Japan

AN ACCOUNT OF TRAVELS IN THE INTERIOR INCLUDING VISITS TO THE ABORIGINES OF YEZO AND THE SHRINE OF NIKKO

by Isabella L. Bird

A Japanese Ferry - A Corrugated Road - The Pass of Sanno - Various Vegetation - An Unattractive Undergrowth - Preponderance of Men.

We changed horses at Tajima, formerly a daimiyo's residence, and, for a Japanese town, rather picturesque. It makes and exports clogs, coarse pottery, coarse lacquer, and coarse baskets.

The Fatigues of Travelling - Torrents and Mud - Ito's Surliness - The Blind Shampooers - A Supposed Monkey Theatre - A Suspended Ferry - A Difficult Transit - Perils on the Yonetsurugawa - A Boatman Drowned - Nocturnal Disturbances - A Noisy Yadoya - Storm-bound Travellers - Hai! Hai! - More Nocturnal Disturbances

ODATE, July 29.

A Simple Nature-Worship - Aino Gods - A Festival Song - Religious Intoxication - Bear-Worship - The Annual Saturnalia - The Future State - Marriage and Divorce - Musical Instruments - Etiquette - The Chieftainship - Death and Burial - Old Age - Moral Qualities.

Having been recommended to leave home, in April 1878, in order to recruit my health by means which had proved serviceable before, I decided to visit Japan, attracted less by the reputed excellence of its climate than by the certainty that it possessed, in an especial degree, those sources of novel and sustained interest which conduce so essentially to the enjoyment and restoration of a solitary health-seeker. The climate disappointed me, but, though I found the country a study rather than a rapture, its interest exceeded my largest expectations.

by Lafcadio Hearn

"Perhaps all very marked national characters can be traced back
to a time of rigid and pervading discipline" - WALTER BAGEHOT.

by Lafcadio Hearn