The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1892-07-10

even money as against any one else. Part
OF the taxes, 1t is said, lies by in the local
| procedures office as reserve fund against
lnundations. Yet, and this seems little
| confusing, there are between five and
seven other local, provincial. and NUM-
cipai taxes which can reasonably be ap-
| pied to the same ends. No one of these
taxes exceeds half of the land tax, unless
1t be the local prefecture tax of 2@ per
| cent.
In the old days people were taxed, or
| perhaps squeezed would be the better
word, to about one-half of the produce of
the land. There are those who say that
the present system is not as advantageous
as 1t looks. Beforetime the farmers, it is
true, paid heavily but only on their NOM
inai holdings. They could, and often did,
hold more land than they were assessed
on. Today rigid bureaucracy surveys
every foot OF their farms, and upon every
loot they have TO pay. Somewhat similar
complaints are made still by the simple
Peasantry OF India, for if there is one thing
that the Oriental detests more than
another, 1t Is the damnable Western vice
OF accuracy. That leads to doing things
by rule. Still, by the look of those ter
raced helds. where the water is led SO cum
nlngly from level to level. the japanese
cultivator must enjoy at least one excite
| ment. Ii the villages up the valley tam
per with the water supply there must
| surely be excitement down the valley, ar
| gument, protest, and the breaking of heads.
The days of romance, therefore, are not
| all dead.
This that follows happened on the coast
twenty miles through the fields from
okohama, at kamakura, that is to saw
where the great bronze Buddha sits facing
the sea to hear the centuries go by. He has
| been described again and again-his ma
Jesty, his aloofness, and every one of his
dimensions, the smoky little shrine with
In him. and the plumed hill that makes
| the background to his throne. For that
reason he remains. as he remained from
| the beginning, beyond all hope of descrip-
tomas 1t might be, a visible god sitting
| In the garden of world new made. They
sell photographs of him with tourists
standing on his thumb nail, and, ap-
parentty, any brute of either gender can
scrawl his or her ignoble name over the
inside of the massive bronze plates that
build him up. Think for moment of the
lndIgnity and the insult. Imagine the
ancient orderly gardens. with their clipped
trees, shorn turf, and silent ponds smok-
ing in the mist that the no: sun soaks up
after rain, and the green-bronze image of
the teacher of the law waverlng there as if
half seen through incense clouds. The
earth is all one censor, and mvriads of
frogs are making the haze ring. 1t is too
warm to do more than to sit on stone
! and watch the eyes that, having seen all
things, see no more-the down-dropped
eyes, the forward droop of the head, and
the colossal simplicity of the fold Of the
robe over the arm and knee. Thus, and in
no other fashion, did Buddah sit in the
old days when Amanda asked questions
and the dreamer began to dream of the
lives that lay behind him ere the lips
moved and as the Chronicles say: "He
fnt1 fo1a H. Al L
began, for dreamers in the East tell some
thing the same sort of tales today: "Long
ago, when Devadatta was king of Benares,
there lived virtuous elephant, a repro
bate OK, and a king without understands
ing" And the tale would end, after the
moral had been drawn for Ananda's
benefit: Now the reprobate OK was such
one, and the king was such another,
but the virtuous elephant was l myself
Amanda" Thus, then, he told the tales in
the bamboo grove, and the bamboo grove
is here today. Little blue and gray and
slate robed figures pass under its shadow.
buy two or three joss sticks, disappear into
the shrine. that is, the body Of the god,
come out smiling, and drift away through
the strawberries. A fat carp in pound
sucks at a fallen leaf with just the sound
of a wicked little worldly kiss. Then the
earth stearns, and steamS in silence and
gorgeous butterfly. full six inches from
Zlgzag of color and tlickers up to the fore
head of the god. And Buddha said that a
man must look upon everything as illusion
even light and color-the tlme-worn
bronze of metal against blue-green of pine
and pale emerald of bamboo-the lemon
sash of the girl in cinnamon dress. with
coral pins in her hair, leaning against a
block of weather-b leached stone-and last,
the spray of bloOd-red azalea that stands
on the pale gold mats of the tea house be-
meath the honey-colored thatch. To over
come desire and covetousness of mere gold.
which is often very viley designed, that is
conceivable; but why must man give up
the delight of the eve. color that rejoices,
light that cheers and line that satisfies
innermost deeps of the hearth All, if the
Bodkisat had only seen his own image.
At the entrance to the gardens there is
quaint little printed appeal, half pathetic
and half digniiied, put forward by the
priests of the place. for reverence and
decent behavior on the part of the visitors
1t might, perhaps, be done into rhyme,
something after this style:
Oh we who tread the narrow way
BY Tophct-flar to Judgement Day
Be gentle when the heather pray
To Buddha at Kamakura-
To him the Way, the Law Apart,
Whom Maya held beneath her heart,
Ananda's Lord the Bodhisat,
The Dlabutz, ~ OF kemakura.
For though he neither burns nor sees
Nor hears ye thank your Deites
Ne have not sinned with such these
His children nj kamaKura.
Yet spare us still the Western Joke
When Joss sticks turn 10 scented smoke
The little sins of little fox
That worship at kamakura
The gay-robed. ay-sashed butterflies
That hit beneath the Mgsters eyes
He is beyond the Mysteries,
But loves them ut kamakura-
And who so will, from Pride released
Despising neither man nor beast,
May hear the soul OF all the East
Breathe round him at kamakurA
Yea. every tale Amanda heard,
q. birth as fish or beast or bird
While yet IN Life the Master stirred,
The warm wind brings kamakura
With voice of every soul that chung
To life that strove from rung 10 rung,
When Dcvadatta's cuie WAS young,
IL worship at kamakura
Till drowsy eyelids seem to see
Far-faming meath her golden Utee
The shwe-Dagon flare easterly
From Burmah TO kamakura
And down the loaded air there comes
The thunder of Ihibetan drums
And droned 80 ON name pudBte hHns"-
worlds width from kamakura
Yet Brshmins rule Benares still,
Buddh Gayas ruins pit the hill,
And bee fed Zeaio,s threaten i'll
10 BuGda and kamakuEa.
tourists show. a legend told
a rustlug bulk OF bronze and gold
go l4ugI, ana scarce mucn. hold