February 1.—I was fossil-cutting all morning. Aluminium, of all metals, seems to be forging ahead as the prize saw-maker.
February 2.—A dull day, so I didn’t go out exploring as I had intended, but snuggled into bed all the morning to counteract the cutting-machine, which is really rather wearing.
February 3.—At work all day on the fossils. Dinner at the P——s, after which I had to give the long-promised lecture on fossils to the Literary Society of Tokio. Naturally, to an audience in which missionaries played an important part, but little science was desirable. However, they seemed pleased to hear about the various adventures connected with fossil collecting.
February 4.—At work in the Institute over fossils all day. In the course of my walk to the Institute, which takes about forty minutes, I pass quiet streets which are little frequented by the foreigner. In all these months I have never yet met a single foreigner between my house and the Institute, though in other parts of the town they are common enough.
Every day I see something or other I long to record, and forget when it comes to writing this journal what it was.
The shops are now full of oranges. Small ones, like our “Tangerines,” but native grown, and seedless. They are sent to the shops in little boxes, universally the same size. How sensible the Japanese are about such things—in spots! But oranges are a little tedious, and there is really almost nothing else to be had but tasteless and expensive apples. This country is still in that primitive state when we can only get the fruits and flowers that are locally in season. Even well-off people, who at home could command strawberries in March and roses in December, must here eat the things at the time Nature intended. It has a certain charm but—I am a Londoner.
Another striking thing about this country’s products is the extraordinary richness and variety of the vegetation,—palms and pines, bamboos and magnolias, chestnuts and orange trees, rice and roses; the number of plant species in the little country of Japan alone exceeds that in all Europe. Also the number of species of birds and insects is extraordinarily great, and their brilliance and beauty quite unusual. Yet it has been said by one who knows the country, “The flowers have no scent, the fruit no flavour, and the birds no song!”
To this, I myself would add, “and the people no souls.” And in the whole saying there is truth enough to justify its existence, probably as much truth as there is in any saying, for in all our sheaves of words there are but a few ears bearing the grains of truth. Now I hasten to add that a spray of plum blossom in January scents a whole room with its fragrance; that the native-grown figs are the most luscious and sweet I ever tasted, and the nightingales’ thrilling melody to be heard even in the cities; while I have met men and women who are as the plum, the fig, and the nightingale. And yet on the whole, that hard saying is true.
February 5.—At the fossil workshop all day. Nearly every day in this clear weather I see the great Fujisan, its whiteness high up in the clouds on the horizon. The pearl of mountains, that, alas, I have not seen yet except from this great distance. From her superb height she looks down on this grey-roofed city, and I wonder if she sees in it all the things I see! The dirt, for instance, and the horrors of disease. I have praised so much in Tokio that I think you can bear to hear something of the other side, of the sights that sicken and appal. Of these, the ones that struck me first were the numerous children (only very young ones) with frightful eczema; the one that now haunts me is the sight of lepers. They are not allowed to live in the city, when in an advanced state of disease, but they are allowed to come in and beg. One may easily touch one by accident! To-day I was within a foot of one before I noticed it. They hold out their hands, with the fingers eaten away, gruesome sights, and mumble prayers for alms. Once one died, or nearly died, on the road, a crowd formed round, with a policeman on guard, but no one would touch it to give assistance.
On the whole, the Japanese do not fear leprosy nearly so much as we do, they say we over-rate its contagion; but how can they pretend to civilisation with such sights in their streets?