Talking of catechism, I have been thinking of making a Buddhist catechism of a somewhat fantastic sort.
“How old are you?”
“I am millions of millions of years old, as a phenomenon. As absolute I am eternal and older than the universe,” etc.
Faithfully ever,
Lafcadio Hearn.
TO ELLWOOD HENDRICK
Kōbe, September, 1895.
Dear Hendrick,— ... I am waiting every day for the sanction of the minister to change my name; and I think it will come soon. This will make me Koizumi Yakumo, or,—arranging the personal and family names in English order,—“Y. Koizumi.” “Eight clouds” is the meaning of “Yakumo,” and is the first part of the most ancient poem extant in the Japanese language. (You will find the whole story in “Glimpses”—article “Yaegaki.”) Well, “Yakumo” is a poetical alternative for Izumo, my beloved province, “the Place of the Issuing of Clouds.” You will understand how the name was chosen.
If all goes well, and I am not obliged to return to America, I shall next year probably return to Izumo, and make a permanent home there. So long as I can travel in winter, I need not care about the weather. When my boy grows big enough, if I live, I shall take him abroad, and try to give him a purely scientific education—modern languages if possible, no waste of time on Latin, Greek, and stupidities. (Literature and history can be best learned at home; and the greatest men are not the products of schools, not in England or America, at least: Germany is an exception.) He might turn out to be very commonplace, in which case all plans must be changed; but I suspect he will not be stupid. He says, by the way, that he was a doctor in his former birth. It is quite possible, for he has my father’s eyes.