CHAPTER XVI
THE MAPLE LEAVES
The Japanese quite rightly give the name of Ko haru or Little Spring to the Indian summer, Keats’s season of mists and mellow fruitfulness; for indeed those beautiful weeks in November are incomparable, the heavy damp heat of the summer has lifted, the sky is clear and blue, the atmosphere is light, and the freshness of spring seems to have returned to revive the dying year. They say, “Here is the right end, since we had a right start.” These fortunate people who rejoice in the beauty of spring beginning with the plum blossoms born out of the frost, now have the autumn with the momiji or maple leaves to complete the floral season, and the red leaves will be the beauty of the maturing year. Autumn weaves her red and gold brocade and spreads it on mountain and tree, the whole country being alight with the scarlet
THE SCARLET MAPLE
and gold of the momiji; for not only the maples are called momiji, but any tree whose leaves turn red in their last moment of life.
Throughout the land there are favourite places where the holiday-maker holds his maple-viewing feast. The trees at Nikko are probably the first to turn, and by the middle of October this little mountain village will be visited by a throng of sight-seers, all bent on viewing the red leaves; and here truly not only the maples, but every tree seems to wear its mantle of autumn brocade, making a splendid contrast to the bronze green of the cryptomerias. The first touch of frost will have made the trees blush, so the Japanese say—it being a favourite expression of theirs, when a blush of modesty spreads over a girl’s cheeks, to say that “she scatters red leaves on her face,”—and then will come the first light fall of snow or a rude wind storm and scatter all the silent beauty of the valley. If you would continue your maple feast, you must go farther south, say to Oji near Tokyo, where you will find a whole glen filled with nothing but maples. No other momiji will dispute their fiery splendour; and there, in a little rustic tea-shed, you can sit and gaze at the gorgeous scene below, and wonder whether it is more beautiful to see the leaves like lace-work against the sky, or to look down on the great spreading branches shading the stream below. Here and there will be a tree that does not deserve the name of momiji, for it has no red leaves. Possibly it is a descendant of the celebrated maple-tree of the Shomeiji temple at Mutsuura, which turned a glorious colour when summer had scarcely waned, in order to earn the praise of the poet Chunagon Tamesuke, who went to seek the beauties of the early maple. The tree being fully satisfied with the admiration of the poet, remained green for ever after; for did not the poet say—
“How did this one tree thus get coloured?
This one garden maple-tree
Showing Autumn before the mountain trees!”
It is always said that the poetical spirit of Tamesuke moved the responsive heart of the maple-tree.