It was the Viscount's grandson who, when I showed him the photograph, called attention to that.
"Yes," he said, with a smile, "you have there the swords of Old Japan. But the watch-chain—that is an anachronism."
CHAPTER XVIII
Viscount Kaneko's Home—Some Souvenirs—A Rooseveltian Memory—Doctor Bigelow's Prophecy—A First Meeting with Roosevelt—The Russo-Japanese War—Luncheons at the White House—Roosevelt's Interest in the Samurai Tradition—Sagamore Hill—Mrs. Roosevelt and Quentin—A Simple Home—The President Brings Blankets—A Bear Hunt—The Peace of Portsmouth and a Bearskin for the Emperor—A Letter of Roosevelt's on Relations with Japan—A Letter from Mid-Africa—"American Samurai"
Never while in Japan did I feel quite so close to home as on the several occasions when I sat in the study of Viscount Kentaro Kaneko, in Tokyo, listening to his reminiscences and looking at his souvenirs of Theodore Roosevelt.
No Japanese has been more widely known in the United States, or more familiar with our ways, than Viscount Kaneko (Harvard '78), Privy Councilor to the Emperor, chairman of the commission which is engaged in preparing the history of the reign of the late Emperor Meiji, and president of the America-Japan Society of Tokyo.
I found him living in a good-sized but not ostentatious house, purely Japanese in architecture. But it was not purely Japanese in its equipment. Like the houses of other Tokyo gentlemen accustomed to see much of foreigners, it had carpet over the hall matting, rendering the removal of shoes unnecessary, and certain of its rooms were furnished in the Occidental style.
Such rooms, in Japan, usually are stiff reception-rooms which look as if they were used only when visitors from abroad put in an appearance; but Viscount Kaneko's study held a homelike feeling which made me think the room was frequented by the master of the house when no guests were present.