The Democratic advocate. [volume] (Westminster, Md.) 1865-1972, 1898-02-26
A PICTURESQUE JAPANESE IS.
LAND.
An Ideal Place Where Death Has
Never Come and Where Poesy
Dwells.

Miyajima is an inland midway in the
Inland Sea, lying so far within the bend
OF the Aki shore that it cannot be seen
from the route of the large ocean steamers
that pass through those enchanted waters
To reach it most appropriately one must
take one of the tiny coasting steamers
from Osaka, and, touching at dozen
quaint little ports on the matchless voyage,
at last see the mountainous green island,
with temple roofs showing here and there
through all the dense foliage of the heights,
and, standing far out in the water, heroic
tOrii, fit gateway to that ideal place where
death has never come; where religion and
landscape loveliness, legend and poesy,
still dwell; where the simple villagers, the
gentle old Shinto priests, and the tame
deer, protected by the gods and loved by
the people, maintain an atmosphere foreign
to the busy new Japan of railroads, par
liaments, imported military tactics, and
modern war-vessels Or one may take the
railway from Kobe to Hiroshima and then
jinrikisha for twelve miles along its bay,
and be ferried across narrow strait to this
isle of the blest, which will impress the
more with its Arcadian features when one
comes to it from all the bugling, parade,
and din of mimic war that goes on in the
shadow of Hiroshima picturesque castle
keep, and at its port Of Ujina, chief naval
station Of the empire, and, during that
victory year of 1894, port of departure of
transport ships to Corea and China. Then
one can accept the legend that Miyajima
grew from one of the congealed drops that
fell from Izanami' jeweled spear, and that
Itsukushima and her two sisters, daughters
of the god of the sea, aptly chose it for
their favors; that their temple rose from
and foated in from the sea, and that the
great water toril grew with the tides as
naturally as any coral reef.
There is small village at the foot Of a
green bank, but that is off by its common
place, profane self, and the temple is en-
bayed in an amphitheater of the hills, with
a shore and water foreground all its own.
On the shore line at the edge of the vii
lage noble tori of Oshima granite, each
pillar and crossbeam single stone, marks
the entrance to sacred ground and this
road, following the curve of the shore, is
lined for quarter Of a mile to the temple
with tall stone lanterns, the same align
ment of votive lights continuing for half a
mile along shore at the other side of the
great shrine.
The water tori is the unique and great
feature of Miyajima' $ shrine, and one
grows very familiar with it from its repre-
sentations by japanese artists in every line.
The colossus is formed of great beams,
each hewn from the single trunk of a cam
phor-tree, and strengthened at the base by
crossbeams joining low parallel columns
which give it balance and solidity and most
impressive effect. These beams are COW
cred below the water-line with such heavy
growth of barnacles and marine plants that
the tori seems very reasonably part of
the sea god kingdom and creating. This
skeleton gate in the sea is so delicate and
fairylike in first distant view, that one
is not prepared for its great size, and the
impressive sense of its proportions, when
one floats in between its great camphor-
wood piers, as massive and solid as mason
ry. Sculling through this notable gate
way, and across the water court of ap-
proach, at high tide, one may visit every
part of the temple, and penetrate to the
farthest labyrinth, passing beneath gale
ries and bridges, and floating before the
open fronts of the great shrines. The
galleries connecting the different parts Of
the temple have, strung along their leaves,
hundred of quaint little bronze and iron
lanterns, all votive offerings, as also are
the pictures that hang in line above them
and form a famous gallery Of ancient art,
IAN Island Without Death by Eliza
Ruhamah Scidmore, in the Century.