CHAPTER LXIX
NAGASAKI
August 10th.—Towards five o’clock in the morning our vessel glided into the verdure-framed harbour of Nagasaki, a dream of loveliness. High on the three sides rose steep green hills, clothed with forests of palm-trees. On our left the port stretched out, covered with a multitude of junks. Here is the home of Madame Chrysanthemum!
The town of Nagasaki glitters in the sunshine in the distance, buried in verdure. We exchange the habitual salutes with the Japanese men-of-war. One of them had hoisted the Russian flag. I sought refuge on the commander’s bridge, where the cannonade was less deafening.
A Japanese officer in full uniform, came in a canoe to welcome and bring us on shore. On the quay the Russian consul, Mr. Kostileff, was expecting us. We climbed up to the Hôtel Belle-Vue by narrow stone steps cut in the rock. The landlady, a respectable Frenchwoman of about forty, came hastening to receive the guests the steamer had brought her.
The hotel is surrounded by galleries on which all the bedrooms open. Our windows look out on the gulf, studded with a multitude of ships. Two British steamers are leaving for America to-night. I do not envy them!
A boy, speaking a few words of Russian, brought in tea with excellent cream and cakes. At Nagasaki the close neighbourhood of Russia is felt, a great number of natives speak our language.
I took refuge in my room from tailors, dressmakers and merchants of every kind, who besieged us the whole day smiling and curtseying at every step and eyeing each other mistrustfully. Here is a thick man entering our apartment with cat-like step, who with much drawing of breath, and bowing as low as his obesity permitted him, introduces himself laconically “Tortoise-shell man,” which means that he dealt in wares made of tortoise-shell. When he bowed himself off, another Jap, selling post-cards and pictures, comes in announcing himself “Photograph-man,” and so on.
We asked our Consul to dine with us. We were disturbed during the meal by the announcement that two sailors from the “Mandchour” were missed at the evening roll-call. Mr. Kostileff had to get up and make inquiries in the town.
We continue to have no news of the Nijni-Novgorod, the ship on which my husband’s aide-de-camp had embarked with all our household. We asked the consul to cable to Singapore and got the same reply: “No news.” We begin to get very anxious.