New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1918-06-23


lectureship at the University of Toxic
and never afterward left Japan. He
married japanese woman and became
naturalized citizen under the nume
Yakumo Koizum He died on Septem-
Der 26, 1904.
The frog, whose song of solitude"
has for centuries inspired Japanese
poets, is the subject of one OF Hearns
essays in "Exotics and Retrospectives
From it the following is reprinted:
IT appears that for more than eleven
i hundred years the Japanese have been
making poems about frogs, and it is at least
possible that verses on this subject, which
have been preserved in the Manyoshu, were
composed even earlier than the eighth CEN
fury. From the Oldest classical period to
the present day the tseme has never ceased
to be favorte one with poets of all ranks.
A fact noteworthy in this relation is that
the first poem written in the measure called
hokku, by the famous Basho, was about
frogs. The triumph Of this extremely brief
form of verse-(three lines of five, seven
and five syllables. respectively)-is to Gre
ate one complete sensation picture, and
Bashos original accomplishes the feat. diff
Furu ike va,
kawazu tobikomu,
Midzu no oto =.
cold pond-frogs jumping in-sound of
water.D An immense number of poems
about frogs were subsequently written in
this measure. Even at the present time pro-
fessional men of letters amuse themselves
by making short poems on frogs. Distin-
guished among these is q young poet known
TO the Japanese literary world by the
pseudonym of "Roseki," who lives in Osaka
and keeps in the pond of his garden hundreds
of singing frogs. At fixed intervals he in
vites all his poet friends to feast, with
the proviso that each must compose during
the entertainment, one poem about the in
habitants Of the pond A collection of the
verses thus obtained was privately printed
in the spring of 1897, with funny pictures
Of frogs decorating the covers and illus
tratng the text.
THOUGHT it strange that out of
II hundreds of frog poems collected for
me could not discover q single mention
OF the GOODNESS and clamminess of the frog.
Except a few testing lines about the queer
attitudes sometimes assumed by the creature
the only reference to its uninviting qualities
that could find was the mild remark:
Seen IN the daytime, hou uaintcresting
you are, oh frog'
While wondering at this reticence con-
corning the chilly Shiny, faccid nature Of
frogs. it all at once occurred to me that in
other thousands of Japanese poems which
had read there q total absence of allu-
sions to tactual sensations. Re-
membcring that the race has been living
for ages upon food which seems tasteless to
the Western palate, and that impulses to
such action as hand clasping. embracing,
kissing, or other physical display of the af-
fectioDate feeling are really foreign to Far
Eastern character, one is tempted to the
theory that gustatory and tactual sensa-
tions, pleasurablc and otherwise, have been
less highly evolved with the Japanese than
with us. but there is much evidence against
such theory, and the triumphs of Jap
anese handicraft assure US of an almost
Incompatible delicacy of touch developed in
special directions
Whatever be the psychological meaning
Of the phenomenon, it's moral meaning is of
most importance. SO far as | have been
able to Judge. Japanese poetry usually ig-
nores the inferior qualities of sensation,
while making the subtiest appeals to those
superior qualities which we call aesthetic
Even II representing nothing else, this
fact represents the healthicst and happiest
attitude toward nature. Do not We Occi~
dentals shrink from many purely natural
impressions by of repulsion de-
veloped through morbid tactual sensi-
bility? The question is at least worth CON
sidering. Ignoring or mastering such re-
yulsion--accepting naked nature as she is
always lovabie when understandable Jap
anese discover beauty whore we bindly
- - ~
someness-~beauty in insects, beauty In
stones, beauty in frogs. Is the fact without
significance that they alone have been able
to make artistic use Of the form Of the
centipedc? You should see my Kyoto
tobacco pouch, with ccntipedes of gold run
ming over its figured leather like ripplings
of firc