The road having brought them to the sea-shore, Thunberg observed the Fucus saccharinus, called by the Japanese Kombu, or sometimes Noshi. Cleansed and dried, it is eaten, though very tough, either boiled or raw,—in the latter case cut into strips, which are folded in little squares, a considerable number of which are usually strewed on the little tables, or salvers, on which the complimentary presents, so common with the Japanese, are offered. These presents, generally of trifling value, are always accompanied with a complimentary paper (so called), folded in a peculiar manner, and having slips of this fucus pasted to both ends of it.
The mountain, Fuji, was now in sight, and presently the mountainous tract of Hakone was entered, separating the bays of Tōtōmi and Yedo. It took a day to cross these mountains, which were covered with bushes and forest trees, and were the only hills in Japan, except those close to Nagasaki, which Thunberg was permitted freely to wander over and examine. “This day,” he says, “I was seldom in my norimono; but in the same degree as I eased my bearers of their burden, I rendered the journey troublesome to the interpreters, and more particularly to the inferior officers, who, by rotation, were to follow my steps. I was not allowed, indeed, to go far out of the road, but having been previously used to run up rocks in the African mountains, I frequently got to a considerable distance before my anxious and panting followers, and thereby gained time to gather a great many of the most curious and scarcest plants, which had just begun to flower, and which I put in my handkerchief.”
Among the trees growing in this tract was the Thuya dolebrata, planted everywhere by the road-side, tall, straight, and with leaves of silver-white on their under sides,—in Thunberg’s opinion the handsomest of the fir tribe. There were no less than six peculiar species of maple, all of great beauty. Cedars (Cupressus japonica), a common tree throughout the country, grew here in great perfection. The straightest and tallest of the firs, their trunks ran up straight as a candle, and, being both light and very durable, the timber was employed for all sorts of constructions, and also for cabinet work, the veins showing to advantage when covered with varnish. The wood of this tree, next to the Pinus silvestris, is that most employed by carpenters, etc. He also observed several species of oaks,[52] the common barberry, in full blossom, several species of the Vaccinia, or whortleberry, a wild pear-tree, a shrub with leaves so rough that they are used for polishing by the joiners, the Oryris japonica, bearing its flowers at the middle of its leaves; also, several beautiful flowering shrubs, Viburna, with double as well as single flowers, two species of Spirea, the Citrus tripoliata, and the Gardenia Florida, of which the seed-vessels afforded a yellow dye. The dragon lily (Arum dracontium), and the edible species of the same plant (Arum esculentum), the eddo, or tania, of the West Indies, and taro, of the Sandwich Islands (Caladium in more recent classifications), were cultivated in some spots.
By night the sea-shore was again reached, at Odawara, whence two days’ journey took them to Yedo, where they arrived, on account of the delay in the sea voyage, at a period unusually late, but which Thunberg notes as an advantage, since it gave him, both going and returning, a better opportunity to observe the vegetation of the country. During the journey there had been rain sometimes, but not too often, and the cold had been such as occasionally to make fires very comfortable. The Japanese, he observed, bore the cold better than the rain, which did not altogether agree with their bare feet and heads. For the feet they used only slippers of rice straw,[53] left at the door whenever they entered a house, consisting of a sole, without upper leather or hind-piece (kept on by a thong, or strap, held fast between the toes), and soon soaked and spoiled by the rain, on which occasion, indeed, high wooden clogs were sometimes substituted. Ordinarily, even while travelling, no covering for the head was worn, but in hard rains they used an umbrella, a hat of plaited grass, and a cloak of oil-paper, for which the poorer class substituted a piece of straw matting, thrown over their backs.
The weather, during a stay of twenty-six days at Yedo, from April 28 to May 25, was often damp, almost every day cloudy, with sometimes drizzling, and sometimes heavy, rain. Several slight shocks of earthquake were felt. Several fires occurred, which were soon extinguished. A great fire, during the Dutch visit of 1772, had burned from noon till eight at night, spreading over a vast space, and making it necessary to remove the Dutch three times.
Down to the day of audience, which did not take place till the 18th of May, the Dutch were not suffered to go out. Numbers of persons obtained, however, permission to visit them. The first who called were five physicians and two astronomers, prompted especially by Thunberg’s scientific reputation, which the interpreters had noised abroad, and who were very inquisitive on various points of science. The questions of the astronomers related principally to eclipses, which it appeared they could not calculate to minutes, and frequently not even to hours; but besides the difficulty of carrying on this conversation through interpreters, another arose, from the fact that Thunberg’s astronomy had grown a little rusty, and that neither he nor the Japanese had any books to which they could refer.
In matters of medicine[54] he felt more at home, especially as two of the Japanese doctors could speak Dutch,—one of them tolerably well. They also had some knowledge of natural history, collected partly from Chinese and Dutch books, and partly from the Dutch physicians who had visited Yedo, but who frequently had not been very well able to instruct them, as they were often, to use Thunberg’s expression, “little better than horse-doctors.” One of the two Japanese, quite a young man, was the emperor’s body-physician; the other, somewhat older and better informed, was physician to one of the chief princes. Both were good-natured, acute, and lively. They attached themselves to Thunberg with great zeal, coming to see him every day, and often staying late at night. Though wearisome with their questions, yet so insinuating were they in their manners and anxious to learn, that our traveller found much pleasure in their society. They had a number of Dutch works on botany, medicine, and surgery, and Thunberg sold them some others. They were particularly struck with the fine set of surgical instruments which he had brought from Amsterdam and Paris. These medical friends were of great use to him in his studies in natural history. Among the botanical specimens which they brought him were the pine of Europe (Pinus abies), of which, as well as of the Pinus silvestris, he had seen several on his journey to court, the chestnut, which he saw afterwards at Miyako, on his return, and the walnut (Jugulans nigra). They also brought him a variety of ores and minerals, and specimens of fishes and insects.
Reeling
