The Democratic advocate. [volume] (Westminster, Md.) 1865-1972, 1897-05-15
Idyllic Life in Japan.
From the centurv Magazine.

From the Century Magazine.
There is an isolated aristocratic quarter
of the village in the ravine behind the
temple, inhabited by priests and superior
folk; and the far ravine holds the Momiji,
or Maple-leaf, Tea -house-most bewitch-
ing cluster of doll-houses in the most pic
tuesque setting ever found in Japan.
There is the usual large living room, or
Office of the landlord, and general food
preparing room for the establishment
opening on the roadway; but within the
gates one finds deep, green glen, an aw-
ful chasm some fifteen feet deep and twice
as wide, all filled with delicate, airy
branches of cut-leaf naples. A terrible
torrent some two feet wide dashes madly
down from the mountain side, spreads out
into lake the size of large nner-table,
with wooden sauce-boat moored at one
side.
Each vantage-spot on the steep bank
holds one, two or three -roomed doll
house-such dainty, exquisite little toy
dwellings, with such fairy balconies, such
spotless screens and soft, shining mats, that
one hesitates to desecrate them with the
clumsy, defling, destructive appurtenances
of the simplest foreign living; and as for
himself fitting into one of these midget
mansions, it is Gulliver alive among the
Lilliputians. Our life in that glen of
maple-leaves was full of interest, from the
moment of slipping back the screens in the
morning with some anxiety lest the mite
of glen and its midget lake were not
there or real, rolled up over night, and
some other charming japanese drop-cur
tain put in its place, to the last banging
of the amados, or wooden outer screens,
at night
The deer were friends and neighbors
from the moment of our arrival, coming
to drink from the musical fountain jet in
our three -feet-square court of entrance,
and then to the edge of our porch to bob
their heads in well-mannered appeals for
deer-cake These pretty beggars, with
their lovely eyes, their sharp muzzles, and
delicate feet, seemed to know the value of
their charms, and having no fear of man,
had only to pose few moments to move
the stoniest and most indolent heart to wait
on them. 1t was even more idyllic in the
early morning to find some antlered friend,
or an equally fearless doe and her tiny
fawn, waiting by the lakeside to share our
breakfast.
After Miyajima one may well boast Of
having lived in Arcadia, and each day,
more idyllic than the other, puts one in
the better spirit for enjoying the rare Jap
anese charm of it all. The peace of the
island is as perfect as its piety, and few
sounds but the gentle dashing stream and
the futter of maple-leavcs disturbed our
enchanted little glen. One spoke softly,
as be6tted a place of such perfect beauty.
Neighbors came to the dollhouse across
the chasm, but only the rat-tat of their
pipes on the bamboo cups of the tobacco
trays was evidence of their presence there.
In that simple, intimate life there were
no mysteries, not even of the menu. All
the villagers who passed might stop and
watch our cook making his highly colored
curry for our midday meal; and the
peddlers who came to tempt the tea-hOuse
maids with gay kimono patterns watched
his strange concoctions, and sought pre-
texts to watch our further play with the
knife and fork as we sat at feast on our
little veranda over the lake. The small
boy of the tea-house added the comic ele-
ment, and his morning pursuit OF our din
ner chicken was always feature. He
would chase the angry hen around and
around the lake, and when it fled cackling
ND the bank, swift movement of his palm
across the lake would squirt such showers
of water on the rufled fowl as might soon
empty the whole vast deep and rob the
ravine of its choicest landscape ornament.
When the tea house staff had combined
against the hen, our majordomo would
bring the captive to us in his arm and dis
play the fine stew chicken.
There was solidity and an adamantine
fibre to the Miyajima fowls that resisted
ordinary cooking, and we commanded one
day that the bird should be divided at
every joint, the body quartered, and all
kept stewing for the three hours during
which we expected to be gone on an ex-
eursion. Summoned to see if all was right
we found the pallid, uncooked chicken
dismembered to the last joint; but the
whole puzzle had been neatly put together
again. and the bird wound over and over
with the closest network of fine spool-cOt-
ton-a strange travesty on that Gulliver
to whom we were always comparing our
selves.