned at the oft -repeated crying of a little
girl of five or six in a neighbouring establish
ment. Her mother was given to the use —
perhaps oftener than was necessary — of the moxa,
a burning weed applied to the skin in such a
manner as, sometimes, to leave a scar. This used
to be the recognized form of punishment for
children, though now less commonly resorted to.
Sometimes a burning joss-stick is the instrument
of punishment. In the case in question the little
damsel had not acquired the art of bearing the
pain without crying, but intercession on her
behalf proved unavailing.
While, then, it is not true that Japanese
children are never punished, it is probably true
that they might with advantage be punished
oftener than they are. If there are more children
292

Education and Religion
spoiled by over-indulgence in the United States
of America than in any other country, Japan
would probably come next. Solomon's dictum
about sparing the rod does not pass for gospel
in either country. So the American youth who
went to school with a revolver in his pocket, that
he might resist any visitation of discipline upon
his own person, has his counterpart in the
Japanese school -striker. Unpopular masters in
provincial middle schools have not infrequently
been made the victims of a general strike, and
principals have been known to resign their posts
as the simplest way out of the difficulty. Some
of these affairs may be the fault of the teachers.
As an educational handbook naively puts it, " the
introduction of the Occidental system of learning
and the displacing of venerable teachers of the
old system with young teachers devoid of experi
ence and virtue have undermined the laudable
custom that formerly existed between masters
and pupils." Unquestionably the status of the
Japanese schoolmaster, social and financial,
might with advantage be improved ; but it would
be difficult to conceive of such situations arising
in, say, an English school, though the English
boy is not lacking in spirit. Most people who
have travelled in the interior will agree that the
manners of Japanese children leave room for
improvement. Curiosity in itself is natural and
unobjectionable, but the widespread use of the
293

Japan's Inheritance

expression " ijin baka " (foreign fool) reflects
less on the children who use it than on those
entrusted with their upbringing. It gives oppor
tunity to the enemies of Japan to point the finger,
and confirms the suggestion that "the politeness
of the Japanese people is, after all, only skin-
deep. On the whole, if there were a little more
correction at home and better discipline at school,
the Japanese youth would be a less wayward and
more agreeable person than he is at present.
And those looking on in the conviction that " the
boy is father to the man " would feel more at
ease. The educational system comprises the three
orthodox grades, elementary, middle, and higher,
the commencing age in each case being 6, 1 2,
and 17. Elementary schooling is compulsory
for all classes. From the point of attainment an
average pupil of the middle and higher grades
shows at least as much general knowledge and
capacity as one of the same age in Occidental
countries. A great deal of time, however, is
lost over the laborious task of committing to
memory some thousands of Chinese ideographs.
A knowledge of five thousand is necessary for
ordinary purposes, of ten thousand to establish a
claim to scholarship. Though much current
matter is published in the hirakana and katakana
syllabaries — which with their two hundred
comparatively simple characters represent a
294

Education and Religion
stumbling effort after the phonetic system— to
all who are unversed in the Chinese word-pictures
the classics and the official language remain a
sealed book. To get over this difficulty school
days are increased in number and school -hours
prolonged — with consequent injury to health and,
especially, to the eyesight. Though inherited
disease is responsible for much of the prevailing
blindness and semi-blindness among the people,
this poring over Chinese hieroglyphics, often by
the indifferent light of the ando/i,1 is probably
responsible for more. Many of the leading
Japanese papers now print a page in English,
and a movement is on foot for the use of Romaji
— the writing of Japanese in the Roman char
acters. This last is not making the headway it
should, partly because of the difficulty of cor
rectly representing the sounds of Japanese words,
partly because the literary and official worlds
look coldly on the movement. The difficulty
of transliteration is not, however, insuperable.
The abandonment of the Chinese script for every
day use is one of those changes which must come .
For Japan's own sake, the sooner the better.
If Japanese education, regarded as a prepara
tion for life, has one fault more than another, it
is in the inculcation of undue dependence on the
powers that be. One of the doubtful legacies
of Confucianism, it is seen in the unquestioning
1 An oil-lamp on a wooden stand with a tissue-paper shade.
295

Japan's Inheritance
obedience, not to say veneration, accorded to the
pettiest official. Its effect is to discourage
initiative and private enterprise as being better
left to "the authorities." Though the Japanese
are not wanting in inventiveness, their capacity
for adaptation and assimilation is greater. The
idea prevails that for an enterprise to succeed it
must be backed by the State, and this belief
seems to be strengthened in practice. All under
takings on a large scale, if not actually in
augurated by the Government, are in receipt of
official support. Conversely, enterprises not thus
advantaged stand little chance of success.
English is taught in the three hundred middle
schools of the Empire, and, in the higher, a
second foreign language — French or German-
finds a place. A few of the middle and most of
the higher schools employ foreigners for the
purposes of instruction, but the bulk of Young
Japan learns its English from Japanese teachers
whose knowledge of the language is fragmentary
or, at best, of the reading -book order. In word-
construction and syntactical arrangement the two
languages are absolutely antipodal. So simple
an English sentence as " There is a bird on that
tree " appears to the Japanese mind, which knows
not prepositions, articles, and indefinites, highly
anomalous and idiomatic, full of snares and pit
falls . Add to this the characteristic eagerness of
the Japanese student, impatient of delay and in-
296

STUDENTS AT WORK : KEIO UNIVERSITY, TOKYO.

A JAPANESE WEDDING.

The bride, wearing her bridal filet is on the right; the groom, next to her. Sake' is being
served in cups. The storks are emblematic of long life. To face p. 296.

Education and Religion
capable of being in a hurry slowly, and you have,
for a result, the amazing vagaries of " English
as she is Japped " — despair of the foreign pro
fessor and perennial source of amusement for
such of the foreign Press as are wont to make
sport of Japanese foibles.1
It is in the simple everyday conversational
English that the student fails. Where his weak
ness lies none knows better than he. When,
therefore, having spied a foreigner, he decides
that he is neither French, Russian, nor German,
he loses no time in opening the attack — often with
the most startling remarks—" What you go ? " "I
have delight to behold your face," and so forth.
In this quenchless thirst for conversational
English the proselytizing missionary sees his
chance, and takes it. He opens an evening
school for English at a shilling a month, and by
dexterous management interpolates some Gospel
with his grammar. Seldom, however, does the
Japanese student-fly really walk into the mis
sionary-spider's parlour. He will join lustily in
the singing of " The sweet by-and-by," " There
is a fountain filled with blood," and other evan-
1 Typical examples of Japanese- English meet the eye in
the vicinity of foreign settlements. Thus a laundry displays
the sign "^Ladies washed four yen a hundred," and a butcher
who desires prospective customers to know that he does not
confine himself to beef and mutton announces " Hen Met "
for sale. There is reason to believe that practical jokers of
foreign extraction are responsible for some of these.
297

Japan's Inheritance

gelistic gems, but, while absorbing the grammar,
will leave the Gospel for the next who comes.
Are the Japanese religious ? The question is
more often asked than answered. This is not
because there is any lack of religions. Confu
cianism apart — for that is out of date and receives
a moiety of the contempt which your modern
Japanese entertains for all things Chinese — there
still remain Buddhism, Shintoism, and Chris
tianity. Speaking generally, Shintoism is the
religion of the classes, Buddhism of the masses ;
the one official, the other popular. " The way
of the gods," with a " cluster of picturesque
myths " for its basis, has little by way of " body "
but worship of ancestors and, particularly, of the
Imperial ancestors. Hence its importance in
official eyes, though it leaves the average wor
shipper cold. Another drawback is that it
involves contemplation of the dead Past, with
little bearing on the ever-changing Present and
still less on that glorious Future of which all
Japanese live in hope. To a strictly practical
people Buddhism with its theories of reincarna
tion makes a stronger appeal. There is more
warmth, more colour, more nearness in its creed.
Many a simple peasant believes that his humble
sen dropped in at the temple money-box will
through the mercy of Amida secure him all
manner of material benefits in life — good har
vests, deliverance from sickness, and the like.
298

Education and Religion
Nevertheless, there is a large and growing class,
especially among educated folk, who, while
recognizing the claims of Shintoism as a State
religion, have in their hearts no use for any
religion at all.
The men at the head of the Japanese polity are
wise enough to know that irreligion for a State
is bad. In recent years they have given indica
tions that in their opinion a great deal of
irreligion exists. In their characteristically
na'ive, though not wholly illogical, fashion they
argue that there must be something wrong with
the religion, or religions, and that it, or they, must
forthwith be taken in hand, so to speak, for
alterations and repairs. In this way they might
be made more attractive, and at the same time
more advantageous, to the nation at large . From
this they proceed to inquire, after the manner
which fifty years of adoption of Western institu
tions have almost made a habit, What is this
Christian religion which the missionaries from
America and England preach? Has it any
desirable or useful features which may with
advantage be incorporated in our own religion?
Or stay, might it be possible, by a wise process
of selection, to take what is best in the three
religions and construct a new and excellent
religion, especially suited to our needs ?
So, at first, they resorted to the expedient of
an edict directing the principals of all elemen-
299

Japan's Inheritance

tary schools to march their pupils at regular
intervals to the nearest Shinto shrine, there to
worship the spirits of Imperial, and other, ances
tors. This having raised an outcry from the
adherents of Buddhism and Christianity as being
a violation of that article in the Constitution
which guarantees complete religious liberty, the
leaders of Japanese officialdom' " tried again."
The Vice-Minister for Home Affairs summoned
a conference of representatives of the three
religions, with a view to discovering a common
basis of operation which, conceivably, might
serve as the foundation of a new national creed.
Though nothing so far has come of this action,
we have not heard the last of it, or of its effects.
Meanwhile, it retains immense significance not
only as a revelation of the working of the official
mind, but as an expression of dissatisfaction with
the present religious life of the nation.
For Christianity to be thus officially recognized
was something of a compliment, and might be
construed as implying progress. Some headway
has undoubtedly been made— there are eight hun
dred missionaries in Japan, with ample funds at
their disposal, and many of the finest building
sites in the large centres are the property of
various Mission Boards. Nevertheless, the
progress made has not come up to expectations,
and a conference of Mission Boards became
necessary to inquire into the cause. It is to be
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Education and Religion
feared, for reasons already suggested, that much
of the progress placed on record is more apparent
than real. Probably the greatest obstacle to the
spread of Christianity in Japan, as in other lands,
is the never-ending war, on matters of doctrinal
detail, between the various sects which set out
to declare to " the heathen " the one and the
same Gospel. If the forces of Christianity, as
presented in the mission field, could combine to
show to the non-Christian world a solid and
united front, their message would stand a better
chance of carrying conviction.
Then there is the heavy handicap of the fact
that Christianity is a foreign religion. Unless
the Japanese people are satisfied that they can be
Christians and loyal Japanese at the same time,
missions will labour in vain. " The national
spirit is closely involved with the ideas of inde
pendence and responsibility, and, so far as Japan
is concerned, missionaries who ignored or
violated the national spirit were only courting
disaster, while any apparent denationalization on
the part of Christian converts would surely bring
upon them persecution." ' The tendency of
thought among Japanese Christians is all in the
direction of the autonomous church on national
lines. They will not submit to be ruled by
Mission Boards in London and New York ; they
1 Bishop Honda, of South Tokyo, at the World Missionary
Conference, 1910. 301

Japan's Inheritance

look for full ecclesiastical self-government. Up
to that goal — even though it means his own
effacement — the missionary must work. Other
wise, there is the fear that the Japanese may
turn from " foreign " religion to foreign
irreligion .
This, indeed, is the greatest danger of all . The
nations which have roused the East are Christian
nations, but the problem still remains whether
Japan, as the leading Power in the Orient, " is to
be swayed by materialism, agnosticism, or Chris
tianity." l The worst enemies of missionary
effort in the Far East are the foreign commu
nities, and, in particular, the foreign professors,
many of whom find in the impressionable minds
of their Japanese students an excellent soil for
the seeds of atheism under the guise of
" rationalism," and follow this up by similar
propaganda in the Press.
The subject of " Morals " occupies the first
place in the curricula of all Japan's public
schools. Private institutions are permitted to
give instruction in religion, but all such teaching
is barred in the State schools. The teaching of
morality is based on the late Emperor's Rescript 2
— a sort of modern Decalogue for Young Japan—
1 Dr. J. W. Davis, of the Doshisha Theological Seminary,
Kyoto. 2 Promulgated in 1890. This is supplemented in the
class-rooms by "text-books on ethics, in which stories of
famous men and women are predominating features."
302

Education and Religion
without, however, the sternness or the particu-
larization which characterizes the Mosaic code.
Eilial piety, modesty, benevolence, and sacrifice
are commended for acquisition by " all our good
and faithful subjects," but there are two notable
omissions which seem to have escaped general
attention. No specific exhortation to honesty
is to be found in the Rescript, nor any reference
to sexual morality. There is no " Thou shalt
not steal " ; there is no " Thou shalt not commit
adultery." Education, everywhere, begins in the cradle.
In the West, knowledge of life and sex is
imparted late in life, or not at all — left, in other
words, to be discovered as may be. Here lies
the difference with the Japanese. The Japanese
boy or girl grows up in this knowledge. It is
common above-board knowledge, viewed natur
ally and without offence. It is thus, with them,
no guilty secret, ignorance of which, even when
such ignorance does not exist, must always be
feigned. The results of this distinction are important.
In the West, the term " morality " does not, in
common usage, carry with it the collective idea,
connoting "a bundle of habits." It is used in
a narrow sense, to signify the possession or
absence of a particular quality, exalted above the
rest. Kindness, honesty, nobility of mind, refine
ment, courage, sincerity — all these, comparatively
3°3

Japan's Inheritance
speaking, count for little. If the man conforms
to the conventions which have grown up around
the subject of sexual ethics, he is moral. If not,
his other virtues are but a drop in the bucket.
Sexual correctness, in other words, is made the
criterion of morality, and, indeed, in the popular
view, the terms are synonymous.
With the Japanese a sense of proportion pre
vails. Continence is a virtue, not the virtue.
Concubinage ¦ is not in itself an immoral state
nor resort to the Yoshiwara a deadly sin. A
woman who for some sufficient reason has lost
her honour does not become, ipso facto, an evil
and abandoned creature. Many a father in
financial straits has sold his daughter's honour
for a sum of money, and the girl's submission
has been a sacrifice on the high altar of filial
piety. What, therefore, the West regards as
woman's unpardonable sin, rendering her fit only
for the gutter, becomes a positive virtue. Yet
your Mrs. Grundy (with a load of envy, hatred,
malice, and all uncharitableness in her withered
breast) will draw her skirts together in horror lest
such fallen creature (all gentleness, love, and
1 Concubinage was established under the Confucian code
to ensure the Imperial succession. Twelve concubines were
permitted by law for the Emperor. The present Emperor,
as is generally known, is the son of one of these. Though
not now recognized by law, concubinage still exists to a
wide extent. 3°4

Education and Religion
goodness) should contaminate by her touch the
personification of Occidental respectability. And
your unctuous, middle-class paterfamilias, not
to be behind, condemns all Japanese as vicious
and immoral.
Reference has already been made to the insti
tution of the Yoshiwara . As to the ruling motive
of its inmates, confusion still exists. Even so
lucid a writer as Sir Henry Norman, after
vehemently maintaining that prostitution in Japan
differs from what it is in other countries because
(so far as the woman is concerned) it is resorted
to under compulsion, not from choice (i.e., filial
piety compels the girl to obey the wish of her
parents), proceeds to quote officials of the De
partment of Police as saying, " There are only
two (chief determining causes) that recruit the
ranks of the yujo: poverty and natural inclina
tion " !
The fact is that Nature — not convention or
religion — is the basis of Japanese sexual ethics.
In all save the higher classes sexual irregularities
are not viewed in the same light as in the West.
They may constitute indiscretion, indulgence,
folly — they are not sin. Consequently, recourse
to them fails to produce the degrading effect upon
either sex which it does elsewhere. There is no
reason under the sun why " natural inclination "
should lead a girl to sell herself into the bondage
of the licensed quarter. Where such inclination
3°5 u

Japan's Inheritance

exists, it can be gratified without resort to that
extreme .
A somewhat similar system of proprietary ser
vice exists in the case of the geisha — that is to
say, promising young girls are to all intents and
purposes sold for a term of years to an entertain
ment agent, who often keeps a so-called " tea
house." From an early age the girls are trained
in the arts of dancing, singing, samisen -playing,
and entertaining generally. Some writers with
more book-knowledge than experience of
Japanese life have maintained that the geisha
does not dance, but merely sings.1 The asser
tion, which is unwarrantable, rests on' the strength
of a verbal distinction between the terms geisha
and maiko, the latter of which signifies, literally,
" a dancer." If any distinction can be drawn
in practice, it is that the maiko are young geisha
or, as a Japanese gentleman once put it to an
inquiring foreigner, they are " embryonic
geisha." The term may be applied to girls under
sixteen or seventeen years ; beyond that age they
are called geisha. The term maiko is more
widely used in Western Japan. In Tokyo, hang-
yoku is the expression for a geisha of tender
years.
1 Cf. the correspondence columns of the Pall Mall Gazette
containing, in February, 1912, a controversy on this subject
in which Messrs. Diosy, Douglas Sladen, Yoshio Makino,
and others took part. 306

Education and Religion
Because the geisha, in her capacity as enter
tainer, constitutes a feature of Japanese dinners
and public functions, it is unfair to put her on
the level of the hetaira of the " nightless city."
There are frail geisha, and there are geisha
chaste as snow. If she must be classed for com
parative purposes, let her be put rather above
than below the ballet-girl of the West, and credit
given for a good deal more refinement in her
composition than her Occidental counterpart can
claim. So much for the lower orders of Japanese
womanhood. What of Japanese women in
general? All agree in giving them a very high
place. It has been remarked that foreign resi
dents in Japan, with seldom a good word to say
for Japanese men, have nothing but praise for
the women, who (they are wont to declare) must
belong to a different race. Women as a rule
are sparing of praise for their own sex, but few
foreign ladies who can number Japanese ladies
among their friends will fail to endorse Mrs.
Hugh Fraser's opinion : " Real womanliness
means a high combination of sense and sweet
ness, valour and humility. ... In this the
Japanese lady ranks with any woman in the world
and passes before most of them." If sweetness
and modesty are the choicest qualities of woman
hood, then, than the Japanese woman, there is
none more womanly. It is not surprising that
3°7-

Japan's Inheritance
Japanese of the old school look askance at the
" Higher Education of Women " movement, im
ported, in small doses, from America. But the
Japanese woman will take a lot of spoiling.
Let no one think that disagreeable women are
quite unknown in Japan. The mother-in-law is
the source of much mischief in Western lands ; in
Japan she is even worse. There is no escaping
her. For when a young couple wed in Japan
they do not set up housekeeping afresh on their
own account ; the young wife literally enters her
husband's family. Not she, but her husband's
mother, is the lady of the house. And to her
authority in all things she must dutifully defer.
Verily the word " obey " is writ large in the life
of the Japanese bride. But she is happy, never
theless. Her perennial, infectious brightness
is, indeed, her greatest charm. Woman in Japan
is more than a helpmeet. She sheds about her
the sunshine of a quiet but overflowing joie de
vivre. And because of this quality, and the
gladsomeness it makes, her way through life is
like that of which the Hebrew prophet sang : —
" How beautiful upon the mountain are the feet of him
that bringeth good tidings."

308

CHAPTER XVII
THE POLITICAL FABRIC
Fortified places — "Spionitis" — Launch of a super- Dread
nought — A nation of soldiers — Life is cheap — Militarism
in Lotus-land — The great renunciation — The samurai
and the State — The Constitution — The Throne and the
Genro — The Diet and the franchise — The first Party
Cabinet — Ito and the Seiyukai — Militarists and the Diet
— Vox populi at last ?
Not very long ago an unsuspecting tourist,
accompanied by a native guide and coolie, made
the ascent of an old volcano in the Hokkaido,
remarkable for the magnificence of the view to
be obtained from' the summit. Not a picture,
however, was he permitted to take from the crest
of the mountain, and even on descending into
the hollow of the ancient crater it was only
after much manoeuvring that he managed to
secure a few snapshots of the surrounding
rampart and of the steaming pits in the centre.
On returning to the foot of the mountain he
was given in charge to the police. The fact
3°9

Japan's Inheritance
that he was an Englishman proved to be in his
favour, and the exposures, on development, were
seen to be harmless. Nevertheless, there was
much coming and going of officials, much
examination of papers, and much general
yakamashi (noise, fuss) before the offending
visitor was allowed to depart — a lifelong enemy
of all things Japanese.
The explanation of the matter lay in the fact
that from the summit of the mountain the forti
fied port of Hakodate" could, in clear weather,
be discerned some 20 miles away, and the
said mountain was therefore included in the
" fortified zone." No doubt, to the careless
Anglo-Saxon, such excess of caution appears
absurd, but the Japanese cannot see it in
that light. Where the national defences are
concerned, he argues, nothing must be left to
chance. Consequently, while there is probably
no nation that knows more about its potential
enemies, there is probably no nation about which
its potential enemies know less. " Spionitis " is
epidemic in certain parts of the East — Manila,
for choice — it is endemic in Japan. But " our
little brown allies " make no attempt to stamp
out the disease.
Fortified places are numerous enough in
Japan. It may be that, on account of the pother
that is made about them, they seem more
numerous than they are. The fact of their
310

The Political Fabric
existence is thrust upon the attention of the
passer-by with a callous obtrusiveness that admits
of no escape. A quiet country lane in some un
frequented district invites, shall we say, an early
morning stroll, with promise of unconventional
subjects for the photographic film. Suddenly,
at the bend of the path, the visitor is confronted
with a notice-board, whose very pose and white
ness compel consideration : " Four thousand
three hundred and ninety-five ken south-east,
and two thousand nine hundred and seventy-
seven ken J north-west-by-north of this board," it
says with solemn precision (in English and
Japanese), " no photographing, sketching, or
taking of observations shall be permitted. By
order of the War Department." If the visitor
be wise, he will retrace his steps to the little
yadoya (inn) whence he came, and leave his
photographic outfit behind him'. To be the
central figure in an " affair " may seem, from
some points of view, an interesting experience,
but it has its drawbacks.
This extensive recourse to land fortifications
on the part of an insular Power suggests at
first sight that Japan has not taken to heart the
lesson of history as to the bearing of sea-power
on the rise and fall of nations. Such is not,
however, the case — there are other reasons, to
which I shall refer later on. Naval develop-
1 i ken = 6 feet.
3H

Japan's Inheritance
ment is still in the forefront of Japanese national
policy. The process is not advertised, but
notable exceptions occur from time to time.
Such a one was the launch of the first super-
Dreadnought in October, 1910. On the
appointed day the central of the three inlets
which form the picturesque but somewhat intri
cate harbour of Yokosuka, the Portsmouth of
Japan, presented a scene of unusual animation.
Had not the O-Tenshi-sama (literally " the Son
of Heaven ") honourably condescended to be
present ? So the thousands of Japanese spec
tators, well supplied with expansive umbrellas of
bamboo and oil-paper, recked not of the rain
that descended nor the wind that blew. Civiliza
tion in Japan has not quite reached the stage at
which ladies are asked to assist with launching
ceremonies. The actual task of cutting the cord
which supports the " dog-shores " is usually
undertaken by the admiral in charge of the dock
yard. In this case the dignitary first approached
the Emperor, and reverently informing his
Majesty that it was proposed to name the ship
Kawachi, that it had taken some eighteen months
to build, and that it was now ready for launch
ing, received the Imperial permission to release
the vessel from its slip. As the vast hull began
to move down the ways, a number of pigeons,
liberated from the bows, fluttered into the air,
and a great shout of " Banzai! " rolled round
312

The Political Fabric
the harbour. Within the memory of many of
the cheering spectators, Japan's maritime strength
had been embodied in a fleet of junks. Their
enthusiasm, therefore, was natural enough.
Behind the bulwark of her naval defences,
fixed and floating, lies the real secret of Japan's
position as a world-Power, which renders her
own conquest to all intents and purposes impos
sible, and at the same time gives her a com
manding voice in the fate of Asia. Every able-
bodied man is a soldier, and every boy preparing
to be one. Such is the result of a system of
universal service more rigidly and systematically
enforced than in any European country. The
story is told of an old couple who, in the critical
days of the Russian War, importuned the War
Office to excuse from active service the son on
whom they depended for support, that he might
remain with them. At length, one evening, they
got their answer — the dead body of their son
left at their door on a hand-cart. To get to the
bottom of a story like this is impossible in Japan ;
but, however the truth may be, there is no doubt
that the Japanese soldier is trained to look upon
death in the field as the natural issue of his
calling, and few, indeed, are the wives and
mothers who would permit themselves to shed
a tear over such a circumstance.
Two other factors go to the making of the
Japanese character from the military point of
313

Japan's Inheritance

view — a certain cheapness of life and the
doctrine that suicide is the penalty of failure.
The latter, of course, is a survival of the custom
of harakiri practised in feudal times. On the
eve of Tsushima, Admiral Togo gave his officers
more than a hint of what was expected of them
in event of defeat. Nogi's self-immolation on
the occasion of the Meiji obsequies bears the
same construction. The grizzled, great-hearted
warrior felt that his own past sacrifices, his own
example, had failed to influence the nation as he
had hoped. Recognizing this, and the fact that
the passing of his Imperial Master marked the
end of the old order of things, he felt that he
could but make the samurai's last atonement.
One summer day I was travelling by rail from
Tokyo to Yokohama when the train was brought
to a standstill by an " accident " on the line.
Perceiving that most of my Japanese fellow-
passengers alighted from' the carriages and
hurried in the direction of the engine, I followed
suit. To my horror I found that a suicide had
been the cause of the delay, and the track and
the engine-wheels were being hastily cleared of
the mangled remains of what had been a human
body. But more horrible still, to my mind, was
the attitude of the crowd. Neither horror, nor
disgust, nor pity could be traced upon a single
face. If the general expression might be
summed up in a phrase, it was one of amused
3J4

CALLED TO THE COLOURS : " BANZAI ! '

A GEISHA DANCE.

UU i.

Tm*

TEMPLE OF HACHIMAN, THE JAPANESE
MARS, AT KAMAKURA.

FUNERAL OF COMMANDER HIROSE, WHO
LED THE BLOCKING OPERATIONS AT
PORT ARTHUR (1904).

To face p. 314.

The Political Fabric
interest. " Only another case of shinju ! l "
laughed the beholders of this gruesome scene,
and clattered back on their geta to resume their
seats, while the torn fragments of humanity were
trundled off on a barrow to the nearest police-
station. Militarism of this stern and uncompromising
character is the foundation of the Japanese
polity. On this rough basis has been reared
in the course of the Meiji Era a superstructure
of Constitutionalism. Nominal at first, the efforts
of the popular, as distinct from the ruling, class
have been directed towards making it a reality.
Within certain limits they have succeeded.
Feudalism and Japan parted company when
the great Daimyos laid their possessions at
Mutsuhito's feet. In that same moment the
Mikado was transformed from a sort of high-
priest — an object of veneration enshrined in an
old-world palace — into a monarch, vested with
all spiritual and temporal power. As an act of
renunciation, this self-effacement of the terri
torial barons has received general praise. But
the sacrifice was largely a matter of form. A
sovereign cannot do without Ministers, and so
the great offices of State passed into the hands
of the former Daimyos. These clan chieftains
gave up their actual power over their respective
districts, and received in its place a share in the
1 Suicide. 3*5

Japan's Inheritance

control of the country at large. Although, in
theory, the Emperor— the title Mikado is offi
cially disapproved— was an absolute monarch,
the form of government was in practice an
oligarchy. In the course of centuries the feudal Daimyo
and their samurai retainers had laid wide and
deep the foundations of their class. It was their
privilege to fight for, their responsibility to
defend, the heaven -given land. In such exalted
rights and duties the heimin, or Japanese plebs,
though outnumbering their superiors by fifteen
to one, had neither part nor lot. Obviously,
the first step towards national reorganization on
modern lines was, by abolition of the privileges
of the military caste, to establish the principle
of equality of citizenship. As early in the Meiji
Era as 1878 the wearing of swords — the distinc
tive mark of the samurai — was forbidden by
Imperial decree, and, with the adoption of
military service on European lines, the right of
the peasant to bear arms in defence of his
country was implicitly recognized. This social
revolution was not effected without a struggle,
the Satsuma clansmen, in particular, offering a
fierce resistance. Thirty thousand valuable lives
had to be sacrificed before the peasant could say,
with the two-sworded warrior, " Civis Japonicus
sum." But of the issue no doubt remained.
The plebeian soldier had arrived. Later, as the
316

The Political Fabric
world knows, he proved his mettle on the plains
of Manchuria.
" Disestablished " though the samurai were,
their superior education and social status con
tinued to count in their favour. Military power
taken from them, the civil came in its stead.
The control of affairs fell, almost in the nature
of things, into their hands. Japan's first Parlia
ment, like England's in the thirteenth century,
consisted entirely of noblemen — knights of the
shire — and their erstwhile retainers. A delibera
tive rather than a legislative assembly, it was a
failure at that. But out of the fiasco came forth
light. Count Itagaki, head of the great Tosa
clan, was the first to perceive that in one way
only could the country be saved from' domina
tion by a military oligarchy — namely, by means
of a popular elected Legislature. Seceding from
the ruling clique, he gathered about him a
number of young men who had returned from
travel in Europe, and set himself to the task of
converting his countrymen to liberal views. Not
long afterwards, and influenced by similar con
siderations, Count Okuma began to preach the
new creed of popular control. Thus came into
being two political parties, working independently
along the same lines, with constitutional govern
ment for the common goal. Remarkable success
crowned the campaign. Within a few months of
its inauguration an Imperial decree announced
3*7

Japan's Inheritance
that in ten years' time a national assembly
would be convened.
The keynote of the Japanese Constitution is
the throne. " The Emperor combines in him
self the rights of sovereignty." He " exercises
the legislative power with the consent of the
Diet " (Arts. iv. and v.). Ministerial respon
sibility is not to the Diet but to the Emperor.
The appointment of Ministers vests also in the
Imperial will. Particular stress is laid by the
late Prince Ito, in one of his expositions of the
Constitution, upon the sovereign's right to select
his Ministers from whatever party he pleased
or from no party at all. Finally, the Diet sits
for only three months in the year (Art. xlii).
During the remaining nine, in the event of
" urgent necessity to maintain public safety
or avert public calamities," the Emperor may
issue Imperial decrees " to take the place of
law." This centralization of power, in theory, in the
hands of the sovereign will be condemned by
some as the weak point of the Constitution. By
the framers of that instrument it was regarded
as the strongest. Among the shifting sands of
our environment, said they, there is, at any rate,
one fixed and solid rock — the veneration of our
people for their divinely descended head. But
the makers of the New Japan failed to make
sufficient allowance for the inevitable effect of
3i8

The Political Fabric
modern materialistic ideas and of ever-increasing
intercourse with the West upon this spirit of
reverential unquestioning loyalty, resting on the
slender basis of the supernatural. Moreover,
the pages of Japanese history afford numerous
instances of a Mikado " sacred and inviolable "
indeed, but politically impotent ; while the real
direction of affairs rested with some military
dictator or with some bureaucratic clique. There
exists in Japan at the present time a small coterie
of distinguished men, grown grey in the service
of the State, who form a sort of supreme council,
and in whose hands the real power lies.
Sagacious, experienced, resolute, they have in
practice, so far, been of genuine assistance to
the State, and have played a definite part in
the national development. It is difficult, indeed,
to see how Japan, in her international swaddling-
clothes, could have made shift without them.
Nevertheless, unmentioned in the Constitution,
they stand an irresponsible body between the
Diet and the Cabinet — a factor impossible to
reconcile with any theory of representative
Government. Necessary as they undoubtedly
were in the past, they have, in the view of their
countrymen, survived their usefulness. " The
law," said St. Paul, " was our schoolmaster, to
bring us to Christ." Just such a purpose did
the Genro serve in Japan's progress to consti
tutional freedom. But with a pupil grown to
319

Japan's Inheritance

years of discretion, the need for an escort
disappears .
Under the Japanese Constitution the Diet is
bi-cameral. It consists of a House of Peers
and a House of Representatives. Neither of
these has that direct and intimate connection
with the Government of the day which such
bodies are usually thought to have. The former,
as might be expected, is in close touch with the
conservative and bureaucratic elements, and
enjoys a security of position not vouchsafed to
the Lower House. The hereditary, nominative,
and elective principles are all followed in its
composition. Some 200 out of its 370 members
represent the various orders of nobility ; there
are 120 "men of erudition or distinguished
service " nominated for life by the Emperor ; and
there are 43 representatives of " the highest tax
payers," elected by themselves, one for each
prefecture. Unlike the Lower Chamber, the
House of Peers cannot be dissolved, it can only
be prorogued. So far there has been no occa
sion for it to come into conflict either with the
Ministers or with the popular branch of the
Legislature. Almost a million and a half of the Japanese
enjoy the parliamentary franchise, and some
80 per cent, avail themselves of the privilege.
There are two qualifications — age of twenty-five
years and the payment of 10 yen per annum
320

The Political Fabric
in direct taxation. The rural districts return
300 out of the 379 members. For electoral
purposes they are divided into constituencies
with a population of 130,000, corresponding as
far as possible with the prefectures. The same
figures are regarded as the unit for urban districts
containing over 100,000 inhabitants, though an
incorporated city with 30,000 inhabitants con
stitutes an independent electoral body. Cabinet
Ministers in Japan are not elected, nor are they
made responsible to the elected representatives
of the people. On the other hand, if the House
of Representatives adopts an obstructive attitude
towards the proposals of the Ministry, it is liable
to suffer dissolution by Imperial decree — a fate
which has overtaken it seven times since the
first Assembly in 1890. In most constitutionally
governed countries Vox populi, vox Dei is the
accepted rule. In Japan the voice of the
Emperor, adopted for the moment by the
Ministry in power, is — or has hitherto been — the
voice of God.
General elections in Japan, which take place
every four years — assuming that the Diet escapes
dissolution for that period — do not excite a great
deal of popular interest. Despite elaborate
regulations, a considerable amount of bribery
and corruption persists. In the elections of
191 2, votes were openly sold in some places —
according to the Japanese Press — at 10 yen
321 x

Japan's Inheritance
apiece ; and some sensation was caused by two
ex-M.P.'s who had been convicted of corrupt
practices in connection with the sugar scandals
of 19 1 o, offering themselves for re-election. As
a rule, however, the Japanese elector is more
concerned in such matters as the price of rice
or the cost of his daily tram-ride. The addition
of a sen (a farthing) to the Tokyo street-railway
rates a few years ago gave rise to serious riots,
in which a number of electric-cars were literally
sacrificed to mark the popular indignation.
Between the existence of such grievances and
the election of parliamentary representatives the
Japanese " man in the street " saw no connec
tion. There has been reason in his attitude so
far ; but things have changed considerably of
late years. The political instinct of the people
seems at last to have been aroused, and this must
mean the gradual assertion of the principle of
popular control .
Bearing in mind these conditions, we shall be
in a position to follow more closely the history
of its final stage — the evolution of party govern
ment. The followers of Itagaki had taken unto
themselves the name of Jiyu-to, or Liberals, while
those of Okuma styled themselves Shimpo-to,
i.e., Progressists. In 1898, that is to say just
twenty years after the Japanese Rousseau, as
he has been called, had inaugurated the process
of political agitation, these two bodies, differing
322

The Political Fabric
more in name than nature, united to form a
" Constitutional Party " (Kensei-tai) . The amal
gamation impressed both the official and non-
official world. It was felt that the objection
hitherto advanced against the formation of a
Ministry on party lines — namely, that no single
political association possessed sufficient talent to
conduct the affairs of the country — could no
longer be maintained. Accordingly, Counts
Itagaki and Okuma were invited to form Japan's
first Party Cabinet. They accepted the Imperial
mandate : it was indeed the fulfilment of the aim
for which they had laboured. Alas for human
weakness ! The coalition did not outlive the
test of six months of office. Jealousies arose
between the leading men, and the party broke up
into the two sections which had composed it. The
moral of the failure was evident. Unless one
party or another succeeded in attaching to itself
the highest personages in the land — the " clan
statesmen," or, as they came to be known in later
days, the " elder statesmen " — there was little
hope of its making headway with the task of
government .
It was in this direction that the next move took
place. Throwing principles to the winds, the
Liberals laid themselves at the feet of Ito, who
by this time was facile prince ps in the official
world. Unconditional surrender was what the
Marquis demanded, and he coupled with it the
323

Japan's Inheritance
significant proviso that the new organization was
to be known not as " party " but as an " associa
tion." Such was the genesis of the Seiyukai
(" Friends of the Constitution "), which ever
since has been the most powerful section of the
Japanese Diet. It has travelled far since the
day of its inception. Intended by Ito as a safe
guard against the party system, it has become
the champion and defender of that system. Ten
years ago, on the eve of a new session, its dis
tinguished chief solemnly admonished the
association against any sort of obstructive
tactics. He laid down the doctrine that, once
Ministers had been appointed to office, it was
the duty of politicians, as loyal subjects of the
Emperor, to abstain from interfering with them.
Now this association, frankly a party, does not
hesitate to " hold up " the Government of Japan
by way of asserting the principle that at least
the majority of the Cabinet should belong to
the party which can command a majority in the
Diet. In 1903 Ito, called to the Presidency of the
Privy Council, resigned the leadership of the
Seiyukai to his second-in-command, the Marquis
Saionji, who, during the stormy times of the
Satsuma rebellion, had learned democracy in
France. Since that date the " Friends of the
Constitution," comprising three-fifths of the
membership of the House of Representatives,
324

The Political Fabric
have acted in the main as a ministerial party.
They have supported the Government of the day
— not always, however, wholeheartedly. The
Progressists, numbering a fourth of the House,
together with two minor parties, constituted a
somewhat ineffective opposition. Throughout the
critical period of the Russian War, Marquis (now
Prince) Katsura, who held the reins of govern
ment, deemed it advisable to make a working
arrangement with the Seiyukai. Subsequently
that statesman defined his attitude as one of
" indiscriminate friendship " for all parties.
When, on the death of Mutsuhito, Katsura
took up the post of Grand Chamberlain in the
Imperial Household — the better, from that bad
eminence (so his enemies averred), to turn to his
own advantage, as the power behind the throne,
the course of future events — the Marquis Saionji
succeeded him as Premier. It was an admirable
choice, for that nobleman, as President of the
Seiyukai, was assured of a majority in the Diet.
He could therefore, as no Prime Minister in
Japan had really done, administer the affairs of
the nation constitutionally in the truest sense.
From the constitutional point of view, the era
of Taisho had made a most auspicious start.
But it was not to the liking of the " ruling
caste." Militarists, allied with bureaucrats, had
hitherto succeeded in retaining in their hands all
real power. In the eyes of both the Party
325

Japan's Inheritance
Cabinet was a thing abhorred. It involved re
cognition of the principle of ministerial respon
sibility — not to the Emperor, nor to the Genro,
nor to officialdom', but to the Diet ; and, with
the acceptance of that theory, the power would
pass from their hands into those of the people.
Such an issue, compromising all that bureau
cracy holds most dear, was worth fighting. So,
with a view to enforcing the resignation of the
Saionji Ministry and the recall of Prince Katsura,
General Uyehara, the Minister for War, acting
for the military clique, precipitated a crisis by
demanding two additional divisions for the
defence of the Korean frontier. Faced by this
crisis, the Diet rose to the height of its great
opportunity. A " Constitution Protection
Society " was formed, not from one party,
nor from two, but from all ; and the Diet pre
sented a solid front to the enemy. When Prince
Katsura advanced to the attack with his
announcement of forming " a new party " —
armed, it is said, with a million yen for the
purpose — he found a House profoundly hostile
and strangely incorruptible. Unexpected
" friends of the Constitution " arose likewise
in the country. The campaign of mass -meetings
carried on in all the large centres under the flag
of the allied parties produced remarkable
results. Riots in Tokyo, Osaka, and Kobe left
no doubt as to the depth and character of the
326

The Political Fabric
popular feeling. In the face of such unforeseen
and portentous developments, only one course
remained open to the " privileged caste." Even
the Japanese bureaucrat has not parted with the
saving grace of common sense. Katsura, and
with him the Genro, and with them officialdom
at large, bowed to the storm. In the Ministry
which succeeded, members of the Seiyukai held
a majority of the portfolios.
Though it is early yet to appreciate the effects
of the most momentous of Japan's political crises,
three at least can scarcely be overlooked. For the
first time in Japanese history, in a pitched battle
with the ruling class, a popularly elected assembly
has won. The establishment of the principle of
ministerial responsibility to the Legislature would
seem to follow as a matter of course. In the
second place, the political instinct of the Japanese
people has been aroused. This must tend to
ensure steady progress towards representative
government. Finally, there can be little doubt
that, as the result of certain tendencies of
Japanese statecraft — among which must be in
cluded the abuse of the Imperial prerogative in
the matter of decrees and of prorogation and
dissolution of the Diet — the prestige of the
Imperial House has suffered. In what way and
to what extent these things will affect the future
of the Japanese race it is not possible to foresee.
There is no reason, however, to take a pessi-
327

Japan's Inheritance
mistic view. A quarter of a century ago the
Japanese people received a Constitution . Having
at length made it their own, they may be trusted,
in the future, to use it for the best.

328

CHAPTER XVIII
JAPAN AS A COLONIAL POWER
The fruits of war — A mixed population — The " smoking
islands " — The far south — The subjugation of Formosa
— State Socialism to some purpose — The acquisition of
Korea — A gradual process, despite two wars — " Direct
colonization" — Official encouragement — Japan's handling
of colonial problems — Where the Japanese adminis
trator fails
Japan's over-sea possessions are the fruits of
her successful wars. In the art of territorial
expansion, as in most other things, she has
proved an apt pupil of the West. In 1863 and
1864 two of her ports suffered bombardment
at the hands of European Powers for high
handed action on the part of the southern
Daimyos. In 1874 a punitive expedition left
those very ports to take vengeance on the
barbarians of Formosa. It was the first war
like excursion from Japanese shores since the
days of the Taiko Hideyoshi, who subjugated
Chosen at the cost of a quarter of a million
lives. Less expensive but quite as effective in
329

Japan's Inheritance
its way was this Eorrnosan expedition of 1874.
The savages of Taiwan had butchered, and
possibly eaten, some shipwrecked Japanese
mariners. Thereafter they learned that the
subjects of the Mikado were to be treated with
respect. Which was, of course, precisely the
kind of lesson that De Kuyper and his brother
Admirals had sought to enforce upon the
Tokugawas and their Daimyos.
In the following year, by way of marking
the end of the era of " splendid isolation," two
additions were made to the Japanese colonial
list. A certain Dalmyo of the name of Ogasa-
wara had discovered, in the sixteenth century,
a group of coral -reefed islands, 500 miles south
of Tokyo Bay, and named them' Mu-nin — i.e.,
Uninhabited. In the course of time the popu
lation grew to seventy. History does not relate
who first arrived, nor how and whence ; but
when the Japanese appeared on the scene, to
make good their claim of prior discovery, they
found a motley population of Hawaiians with
Kanaka wives, Malays, a few retired pirates of
Chinese extraction, shipwrecked mariners of half
a dozen European nations, and various half-
breeds. As conclusive confirmation of the claim
of English to be the " universal language," it
deserves to be placed on record that the speech
of these islanders was Anglo-Saxon, of a sort.
Now, however, the official tongue is Japanese,
33°

Japan as a Colonial Power
for the Bonin Islands are duly registered in the
Tokyo Home Office as Ogasawara-Ken, the re
motest of the sixty-five prefectures which in 1870
took the place of the old-fashioned but still
popular Kund (provinces).
It was a bad bargain by which, in the same
year, Japan gave up her claim to Saghalien in
exchange for the barren, fog-bound Kuriles.
The former has valuable forests, oil -fields,
and fisheries ; the latter has — volcanoes . And
volcanoes too young, for the most part, to be
overgrown ! In those days, alas ! the word of
Japan passed for little, while that of Russia was
law ; though more recently, in faith, through
the retroceded southern half of Karafuto, Japan
has got back some of her own.
It was by way of these " Thousand Islands "
(as the Japanese name Chiskima signifies) that
the Ainus, the earliest inhabitants of Japan,
passed thither from the mainland. After them'
came the Cossacks, on the hunt for fur -bearing
animals, and left few to tell the tale. Albeit
there are still some bears ; the streams swarm
with salmon, the shores are beset with miniature
sargassos. And there is sulphur — in Kunashiri,
the nearest to Yezo, a lake of it — which goes to
make Japanese matches. Which might have
been expected. So many of the Kuriles are
active cones rising sheer out of the sea that
the Russians called them the " smoking islands."
33i

Japan's Inheritance
The next assertion of Japan's colonizing
energy was in the far south. For four hundred
years the people of the Lu-chu (Ryu-kyu)
Islands had laboured under the disadvantage of
owning allegiance — and paying tribute — to two
Powers at the same time. China's claim would
seem to have been the superior. It was first
advanced by one of the Ming Emperors, while
the Satsuma Daimyd's conquest of the archi
pelago in the seventeenth century was only
partial. In 1879 tne Japanese resolved to put
an end to this equivocal state of affairs. The
King of the Luchuans was seized and brought
captive to Tokyo, while, with the minimum of
delay, the name of Okinawa (the principal
island) was added to the prefectural list.
By all these little annexations, then, there
hangs a tale. But they implied no material in
crease in the wealth or influence of Japan. Nor
did they involve any expenditure of life or
treasure. With the later acquisitions it is another
story. For them the island-people had to fight
— with, however, the consolation that they were
worth fighting for.
In Formosa the Western world, which has
been wont to arrogate to itself a monopoly of
colonizing capacity, may study the results of
Japan's first experiment in that direction. The
island — equal in size to Kyushu, or about half
as large as Scotland — was the chief prize of the
332

Japan as a Colonial Power
war with China. Though Japan got it in 1895,
she had to make good her possession. The
western slope of the island terminates in an
alluvial plain, which was peopled by Chinese and
other traders, peaceably disposed, but with little
love for their new masters . With the aid, indeed,
of the Chinese garrison, an attempt was made
to set up a republic ; but, on the whole, the
civilized portion of the population gave little
trouble. When it came to asserting their
authority and establishing order in the interior
the Japanese found their work cut out for them.
The whole centre of the island is occupied by
a mountain range, exceeding in elevation any
peak in Japan proper. The upper slopes and
spurs of this range, falling rapidly from a height
of 12,000 to 13,000 feet, give rise to a rugged
and densely wooded country, and terminate, on
the east coast, in a magnificent array of cliffs,
5,000 to 6,000 feet high. The almost impene
trable forests of the interior — in the north of
the island especially — are peopled by a race of
warlike savages of Malay descent, armed with
poisoned arrows and addicted to the inconvenient
pursuit of head-hunting. With these aboriginal
Formosans the Japanese have waged ceaseless
warfare up to the present day. The modus
operandi was that of slowly advancing expedi
tions, fully equipped in the ordinary sense, and
carrying an ample supply of barbed-wire. When
333

Japan's Inheritance
a village had been taken or a forest clearing
made, the area was surrounded with an elaborate
system of wire entanglements. The nearest
approach to an engagement was in 19 10, when
the Japanese troops, after almost superhuman
efforts, succeeded in occupying some heights

C. L ong. Kl

PACIFIC

OCEAN c

FORMOSA.
Contours 6,000 ft. and 10,000 ft. S.
Setsuzan (Mt. Sylvia) ; N, Niitaka-
yama (Mt. Morrison). Tm, Tamsui ;
Th, Taihoku ; K, Keelung ; Tn,
Tainan; Tk, Takow.

which commanded a tableland where many of
the aborigines dwelt. The capture of a head-
hunter flagrante delicto was a rare event, but
one by one the chiefs have made submission,
till the area actually untraversed or unoccupied
is comparatively small. Dutch, Spaniards,
334

Japan as a Colonial Power
English in turn have " occupied " the Beau
tiful Island ; for a score of years it even had
a dynasty of its own, founded by one Koku-
Singa, the son of a Chinese pirate by a
Japanese mother'; and for two hundred years
it has been a Chinese province. But never
has it known a fraction of the security it now
enjoys .
Hard things have been said as to the severity
of the Japanese methods of dealing with the
Formosan aborigines. One might as well accuse
the British Army of barbarity when, on the
North-West Frontier, a Pathan who had
" knifed " some sleeping " Tommy " in the
night was blown next morning from a cannon's
mouth. It would be quite impossible to kill
Formosan head-hunters with kindness. Nor were
the Japanese so foolish as to try. In the heavy,
thankless, and long-drawn task of reducing these
savages to submission the Japanese have rather
shown that " infinite capacity for taking pains "
which amounts to genius, and their record has
not been marred by inhumanity.
They have their reward. Under the Chinese
regime the revenue of the island stood at half
a million sterling. It is now over four millions.
Within the past ten years the total value of the
import and export trade, which now stands at
about £11,000,000 annually, has increased by
250 per cent. Formosa, with Japan proper, sup-
335

Japan's Inheritance
plies the bulk of the 1 1,000,000 lb. of camphor
annually consumed throughout the world. To
furnish the most profitable yield a tree has to
be from sixty to a hundred years old, so that,
with the felling of over ten thousand trees a
year, the industry was at one time threatened
with extinction. In 1899, however, camphor was
proclaimed a Government monopoly. Reckless
cutting was stopped and extensive afforestation
taken in hand. Other promising industries, such
as sugar, tea (Oolong), oil, and cotton, were also
brought under State control. Over 1,000 miles
of good roads have been constructed, a rail
way has been built from Tamsui and Taihoku,
the capital, in the north to Tainan and Takow,
in the south. Important irrigation and harbour
works, estimated to cost 35,000,000 yen, are in
progress in various parts of the island. The
Japanese, in short, have spared neither money
nor pains in the development of their colony.
If exception may be taken to their system on the
ground that it is a huge piece of State Socialism,
costly in the long run because subversive of
private enterprise, the obvious answer is that in
no other way could such results have been
obtained within a reasonable time. Given the
desirability of speedy development, it was the
only system possible. At least the Japanese can
point to the fait accompli — the face of this once
unhappy island transformed by the work of their
336

Japan as a Colonial Power
hands— and claim that the end has justified
the means.
In Korea, from the first, Japan has had to
face problems of a different order. She has not
had to deal with barbarous or semi-barbarous
tribes, but with a people whose civilization is
as old as, if not older than, her own. While
securing her own interests, she has had to refrain
from alienating the goodwill of that people ; and
all this, in the teeth of the bitter hostility of
at least two powerful nations and under the eye
of a none too friendly world. Politically and
nominally, her work is done. In reality, it is
but beginning. In 1894 Japan fought China for
Korea. Ten years later she fought Russia with
the same object. Before her conquest of the
Land of the Morning Calm is complete she will
have to fight — herself.
The process by which Japan has obtained
possession of the much-coveted Korean Penin
sula affords an instructive study in the art
of territorial expansion. It is not possible here
to enter into a discussion of Japanese relations
with Korea in modern times, but a brief review,
chronologically arranged, will be a sufficient
guide .
1876 (February 26) A Japanese Mission, escorted by several
war ships, makes a treaty with Korea, recognizing
the latter as a sovereign State, and ignoring the
ancient Chinese claim of suzerainty.
337 Y

Japan's Inheritance

1882-4 Various Korean ports were opened to foreign trade.
1882 Anti-Japanese riots at Seoul : Japanese Legation burnt
to the ground.
1885 Convention between China and Japan giving either
Power the right to station troops, with due notice,
in Korea. (This privilege was claimed by Japan in
consequence of the attack on her Legation.)
1 89 1 Russia commences the construction of the Trans-
Siberian railway.
1894 Rebellion in South Korea. Both Powers sent troops —
China in response to a Korean appeal ; but China
refused Japan's invitation to co-operate. Japan
thereupon declared war, on the ground of Chinese
interference with her interests in Korea.
1895 (April 17) Peace of Shimonoseki, recognizing "the
absolute independence of Korea."
1895 (April 22) Russia, France, and Germany advise the
retrocession of Liaotung on the ground that "the
Japanese occupation of that territory endangered
the existence of the Chinese capital and of Korean
independence."
1896 Russo-Japanese Convention with regard to Korea,
according equal rights to both Powers in the
matter of protective troops and advice to the Korean
Government.
1898 Germany "leases" Kiaochou, Russia the Liaotung
Peninsula, and Great Britain Wei-hai-wei.
1902 Anglo-Japanese Alliance, recognizing "the independence
of China and Korea," and the special interests of
Japan in Korea.
1903 (June) Japan opens negotiations with Russia for the
settlement of the Korean and Manchurian questions.
1903 (October) Russia returns an unsatisfactory reply,
strengthening her armaments meanwhile.
1904 (February 9) Japan, having broken off negotiations,
attacks the Russian fleet in Port Arthur.
338

Japan as a Colonial Power
1905 (August) Treaty of Portsmouth between Russia
and Japan, by which Russia acknowledged the
"paramount ^political, military, and economic
interests " of Japan in Korea, and undertook not
to interfere with any Japanese measures of " guid
ance, protection, and control." A few weeks
previously the Anglo-Japanese Alliance had been
renewed on an extended basis.
1905 (November) The Ito Mission to Korea leads to a Con
vention giving Japan complete control and direction
of Korean affairs, and providing for the appoint
ment of a Resident-General.
1907 (July) Intrigues against Japan, culminating in the dis
patch of Korean delegates, under the Imperial seal,
to the Hague Conference. The Korean Emperor
voluntarily abdicates the throne. Virtual protec
torate established by Japan.
1909 (October 26) Assassination of Prince Ito at Harbin by
the Korean An.
1910 (August 2) Annexation of Korea.
More eloquent than words, this record of
events as they occurred shows how great a
danger to its neighbours and to the world
the weak, ill -ordered State can be. Japan's
prescience, her resolution, her military capacity
have removed that danger for ever. The former
Hermit Kingdom is now an integral part of the
Japanese Empire in thirteen prefectures, under
a military, or naval, officer, who, as Governor -
General, presides over five Administrative De
partments — Internal Affairs, Finance, Agricul
ture, Commerce and Industry, and Justice. This
339

Japan's Inheritance
inclusion of an additional 85,000 square miles
brings the area of the Japanese Empire above
that of Germany, and its population to well over
sixty million souls.
Every effort is made by the Japanese authori
ties to encourage settlers to go to Korea, or
Chosen, as it was officially re-named in 1910.
Land up to two acres is given to each worthy
immigrant, to be paid for by moderate instal
ments. As a result the number of Japanese in
Korea has increased from 50,000 before the
war to a quarter of a million, and land to
the value of thirteen million sterling is actually
owned by Japanese small -holders. Most of
this " direct colonization " is the work of the
Oriental Development Company, a joint Korean-
Japanese undertaking, established under Govern
ment auspices in 1908 with an annual subsidy,
for the first eight years, of 300,000 yen. Apart
from agriculture, which this quasi-official com
pany makes its special concern, mining, forestry,
and communications receive most attention from
the authorities. The successful results obtained
by the Oriental Consolidated Mining Company
— an American concern, founded in 1897 to
develop the Woonsan concession in the Pyong
yang district, where there is a yearly output of
gold to the value of i\ to 3 million yen — led,
in 1 910, to a Japanese -American venture on
similar lines to work quartz and placer-gold at
34o

Japan as a Colonial Power
Chiksan, 50 miles south of Seoul. Here 2,500
Koreans find regular and, for them, remunerative
employment on a tribute system'. Like the
Chinese, the Koreans are ruthless destroyers
of tree-life, for purposes of fuel ; and strong
measures have been taken under the new regime
to prevent deforestation and develop the timber
industry. There has been no occasion for the
Tokyo officials to nurse the fisheries. Long
before the Protectorate, Japanese fishermen from
Kyushu and Western Japan discovered the poten
tialities of the Korean fishing-grounds, which
they virtually annexed. Over a thousand
Japanese fishing hamlets have sprung up all
along the Korean coast . The inhabitants of these
unauthorized colonies enjoy comparative afflu
ence, for they make four or five times as much
out of their annual catch as they could off their
native shores.
Japan feels that her international standing
depends in large measure upon success or failure
in Korea. Her work in Formosa was, by com
parison, child's play. That being the case, it is
unfortunate, from her point of view, that many
unscrupulous and worthless persons — speculators
and adventurers clearly actuated by greed — were
permitted in early days to find their way into the
Peninsula. Nor did Japan, at the outset, send
of her best to aid in the work of government.
These errors furnished ready material to a coterie
341

Japan's Inheritance

of foreign intriguers, and enthusiastic but short
sighted friends of Korea, who, with the aid of
secret societies and a liberationist Press, set
themselves (often with the best intentions) to
the impossible task of rolling uphill the heavy
stone of Korean independence. That evils have
arisen in connection with the Japanese adminis
tration set up in 1907 cannot be gainsaid. From
such an affair as the recent Conspiracy Trial,
whereby a mountain was made out of a molehill,
it is evident that the minor officials, and
especially the too ubiquitous police, would be
all the better for a little more supervision from
headquarters. But these are incidental and
remediable evils, which will soon cease to dis
figure the work of Japan's hands. No one will
deny that the state of Korea, after three years
of unrestricted Japanese control, shows a material
improvement which those familiar with pre-exist
ing conditions could scarcely have considered
possible. Reviewing in a general way Japan's colonial
problems and her handling of them, it may be
remarked that the Japanese have the idea of
ruling for the benefit of the ruled, without the
faculty of convincing them of the fact. Perhaps
this is because, while the ruled have undoubtedly
benefited, the rulers have, at the same time, too
much of an eye for their own profit. The con
duct of a colony on the lines of a State farm,
342

Japan as a Colonial Power
even when no other method offers, must tend to
create this impression — among the farm-hands,
at any rate, if not in the world outside. The
sooner, therefore, the official strings are removed
the better for the tone and spirit of the colony.
But the hour for that relaxation is for the rulers
to decide. If there is another defect that cannot
escape the impartial observer's notice, it is that
the moral factor, the personal sympathetic influ
ence which goes so far to make the Englishman
the beau idepf, of a civil servant, is lacking in
the Japanese administrator. There is a certain
brusqueness and, again, a calculating cold
bloodedness — often accompanied by an unneces
sary parade of force — which suggests that the
Japanese official is not quite sure of himself. It
was evident, for example, that the annexation
of Korea had been decided upon, and prepara
tions made to the smallest detail, long before
the event took place. On the very day of the
promulgation the name of every station on
the Korean railway system was changed — the
Japanese name taking the place of the Korean ;
and bewildered Korean passengers might have
been seen gazing " in fixt amaze " at time
tables in Japanese characters and schedules of
fares in Japanese money, which were to them
like so much Greek. The good-natured official,
always on hand to explain, was conspicuous by
his absence. This sort of thing is admirable
343

Japan's Inheritance

as preliminary to a bloody campaign, when all
must be in place " to the last button on the last
gaiter." But the Japanese were not about to
war. They were taking over the government of
a country for that country's good.

344

CHAPTER XIN
WHERE EAST MEETS WEST
The turning of the tide — East and West must meet — Imprints
of the West — First results — Commercial integrity — The
presentation of things Japanese — Is coalescence possible ?
— Mixed marriages and race-prejudice — The Japanese
resents indignity — La morgue anglaise— The Japanese
abroad — An unwelcome guest — The worst offenders —
England's lost opportunity — The call of the blood —
The Yellow Peril
If the nineteenth century was the opportunity of
the West, the twentieth is for the East. Con
centrated in its eastern and south-eastern fringe,
Asia holds well over half the inhabitants of the
globe ; and this vast population is astir. Within
the past decade, and beginning with the Farthest
East, a revitalizing movement has spread along
the oceanic borders of the great continent — from
Japan through China and India to Persia, and,
beyond, to the basin of the Nile. It may be
called " unrest " in one place, the " sense of
nationalism " in another ; it may be dubbed
" sedition " here, " ambition " there, but the spirit
345

Japan's Inheritance

and driving -power are the same. The people
of the East are awakening to a new consciousness
of life ; the tide of civilization which for two,
thousand years has rolled westward now " turns
again home."
In the opinion of many people, differences of
race, creed, and colour have reared between East
and West an insuperable barrier. An English
poet tersely, if somewhat dogmatically, has given
currency to the same idea : —
"O East is East, and West is West,
And never the twain shall meet."
But to believe this is to ignore " the annihila
tion of distance " and the rapid shrinking of the
world. The meeting of East and West is inevit
able. All that remains to be considered is the
manner of their meeting, and the result of it. The
vista of circumstance here opened to the seeing
eye is long indeed.
Hitherto in the intercourse between these two
great divisions of humanity, the Oriental has
been "under dog." Only in Japan, so far, have
East and West met on equal terms. Not that it
was so in the beginning. The knocking of the
West at the gates of the self-secluded Island
Power was rough and rude. Perry's treaty of
" peace and amity " would never have received
the Mikado's signature except for the threat of
force. The future ally of Japan obtruded her-
346

Where East meets West
self upon the attention of the Shogunate with
shot and shell. Even up to the last year of the
nineteenth century foreign traders and representa
tives in Japan remained outside the jurisdiction
of the country where they lived — an anomalous
situation only to be found, at the present day, in
the treaty-ports of China, and duly resented by
the native inhabitants there, as it was by the
Japanese. But with the opening of the twentieth
century a new era dawned upon the East. Quick
to perceive that the only hope of saving herself
from absorption by the European Powers lay in
the whole-hearted adoption of Western civiliza
tion, Japan set herself with extraordinary persist
ence and ability to qualify for recognition as a
sovereign State. She succeeded, and now stands
the type (if the paradox be permitted) of the
Westernized Oriental nation. In Japan, there
fore, to greater advantage than elsewhere, may
be studied the results — so, far as they go— of that
meeting of East and West which poets and pub
licists have declared impossible.
As representative of modern, commercial
Japan in its relations with the outside world— as
imprints of the West upon the East— the former
treaty-ports may be considered typical. These
settlements, with their brick-built warehouses,
offices, and shops on the flat, their cosy bunga
lows and villas on the overlooking ridge, might
pass for small provincial towns in the West, but
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Japan's Inheritance
for the vision of little Japanese policemen of great
dignity standing at the corners, or the rotund
Chinese cofnpradore complacently filling a riksha
drawn by a perspiring kurumaya half his size.
A few hundred yards off, and on all sides round,
lies the native or Japanese town — non-existent
fifty years ago, but now rapidly extending inland
and along the coast as means of communication,
in the shape of electric tramways, are improved.
In narrow streets, lined with diminutive wood-
and -paper houses mainly of one story, the
European taking his walks abroad may experi
ence the pleasurable sensation of hearing himself
called ijin -baka (foreign fool) by small, naked
children with babies on their backs, or may even
behold schoolboys in tunic and trousers complete
— with a weird imitation of the mortar -board
thrown in — forsaking their home-made jiujitsu
for the " A-mer-i-caine shinjo " (" American
present " — a blow with the fist), a term which
owes its origin to the brawls of sailors from'
foreign, and especially American, warships — only
too frequent in former times. A decade or so
ago, however, the foreign settlements, as such,
ceased to exist. They were officially renamed —
everything of any consequence is done " offici
ally " in Japan — and Consular Courts have given
place to Japanese tribunals, with a cumbrous and
dilatory procedure which gives the foreign resi
dent at least one genuine cause of complaint.
348

Where East meets West
What are the characteristics, mental and
moral, which the first contact of the Japanese
with the West has brought to the surface? Ah,
there's the rub ! Probably no nation on earth
has been so much discussed, no nation so little
understood. The globe-trotter sees them at
play ; he is frankly delighted, and says so — in a
book of many pages. The foreign trader sees
them at work ; he is offended, and proceeds to
relieve his feelings in the columns of the papers,
published in English, which flourish — like the
green bay -tree — in the former treaty-ports.
Now, there is no species of the animal man —
whatever his colour — the Japanese love more than
the globe-trotter. The American variety is
especially esteemed. In the mind of high and
low alike he is associated with illimitable wealth.
He visits their beauty-spots, makes their hotels
pay, falls an easy victim to the curio-dealer, and
is a perfect godsend to the licensed guide. Not
satisfied with these good works, he returns to his
native land and lauds Japan, and all that therein
is, to the very skies. Yes, the Japanese adore
the globe-trotter. But they hate the foreign
middleman, and having learned from him by
diligent study the secrets of the commercial
world, they have no further use for him. So he is
being squeezed out by degrees, the tariff and the
competition of the Japanese merchant affording
ready and efficient means for the end in view.
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Japan's Inheritance
One of the first effects of the opening of certain
ports to foreign trade was a flocking thereto' of
the least desirable elements of the native
population. The time-honoured prejudice against
trade caused the higher classes to hold aloof. In
this single circumstance we have the explana
tion of most of the disagreeable experiences re
corded by the earlier foreign arrivals — the
charges of greed, defective commercial integrity,
and what not. And the results of it survive, in
a measure, to the present day, though even
Japanese merchants as a class have long since
¦ recognized that honesty is the best policy, and
act accordingly. Nevertheless, the foreign com
munity, not without sin itself, is in no position to
cast stones. Fortunes were amassed in the old
days by foreign merchants in ways that will not
bear examination, but now lie naked to the know
ledge of their Japanese victims. Since the aboli
tion of extra-territoriality it has fallen to the lot
of the Japanese authorities to arrest and punish
foreigners for fraudulent transactions. A gross
case of barratry in which some members of one of
the largest foreign firms were concerned occurred
some years ago. An ancient sailing-vessel with
an over-insured cargo of rice was deliberately,
if clumsily, sent to the bottom off the coast of the
Kii Channel, the actual perpetrators of the crime
being subsequently tried and sentenced to life-
imprisonment. The moral of the affair was not,
35°

Where East meets West
of course, lost on the Japanese, who. for years
past had been held up to obloquy by foreign
publicists for lack of commercial probity.
The Japanese as a nation are somenvhat sensi
tive to criticism. No doubt the consciousness
that their adoption of Western ways and customs
leaves much to be desired does not diminish
this susceptibility ; but, be that as it may, the ill-
natured aspersions on things Japanese with which
the local foreign Press of anti-Japanese com
plexion delights to regale its clientele touches
them on the raw. It would surprise nobody if,
some day, one of these precious issues became
the subject of a disagreeable " incident." In
these circumstances the due presentation to the
world of the Japanese, as opposed to the local
foreign, view on all matters of international con
cern has for some years past assumed great im
portance in official eyes. A point has been made
of winning over to the Japanese side the most
important foreign correspondents and exponents
of opinion. One of their greatest hauls, in this
respect, was the late correspondent of the London
Times ; another was the representative of the
American Associated Press. Not content with
the unwearying defence of Japanese policy given
to the world by the former writer (who was also
the editor of the principal local foreign paper),
the Tokyo authorities founded, some dozen years
ago, another semi-official organ, published in
35i

Japan's Inheritance

English and edited by Japanese. With the same
object, newspapers pledged to uphold Japanese
interests have been established in Seoul, Peking,
New York, and San Francisco. No one will
deny that, in so doing, the Japanese are wise in
their generation. They might with reason con
tend that their Press Bureau, with its compre
hensive and widespread activities, is necessitated
by the anti-Japonicism of 'the local foreign
Press. Nations differing in colour and civilization
have met before, in various parts of the world,
without disaster to either. Immigrants have been
absorbed by the aboriginal inhabitants of an in
sular territory or of a continent, and vice versa.
In other instances the aborigines, preserving their
racial characteristics to the last, though out
numbered by the new-comers, have failed to
coalesce, and have suffered extinction. Is
coalescence by naturalization and intermarriage
possible, or practicable, between the nations of
the East and those of the West? If not, their
present rivalry, economic in its origin, cannot
but be intensified by racial ill-will.
Since the opening of the country, some twenty
thousand Europeans and Americans have resided
in Japan, for the most part in the former treaty -
ports. The cases in which papers of naturaliza
tion have been taken out may almost be
numbered on the fingers of one hand. In pre-
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Where East meets West
revision days, when white women were very few
and far between, it was not an uncommon thing
for the foreign resident to take unto himself
a Japanese wife, who (by way of putting the
best face upon the business ) was always " a
samurai's daughter." Marriage with a Japanese
woman is now exceedingly rare. In the eyes of
the foreign community such a union constitutes
a social blunder of the first order. Marriages
between Japanese men and European women are
even more rare, and, for reasons not far to seek,
almost invariably end disastrously.
Irregular unions are as common now as in the
early days. To be the mistress of a foreigner —
if only for a brief three years — is the ambition of
many a lower-class Japanese girl, to whom it
spells a life of luxury. While affording an inex
haustible theme for the Anglo-Japanese novelist,
these alliances lead in real life to situations the
reverse of romantic. The half-caste offspring
of unions contracted many years ago have a way
of obtruding themselves upon the present-day
family of some highly respectable leader of the
community, to the embarrassment of all con
cerned. They are also a source of worry to the
foreign Consuls, when questions of legitimisation
or adoption arise — though such cases represent
only the fortunate minority. These Eurasian
children take after the mother rather than the
European father, with black hair and eyes and
353 z

Japan's Inheritance

dark complexions. Though physically superior
as a rule to the purely native, they seem fated to
be despised both by foreigners and Japanese —
the latter of whom refer to them as Aino-ku
(barbarians). This is probably due to the belief,
which has no foundation in fact, that they inherit
the vices of both races. Similar conditions
obtain, in even more marked degree, in the open
ports of China. The additional argument against
the Chinese, from this point of view, is that they
lack, both in their persons and in their homes, the
scrupulous cleanliness of the Japanese. In Japan
and throughout the East the tendency is for
mixed marriages to decrease rather than to
increase in number. Even when the natural
obstacles of colour and custom are overcome,
public opinion arrays itself uncompromisingly
against the process.
The Japanese has the advantage of all other
Orientals in courage and versatility, but there
his superiority ends. He lacks, for example,
the more solid qualities of the Chinaman, who
has not in vain sat for centuries at the feet of
Confucius and Buddha — <, that steadiness and
reliability which are recognized in the Celestial
throughout the East. Nor shares he the China
man's almost patriarchal conservatism — that
aloofness from the petty strife of material things,
derived from an age-old belief in the superiority
of moral, as opposed to physical, force. I have
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Where East meets West
seen a small English boy of ten, when compelled
to dismount from his bicycle on the outskirts of
a treaty-port by reason of a crowd of Chinese
wayfarers to whom his advent seemed a matter of
no importance, rush in a passion at his obstructors,
kicking and cuffing right and left, and cursing in
two languages with a volubility that would have
astonished Biddy Moriarty herself. But this
ebullition was received with amused, good-
natured tolerance— regarded objectively, so to
speak, as a strange and interesting phenomenon
— even by those of its victims who bore on their
shins the marks of the little " foreign devil's "
boots. In a somewhat similar spirit, no doubt,
many a Chinese " boy " in a European or
American household submits with strange docility
to personal chastisement at the hands of his
foreign employer — a method of keeping native
servants " up to the mark " which has not wholly
gone out of fashion in the open ports of far
Cathay, but would not do at all in Japan. The
last thing to which the Japanese will submit is
indignity of any kind. Such high-handed treat
ment extended to him, if not requited at once
with violence, would involve an action-at-law
and a claim — usually successful — for substantial
damages for physical injuries. He considers
himself the equal, if not the superior, of any other
species of the genus man.
The mistake of all others which the white man
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Japan's Inheritance
makes in his dealings with the Oriental is the
assumption of superiority. Superior he may con
sider himself, but the consciousness of his high
estate should not appear. As it is, la morgue
anglaise has become the universal air of the
foreigner in the Far East. He settles in a foreign
land, draws from it a livelihood, and, at the same
time, treats its inhabitants as of a lower order of
creation. The foreign communities in China and
Japan, as embodiments of Occidental civiliza
tions, as microcosms of the West, might have
accomplished much towards bringing East and
West together. Who will say that they have
lived up to their opportunities? Backed by their
respective nations and the old appeal to force,
they indeed aroused the East ; but fifty years
of intercourse have widened, rather than bridged,
the gulf.
When the Oriental turns, a stranger, to the
White Man's land, how is he received? To the
East, wishing to return the unsolicited call of the
West, the latter is " not at home." After forcing
the East to open its gates and its markets, the
West adopts a policy of exclusion dictated by the
fear of competition, and defended on the ground
of an insulting and hypocritical suggestion of
racial unfitness. Thus in its dealings with the
East, the West breaks the golden rule. It does
not as it would be done by. The " open door " is
for the West, in the East. The " bang'd, barred,
356

Where East meets West
and bolted " door is for the East, when it goes
West. There it knocks in vain.
Some four hundred thousand Japanese are
abroad in foreign lands— nearly half of them in
Hawaii and the United States of America ; and
the number of Chinese is considerably greater.
Neither are welcome anywhere, partly because
of their vices, but rather, I fancy, for their
virtues. They are too plain -living, industrious,
and thrifty. Admittedly the Chinese make
excellent domestic servants. With all their
competence they are submissive, and show con
tentment with their lot. The Japanese, on the
other hand, is ambitious. His service is invari
ably the stepping-stone to something higher. He
saves, and before long blossoms out as a tenant-
farmer and even as a landlord. To some extent,
therefore, economic considerations, emphasized
by labour agitators, reinforce the aversion with
which they are regarded. In the United States
this is supplemented by suspicion of the Japanese
on the score of military training, which the
Yellow Press makes the basis of a periodical
" scare." But the real secret of the anti-Japanese
movement which has disgraced the Pacific slope
since 1906 is racial prejudice. Various pretexts
have been advanced to disguise the fact. First
it was the contaminating influence of Japanese
youths in the State schools. Then it was not
their moral obliquity, but that there were too
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Japan's Inheritance
many of them. Then they are declared to be
the advance-guard of a Japanese invasion.
Should a Marine Products Company lease land
in Mexico, it is for a naval station, and an
extension of the Monroe Doctrine is demanded
to cope with the new development. Any stick,
in fact, is good enough. The Japanese, being
yellow, carries his damnation in his face.
Although, in Oriental eyes, all Western nations
are tarred with the same brush of selfish incon
sistency, Germany and the United States of
America are the chief offenders. However re
signedly Old China may have viewed the Teutonic
descent on Kiaochou in 1898, Young China will
never rest till Shantung ceases to; be the Far
Eastern repository of the " mailed fist." That,
to the republican way of thinking, would be no
more than just retribution for German sympathy
and assistance extended to the Imperialists during
the Revolution. When the trouble was at its
height the compradore of a well-known foreign
firm in Shanghai was shot dead by a queueless
Chinese, who succeeded in making his escape.
The point of the affair was that the victim served
a German firm which supplied machine guns and
ammunition to the Imperialists at Hanyang. In
Japan, the Kaiser is remembered as the creator
of the " Yellow Peril," and Germany, accord
ingly, is held in general detestation . The part
played by her in the enforced retrocession of
358

Where East meets West
Liaotung will never be forgotten, or forgiven,
by the people of Japan. Strategically Germany
at Kiaochou is almost as much a thorn in the
side of the Island Power as Russia was at Port
Arthur ; and in any attempt to terminate the
" lease " long before its ninety-nine years are
expired, China will not need to act alone. Anti-
German articles form a feature of most Tokyo
papers, and I have even seen it suggested, in
one of these, that the anti-Japanese legislation
of the Californians is inspired by some of the
many Germans who have settled in the States.
America has mortally offended the East, in
the first place, by her policy of exclusion. How
much of the anti-Asiatic sentiment in the United
States is due to the fact that in the " black
fringe " about the Gulf of Mexico she has a
colour problem of her own, how much to the
invidious work of the trade unions, and how
much to the war -talk of the Hobsons is her affair.
The Asiatic knows that he is barred from the
Land of Liberty because he is not white. Many
of the ugly features of the anti-Japanese agita
tion could, if expedient, be ignored. Acts of
open interference with Japanese interests could
not thus be passed by. The Manchurian pro
posal of Secretary Knox falls into this category.
That a Power which persisted in crying " hands
off " in respect of one continent should demand
for itself participation in the affairs of another
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Japan's Inheritance
was enough ; that Japan should a second time
be deprived of the fruits of a costly war was
intolerable. " The race of Yamato," said a well-
known Tokyo publicist — his mind evidently hark
ing back to 1895 — "will know how to reply
to these Imperialistic interferences," and, under
the surface, the nation seethed. The Japanese
people have long entertained a kindly, almost
reverent, feeling towards America. Their dis
illusion is now complete. If these things be
done in the green leaf — when America is more
of an Atlantic than a Pacific Power — what will
be done in the dry, when the Panama Canal
reverses the situation and makes her two coasts
and her two fleets one ? Thus reasoning among
themselves, the men of the East regard with
growing suspicion the gathering of American
naval strength in the Pacific, and in their eyes
the fortifications at Hawaii, at Guam, and at
Manila begin to wear a sinister look.
It still remained for the other branch of the
Anglo-Saxon race to repair the breach, to give
the lie to the suggestion that the West looked
upon the East as nothing but the happy hunt
ing-ground of the political concessionaire. One
could always point to the Anglo -Japanese Alli
ance as an embodiment of equality and fair play
between the white man and his coloured brother.
In 191 1, however, England threw away a great
opportunity . 360

Where East meets West
The alliance, of which men had hoped that it
would prove the Magna Charta of the Yellow
Race, was reconstructed on a basis unfavourable
to Japan. While still securing to Great Britain
all the advantages of the former arrangement
—including relief from the necessity of main
taining a battle-fleet in Far Eastern waters — it
deprived Japan of England's assistance against
any Power with whom the latter might happen to
conclude a Treaty of Arbitration. Though in
the end the Washington Senate threw out the
Treaty in question, the mischief had been done.
The Japanese, of course, understood. Being
practical people, they accepted the arrangement,
on the principle that half a loaf is better than
no bread ; but intelligent Japanese, if they can
be persuaded to unbosom themselves, will con
fess that, in their view, it was the unkindest cut of
all. England (the people say among themselves,
while officialdom preserves the sphinx-like atti
tude appropriate to such occasions), called upon
to choose between her friendship for America
and her alliance with Japan, leaves her ally
naked to the foe.
All this prejudice and cold-shouldering— not
to say antagonism — can have but one effect. It
will drive the two chief branches of the Yellow
Race into a mutually defensive League. Such
a tendency is already visible in both countries.
Japanese statesmen have been wisely listening
361

Japan's Inheritance

of late to " the call of the blood." By skilful
diplomacy they have reduced to vanishing-point
the differences between the two countries. The
Japanese position in Manchuria does not consti
tute a bar to friendly relations with China. The
Chinese recognize that in resisting the advance
of Russia, Japan was fighting their battle as well
as her own ; that were it not for the stricken field
of Mukden and the unquenchable heroism of
Nogi at Port Arthur, Russia would be where
Japan is now. They admit that the position of
Japan in South Manchuria is but a small return
for her enormous sacrifice of blood and treasure
and for the untold service she has rendered to
the East. No bitterness therefore exists be
tween the two peoples. On the contrary,
increased intercourse is producing a better under
standing, based on mutual knowledge and
respect. The Japanese " man in the street," who
was wont to entertain for his Celestial brother
a certain measure of contempt, has begun to
realize that the Chinaman, if less martially
inclined, is a better man of business than
himself. Since the war, upwards of eight
thousand Chinese students have completed their
education in the Higher Schools of Tokyo and
Kyoto. Many of them, profoundly impressed
by the progress made by their neighbour in the
arts of peace and war, have returned to play
their part in urging their own countrymen to a
362

Where East meets West
new way of life— which, in its essence, is Japan's
way of life. As to the change in the form of
government in China, while the Japanese authori
ties would have preferred for obvious reasons
that even the shadow of a monarchy had been
retained, popular sympathy in Japan was on the
side of the Revolutionists. The Japanese, as
a whole, official and unofficial, would have pre
ferred—and still prefer— anything to the last of
all calamities — the partition of China among the
Powers of the West.
The real revolution that has taken place in
China is the recognition of the fundamental value
of material strength . Of all the lessons the East
has learned from the West, this is the greatest.
It is one with which Japan, taught by her own
history, is in the fullest sympathy. Nations in
whose eyes the profession of the soldier ever
ranked the lowest have learned that, for their
own security, they must call their sons to arms.
In preparing herself for self-support and self-
defence China will need assistance. As surely
as the flower turns towards the sun, she will turn
to Japan. Chinese warships are now being built
in Japanese yards ; Japanese officers are engaged
in the organization of the Chinese land forces,
and a Japanese expert has been appointed adviser
to the Department of Communications at Peking.
Already Chinese papers are urging that important
works of development in connection with mines
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Japan's Inheritance

and railways should be entrusted to Japanese,
rather than to, foreign, experts. And when the
hour strikes for the Middle Kingdom to shuffle
off the toils of Western tutelage, the opportunity
for which the more virile section of the Yellow
Race is waiting will have arrived.
For that supreme moment in the history of
the East the Japanese, on their part, are pre
paring. In a sense, Japan needs China more
than China needs Japan. China's immensity,
her vast reserve of map -power, will render her
valuable as an ally, formidable as a foe. While
China's immediate needs are military rather than
commercial, Japan's are commercial rather than
military. The two nations will, therefore, serve
as complements the one of the other. Just as
the Japanese look to the development of their
trade with China — and with the Yangtse Valley
in particular — to furnish the sinews of economic
strength, the Chinese are looking to the Japanese
to lay wide and deep the foundation of their
military strength and teach them the once
despised, but now essential, art of war.
No doubt the bare suggestion of an offensive
and defensive alliance between China and Japan
as one of the probabilities of the near future
will suffice to conjure up in many minds that
still uninterred bogy, the " Yellow Peril." The
simple fact that the two great branches of the
Mongolian race muster between them a third of
364

Where East meets West
the world's population wears, on paper, a most
portentous look. In the view of certain imagina
tive publicists — among whom history includes a
Royal orator — it has bred visions of yellow
hordes innumerable pouring from the East on to
the plains of Europe, to launch humanity upon
an Armageddon of race and colour in which sheer
weight of numbers prevails. Of this, however,
the world may rest assured — that if the " Yellow
Peril " ever materializes in the shape, or any
thing like the shape, its exponents assign to it,
the responsibility for the ensuing cataclysm must
be laid at the door of the West, and of the repre
sentatives of its civilization in the East. Aggres
siveness — the chief attribute of the West in its
dealings with the East — is utterly foreign to the
Chinese character ; prudence is the keynote of
the Japanese. The union — one might almost say,
the fusion — of the two races is inevitable ; but
only a keen and unquenchable sense of resent
ment — the memory either of material wrongs
inflicted or of accumulated insults endured — can
ever arm the East against the West, or precipitate
a war of hemispheres.

365

CHAPTER XX
A PEEP INTO THE FUTURE
Japan's mission — Nations "sunk in misery" — A momentous
step — The soul of Japan — The quest of the material —
Dangers of materialism, and of internal unrest — The
problem of the Pacific — Its real character — Hawaii and
the Philippines — Common ground for China and Japan
— The demand for equality — The hope of the East —
Is it peace ?
The Japanese believe that they have a mission
in the world. Agreement as to the scope and
character of that mission is not general, but such
differences as exist amount merely to a question
of degree. Some exponents of Japanese aims
give the mission a wider range ; others would
carry it a step farther. " The Japanese," said
the late Prince Ito, speaking in the first year
of the present century, " are the only people
in the Orient who understand the importance
and significance of two civilizations " ; and he
went on to say that in his view it was the " noble
mission " of Japan to play the part of an inter -
366

A Peep into the Future
mediary between the East and the West. By
acting at once as " the advocate of the East
and the harbinger of the West " Japan, he hoped,
might bring the two civilizations into harmony,
and, perhaps, evolve out of the twain a new
world of thought — a philosophy that would
appeal strongly and successfully to two -thirds
of the human race.
This was ten years ago, or more. Since then
many things have happened. There was, indeed,
the Anglo-Japanese Alliance to be set on the credit
side ; but, on the other, the war with Russia ;
the outbreak of anti-Japanese sentiment in the
United States, British Columbia, and Australia,
in the sequel of that war ; the attempted inter
vention of the United States between China and
Japan in the matter of the Manchurian railways ;
the annexation of Korea — undoubtedly hastened
by the American proposal ; the bowdlerization
of the Anglo -Japanese Alliance in response to
American sentiment ; and, last, but not least,
the revolution in China.
These happenings have not been without their
influence on Japanese thought and policy. As
a net result there has been a narrowing of the
high ideal, the noble ambition which the leaders
of Japanese thought had set before themselves.
No views are too long for the statesmen of the
Island Empire, but they are practical men, not
visionaries. There has been an awakening from
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Japan's Inheritance
the dream of Ito. The mediaries of the East,
rebuffed by the West, despair of its fulfilment.
Later, perhaps, if circumstances change for the
better, they may return with a new appeal ; but,
for the present, they are disposed to fall back
upon the lesser mission more recently set forth
by " the Sage of Waseda." l That is to take
a leading part in " the glorious work of civilizing
and developing two Oriental nations deeply sunk
in misery." If with this we couple a still later
utterance from the same exponent of Japanese
thought, the mission of Japan assumes a more
definite shape : " China is the true field for
Japanese expansion in the future."
One of these miserable nations has already
been drawn within the pale of the Japanese
polity- — unquestionably, for its own ultimate
good. No one who has studied the relations
between Korea and the three Powers interested
in its fate can have entertained any hope that
the independence of the ancient Hermit King
dom could have been much longer maintained.
In their treatment of the Korean population the
Japanese have erred, at times ; but, unless all
the omens are at fault, there will be fewer mis
takes in the future. On fthe whole, the prob
abilities are that the Koreans will fare better
as subjects of the Japanese Emperor than they
1 Count Okuma, so known because of his association with
the Waseda University, which he founded.
368

A Peep into the Future
would under Russian or Chinese rule, or under
the weak and corrupt administration of the
displaced dynasty.
The annexation of Korea was one of those
political acts the consequences of which will
reverberate through the ages. Japan's future
course cannot but be profoundly affected thereby.
To begin with, it has changed not only her
political status, but her whole relationship both
to the continent of Asia and to the Pacific area.
While still an island State, she has become a
continental Power, neighbour to two of the great
land-empires of the world. Her position re
sembles that of England under the fifth Henry,
when that island Power sought to hold sway
over the half of France — though, as we shall
see, there is an important difference. Stra
tegically, Japan may be the weaker ; she has
now a land-frontier to defend. Politically and
racially, it has strengthened her enormously.
Nevertheless, the very deliberation with which
the step was taken carries proof of its momentous
character. Japan held the peninsula in the
hollow of her hand for five years before annexa
tion was resolved upon. Her triumph over
Russia had brought her to the parting of the
ways. That the fateful course at length was
taken may be regarded as showing that Japan
had finally decided upon her future role. Destiny
called her to the leadership of the Orient,
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Japan's Inheritance
The better to fulfil it, she abandoned for ever
the old policy of isolation, and entered the lists
of Welt-politik a continental State.
Before speculating upon the future course of
Japan's foreign policy it will be necessary to make
an inquiry. Certain changes are now in pro
gress within her own borders. Will these
changes enhance or impair her fitness for the
task of guiding the political fortunes of four
hundred million souls? National character and
national stability are the prime requisites of a
directing Power. Will these be maintained at
the necessary high level in the future?
The soul of Japan is a highly complex affair.
It has been well defined as " the resultant of all
the religious and moral influences of the East."
That was the Japanese soul of fifty years ago.
Since then its composition has been profoundly
modified by the influences of the West. Allow
ing for the elevating but strictly limited effect
of Christianity, these influences have tended, on
the whole, to materialism and irreligion. Coming,
as they did, at a time of social and political up
heaval, they produced a state of moral flux, of
spiritual darkness and confusion, in which the
whole nation still walks. In what state will it
emerge when the fires of shifting circumstance
are passed? The answer to this question bears
closely on the whole future of the East.
When, a generation ago, the soul of Japan was
37°

A Peep into the Future
put into the melting-pot, it was in the form of
bushido. The term, of comparatively recent
coinage, signifies the creed of the bushi, or
samurai. The late Emperor himself defined it
as " the way of loyalty," pursuable as well by
the " peaceful citizen " as by the " soldier under
arms." Briefly, it embodies the principle of
putting country before self in all things. The
following stanza, written by a Japanese student
at the time of the Russian War, is considered by
Professor Lloyd " a good exemplification of
bushido in its modern applications "-:—
"When holy Peace on Eastern shores
Her mellow light once more outpours,
Then, the wise Trade-god's wand in hand,
We'll build the glories of this land.
But when upon the battlefield
Flashes the sword, to you we yield
The post of honour. Strike apace,
Brave scions of a martial race ! "
At the time when the samurai laid down his
two swords, his attitude towards commerce and
all that pertained thereto was one of contempt.
Already, therefore, in admitting the Trade-god's
share in the glories of the land, he has travelled
far. And if the samurai, without a pang, has
exchanged the sword which was his soul for
the soroban, how much more gross must have
become the spiritual darkness of the remaining
95 per cent, of the population !
371

Japan's Inheritance
The East has always been the home of the
Ideal. Esteeming the higher things of life as
of greater moment than the material, it has for
ages worshipped Thought rather than Action ;
it has given to the world its systems of religion,
philosophy, and ethics. Meanwhile the West,
exalting the Material, has pursued it unre
mittingly, till one might almost say, in the words
of the Evangel, that it has " gained the whole
world and lost its own soul." The feature of:
the New Age is this — that the East, laying aside
its quest of the Ideal, is going the way of the
West. Japan was the first to take the broad
road. Her youth of to-day is the most
materialistic on the face of this earth, and the
nation as a whole has embraced, not the Gospel
according to St. Matthew or St. Mark, but the
gospel of Mammon. " These are your gods, O
Israel ! " Such was the cry of the West to
the East. Having reached Yamato, it is now
being passed on to the Orient at large. Seeing
that Japan has accepted the new creed, and to
some purpose, the East en masse is flinging
philosophy to the winds, and is bowing down
to the same divinities of Trade, Wealth, and
Material Power.
For the East, as for the West, the issue will
be vast and strange. But if Japan is to main
tain her place at the head of the Oriental world,
she must beware. Materialism inclines to greed,
372

A Peep into the Future
and greed to an insensate ambition, which con
siders not the welfare of the subject race. Mere
exploitation of the " miserable nations " will help
neither Japan nor them. Even a Chinaman will
fail to see that exploitation at the hands of the
Japanese is any better than exploitation by a
Russian, a German, or a Britisher. Unless the
relation between the island people and their
continental kinsmen be one of co-operation for
the latter's good, the " mission " of Japan will
not succeed.
Nor will Japan succeed if there be unrest
within her borders. There is real danger in
materialistic ideas and theories of popular con
trol if their growth be too rapid. Unhappily,
the forces of conservatism have identified them
selves with those of militarism and the bureau
cracy — which is hardly in their favour. We have
seen how swift the spread of revolutionary ideas
in China, how sudden their denouement. Japan
cannot afford to run such risk. The Throne is
both the foundation and the crown of the
Japanese polity. All that is best in Japanese
national life— patriotism', self-sacrifice, courage in
the field, and a disregard for death which seems
to us sublime — all these spring from and are
bound up with the idea of loyalty to the Throne
and its sister grace of ancestor-worship. Any
weakening of these fundamental motives would
undermine the whole fabric of the State.
373

Japan's Inheritance

Socialism may suit China; it would mortally
hurt Japan. That this ill plant should grow is
inevitable. None can wonder that the authori
ties should determine to make a dwarf tree of
it, or blame them if they succeed.
The " problem' of the Pacific " is commonly
deemed a matter of ships and guns. Its scope,
however, is wider than at first sight appears . We
have it on the authority of Mr. Secretary Knox
that " the Far East is part of the problem1 of
the Pacific," and that the United States " views
with disfavour any extension of Japanese terri
torial influence in the outlying portions of the
Chinese Empire." But " the problem of the
Pacific " is more than naval and more than
territorial. It is racial. And, curiously enough,
the United States has done more than any other
Power to make it so. Generally speaking, the
eastern and southern fringes of the Pacific area
are tenanted by the white races, the western
by the yellow . The regions over which the white
man exercises lordship are sparsely inhabited —
some, indeed, are not inhabited at all ; and the
birth-rate in the countries which1 supply this
population tends to decrease. On the other
hand, the Japanese and Chinese lands are densely
peopled. The population of the Japanese
Empire, as a whole, increases at the rate of
three-quarters of a million annually. With
regard to China, no reliable returns are avail-
374

A Peep into the Future
able ; but assuming the ratio of increase to be
the same— it probably is greater— the population
of China is growing at the rate of five millions
annually. The disposal of this surplus Oriental
population, in view of the inadequacy and
hostility of the Occidental population, constitutes
the real problem of the Pacific.
There is a part of the Eastern Pacific where
the ascendancy of the White Race is not so pro
nounced . Throughout South America, where the
inhabitants are of mixed descent, the colour line
is drawn less hard and fast. The conditions
of life, the climate, and opportunities for work
are regarded as very favourable to Orientals,
and the at-present absence of race-feeling is,
of course, a great recommendation. Conse
quently emigration to several of the southern
Republics proceeds at a brisk rate. In contrast
with its voluntary restriction of emigration to
what is commonly known as " the Pacific slope,"
the Tokyo Government gives special encourage
ment to the South American branch of the Toyo
Kisen Kaisha, whose main line runs, under a
working arrangement with the Pacific Mail
Steamship Company, to San Francisco. Five
thousand Japanese have settled in Peru alone,
and many others are finding their way to Brazil,
Columbia, Chili, and Argentina. In view of this
movement every effort is being made in Pan-
American circles to persuade the Latin Republics
375

Japan's Inheritance

of South America to fall into line with the North
in their attitude towards Oriental immigration.
Even the Monroe Doctrine is enlisted for the
purpose. Those members of the Washington
Senate who make it their business to keep an
eye on the Far East in general, and Japan in
particular, introduced in June, 1 9 1 2, a resolution
to the effect that the United States would view
with disfavour the acquisition, even by private
corporations or individuals, of any land on the
American continent which might serve as a base
of operations, etc. Some such extension of the
famous Doctrine was in the opinion of these
Senators necessary because a Japanese marine
products company, which had secured fishing
rights for some distance along the Mexican
coast, had applied for the lease of a small piece
of land whereon to erect a factory. By such
means as this South America is also to be
dragged into the racial maelstrom.
The Pacific has been called " the Ocean of
the Future." That future is already with us.
On the one hand, the Panama Canal, an
accomplished fact, makes the United States, in
a very real sense, a Pacific Power. Austral
asia has also a fleet in being, with a trade and
policy of her own. On the other hand, China,
with a population more than double that of the
two Americas, is awake. Japan, her neighbour,
has reached the status of a World-Power.
37°

A Peep into the Future
Russia, resurgent from the disasters of 1905,
has not abandoned all hope of territorial and
commercial development in the Far East. Her
recent action in Outer Mongolia points to the
intention to make of her Trans-Siberian system
a pathway to Peking which for no part of its
course would pass through territory dominated
by another Power. Great Britain is still, on the
basis of trade, the greatest of Pacific Powers^
with immense possibilities before her. For all
the prize is wealth, by means of commerce. With
all force is the arbiter and ultimate weapon. So,
unless moderation and toleration prevail, com
petition, sharpened by racial enmity, must end
in strife.
Potentially, and on paper, the United States
holds the supremacy of the Pacific. But the vast-
ness of the area renders such supremacy relative.
To assert the command of the sea in Puget Sound,
and to assert it in the Far East, 5,000 miles
away, are two very different things. In Hawaii
and the Philippines America has given hostages
to fortune. Prior to their acquisition she was
practically invulnerable ; the mere possession of
these outlying dominions is a present source of
weakness. All the fortifications of Diamond
Head and Pearl Harbour cannot get over the
fact that a third of the population of Hawaii
consists of Japanese. The defence of the Philip
pines places the American fleet at a further dis-
377

Japan's Inheritance
advantage. Manila is but two days' steam from
Formosa. If a real Pacific coast " scare " kept
the greater part of the fleet in that part of the
theatre of operations, or it were decoyed in the
direction of Hawaii, the launching of an expedi
tion from Taiwan against the Philippines might
be accomplished with comparative ease. In
vasion, for either Power, presents almost insuper
able difficulties . Such advantage as there is rests
with the Japanese. Given the command of the
sea, they could occupy various points on the
seaboard of the Western States from which it
would be difficult to dislodge them. On the
other hand, invasion of Japan by American forces
is out of the question ; but there is a danger that
the entanglement of Japan in a struggle with
the United States might be regarded by Russia
as an opportunity for a war of revenge. In that
event, assuming that the Anglo-Japanese Alliance
still existed, Great Britain also would be involved.
This would mean the break up of the balance of
power in Europe, with consequences of the
gravest character to the peace of the whole
world. " How great a matter a little fire kindleth I "
All these appalling consequences may yet flow
from the suspicious, illiberal and intransigent
attitude of a single American State.
'Si vis pacem, para helium. The brutal doc
trine on which Western polities have been built
378

A Peep into the Future
up is penetrating the " myriad mind " of the East.
Japan, having proved its efficacy, intends to hold
f asf by her experience . China believes and, with
all a convert's zeal, will make up for her past
unbelief. With so vast a population to draw
upon and Japan's example before her, the intro
duction of conscription, even on a narrow basis,
gives immeasurable possibilities of power. In
her own borders she has already had good
schooling in the art of war. From a struggle
between North and South — should it come to that
— the Celestial millions would arise a different
nation, shaken into virility — a New China on a
military basis, a China prepared at last to give
practical recognition of the fact that, in opposing
Occidental discrimination against, and depres
sion of, the Yellow Race, Japan is fighting a
bigger battle than her own.
When the Yellow Race is in a position to
enforce its claim to equality by force of arms
it will be put on the same footing as the White
— not before. It will be of no use for Japan to
work for the uplifting of subject nations, only
to find that recognition as equals is still denied
herself and them. Since nothing less than
material power avails in diplomacy, her task will
be to bring the entire Yellow Race to such a pitch
of naval and military strength as will enable it
to demand equality from the West. The alter
native will be the policy of " Asia for the
379

Japan's Inheritance

Asiatics " and the expulsion of the white man
from the Orient.
This, then, is the destiny of Japan — by influ
ence, by example, by help to raise the East.
In this lurks no aggression ; from this need
flow no strife. But with nationhood comes pride,
which cannot abide contumely — and strength,
which can avenge it. All therefore depends
upon the West, upon its attitude towards the
risen, and the rising, East. Let it abjure the
lust of dominion, let it have done with racial
hate ; let it put forth the right hand of fellow
ship, that " the twain may meet " — in peace.
So may Japan press on to the fulfilment of her
larger mission.

380

INDEX

Adams, Will, grave of, 68
Ainus, of Yezo, 246-7
Akaishi (Koshu) Mts., 102, 105
Ama-no-hashidate, 71
Amaterasu (Sun-goddess), 13, 14
America, Japanese relations with,
359> 367
Amma (shampooer), 59
Andon (lamp), 295
Anglo-Japanese Alliance, 338 ; recon
struction of, 360
Arbitration Treaty, effect of, 361
Arima, spa, 210, 216
Asama, 162 et seq., 56 ; lava stream
of, 169, 57
Atami, 215 ; coast in vicinity of, in
Awaji, 15
Azumayama, 143, 145
Azusa valley, 89, 104
Bandaisan, 170 et seq., 143
Basaltic cliffs, 73, 240 ; " causeways,"
243
Basha, 47, 87
Bento, 45
Beppu, spa, 217
Biwa, lake, 93
Blindness, causes of, 295
Buddhism, 298
Bushido, 371
Camphor, 336
Cherry-blossoms, 285 ; under snow, 27
Chikuma valley, 54

381

Children, Japanese, 291
China, Japanese relations with, 362-
4; 379
Chochin (paper lantern), 179
Christianity, in Japan, 301
Chuzenji, lake, 94
Climate, 25 et seq. ; and health, 35
Coaling, at Moji and Nagasaki, 238
Coast scenery, n 1-2
Coasting steamers, 151 ; 248-9
Concubinage, 304
Constitutionalism, 326 et seq.
Country-folk, physique of, 266
Crater lakes, Hakone, 77 ; Kirishima,
no ; Shiranesan, 145 ; Oregon,
180 ; Tonami, 219
Daikan (great cold), 34
Daikon (radish), 26
Daimyo, 315-6, 258-9
Daiyagawa, 94
Deshima (Nagasaki), 228
Diet, Imperial, 320
Divers, 94, 269
Doyo (great heat), 34 ; 52
Earthquakes, 191 et seq. ; effect on
character, 23, 194 ; earthquake
weather, 195
Educational system, 294
Eino, spa, 221
Elections, parliamentary, 320, 321
Enoshima, 69
Erosion, rapid, examples of, 66, 113

Index

Fires, 206 ; 273, 287
Fishing industry, 266 ; bounty on,
267 ; in Korea, 341
Foreign settlements (former), 282-4
Formosa, 332 etseq.
Fortified zones, 309-10
Fossa Magna, 102, 107
Fuji, 114 et seq. ; mirrors of, 77, 95
Futami (Man and Wife Rocks), 73
Ganjusan, 137
Geisha, 306 ; 224, 232
Go-kinai (Five Home Provinces),
20 ; 282
Gold mining, in Korea, 340
Guides (annai), 39
Habu, crater-harbour, 152
Hachiman, Taro, 246
Hakodate, 243 ; 310
Hakone, district, 76 ; lake, 77, 95
Harakiri, 314
Harinoki Pass, 108
Hawaii, 377
Hayakawa (Hakone), 76 ; (Akaishi),
106
Heavenly spear, 239
Hibachi (fire-box), 30
Hibara, lake, 113, 175
Hibiya Park, Tokyo, 278
Hida Mts. (Hida-Etchu, or Japanese
Alps), 102, 104
Hideyoshi, Taiko, 329
Hodakayama, 102, 104
Horse's Bone (crater-lip), 238
Ideographs, 294
Immigration, Oriental, 356 et seq.
Inawashiro, lake, 93, 143
Inland Sea, 242 ; 101
Ishikari, river, 83
Ito, Prince, on Ministerial responsi
bility, 318
Izu Peninsula, 42 ; 88 ; 107, in ; 214

Japanese-English, 296-7
Jimmu Tenno, 14, 226
Jinrikisha, 47 ; invention of, 48 ;
rubber-tyred, 276
Jizo (god), 77
Junsa (policeman), 213, 223
Junsai, a succulent weed, 252
Junsai-numa, lake, 252
Kago (chair), 48
Kagoshima, Castle, 227 ; Gulf, 237
Kaimondake, 133, 182
Karuizawa, 56, 57 ; 212
Katsura, Prince, 326
Kawachi, battleship, launch of, 312
Kegon Fall, 109 ; 91
Kii Peninsula, 42, 79 ; 210
Kinkwazan, 70, 101
Kirifuri Fall, 92
Kirishima, range and spa, 182, 221,
251 ; crater-lake, no
Kisogawa, 84
Kitakami, river, 80 ; range, 112
Kobe, 19, 283
Komagatake (Koshu), 102 ; (Yezo), 251
Konsei-toge, 107
Korea, acquisition of, 337 et seq. ; de
velopment of, 340-1 ; effect on
Japan, 368
Koshu (Akaishi) Mts., 98, 102, 105
Kurile Is. (Chishima), 321
Kurobegawa, 89, 105
Kuroshiwo, influence on climate, 28,
80 ; on crops, 257
Kusatsu, 57, 58 ; 215, 218
Kuwanto Plain, 82, 271
Kyoto, 280
Kyushu, 225 et seq.
Lagoon (Hamana), 73 ; (Tonegawa),
82
Land, system of tenure 258-9
Lava stream, 169 ; 57
Lepers, 58 ; baths for, 218
Lotus, 36 ; 114, 115

382

Index

Maiko (young geisha), 306
Manchurian Railways, 229-30 ; 367
Marriages, mixed, 352-3
Materialism, pursuit of, 372
Matsuri (festival), 233 ; 168, 258
Matsushima, 70
Milne, Prof. John, on Oshima, 159 ;
on Bandaisan, 171 ; on earthquake-
proof buildings, 208
Mineral springs, 209 et seq.
Mission, Japan's, 366-8 ; 380
Missionaries, 300-2 ; 297
Mitsubishi Dockyard, 231
Miyajima, 71
Miyanoshita, 76 ; springs, 215
Monroe Doctrine, 376
Morality, 302 et seq. ; commercial,
349-5°
Motomachi, 21
Motomura (Oshima), 152
Motosu, lake, 95
Moxa, as means of punishment, 292
Muroran, 254
Myogisan, " cathedral rocks," 99
Nachi, waterfall, 90, 91
Nagasaki, 19, 231, 284 ; festivals, 232
el seq.
Nakasendo, 55
Nantaisan, 75, 94, 109
Nasu, volcano, 146 ; baths, 211, 215
Naturalist's (Blakiston's) line, 245
Naumann, theory of Oshima, 156
Nikko, 74 ; 66 ; waterfalls, 89
Noboribetsu, spa, 220
Nogi, his Invocation, 235 ; his sacri
fice, 314
Nunobiki Falls, 92
Nyubai (rainy season), 34, 37
Ogasawara (Bonin) Is., 330
Oigawa, 85
Ojigoku (Hakone), view from, 172 ;
(Tateyama), 219
Okinawa (Lu-chu), 332

Okuma, Count, 317, 368
Onuma, lake, no, 251
Ordeal, trial by, 236
Osaka, 272 ; 271
Oshima (Vries Island), 18, 150 ct seq.
Ota Dokwan, 271
Otodome (" noise-stopping ") Cas
cade, 90
Otonashigawa, 79
Pacific, problem of the, 374 et seq.
Passes (toge), height of, 107
Peking, 377 ; 352
Philippines, 377
Pit-dwellers, 246-7
Press Bureau, 352
Press, foreign local, 351 ; 297
Railway system, 42 et seq. ; -Manchu
rian and Korean, 229 ; Tokyo, 276
Rapids, Tenryugawa, 86-87 I Kuma-
gawa, 240
Rein, J. J., 237
Revolution, Chinese, 379
Rice, 261-2
Riots, tramway, 276 ; Constitutional
326
River scenery, 88-9
Romaji, 295
Sagami, scenery of, 67, 69
Saigo Takamori, 227
Sakurajima, 237 ; eruption of pumice
137 ; hot-springs, 217 ; sugar cane,
26
Samurai, 315-17
Sapporo, 83
Sasago-toge (tunnel), 46
Satsuma rebellion, 237, 316
Schist ranges, 100, 101 ; 65
Seiyukai, 324-7
Sendai, 286 ; bay of, 70
Sendai-Niigata line, 31
Shibu, spa, 214, 219 ; pass, 58, 108

383

Index

Shikotsu, lake, 83, 99, 254
Shimabara, gulf, ignis fatuus, 236
Shimonoseki-Fusan route, 45 ; 229
Shinanogawa, 81
Shinto, 298 ; 15
Shiobara, spa, 215
Shiojiri, pass, 107
Shiraito, falls, 90
Shirakawa, 183
Shiranesan (Kusatsu), geyser-like
activity, 145 ; composition of lakes,
147 ; (Nikko), 75, 94 ; (Koshu), 102
Shiribeshisan, 253 ; 147
Shuzenji, spa, 215
Silk industry, 262-4 i 55
Soft contours, 62 et seq.
Solfataras, 76, 210, 219, 250
Somna, of Oshima, 155 ; of Asosan,
182
Soul of Japan, 370
South America, emigration to, 375
Subsidence in volcanic regions, 143,
161, 184
Sugar-cane, 26
Suicide, 168, 314
Sulphur, industry, 250 ; 331
Suwa, lake, 54 ; skating contests on,
31
Takachiho, 238 ; 14
Tansan, mineral water, 217
Tarumai, 149 ; 254
Tea, varieties of, 262
Timber-felling, 84
Tobacco cultivation, 241 ; monopoly,
53
Tokaido, railway, 42, 44, 277 ; fifty-
three stages, 85
Tokonoma, 16, 50
Tokyo, 271 et seq.
Tonegawa, 82
Torii, limit of climbing for women,
136, 154 ; Torii-toge, 84

Toshima, cliffs, 151
Towada, lake, 93
Toya, lake, 93
Toyama, bay, in
Travel clubs, 264-5
Tsubuka, mountain, 68
Tsugaru, strait, 29, 243
Tsuri-bashi (rope bridges), 106
Tsuruga, 44 ; 230
Tsushima, strait, 29, 230
Tunnels (railway), 46
Unzen, spa, 219 ; volcano, 182, 236
Usui-toge (pass) and tunnels, 46 ; 60,
107
Vesuvian type of eruption, 144-5 >
lava, 169
Volcanic soil, fertility of, 241
Volcano Bay (Uchi-ura), 248, 253
Volcanoes, veneration of, 23, 134
et seq.
Wada-toge, 56
Waseda, university, 368
Water, a factor in volcanic action,
142-3
Waterfalls, 89-92
Yabakei, 73 ; 235
Yadoya (inn), 49
Yakegatake, 105, 147
Yamanaka Onsen, 179
Yarigatake (" Spear Peak "), 102, 104
" Yellow Peril," 364
Yokohama, 19, 282
Yorotaki (Filial Piety Cascade), 91
Yoshiwara, 279 ; motives of inmates,
305
Yulo-ing, as an exercise, 266
Yumoto, lake, 75 ; spa, 216
Yunotaki, 91

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