CHAPTER XXXII
Post-houses—Imperial Messengers—Inns—Houses—Their Furniture and Interior Arrangements—Bathing and Sweating House—Gardens—Refreshment Houses—What they provide—Tea.
“To accommodate travellers, there is, in all the chief villages and hamlets, a post-house, belonging to the lord of the place, where, at all times, they may find horses, porters, footmen, etc., in readiness, at certain settled prices. Travellers, of all ranks and qualities, with their retinues, resort to these post-houses, which lie at from six to sixteen English miles distance from each other, but are, generally speaking, not so good nor so well furnished upon Kiūshiū as upon the great island Nippon, where we came to fifty-six in going from Ōsaka to Yedo. These post-houses are not built for inn-keeping, but only for stabling and exchange of horses, for which reason there is a spacious court belonging to each; also clerks and bookkeepers enough, who keep accounts, in their master’s name, of all the daily occurrences. The price of all such things as are to be hired at these post-houses is settled, not only according to distances, but with regard to the goodness or badness of the roads, to the price of victuals, forage, and the like. One post-house with another, a horse to ride on, with two portmantles and an atotsuke, may be had for eight sen a mile. A horse, which is only saddled, and hath neither men nor baggage to carry, will cost six sen; porters and kago-men, five sen, and so on.
“Messengers are waiting, day and night, at all these post-houses, to carry the letters, edicts, proclamations, etc., of the emperor and the princes of the empire, which they take up the moment they are delivered at the post-house, and carry to the next with all speed. They are kept in a small, black varnished box, bearing the coat of arms of the emperor or prince who sends them, which the messenger carries upon his shoulder, tied to a small staff. Two of these messengers always run together, that in case any accident should befall either of them upon the road, the other may take his place, and deliver the box at the next post-house. All travellers, even the princes of the empire and their retinues, must retire out of the way and give a free passage to the messengers who carry letters or orders from the emperor, which they take care to signify at a due distance by ringing a small bell.
“There are inns enough, and tolerable good ones, all along the road. The best are in those villages where there are post-houses. At these even princes and princely retinues may be conveniently lodged, treated suitably to their rank, and provided with all necessaries. Like other well-built houses, they are but one story high, or, if there be two stories, the second is low, and good for little else but stowage. The inns are not broader in front than other houses, but considerably deep, sometimes forty ken, or two hundred and forty feet, with a Tsubo—that is, a small pleasure-garden—behind, enclosed with a neat white wall. The front hath only lattice windows, which, in the daytime, are kept open. The folding screens and movable partitions which divide the several apartments, unless there be some man of quality with his retinue at that time lodged there, are also so disposed as to lay open to travellers, as they go along, a very agreeable perspective view across the whole house into the garden behind. The floor is raised about three feet above the level of the street, and by jetting out, both towards the street and garden, forms a sort of gallery, which is covered with a roof, and on which travellers pass their time, diverting themselves with sitting or walking. From it, also, they mount their horses, for fear of dirtying their feet by mounting in the street.
“In some great inns there is a passage, contrived for the conveniency of people of quality, that, coming out of their norimono, they may walk directly to their apartments, without being obliged to pass through the fore part of the house, which is commonly not over clean, and makes but an indifferent figure, being covered with poor, sorry mats, and the rooms divided only by ordinary screens. The kitchen is in this fore part of the house, and often fills it with smoke, as they have no chimneys, but only a hole in the roof to let the smoke through. Here foot travellers and ordinary people live, among the servants. People of fashion are accommodated in the back part of the house, which is kept clean and neat to admiration. Not the least spot is to be seen upon the walls, floors, carpets, window screens, in short, nowhere in the room, which looks as if it were quite new, and but newly furnished. There are no tables, chairs, benches, or other furniture in these rooms. They are only adorned with some Miseratsie (?), of which more presently, put into or hung up in the rooms, for travellers to amuse their leisure by examining, which, indeed, some of them very well deserve. The Tsubo, or garden behind the house, is also very curiously kept, for travellers to divert themselves with walking in it, and beholding the beautiful flowers it is commonly adorned with.
“The rooms in Japanese houses have seldom more than one blank wall, which is plastered with clay of Ōsaka, a good fine sort, and so left bare, without any other ornament. It is so thin that the least kick would break it to pieces. On all other sides the room has either windows or folding-screens, which slide in grooves, as occasion requires. The lower groove is cut in a sill, which runs even with the mats, and the upper one in a beam, which comes down two or three feet from the ceiling. The beams in which the grooves run are plastered with clay of Ōsaka. The ceiling, to show the curious running of the veins and grain of the wood, is sometimes only covered with a thin, slight layer of a transparent varnish. Sometimes they paste it over with the same sort of variously colored and flowered paper of which their screens are made. The paper windows, which let light into the room, have wooden shutters on both sides, taken off in the daytime, but put on at night.
“In the solid wall of the room there is always a Toko, as they call it, or sort of cupboard, raised about a foot or more above the floor, and very near two feet deep. It commonly stands in that part of the wall which is just opposite to the door, that being reckoned the most honorable. Just before this toko two extraordinarily fine mats are laid, one upon the other, and both upon the ordinary mats which cover the floor. These are for people of the first quality to sit upon, for, upon the arrival of travellers of less note, they are removed out of the way. At the side of the toko is a Tokowaki, as they call it, or side cupboard, with some few shelves which serve the landlord or travellers, if they please, to lay their most esteemed book upon, they holding it, as the Mahometans do their Alcoran, too sacred to be laid on the ground. Upon the arrival of the Dutch, this sacred book of the landlord is put out of the way. Above is a drawer, where they put up the inkhorn, paper, writings, books, and other things of this kind. Here, also, travellers find sometimes the wooden box which the natives use at night, instead of a pillow. It is almost cubical, hollow, and made of six thin boards joined together, curiously varnished, smoothed, and very neat, about a span long, but not quite so broad, that travellers by turning it may lay their head in that posture which they find the most easy.[1] Besides this wooden pillow, travellers have no other bedding to expect from the landlord, and must carry their own along with them or lie on the mats, covering themselves with their clothes. In that side of the room next to the toko is commonly a balcony, serving the person lodged in this, the chief room, to look out upon the neighboring garden, fields, or water, without stirring from the carpets placed below the toko.
“Beneath the floor, which is covered with fine, well-stuffed mats, is a square walled hole, which, in the winter season, after having first removed the mats, they fill with ashes and lay coals upon them to keep the room warm. The landladies in their room put a low table upon this fire-hole, and spread a large carpet or tablecloth over it, for people to sit underneath, and to defend themselves against the cold. In rooms where there are no fire-holes they use in the winter brass or earthen pots, very artfully made, and filled with ashes, with two iron sticks, which serve instead of fire-tongs, much after the same manner as they use two other small sticks at table instead of forks.
“I come now to the above mentioned Miseratsie (?), as they call them, being curious and amusing ornaments of their rooms. In our journey to court I took notice of the following: 1. A paper neatly bordered with a rich piece of embroidery, instead of a frame, either with the picture of a saint done apparently with a coarse pencil, and in a few, perhaps three or four, strokes, wherein, however, the proportions and resemblance have been so far observed, that scarce anybody can miss finding out whom it was designed to represent, nor help admiring the ingenuity and skill of the master; or else a judicious moral sentence of some noted philosopher or poet, writ with his own hand, or the hand of some noted writing-master, who had a mind to show his skill by a few hasty strokes or characters, indifferent enough at first sight, but nevertheless very ingeniously drawn, and such as will afford sufficient matter of amusement and speculation to a curious and attentive spectator; and, lest anybody should call their being genuine in question, they are commonly signed, not only by the writing-masters themselves, but have the hands and seals of some other witnesses put to them. They are hung up nowhere else but in the toko, as the most honorable place of the room, and this because the Japanese set a great value upon them.