Part 20
About my name. Koizumi is a family name: I take my wife's name as her husband by adoption--the only way in which I could become a Japanese citizen. Koizumi means "little spring" or "little source." The other name means "many clouds," and is an alternate poetical name for Izumo, the "Place of the Issuing of Clouds." For I became a citizen of the province of Izumo, where I am officially registered. The word is also the first word of the most ancient poem in the Japanese language--referring to a legend of the sacred records. _Please do not publish this!_ it is a little private matter, and the whole explanation, though read at a glance by a Japanese, would require many pages to make clear. As to your other question, I always wear the Japanese dress at home or in the interior. In Kōbe or the large cities I wear Western clothes when I go on the street; because it does not do there for a man with a long nose to be too "Japanesey"--there has been a surplus of "Japanesey" display on the part of foreigners of the jocose class. I am Japanese only among Japanese....
And you have been very sick too. Do you know that I am often worried by the fear that one of us might die before we meet again? I very often think about you. Please take every care of yourself,--all the outing you can. I think, though, you are a long-lived tough race--you Bakers; and that Page M. Baker will be writing some day an obituary of Lafcadio Hearn that was,--with many pleasant observations which the said Lafcadio never deserved and never will deserve.
You think I am misanthropic--no, not exactly; but I do feel an intense hatred for the business class of Northern mankind. You know I never could learn much about them till I was ass enough to go North.... And you will remember that settled dislikes or likes come to this creature at intervals--never thereafter to depart. My last horror--one that I can scarcely bear--is what is called "business correspondence." That is why I say that I dislike the sight of typewriting--though I assure you, dear Page, I am glad to get a line from you written or printed in any way, shape, or form.
Ghosts! After getting your letter last night I dreamed. Do you remember that splendid Creole who used to be your city editor--whose voice seemed to come up from a well, a lover of music and poetry and everything nice? John----? Is it not a sin that I have forgotten his name? Next to yourself I see him, however, more distinctly than any other figure of the old days. He recited "The Portrait" of Owen Meredith in that caressing abysmal voice of his. Last night I was talking to him. He sat in a big chair in the old office, and told me wonderful things,--which I could not recall on waking; but I was vaguely annoyed by the fact that he "avoided the point." So I interrupted, and said: "But you do not tell me--you are dead--is there ..." I only remember saying that. Then the light in his eyes went out, and there was nothing. I woke up in the dark and wondered.
For six years in Japan I have been walking up and down--over matted floors--by myself, just as I used to do in that room you wrote me from. Curiously, my little boy has the same habit. It is very difficult to make him keep still at meal-time. He likes to take a nibble or sup of something, then walk up and down, or run, then another nibble, etc.--I hope the gods will save him from adopting other former habits of mine, which are less innocent, when he grows up:--for example, if he should take a foolish fancy to every damozel in his path. However, I expect that his mother's strong common-sense, which he seems to inherit, will counterbalance the fantasticalities bequeathed him by me.... It has only been since his entrance into this world that I fully realize what a "disgraceful person" I used to be.
I live pretty much alone--have no foreign friends and very few Japanese friends outside of my family, which numbers, however, a good many dear souls. How isolated I have managed to be you can imagine from the fact that sometimes for months no one sees me except home-folks. I work when I can; and when I cannot I bury myself in studies--philosophical studies: you can scarcely believe how they interest me now, and I find worlds of inspiration in them--new perceptions of commonplace fact. I try not to worry, and let things take their course. Probably next year I shall be leading a busier life; but I don't know whether Japanese officialism can be endured for any great length of time. I had one dose of it too much already. The people are the best in the world; the military and naval men are _men_, and generally _braves garçons_....
The old men are divine: I do not know any other word to express what they are. When you meet a horrid Japanese, though, there is a distorted quality about him that makes him a unique monster--he is like an awry caricature of a Western mean fellow, without the vim and push--solid contemptibility _in petto_. You can scarcely imagine what he may be. Every transition period has its peculiar monsters.
I wonder, wonder, wonder whether I shall see you again,--and walk up and down on that cocoanut matting,--and make noises through the speaking-tube leading to the composing-room. Perhaps I could make some sketches of American life better now--after having looked back at it from this distance of eight thousand odd miles....
LAFCADIO HEARN (Y. KOIZUMI).
TO SENTARŌ NISHIDA
KŌBE, April, 1896.
DEAR NISHIDA,--It made me happy to get your letter, and to hear from you that you think I am beginning to understand the Japanese a little better. My other books have had success in Europe as well as America;--the leading French review (_Revue des Deux Mondes_) had a long article about me; and the _Spectator_, the _Athenæum_, the _Times_ and other English journals have been kind. Still, I am not foolish enough to take the praise for praise of fact,--feeling my own ignorance more and more every day, and being more pleased with the approval of a Japanese friend than with the verdict of a foreign reviewer, who, necessarily, knows nothing to speak of about Japan. But one thing _is_ encouraging,--namely, that whatever I write about Japan hereafter will be widely read in Europe and elsewhere,--so that I may be able to do good. My first book is being translated into German.
I got a beautiful letter from Mr. Senke the other day, to which he has, I trust, by this time the answer,--in which I told him that I hope to see Matsue and Kizuki again in about another month. Setsu, mother, and the boy come with me. Kazuo is now much better--except morally;--he is more mischievous than ever. I want him to have as much of the sea this summer as he can bear. And I want to swim at Kizuki and Mionoseki, and to talk to you all I can--without tiring you.
I have been away. I have been at Ise, Futami, and nearly a week in Ōsaka. Ise disappointed me a little. The scenery is superb; but I like Kizuki better. At Ise there is so much money,--such enormous hotels,--such modernization: the place did not _feel_ holy to me, as Kizuki did. Even the _miko_ won't show their faces for less than five yen. Besides, it was bitterly cold, and hurt my lungs. I came back sick. Ōsaka delighted me beyond words. Excepting Kyōto, it is certainly the most interesting city on this side of Japan. And I could never tell you how Tennōji delighted me--what a queer, dear old temple. I went to Sakai, of course,--and bought a sword, and saw the grave of the eleven samurai of Tosa who had to commit _seppuku_ for killing some foreigners,--and told them I wished they could come back again to kill a few more who are writing extraordinary lies about Japan at this present moment. I would rather live a month in Ōsaka than ten years free of rent in Tōkyō.
Speaking of Tōkyō reminds me to tell you that my engagement with the university is not yet assured. Day before yesterday I had a letter from Professor Toyama that my becoming a Japanese citizen had raised a difficulty "which," he wrote, "we must manage to get over somehow." I wrote him that I was not worried about the matter, and had never allowed myself to consider it very seriously,--hinting also that I would not accept any low salary. What he will next write I don't know, and don't very much care. If Matsue were a little warmer in winter I should rather be teaching there. Indeed I think that even after a few years in Tōkyō, I should be asking to get back to Matsue; and in any event I hope to make a home there. If I can get such a _yashiki_ as I had--I mean buy one for my own home--Matsue would be a very happy place to work and study in. Besides, if my health keeps fair, I can hope eventually to be able to travel in the coldest winter months, and then the Matsue climate would make no difference for me. In summer it is delicious. Even Setsu now thinks it better to live in the interior; and I shall be glad to escape from the open ports. I have seen enough of the foreigners here, and like them less than ever.
I should certainly like Mr. Asai very much, from your charming account of him; and, at any rate, I expect to see both you and him within forty days from this writing. If you think he would like a copy of "Kokoro" it will make me very happy to send him one. As he has studied philosophy, however, I don't know what he will think of the chapters on the Idea of Preëxistence and the Worship of Ancestors. You know the school of thought that I follow is bitterly opposed; and I believe it is not honestly taught in any English establishment. In one or two American universities it is partly taught; but only the French have given it really fair attention abroad.
LAFCADIO HEARN (Y. KOIZUMI).
P. S. It made me feel queer to be addressed by Prof. Toyama as "Mr. Yakumo Koizumi"!
TO ELLWOOD HENDRICK
TŌKYŌ, May, 1896.
DEAR HENDRICK,-- ... Somebody (who, I do not know) has been sending me books. Did you send me a book by Richard LeGallienne? I thought Mrs. Rollins had sent it, and I wrote to her nice things about it, which vexed her into sending me a very sharp criticism of it (she _is_ a critic), and proving me to have praised a worthless book out of liking for the sender! Where am I? I am certainly wrong. I did think the book nice because of my belief that she sent it; and I am now equally convinced that it isn't nice at all, because she proved that it was not. I should certainly make a bad critic if I were acquainted with authors and their friends. One sees what does not exist wherever one loves or hates. As I am rather a creature of extremes, I should be an extremely crooked-visioned judge of work. I have not tried to answer Mrs. Rollins's letter--fact is, I _can't_.
No: the head on the title-page of "Kokoro" is not Kazuo, but the head of a little boy called Takaki. The photograph was soft and beautiful, and showed an uncommonly intellectual type of Japanese head. The woodcut is rather coarse and hard.--But I enclose a third edition of Kazuo: he is growing a little better-looking, but is not so strong as I could wish; and he is so sensitive that I am very much worried about his future. Physical pain he bears well enough; but a mere look, a careless word, a moment of unconscious indifference is fire to his little soul. I don't know what to do with him. If he shows the artistic temperament I shall try to educate him in Italy or France. With an emotional nature one is happier among Latins. I confess that I can only bear the uncommon types of Englishmen, Germans, and Americans,--the conventional types simply drive me wild. On the other hand, I can feel at home with even a villain, if he be Spaniard, Italian, or French. According to evolutionary doctrine, however, it seems not unlikely that the Latin races will be squeezed out of existence in the future pressure of civilization. They cannot hold their own against the superior massiveness of the Northern races,--who, unfortunately, have no art-feeling at all. They will be absorbed, I suppose. In the industrial invasion of the barbarians, the men will be quietly starved to death, and the women taken by the conquerors. History will repeat itself without blood and shrieks.
What is the present matter with American civilization? Nearly all the clever American authors seem to be women, and most of them have to go "out of town" for their studies of life. American city-life seems to wither and burn up everything. There is something of the same sort noticeable in England--the authors have to go out of England. Of course, there are some great exceptions--like James and Mallock. But how many great writers deal with civilized life as it is? They go to the Highlands, like Black and Barrie,--or to Italy, like Crawford,--or to strange countries, like Kipling;--but who to-day would write "A London Romance"? This brings up another question. What is the meaning of English literary superiority? It is all very well to howl about the copyright question, and the shameful treatment of American authors; but what American authors have we to compare with the English? Excepting women like Mrs. Deland and Miss Jewett and Mrs. Phelps, etc.,--what American writers can touch English methods? James is certainly our best;--so London steals him; but he stands alone. America has no one like a dozen,--nay, a score of English writers that might be named. It certainly is not a question of remuneration; for real high ability is always sooner or later able to get all it asks for. It must be an effect of American city-life, and American training, and American environment;--perhaps over-education has something to do with it. Again--English work is so massive--even at its worst: the effort made is always so much _larger_. Perhaps we do things too _fast_. The English are slow and exact. I am told that the other Northern races are still somewhat behind--always excepting great Russia. But in the France of 1896, what is doing? The greatest writers of the age are dead or silent. Is not our horrible competitive civilization at last going to choke all aspirational life into silence? After the Du Maurier school, what will even England be able to do? Alfred Austin after Alfred Tennyson!
These are my thoughts sometimes;--then, again, I think of a possible new idealism,--a new prodigious burst of faith and passion and song greater than anything Victorian;--and I remember that all progress is rhythmical. But if this comes, it will be only, I fear, after we have been dust for a century.
I feel this is an awfully stupid letter. But I'll write a better one soon. My best wishes for your big, big, _big_ success. They will be realized, I think.
Ever affectionately, LAFCADIO HEARN.
TO ELLWOOD HENDRICK
MIONOSEKI, IZUMO, July, 1896.
DEAR HENDRICK,--I have just had a most delightful letter from you. Your letters are full of witty flashes and curious observation. As they contain personal portraits, I make it a duty to burn them; but I regret it--like a destruction of the artistic. The rapid sketches they give of the most extraordinary bits of character, in the midst of the most extraordinary and complicated life of the century, are such as only one having your own most peculiar opportunities could make.
Do you ever reflect how much more of life you are able to see in one month than the ordinary mortal in twenty-five years? You belong to a purely modern school of travelling observers. Fifty years ago such experiences were not possible--at least upon any scale to speak of.
But why is it that the most extraordinary experiences of business men are never written? Is it because, like the scholarly specialist who knows too much about literature to make any literature, they see too much of the wonderful to feel it? The astounding for others is for them the commonplace,--perhaps. Or perhaps they are not sympathetic like your friend Macy,--have no inclination to apply the philosophy of relations to what they see and study?
I have been sick--eyes and lungs;--and now I am in an Izumo fishing-village to recruit. I swim in the harbour every day for about five hours, and am burnt all over in all colours, and getting thinner and stronger. There are no tables here, and I have to write on the floor.
With best love and felicitations, LAFCADIO HEARN.
TO SENTARŌ NISHIDA
AUGUST, 1896.
DEAR NISHIDA,--We got back on the night of the twenty-third. We had to wait a couple of days at Sakai; and I had some more swimming. Dr. Takahashi was very much surprised at my condition. He said that my lungs had become perfectly well, and that the swimming had brought out all the chest-muscles again in an extraordinary way--considering the time in which it had happened. He tells me to go to the sea whenever I feel pulled down again.
Sakai is a queer place for swimming. The currents change three times every day, and twice at least become very strong. One who cannot swim far has to be careful. Straws in the water show the way of the current near shore; but in the middle there are cross-currents going the other way.
There were eight foreign officers on the Meiji Maru. They were very kind to us. The captain (his name is Poole) was decorated with the 3d Order of the Rising Sun (I think) and got a present of $2000 for services during the war,--the transport-service, of course. He told me some very interesting things about the behaviour of the soldiery,--very nice things.
I felt unhappy at the Ōhashi, because you waited so long, and I had no power to coax you to go home. I can still see you sitting there so kindly and patiently,--in the great heat of that afternoon. Write soon,--if only a line in Japanese,--to tell us how you are.
Kaji-_chan_ remembers you, and sends his little greeting to Nishida-San no Oji-San. We all hope to have another summer with you next year.
Ever faithfully, with warmest regards of all,
LAFCADIO HEARN.
I still see you sitting at the wharf to watch us go. I think I shall always see you there.
[Illustration]
TO ELLWOOD HENDRICK
TŌKYŌ, 1896.
DEAR HENDRICK,--I am in immediate and awful need of books, and am going to ask you to put me into communication with a _general book-dealer_ to whom I can send P. O. orders, and who will mail me books directly on receipt of cash. It is hopeless ordering through local book-dealers,--not simply because of charges and errors, but because of enormous delays. On a separate sheet I enclose some titles of what I badly want for the moment; and I am sending some cash. This said, I promise not to trouble you further _except when I can't help it_. See what a nuisance I am!
You may well believe me in a hurry when I send a letter with such a beginning. Imagine my position:--a professor of literature without books, improvising lectures to students without books. I reached Tōkyō about seven days ago, and have not yet got a house,--but am living in a hotel. At present I can give you no valid impressions:--everything is a blur. But so far the position does not seem disagreeable--rather the reverse. In fact I am afraid to express my satisfaction,--remembering Polyxenes. The salary is 400 yen,--and in Japan, a yen is a dollar though it is only fifty-odd cents in America. Old pupils of Izumo and elsewhere gather round me, welcoming me, delighted--some needing help and winning it--some needing only sympathy. Professors far off, moving in separate and never-colliding orbits. I can teach for years--if I please--without ever seeing any of my colleagues. But Government favour, you know, is uncertain. The chances are that I shall hold on for three years at least.
When I heard last from you I was in Izumo. There I became very strong by constant swimming and starving,--Japanese diet takes all the loose flesh from a man in short order. My lungs got quite sound, and my miserable eye _nearly_ well.
I suppose that I partly owe this place to my books, and partly to Professor Chamberlain's kind recommendation. The Japanese seldom notice literary work,--but they have paid considerable attention to mine, considering that I am a foreigner. My ambition, though, is independence in my own home,--an old-fashioned _yashiki_, full of surprises of colour and beauty and quaintness and peace. And a few years abroad with my boy,--who is very mischievous now, and beats his father occasionally.--Curious, how much better the Japanese understand children than we do. You remember as a boy the obligatory morning _dip_ in the sea, no doubt. This no Japanese parents would inflict on their child. I tried it with mine, but the folks said, "That is wrong: it will only make him afraid of the water." Which proved true. Moreover, he would not allow me to come near him any more in the sea,--but used to order me to keep away. "Go away, and don't come back any more." Then the grandmother took him in charge; and in a week he was as fond of the water as I,--had overcome his fear of it. But it requires great patience to treat children Japanese-style,--by leaving them _almost_ free to follow their natural impulses, and coaxing courage by little and little.
Awful weather,--floods, wreckings, ruinings, drownings. I think the deforestation of the country is probably the cause of these terrible visitations. In Kōbe just before I left, the river, usually a dry sandbed, burst its banks after rain, swept away whole streets, wrecked hundreds of houses, and drowned about a hundred people. Then you know the tidal wave in the north--it was _only_ 200 miles long--destroyed some 30,000 lives. A considerable part of East Central Japan is still under water at this moment--river water. Lake Biwa rose and drowned the city of Ōtsu.
Isn't it almost wicked of me to have fought for a foreign salary under such circumstances?--especially while students come to tell me: "My father and mother have educated me thus far by selling all their property,--piece by piece,--even mother's dresses and our lacquer-ware had to be sold. And now we have nothing, and my education is unfinished--and unless it is finished I cannot even hope for a position. Teacher, I shall work six years to pay the money back, if you will help me." Poor fellows!--their whole expense is only about $120 (Japanese) a year. But if I did not take the salary, another foreigner would ask even more; and I am working for a Japanese community of my own. Buying books is rather extravagant, but my literary work pays for that.
Well, here's love to you. (If the book-business does not bother you too much, please tell the book-dealer to mail _everything_,--not to send by express.)
Ever faithfully, LAFCADIO HEARN. (Y. KOIZUMI.)
TO ELLWOOD HENDRICK
OCTOBER, 1896.