The record-union., 1896-04-06
In the Mountains and Valleys Of Our
Anip0deS.
Life and Manners Compared With
Those of Europe Methods OPP
posite Our Own.

Village
that nestles at the foot of the most
picturesque mountains Of Japan one
scene of beauty and interest after an
other comes into view.
Although you may have an interest
ing novel on your lap very few of its
pages are read, for now the steep steps
to Shinto shrine attracts your atten-
tion; now a great Buddhist temple ap-
pears in a neighbOring grove; now a
gaudy funeral procession passes by;
now your train is dashing along the out
skirts of a straw-built japanese village;
now a group of rustic men and women,
wearing loose upper garments and
coarse blue tights, in the midst of their
farm work, gaze at the moving coaches
with wide-open eyes and mouth now
you are passing through a bamboo
grove; now you are attracted by group
of women and girls attending to the
silk worms or spinning the silk and
winding the thread; now you are watch
ing the crude process of grinding the
grain between great fiat rocks, or beat
ing the straw with rods; and thus. al
though your train has made only
twenty miles an hour, the trip seems too
short when the conductor unIocks your
coachdoOr and cries out "Nikko,"
SACRED SHRINES AND LEGENDS.
Nikko is especially noted for it's tenn
pies, which for their architecture, size
and costliness are as remarkabl as any
in Japan. Millions of dollars have been
spent in these buildings, and the curious
ornamental work, the hideously gro
tesque idols in bronze, the elaborate
wood-carvings of vines, flowers, birds
and beasts display the talent as we'll as
the superstition of the people
The front of one building is orna-
mented by the figures of three monkeys;
one with his hands over his eyes, that
he may see nothing bad; another cover
ing his mouth, that he say nothing that
is wrong, and the third holding his ears,
that he may hear nothing that may
offend his monkeyship. AT the en-
frances of these temples are great brass
gongs. and above them hang metallic
hammers with ropes attached.
When petitions are tc be offered most
unearthly noises are made to awake and
attract the attention Of the Deity. No
amount of clatter, however, is supposed
TO arrest the attention OF the god until
the worshiper casts into the open box
within the door his contribution Of
money.
There is an interesting legend, re-
minding us Of certain classic fable,
that is associated with the carvings on
these temples. The story goes that
this wonderful work was done by a
left-handed dwarf, and while he was
ornamenting the temples he fell in love
with beautiful girl of Nikko, who
spurned his addresses on account of his
deformity Of person. She was unyield-
ing, despite the evidences of his genius
and his tender pleadings; and, at last,
nearly heart-broken, he returned to his
native city, Tokyo where he carved
an image of his loved one, which was
SO perfect that the gods endowed it
with life, and the artist lived with it as
his wife all during his life in the en-
joyment of the greatest happiness.
MOUNTAINS AND MONKEYS.
Early in the morning we engaged
jinrikashas, and, with two men to each
vehicle, we passed out of the village on
a narrow road, with a dashing mount
ain stream on one side and the precip-
itous nights on the other. For eight
miles we ascended the steep and cir
cuitouS path, stopping now and then to
refresh ourselves at a teahouse or to
admire the mountain panorama.
We paused for quite a while before a
cataract, whose waters fell nearly a
thousand feet from the bluff to the
echoing chasm beneath, and watched the
great volume of water until it passed
into cloudy spray in its great leap.
At one time, as we looked out from a
bench before a teahouse, we could see
three great nights of mountain peaks,
rising one above the other, and down
the valley gorges before US three plung-
ing streams foamed over the great
powders of rock, turning in their ex-
cited rage into pale, quivering water
falls as they threw themselves reck-
lessly against the sides of the mount
aims into the valley below!
Suddenly one of my jinrikasha men
exclaimed in English that was more
euphonic than classic, ''Moonkee," and
there before us were six or seven Of
these comical little creatures as self
satisfied as any other Japanese could
possibly be. Whenever / look a monkey
in the face I think of the words of a
certain American professor, who, while
lecturing on evolution, seeing that the
class was inattentive to his words, ex-
claimed: Gentlemen, while / am dis
cussing the monkey desire you to look
me right straight in the facet
ONE OF JAPAN'S FIVE WONDERS.
The object of our mountain trip was
visit to the celebrated Chuzen-ji
Lake, which is one of the five wonders
of Japan.
Before reaching the mountain top
our path for mile or two lay through
snow several inches in depth, and as
we made a sharp turn there lay before
us the ripping face Of this beautiful
sheet of water, thousands of feet above
the village we had left some hours be-
fore.
No words. no brush can describe or
paint this transparent body of water,
lifted so near and rejecting SO per-
fectly the deep blue sky. and there
seems to be no satisfactory explanation
of this strange phenomenon in nature
a lake filling the empty cone of the
mountain.
In Virginia and in North Carolina
we find something of the kind, but they
are not so elevated and picturesque as
the Chuzen-ji.
CURIOUS CONTRASTS.
! noticed on this trip, more than while
was nearer the coast, how completely
the Japanese are our antipodes In many
respects and how opposite are many
CT their methods and manners.
The few horses they have are stalled
with their heads to the passageway
and their tails where we place their
heads, and they are shod with close
braided rice straw in the place of iron
shoes. We noticed that the carpenters