The Portland daily press., 1893-11-28
THE sToDDARD LECTURE.
An Immense Audience Hears of the
Beauties of Japan-Yedo and Its Magni-
hcent Distances-Nikko, the Burial
Place of Japan's Statesmen.

An immense audience welcomed Mr..
John L. Stoddard last evening, when he
stepped out ON City hall:platform to tell
of the present beauties and ancient
glories of the Land of the .Shoguns.
The lecturer, after few felicitious words
of greeting to his Portland admirers,
called to mind the fact that three hun
dred and seventy years ago the great
navigator Magellan, first sailed around
the globe. Since that far off age the
time required for the Journey has been
reduced from years to months and from
months to days. Two hundred years ago
the man who had been around the world
was famous; hundred years ago he was
distinguished; today he is simply a globe
trotter." The lecturer then spoke of the
unchangeability of the East, and the fact
that it was as instructive nd,interesting
today as ever.
Mr.. Stoddard began his journey last
evening at the Canadian Pacific railroad,
with its great trestles, the level plains of
Manitoba, and their heaps of bleached
buffalo bones, the high peaks of the
Rockies and cliffs of the Selkirks and
Cascades.
Launched upon the Pacific in the
beautiful steamship Empress of Japan"
the journey is fully begun. The North
Pacific is cold, dismal and unfrequented.
When aroused it suggests the truth of
the japanese proverb, that a stormy sea
is an inch of hell"
The fine limbs and forms of the
Japanese boatmen and, the politeness of
the custom house officials first strike
the traveller upon landing. The jinriksha
is the first institution of the country to
attract attention. The invention of a
Yankee missionary who is now living in
an Old Mems home in Germantown, this
man-power riding gig has become the
great vehicle of the East. A witty
Chicagoan has called it the Pullman
car. For Is cents day the traveller is
drawn along at the rate of five miles an
hour by athletes who never tire.
After cursory glance at Yokohama,
his audience the world-famous statue
of Buddha, the largest work in bronze
ever fashioned by the hands of man. For
seven hundred years it's pure, passionless
features have represented to the Japanese
mind the divinity before whose shrines
more human knees bow than are bent
before those of any other religion. This
statue is fifty feet high.
By railroad the lecturer goes to Yedo,
Japan's capital. After incidentally re-
marking that Japan has 10000 miles of
railroad, Yedo, the city of magnificent
distances and /, 300, 600 souls, is described.
After speaking of the mysterious ability
of the Japanese to dwarf trees, he dis
played views Of miniature oaks, pines,
naples, ETC., from sixty to a hundred
years old, crooked, ssgnarled and aged, yet
only two feet high. This is an art the
Japanese have been practising for 1900
years. Some of these trees are handed
down from generation to generation.
The flowers and foliage of Japan made
one of the most impressive chapters of
the lecture.
The palaces of the Mikados, Shoguns,
feudal mobiles, the navy with its, modern
vessels and 12,5oo seamen, the schools,
the army of 1900 well armed men, the
wrestling matches, all superbly illus
trated, received the rapt attention of the
audience.
But the most impressive portion of the
lecture, both in matter and illustration,
was the description of the. sacred city of
Nikko, burial place of the most famous
statesman Of Japan. The Shogun's tomb,
the temples, the architecture, were the
themes of brilliant passages.