(1) Since the time this letter to the Mail was written, a primary school has been established for the yama-no-mono, through the benevolence of Matsue citizens superior to prejudice. The undertaking did not escape severe local criticism, but it seems to have proved successful.
(2) Daikoku is the popular God of Wealth. Ebisu is the patron of labor. See, for the history of these deities, an article (translated) entitled "The Seven Gods of Happiness," by Carlo Puini, vol. iii. Transactions of the Asiatic Society. See, also, for an account of their place in Shinto worship, Glimpses of Unfamiliar Japan, vol. 1.
The foregoing extracts from my letter to the "Mail" tell the history of my interest in the Daikoku-mai. At a later time I was able to procure, through the kindness of my friend Nishida Sentaro, of Matsue, written copies of three of the ballads as sung by the yama-no-mono; and translations of these were afterwards made for me. I now venture to offer my prose renderings of the ballads,—based on the translations referred to,—as examples of folk-song not devoid of interest. An absolutely literal rendering, executed with the utmost care, and amply supplied with explanatory notes, would be, of course, more worthy the attention of a learned society. Such a version would, however, require a knowledge of Japanese which I do not possess, as well as much time and patient labor. Were the texts in themselves of value sufficient to justify a scholarly translation, I should not have attempted any translation at all; but I felt convinced that their interest was of a sort which could not be much diminished by a free and easy treatment. From any purely literary point of view, the texts are disappointing, exhibiting no great power of imagination, and nothing really worthy to be called poetical art. While reading such verses, we find ourselves very far away indeed from the veritable poetry of Japan,—from those compositions which, with a few chosen syllables only, can either create a perfect colored picture in the mind, or bestir the finest sensations of memory with marvelous penetrative delicacy. The Daikoku-mai are extremely crude; and their long popularity has been due, I fancy, rather to the very interesting manner of singing them than to any quality which could permit us to compare them with the old English ballads.
The legends upon which these chants were based still exist in many other forms, including dramatic compositions. I need scarcely refer to the vast number of artistic suggestions which they have given, but I may observe that their influence in this regard has not yet passed away. Only a few months ago, I saw a number of pretty cotton prints, fresh from the mill, picturing Oguri-Hangwan making the horse Onikage stand upon a chessboard. Whether the versions of the ballads I obtained in Izumo were composed there or elsewhere I am quite unable to say; but the stories of Shuntoku-maru, Oguri-Hangwan, and Yaoya O-Shichi are certainly well known in every part of Japan.
Together with these prose translations, I submit to the Society the original texts, to which are appended some notes of interest about the local customs connected with the singing of the Daikoku-mai, about the symbols used by the dancers, and about the comic phrases chanted at intervals during the performances,—phrases of which the coarse humor sometimes forbids any rendering.
All the ballads are written in the same measure, exemplified by the first four lines of "Yaoya O-Shichi."
Koe ni yoru ne no, aki no skika
Tsuma yori miwoba kogasu nari
Go-nin musume no sanno de
Iro mo kawasanu Edo-zakura.
The chorus, or hayashi, does not seem to be sung at the end of a fixed number of lines, but rather at the termination of certain parts of the recitative. There is also no fixed limit to the number of singers in either band: these may be very many or very few. I think that the curious Izumo way of singing the burden—so that the vowel sounds in the word iya uttered by one band, and in the word sorei uttered by the other, are made to blend together —might be worth the attention of some one interested in Japanese folk-music. Indeed, I am convinced that a very delightful and wholly unexplored field of study offers itself in Japan to the student of folk-music and popular chants. The songs of the Honen-odori, or harvest dances, with their curious choruses; the chants of the Bon-odori, which differ in every district; the strange snatches of song, often sweet and weird, that one hears from the rice-fields or the mountain slopes in remote provinces, have qualities totally different from those we are accustomed to associate with the idea of Japanese music,—a charm indisputable even for Western ears, because not less in harmony with the nature inspiring it than the song of a bird or the shrilling of cicadae. To reproduce such melodies, with their extraordinary fractional tones, would be no easy task, but I cannot help believing that the result would fully repay the labor. Not only do they represent a very ancient, perhaps primitive musical sense: they represent also something essentially characteristic of the race; and there is surely much to be learned in regard to race-emotion from the comparative study of folk-music.
The fact, however, that few of those peculiarities which give so strange a charm to the old peasant-chants are noticeable in the Izumo manner of singing the Daikoku-mai would perhaps indicate that the latter are comparatively modern.