“It was a fresh and glorious world,
A banner bright that shone unfurled
Before me suddenly.”

I know not if the author of the above lines had ever been to Japan. I should think it very unlikely; and possibly the poet is but describing the scenery of his Cumberland home. In no disparagement of the beauteous country of the lake and mountain, yet we must confess that nothing there can compare with Japan’s natural magnificence.

All who have ever written of Japan, or who have ever visited its shores, are unanimous in the praise they bestow on its charms of landscape. Even rollicking and light-hearted tars, who, as a rule, are not very sensible to the beauties of nature, are bound to use “unqualified expressions of delight,” when that “bright banner” lies unfurled under their gaze. And of all this beauteous land no part of it is more beautiful than the bay of Ommura, in the month of May.

Coming towards Nagasaki, from the westward, is like sailing on to a line of high, rigid, impenetrable rocks, for, apparently, we are heading blindly on to land which discloses not the slightest indication of an opening; but, relying on the accuracy of our charts, and the skill of our officers, we assume we are on the right course. By-and-bye the land, as if by some magic power, seems to rend asunder, and we find ourselves in a narrow channel, with well-wooded éminences on either hand, clothed with handsome fir trees. Right in front of us, and hiding the view of the town, is a small cone-shaped island of great beauty. English is a weak language in which to express clearly its surpassing loveliness. This is Takabuko, or more familiarly, Papenberg, a spot with a sad and bloody history, for it was here that the remnant of the persecuted Christians, who escaped the general massacre in 1838, when 30,000 perished made a last ineffectual stand for their lives and faith. But to no purpose, for pressed to extremities by the swords of their relentless persecutors, they threw themselves over the heights, and perished in the sea.

The people are not altogether to blame for this barbarous and cruel persecution. Had the Jesuits been satisfied with their spiritual conquests, and not sought to subvert the government of the country, all might have gone well, and Japan, ere now, been a Christian country. But no; true to themselves and to their Order, they came not to bring peace, but literally a sword, and the innocent were made to suffer for the ambitions of a few designing priests.

The island passed, what a view presents itself! The long perspective of the bay, the densely wooded hills and lower slopes teeming with agricultural produce, rich corn-fields, ripe for the sickle; picturesque dwellings, hid in shadowy foliage, and flowers and fruit trees, to which the purity and rarity of the atmosphere lend a brilliancy of colouring and distinctness of outline, impossible to describe; the clear blue water, with here and there a quaint and curious-looking junk, resting on its glassy and reflecting surface; the town, sweeping around the shores of the bay; and, afar, the majesty of hill and vale; such, dear reader, is a weak and very imperfect word picture of the charming bay of Omura.

Recent events in Japan have taken such a remarkable turn, that history, neither ancient nor modern, presents no parallel with it. That we may have a more adequate conception of the Japan of to-day, it is absolutely necessary that we make some acquaintance with the Japan of the past.

Of the origin of the people we can gleam very little, except from the questionable source of tradition. Several theories are advanced to account for their existence here. One authority discovers in them the long-lost “lost tribes of Israel;” according to another, they are a branch of the great American-Indian family; both of which statements we had better accept with caution. Their own theory or rather that of the aborigines, the Ainos of Yeso, a race whom the indefatigable Miss Bird has recently brought prominently before the world states that the goddess of the celestial universe, a woman of incomparable beauty and great accomplishments, came eastward to seek out the most beautiful spot for a terrestrial residence, and at length chose Japan, where she spent her time in cultivating the silkworm, and in the Diana-like pursuits of the chase; until one day, as she stood beside a beautiful stream, admiring her fair form in its reflecting surface, she was startled by the sudden appearance of a large dog. Tremblingly she hid herself, but the dog sought her out, and, to her surprise, entered into conversation with her, and finally into a more intimate alliance. From the union of these two opposite natures according to this account the Ainos are descended.

One other tradition I will mention the Chinese which perhaps has something of the truth in it. According to it, a certain emperor of China, ruminating on the brevity of human life, and of his own in particular, thought it possible to find a means whereby his pleasant existence might be indefinitely prolonged. To this end he summoned all the physicians in his kingdom, and ordered them, on pain of forfeiting their heads, to discover this remedy. After much deliberation, one at last hit upon a plan which, if successful, would be the means of saving, at least, his own head. He informed the emperor that in a land to the eastward, across the Yellow Sea, was the panacea he sought; but that, in order to obtain it, it was necessary to fit out a ship, with a certain number of young virgins, and an equal number of young men of pure lives, as a propitiatory offering to the stern guardian of the “elixir of life.” The ship sailed, freighted as desired, and after a few days reached the western shores of Japan, from whence, you will readily imagine, the wily sage never returned. These young men and maidens became the ancestors of the Japanese race.

Their form of government was despotic in its character, and feudal in its system. The country was governed by a powerful ruler with the title of mikado “son of the sun” who was supported in his despotism by tributary princes, or daïmios. Of them the mikado demanded military service in time of war, and also compelled them to reside a part of each year in his capital, where quarters were provided for them and their numerous retainers in the neighbourhood of the palace. The visitor may still see whole streets in Tokio without a single inhabitant, the former residences of the daïmios’ followers, and the aspect is dreary in the extreme.

In addition to his temporal functions, the mikado has always been the great high priest of the Sintor faith. On the breaking out of a war with China, it was found that his attendance with the army would deprive the religion of its spiritual head, and so indispensable was his presence in the great temple, that such a deprivation would be little short of a calamity. In this dilemma, he called to his aid the general of his forces, an able warrior and a shrewd designing man, conferred on him the hereditary title of shio-goon, or tycoon, and despatched him at the head of the army to carry fire and sword into the coasts of China. This prince’s name was Tycosama, a name great in Japan’s history, and destined to become terrible to the Christians. As generally happens, when a clever soldier with a devoted army at his back is placed in such a position, he finds it but a step to supreme dominion, the army being a pretty conclusive argument in his favor. His first act was the removal of the mikado to the holy city, Kioto, where henceforth he was kept secluded, and hemmed in by so much mystery, that the people began to look upon their ancient ruler as little less than a god.

It will be readily imagined that the tycoons, by their arrogant assumption to the imperial dignity, made for themselves many enemies amongst the powerful daïmios. The disaffected united to form a party of reaction which, in the end, overthrew the tycoon, restored the mikado to his ancient splendour, and gave Japan to the world. In 1853, an American squadron, under Commodore Perry, came to Yokohama, and demanded a trade treaty with the United States. After much circumlocution he obtained one, thus pioneering a way for the Europeans. England demanded one the following year, and got it; then followed the other maritime nations of Europe, but these treaties proved to be of as little value as the paper on which they were drawn up.

The adherents of the tycoon displayed a bitter animosity against the foreigner, and especially a most powerful daïmio, the prince of Satsuma, who nourished a detestable hatred to Europeans. Through the machinations of this party, murders of foreigners, resident in Yokohama, were of almost daily occurrence, till at last the British consul fell a victim to their hatred. This brought matters to a head. In 1863, England declared war against Japan; blockaded the Inland Seas with a combined squadron of English, French, Dutch, and American ships, acting under the orders of Admiral Keuper, stormed and captured Simonoseki, and burnt Kagosima, the capital of the prince of Satsuma. Having brought the Japanese to their senses, we demanded of them a war indemnity, half of which was to be paid by Satsuma.

Five years passed. The mikado meanwhile had placed himself at the head of the reactionary party, pensioned the tycoon, and made rapid advancement in European manners and customs. In 1868, Satsuma and his party broke out into open rebellion against the mikado. But the prince’s levies were no match for the imperial troops, armed with the snider, and the result was the rebellion, after some sanguinary battles, was put down, the estates of the rebels confiscated, and the chief actors in the drama banished to distant parts of the empire.

There, dear reader, I am as glad as you that I have finished spinning that yarn. Now for the legitimate narrative.

Nagasaki, or more correctly Nangasaki, is a town of considerable magnitude, skirting the shores of the bay, and built in the form of an amphitheatre. On the terraces above the town, several large temples with graceful, fluted, tent-like roofs, embowered in sombre and tranquil pine groves, shew out distinctly against the dark background, whilst the thousands of little granite monumental columns of the burying grounds, stud the hills on every side, giving to Nagasaki almost a distinct feature.

Immediately ahead of the anchorage is the small island of Desima, the most interesting portion of the city to Europeans. Previous to 1859 it was the only part of Japan open to foreigners, and even then only to the Dutch, who, for upwards of 200 years, had never been allowed to set foot outside the limits of the island, a space 600 feet long by 150 feet broad separated from the main land by the narrowest of canals.

Japanese towns are laid out in regular streets, much after the fashion obtaining in Europe. The system of drainage is abominable, though personally, the people are the cleanest on earth, if constant bathing is to be taken as an index to cleanliness. The streets have no footpaths, and access to the houses is obtained by three or four loose planks stretching across the open festering gutters. As a natural result, small pox and cholera commit yearly ravages amongst the populace. Another great evil against good sanitation, exists in the shallowness of their graves. The Japanese have also a penchant for unripe fruits.

A native house is a perfect model of neatness and simplicity. A simple framework, of a rich dark coloured wood, is thrown up, and roofed over with rice straw. There is but one story, the requisite number of apartments being made by means of sliding wooden frames, covered with snow-white rice paper. The floor is raised off the ground about eighteen inches, and is covered with beautiful and delicately wrought straw mattresses, on which the inmates sit, recline, take their meals, and sleep at night. These habitations possess nothing in the shape of furniture; no fireplace even, because the Japanese like Chinese never use fire to warm themselves, the requisite degree of warmth being obtained by the addition of more and heavier garments. These abodes present a marked contrast to the Chinese dwellings, which, as we saw, were foul and grimy, whilst here all is cheerful and airy.

No house is complete without its tiny garden of dwarf trees, its model lakes, in which that curiosity of fish-culture, the many tailed gold and silver fish, are to be seen disporting themselves; its rockeries spanned by bridges; its boats and junks floating about on the surface of the lakes, in fact a Japanese landscape in miniature.

It seems the privilege of a people, who live in a land where nature surrounds them with bright and beautiful forms, to, in some manner, reflect these beauties in their lives. This people possess these qualities in an eminent degree, for a happier, healthier, more cheerful race, one will rarely see. Their children ridiculously like their seniors from wearing the same style of garment are the roundest, rosiest, chubbiest little pieces of humanity ever born. Everybody has a fresh, wholesome look, due to repeated ablutions. The bath amongst the Japanese, as amongst the ancient Romans, is a public institution; in fact, we think too public, for both sexes mix promiscuously together in the same bath, almost in the full light of day; whilst hired wipers go about their business in a most matter-of-fact manner. This is a feature of the people we cannot understand, but they themselves consider it no impropriety. A writer on Japan, speaking of this says: “We cannot, with justice, tax with immodesty the individual who, in his own country, wounds none of the social proprieties in the midst of which he has been brought up.” These bath-houses are perfectly open to the public gaze, no one evincing the slightest curiosity to look within, except, perhaps, the diffident sailor. It is very evident that Mrs. Grundy has not yet put in her censorious appearance in Japan, nor have our western conventionalities set their seal on what, after all, is but a single act of personal cleanliness. “Honi soit qui mal y pense.”

Their mode of dress is an embodiment of simplicity and elegance. Both sexes wear a sort of loose dressing gown, sometimes of silk mostly so in the case of the fair sex crossed over the front of their bodies, allowing the knee perfect liberty to protrude itself, if it is so minded, and confined to the waist by a band. But it is more particularly of the dress of the ladies I wish to speak. The band circling the waist, and known as the “obe,” is very broad, and composed of magnificent folds of rich silk, and tied up in a large quaint bow behind. A Japanese lady lavishes all her taste on the selection of the material and in the choice of colour, of which these bands are composed, and which are to them what jewellery is to the more refined Europeans. No ornament of the precious metal is ever seen about their persons. Their taste in the matter of hues is faultless; no people, I will venture to say, have such a perception of the harmonies of colour. Their tints are of the most delicate and charming shades the artist’s fancy or the dyer’s art can furnish, and often wrought in rich and elegant patterns. They are passionately fond of flowers, the dark and abundant tresses of their hair being always decorated with them, either real or artificial. Their only other adornments are a tortoise-shell comb of delicate workmanship, and a long steel pin with a ball of red coral in the end, passing through their rich raven hair. They use powder about their necks and shoulders pretty freely, and sometimes colour the under lip a deep carmine, or even gold, a process which does not add to their personal attractions. They wear no linen; a very thin chemise of silk crepe, in addition to the loose outer garment, is all their covering. But it must be remembered that the great aim of this people seems to be simplicity, therefore we wont too minutely scrutinize their deficiencies of costume; there is much to be said in its favour, it is neither immodest nor suggestive. The feet are clothed in a short sock, with a division at the great toe for the passage of the sandal strap. These sandals or clogs are the most ungainly articles in their wardrobe. A simple lump of wood, the length and breadth of the foot, about two or three inches in altitude, and lacquered at the sides, is their substitute for our boot. Their walk is a shuffling gait, the knee bent and always in advance of the body.

The married women have a curious custom now fast dying out of blacking their teeth and plucking out their eye-brows to prevent, as their husbands say, other men casting “sheep’s eyes” at them.

The males of the coolie class are very scantily clad, for all that they wear is the narrowest possible fold of linen around the loins; but, as if to compensate for this scarcity of rigging, they are frequently most elaborately tattooed from head to foot.

A Japanese husband does not make a slave of his wife, as is too often the case amongst orientals; she is allowed perfect liberty of action, and to indulge her fancy in innocent pleasures to an unlimited extent. Her lord is not ashamed to be seen walking beside her, nor does he think it too much beneath him to fondle and carry the baby in public. They are excessively fond of their children; the hundreds of toy shops and confection stalls about the streets bearing testimony to this.

The old custom of dressing the hair, which some of the men still affect, is rather peculiar. A broad gutter is shaved from the crown of the head forward, whilst the remaining hair, which is permitted to grow long, is gathered and combed upwards, where the ends are tied, marled down, and served over (as we should say in nautical phraseology) and brought forward over the shaven gangway.

One other custom I must mention, the strangest one of all: they have a legalized form of that vice which, in other countries, by tacit consent, is banned, but which even the most refined people must tolerate. But what makes it more strange still is, that no inconsiderable portion of the public revenue is derived from this source. The government sets aside a certain quarter in every city and town for its accommodation, gives it a distinct and characteristic name, and appoints officers over it for the collection of the revenues. I thought it not a little significant on landing for the first time in Japan to find myself and “rick-sha” wheeled, by the accommodating coolie, right into the heart of this quarter. The advances of the fair sex are likely to prove embarrassing to the stranger, for, before they are married, they are at liberty to do as they please, and do not, by such acts, lose caste or forfeit the respect of their friends and neighbours.

Here, as in the Indian Seas, our laundresses are men, the cleanest and quickest washers we have encountered in the voyage. As an instance of their despatch, they will take your bedding ashore in the morning, and by tea-time you will receive it ready for turning in, the blanket washed and dried, the hair teazed and made so soft that you would scarcely fancy it was the same old “doss” again.

Though the women do not wash our clothes, they do what is far harder work, i.e. coal our ship. We were surprised, beyond measure, to see women toiling away at this dirty, laborious calling. And the Japanese women are such little creatures, too! There was, however, one exception, a woman of herculean strength and limb, looking like a giantess amongst her puny sisters, and fully conscious of her superior muscular power. This lady, stripped to the waist as she was, would, I am sure, intimidate the boldest mariner from a too close acquaintance with her embrace. They belong to the coolie class, a distinct caste in Japan, wear a distinguishing badge on their clothing, form a community amongst themselves, and rarely marry out of their own calling.

At noon these grimy Hebes, Hercules as well, all tripped on board to dine, the upper battery offering them all the accommodation they required; each carried with her a little lacquered box, with three sliding drawers, in which was neatly and cleanly stowed her dinner rice, fish, and vegetables; taking out all the drawers, and laying them on her lap, with a pair of chop-sticks, she soon demolished her frugal meal. After a whiff or two at a pipe, whose bowl just contained enough tobacco for two draws, she was ready to resume her work.

The European concession occupies the most picturesque position in Nagasaki, from which city it is separated by a creek, well known to our blue-jackets, spanned by two or three bridges. On either side of this strip of water a perfect cosmopolitan colony of beer-house keepers have assembled, with the sole intention of “bleeding” the sailor, and upon whose well-known devotion, to the shrine of Bass and Allsop, they manage to amass considerable fortunes.

Before leaving Nagasaki I would ask you to accompany me to one of the temples, that known as the Temple of the Horse, being, perhaps, the best. It is rather a long distance by foot, but Englishmen, at least according to Japanese ideas, have too much money to walk when they can ride, so to keep up the national conceit, but more for our own convenience, we jump into an elegant little carriage, or “jin-riki-sha,” literally “man-power-carriage,” but in sailor phrase “johnny-ring-shaw,” or short “ring shaw.” Away we go, a dozen or more in a line, over the creek bridge, past Desima, which we leave on our left hand, and soon we are in the heart of the native city, and traversing what is popularly known as “curio” street. At this point we request our human horses to trot, instead of going at the mad speed usual to them, in order that we make notes of Japanese life by the way. We pass many shops devoted to the sale of lacquer ware, for which the Japanese are so justly famed, catch glimpses of unequalled egg shell, and Satsuma china, made of a clay, formed only in this neighbourhood, and which, thanks to the European mania for collecting, fetch the most fancy prices; get a view of silk shops, full of rich stuffs and embroideries. Here an artist tinting a fan or a silk lantern; there a woman weaving cloth for the use of her household and everywhere people plying their various callings on the elevated floors of their houses. I should say needle making amongst these people is a rather laborious undertaking, and one which requires more than an ordinary amount of patience. The wire has first to be cut the desired length, then filed to a point at one end and the other flattened ready for the eye to be drilled, and finally the whole has to be filed up and smoothed off, and all by one man. The Japanese are but indifferent sewers, all their seams exhibiting numerous “holidays.” Pretty children, with their hair clipped around their heads like a priest’s tonsure, sport around us, but are not intrusive. Each child has a little pouch attached to his girdle, which, we are informed, contains the address of the child’s parents, and also an invocation to the little one’s protecting god, in case of his straying from home. We meet with cheerful looks and pleasant greetings everywhere. The gentle and musical “o-hi-o,” “good day,” with its softly accented second syllable, and as we pass the earnest “sayonara,” the “au revoir” of the French, tell us very plainly we are no unwelcome visitors, whilst their bows are the most graceful, because natural, and therefore unaffected, actions it is possible to conceive.

We notice, too, that numbers of the males are in full European costume, which generally hangs about them in a most awkward manner, reminding one of a broom-handle dressed in a frock coat. Others, again, don’t discard the national dress altogether, but compromise matters by putting on, in addition to their long gown, a European hat and shoes, which, if anything, looks worse still. The ladies have not yet adopted the European style which, perhaps, they have sense enough to see, is far more complex and inconvenient than their own. Of this much I am certain that no mysterious production of Worth would be more becoming, or suit them better than their own graceful, national dress.

At our imperative “chop, chop,” jack’s sole stock-in-trade of that intellectual puzzle, the Chinese language, and which he finds equally serviceable this side the water, our Jehus start off like an arrow shot from a bow. What endurance these men possess, and what limbs!

After a pleasant half-an-hour’s ride, a sudden jolt indicates we are at our destination.

We alight at the base of a flight of broad stone stairs leading to the temple, and which we can just discern at a considerable altitude above us, peeping out of the dark shadow of a grove of firs. Arches of a curious and simple design, under which it is necessary to pass, are the distinguishing features of a kami or sintoo temple, and perhaps of Japan itself, as the pyramids are characteristic of ancient Egypt.

Two uprights of bronze, stone, or wood, inclined to each other at the summits, and held in position by a transverse beam piercing the pillars at about three feet from their tops. Over this again is another beam with horn-like curves at the ends, and turned upward, and simply laid on the tops of the shafts. The approaches to some of these temples are spanned by hundreds of such structures, which, when made of wood and lacquered bright vermillion, look altogether curious.

On the topmost stair, as if guarding the main entrance to the sanctuary, are two seated idols of the “god of war,” in complete armour, each with bow in hand and a quiver full of arrows over his shoulder, and protected by a cage work of wire. What certainly gives us matter for speculation, and causes us no little surprise, is to see the golden scales of their splendid armour, and even their ruddy lacquered faces, bespattered with pellets of chewed paper after the manner familiar to us as school boys; when not satisfied with the correctness of the geographers, we used to chew blotting paper to fling in recent discoveries on the wall maps. Do these people desecrate their idols thus? There is no desecration here. These little lumps of pulp are simply prayers, pieces of paper on which the priests have traced some mystic characters for the use of the devout, and which, because of their inability to reach the idol to paste the strips on, they shoot through the wire in this manner.

We now pass under the last arch, with its monstrous swinging paper lantern, into the courtyard of the temple. The first object which claims our attention is a bronze horse, from which the temple takes its name. The work of art for so it is reckoned would be more like a horse, if its tail were less suggestive of a pump handle. Near is a bronze trough filled with holy water, to be applied internally; and around three sides of the square numerous empty houses, which, on high days and holidays, are used as shops for the sale of sacred and fancy articles. Up a few more steps and suddenly we are on the polished floor of the temple, and standing amidst a throng of kneeling worshippers, with heads bowed and hands pressed together in prayer.

Their mode of procedure at these shrines seems something after the following: the worshipper first seizes a straw rope depending from the edge of the roof of the temple, to which is attached a bell, of that shape worn by ferrets at home, only of course on a much more gigantic scale; this is to apprise the slumbering god of the applicant’s presence. He then commences his petition or confession; places an offering of money in a large trough-like receptacle for the purpose; takes a drink at the holy water font, and departs to his home chatting gaily to his neighbours as he descends the steps. The whole business occupies about five minutes.

Sintoo temples have but little interior or body. All the worshipping is done outside on the beautifully kept polished floor. A notice in English reminds us vandals that we must remove our shoes if we would tread this sacred spot.

Within, is simplicity itself; a mirror and a crystal ball is all one sees; the former typical of the ease with which the Almighty can read our hearts; the second an emblem of purity. They worship the Supreme Being under the threefold title, which, strangely enough, we find in the Book of Daniel, by which we may infer they have no inadequate conception of the true God.

We leave the temple court by a different outlet to that by which we entered, and come out on a charmingly laid out garden and fish ponds, where are seats and tea houses for the accommodation of visitors. Each tea house has its bevy of dark-eyed houris, who use every wile and charm known to the sex, to induce you to patronise their several houses. To do the proper thing, and perhaps influenced by the bright eyes raised so beseechingly to ours, we adjourn to one of these restaurants. Removing our shoes a proceeding you are bound to comply with before entering a Japanese house we seat ourselves cross-legged, tailor fashion, on the straw mattresses I have previously mentioned, whilst an attendant damsel, with deft fingers, makes the tea in a little terra-cotta teapot, the contents of which she poured into a number of doll’s cups, without handles, on a lacquered tray. Other girls handed us each a cup, in which was a liquid not unlike saffron water in colour and in taste.

They use neither milk nor sugar, and the cups are so provokingly small, that it is only by keeping our attendant syrens under the most active employment, that we are at last able to say we have tasted it. With our tea we get some excellent sponge cake called “casutira,” a corruption of the Spanish word “castile,” said to be, until very recently, the only word of European etymology in the language. The Jesuits first introduced the cake from Spain, and taught the people how to make it. Whatever its origin, it is very good. You get chop-sticks handed you too, which, after a few ineffectual and laughable attempts to manipulate in the approved fashion, you throw on one side. After the decks are cleared the young ladies bring out their sam-sins, and whilst we smoke Japanese pipes, they delight our ears with an overture, which we pronounce excruciating in English, though with our eyes we say “divine as Patti.”

But we must not tarry longer here for the setting sun warns us it is time to get on board.

Our patient “steeds” are at the foot of the stairs, each ready to claim his rider. These fellows will stick to you like a leech; follow you about for hours, never intruding their presence on you, and yet seem to anticipate all your movements and wants.