The foundations of Japan

by J. W. Robertson Scott

We saw an extinct volcano called "Green Field Mountain." There was not a tree on it and it was said never to have possessed any. The whole surface was closely cut, the patches cut at different periods showing up in rectangular strips of varying shades. Wherever the hills were treeless and too steep for cultivation they were carefully cut for fodder. In cultivable places houses were standing on the minimum of ground. More than once we had a view of a characteristic piece of scenery, a dashing stream seen through a clump of bamboo.

When our basha stopped for the feeding of the horses, they had a tub of mixture composed of boiled naked barley, rice chaff, chopped straw and chopped green stuff. I noticed near the inn a doll in a tree. It had been put there by children who believe that they can secure by so doing a fine day for an outing. When we started again we met with a company of strolling players: a man, his wife and two girls, all with clever faces. We also saw several peasant anglers fishing or going home with their catch. A licence available from July to December cost 50 sen.

At a shop I made a note of its signs, the usual strips of white wood about 8 ins. by 3, nailed up perpendicularly, with the inscriptions written in black. One sign was the announcement of the name and address of the householder, which must be shown on every Japanese house. A second stated that the place was licensed as a shop, a third that the householder's wife was licensed to keep an inn, a fourth that the householder was a cocoon merchant, a fifth that he was a member of the co-operative credit society, a sixth that he belonged to the Red Cross Society, a seventh that his wife was a member of the Patriotic Women's Society,[ ^[188]] the eighth, ninth and tenth that the shopkeeper was an adherent of a certain Shinto shrine, a member of a Shinto organisation and had visited three shrines and made donations to them. An eleventh board proclaimed that he was of the Zen sect of Buddhism. Finally, there was a box in which was stored the charms from various shrines.

We passed a company of villagers working on the road for the local authority. The labourers were chiefly old people and they were taking their task very easily. Farther along the road men and women were working singly. It seemed that the labourers belonged to families which, instead of paying rates, did a bit of roadmending. The work was done when they had time to spare.

For some time we had been in a part of the country in which the ridges of the houses were of tiles. At an earlier stage of our journey they had been either of straw or of earth with flowers or shrubs growing in it. The shiny, red-brown tiles give place elsewhere to a slate-coloured variety. The surface of all of these tiles is so smooth that they are unlikely to change their hard tint for years. Meanwhile they give the villages a look of newness. Their use is spreading rapidly. Shiny though the tiles may be, one cannot but admire the neat way in which they interlock. One day when I wondered about the cost involved in recovering roofs with these tiles, a woman worker who overheard me promptly said that, reckoning tiles and labour, the cost was 60 or 70 sen per 22 tiles. In the old days tiled porticoes were forbidden to the commonalty. They were allowed only to daimyos who also used exclusively the arm rests which every visitor to an inn may now command. Besides arm rests I have frequently had kneeling cushions of the white brocade formerly used only for the zabuton of Buddhist priests.

In the county through which we were passing the fine water grass, called i, used for mat making, is grown on an area of about 78 chō. It is sown in seed beds like rice and is transplanted into inferior paddies in September. (The grass is better grown in Hiroshima and Okayama.)

I saw a beautiful tree in red blossom. The name given to it is "monkey slip," because of the smoothness of its skin, which recalled the name of that very different ornament of suburban gardens, "monkey puzzle."

During this journey we recovered something of the conditions of old-time travel. There were chats by the way and conferences at the inn in the evening and in the morning concerning distances, the kind of vehicles available, the character of their drivers, the charges, the condition of the road, the probable weather and the places at which satisfactory accommodation might be had. What was different from the old days was that at every stopping-place but one we had electric light. Part of our journey was done in a small motor bus lighted by electricity. Like the automobile we had hired a day or two before, it was driven—by two young men in blue cotton tights—at too high a speed considering the narrowness and curliness of the roads by which we crossed the passes. The roads are kept in reasonably good condition, but they were made for hand cart and kuruma traffic.

We passed an island on which I was told there were a dozen houses. When a death occurs a beacon fire is made and a priest on the mainland conducts a funeral ceremony. By the custom of the island it is forbidden to increase the number of the houses, so presumably several families live together. In the mountain communities of the mainland, where the number of houses is also restricted, it is usual for only the eldest brother to be allowed to marry. The children of younger brothers are brought up in the families of their mothers.

We passed at one of the fishing hamlets the wreck of a Russian cruiser which came ashore after the battle of Tsushima. Two boat derricks from the cruiser served as gate posts at the entrance of the school playground.