The appetite for foreign knowledge which Thunberg had noticed was also observed by Titsingh. “During my residence in Japan,” so he writes in the above-quoted Introduction, “several persons of quality, at Yedo, Miyako, and Ōsaka, applied themselves assiduously to the acquisition of the Dutch language and the reading of our books. The prince of Satsuma, father-in-law of the present Shōgun, used our alphabet to express in his letters what he wished a third person not to understand. The surprising progress made by the prince of Tamba, by Katsuragawa Hozan, physician to the Shōgun, and Nakagawa Junan, physician to the prince of Wakasa,[73] and several others, enabled them to express themselves more clearly than many Portuguese born and bred among us at Batavia. Considering the short period of our residence [he means, apparently, the stay of the Dutch embassy] at Yedo, such proficiency cannot but excite astonishment and admiration. The privilege of corresponding with the Japanese, above mentioned, and of sending them back their answers corrected, without the letters being opened by the government, allowed through the special favor of the worthy governor, Tango-no-Kami, facilitated to them the learning of Dutch.”
In 1786, the reigning Shōgun, Iyeharu, died, and was succeeded by an adopted son, Iyenari, who was his distant cousin, being a great-grandson of his great-grandfather. This prince was married to a daughter of the prince of Satsuma, and that is stated to have been a principal reason for his adoption, it being the policy of the Shōguns thus to secure the attachment of the most powerful princes. The reigning family is thus allied to the princes of Kaga, Satsuma, Yechizen, Nagato, and Ōshū, while the houses of Owari, Kishū, and Mito are descended from the sons of Gongen, from among whom, in case of failure of heirs, the Shōgun is selected. These princes of the first class, notwithstanding the jealous supremacy of the emperors, still retain certain privileges. According to Titsingh, they enjoy absolute power in their own palaces, with the right of life and death over their dependents; nor, in case they commit crimes, has the emperor any authority to put them to death. He can only, with the Dairi’s assistance, compel them to resign in favor of their sons.
In 1788, a terrible fire occurred at Miyako, by which almost the entire city, including the palace of the Dairi, was destroyed. The particulars of this event were communicated to Titsingh by his Japanese correspondents.
Early in 1792, the summit of the Onsen-ga-Take (High mountain of warm springs), in the province of Hizen, west of Shimabara, sank entirely down. Torrents of boiling water issued from all parts of the deep cavity thus formed, and a vapor arose like thick smoke. Three weeks after, there was an eruption from a crater, about half a league from the summit. The lava soon reached the foot of the mountain, and in a few days the country was in flames for miles around. A month after, the whole island of Kiūshiū was shaken by an earthquake, felt principally, however, in the neighborhood of Shimabara. It reduced that part of the province of Higo opposite Shimabara to a deplorable condition, and even altered the whole outline of the coast, sinking many vessels which lay in the harbors. This is the event of the latest date mentioned by Titsingh. A plan of the eruption, furnished by one of his Japanese correspondents, also one of the eruption in Shinano in 1783, is given in the “Illustrations of Japan.”
The matter upon which Titsingh throws the most light is the marriage and funeral ceremonies of the Japanese, as to which he gives a translation, or rather an abridgment, of two Chinese works, received as authority in Japan, as to the etiquette to be observed on these occasions, at the same time noting the variations introduced by the Japanese.
The system of Japanese manners, being based on that of the Chinese, abounds in punctilios, and the higher the rank of the parties concerned, the more these punctilios are multiplied. This applies to marriages[74] as to other things. The treatise which Titsingh follows relates only to the marriages of what we should call the middle class (including merchants, artisans, etc.), who, though often possessed of considerable wealth, hold in Japan much the same subordinate position held prior to the French revolution by the corresponding class in France.
With persons of high rank, marriages are made entirely from family convenience; even with those of the middle class they are also much based on prudential considerations. Formerly, the bridegroom never saw the bride till she entered his house, which she does, preceded by a woman bearing a lantern, which originally served the bridegroom to catch his first glimpse of the bride, and, if he did not like her looks, the match might be broken off, and the bride sent home. “Such cases,” says Titsingh, “formerly occurred; but, at present, beauty is held in much less estimation than fortune and high birth,—advantages to which people would once have been ashamed to attach so much value, and the custom has been by degrees entirely laid aside, on account of the mortification which it must give to the bride. At present, when a young man has any intention of marrying a female, whom he deems likely, from the situation of her parents, to be a suitable match, he first seeks to obtain a sight of her. If he likes her person, a mediator, selected from among his married friends, is sent to negotiate a match. People of quality have neither lantern nor mediator, because the parents affiance the children in infancy, and marriage always follows. Should it so happen that the husband dislikes the wife, he takes as many concubines as he pleases. This is also the case among persons of the inferior classes. The children are adopted by the wife, who is respected in proportion to the number of which she is either the actual or nominal mother.”
Formerly the bride was not allowed, in case of the bridegroom’s death before the consummation of the nuptials, to marry again. A moving story is told of a romantic Japanese young lady, who, being urged by her friends to a second betrothal, to avoid such a sacrifice of her delicacy, cut off her hair, and, when that would not answer, her nose also. But this antique constancy has, in these latter depraved times,—depraved in Japan as well as elsewhere,—entirely disappeared, as well among the nobility as the common people.
The match having been agreed upon, the bridegroom’s father sends a present—nothing is done in Japan without presents—to the bride’s father. The bearer, accompanied by the mediator, delivers not only the presents and a written list or invoice of them, but a complimentary message also. For these presents a written receipt is given, and, three days after, the bearer and those who attended him are complimented by a counter present.
The following articles are then got ready at the bride’s house by the way of outfit: A white wedding-dress, embroidered with gold or silver; four other dresses, one with a red, a second with a black ground, one plain white; a fourth plain yellow; a number of gowns, both lined and single, and all the other requisites of a wardrobe, as girdles, bathing-gowns, under robes, both fine and coarse, a thick-furred robe for a bed-gown; a mattress to sleep on; bedclothes; pillows; gloves; carpets; bed-curtains; a silk cap; a furred cotton cap; long and short towels; a cloak; a covering for a norimono; a bag with a mixture of bran, wheat, and dried herbs, to be used in washing the face; also a bag of tooth-picks, some skeins of thin twine, made of twisted paper, for tying up the hair; a small hand-mirror; a little box of medicines; a small packet of the best columbac, for painting the lips; several kinds of paper for doing up packages; also paper for writing letters; a koto (a kind of harp); a samisen (a sort of guitar); a small chest for holding paper; an inkhorn; a pin-cushion; several sorts of needles; a box of combs; a mirror with its stand; a mixture for blacking the teeth (the distinguishing mark of married women in Japan, some blackening them the moment they are married, and others when they become pregnant); curling-tongs for the hair; scissors; a letter-case; a case of razors; several small boxes, varnished or made of osier; dusters; a case of articles for dressing the hair; an iron for smoothing linen; a large osier basket to hold the linen; a tub with handles; a small dagger, with a white sheath, in a little bag (thought to drive away evil spirits and to preserve from infectious exhalations,—a quality ascribed also to the swords worn by the men); complimentary cards, made of paper, variously colored, and gilt or silvered at the ends, to tie round presents; noshi, a species of edible sea-weed, of which small pieces are attached to every congratulatory present; silk thread; a small tub to hold flax; several slender bamboos, used in hanging out clothes to dry; circular fans; common fans; fire-tureens; and—what certainly ought to form a part of the bridal outfit of our city belles—a small bench for supporting the elbows when the owner has nothing to do! Several books are also added, poems and stories, moral precepts, a book on the duties of woman in the married state, and another—the very one we are now giving an abstract of—on the etiquette of the marriage ceremony. Two different kinds of dressing-tables are also provided, containing many of the above-mentioned articles; also a number of other housekeeping utensils.