A Fantasy of Far Japan Part 11

--'I must say I agree with you to some extent. I am rather sorry that such monthly publications as _Kokkwa_ do not pay well in j.a.pan. The present publisher of the journal is the proprietor of a large newspaper, and not a regular book publisher. He is himself a great collector of our _objets d'art_, of which he is very fond, and this is the sole reason why he took up the publication after it had been nearly discontinued by its former publisher. He is now trying to see if an English edition of it will pay, although the end he has in view is to make j.a.pan known to the West, rather than any pecuniary personal gain. Indeed, it is for that reason he has sent me this copy, asking me to show it to those who have a taste for such things. I really think that, for the general good, the publication is worth continuing.'

--'Certainly,' said the d.u.c.h.ess. 'Let me see, it is only two yen per number, that is five francs per month; cheap enough. I will subscribe at once.'

The young n.o.bleman now left our party, for he had another engagement. He has a talent for music, and when a private concert was given only a few weeks ago in the garden of an aristocratic family which I know, he was the conductor, although only an amateur. This the young ladies told me, and the circ.u.mstance led me to ask if they also were not musical. One of them, she told me, played the piano, and the other the violin, and I said I hoped that one day they would let me have the pleasure of hearing them. I further said that the piano was only known in j.a.pan to a slight degree, and that only recently; but that we had always had an instrument much resembling the violin.

The duke held in his hand an English literary weekly of the highest repute. Turning to me he said:

--'Look! here is a review of two new books, one on the Bushido by a j.a.panese writer, and the other on j.a.pan in general by an American, I suppose. It is a subject that interests me, as, indeed, it does many people nowadays. I have read it through and noticed that the reviewer speaks of Bushido very sarcastically. He says, among other things, that the discovery of Bushido is of quite recent date, and continues; but listen, I will read it:

'Neither Sir E. Satow nor Dr. Aston even mentions the word Bushido; Prof. Chamberlain in his _Things j.a.panese_ (1898) does not refer to it; the word is not contained in the admirable dictionary prepared by Captain Brinkley, the able but intensely j.a.panicised correspondent of the _Times_; nor is it to be found in the princ.i.p.al native dictionary, the _Kotoba no Izumi_ ("Source of Language").'

--'What nonsense,' I interrupted; 'by the same a.n.a.logy one might say, because there is no compound noun Christian-morality in an English dictionary, there is no such thing as Christian morality.'

'Bushido, in literal Chinese,' continued the duke, reading, 'is the way of the executioner, and those who were eye-witnesses of the tyranny of the Samurai, in the last three years of the Bakufu [Shogunate], will not regard the name as altogether inappropriate.

The Bushi (a j.a.pano-Chinese, but not Chineseform), or Samurai, were neither knights nor knightly; they were "followers" merely; many, if not most of them, petty officials, few of them for two hundred and fifty years possessed any military experience whatever.'

--'How ridiculous,' I interrupted; 'but I cannot make out what the reviewer could have got into his head to make him translate the term Bushi as "executioner." It is an insult to Bushi, of whom we have the oft-quoted saying, "Hana wa sakura ni hitowa bushi": "As the cherry blossoms are the prime of the flowers, so the Bushi is the flower of man." We have a popular drama in which there is a scene where a female prisoner is brought out under the superintendence of a common Bushi; and there the phrase "Keigo-no-Bushi" occurs, meaning, the Bushi who guards.

Perhaps the reviewer remembered it, and concluded that Bushi meant an executioner, because he had charge of a prisoner. If this is so, by the same a.n.a.logy we might say the "Knight of the Garter" is a domestic servant who looks after his mistress's garter. Ah! there is another thing which occurs to me. In China, where military men are little thought of, they are often used for such duties as those of an executioner; some foreigners, who had seen the fact whereby those men were called Bushi, perhaps thought that the term meant "executioners"

without knowing its primary meaning. By that a.n.a.logy one might say that gentlemen belonging to the honourable guild known as "The Worshipful Company of Grocers of the City of London" were common dealers in tea and sugar, because they are called grocers, without knowing the origin of the term. The pa.s.sages in that review accidentally caught my sight too, and out of curiosity I looked the matter up in a few books which I happened to have by me. It is a little technical, but if you do not mind, I will explain it to you in detail.'

--'Please do,' said the duke.

--'The word Bushi is a noun composed of two Chinese characters, _bu_ and _shi_, both having a distinct meaning. _Bu_ means military or martial when used as an adjective, but it is also very commonly used as a concrete noun; and in that case it may be translated as martialism.

When used as a noun it is used in contradistinction to _bun_. The last word may be translated as "civil," but I am unable to find out an exact equivalent in the Western terms, because the Western term "civil," still less the term "civism," does not convey the true idea of the word. It may, however, be taken to signify things or affairs on civil lines, as contrasting with those on military lines. _Shi_ means a man of position or a gentleman, which came by evolution to mean a military man rather than a civilian. These two words, _bu_ and _shi_, were put together and made a compound noun, signifying professional military people. The term has been most commonly used in j.a.pan for over ten centuries. There are two other terms, Bundo and Budo, the former means principle, or doctrine, or teaching, or ways of affairs on civil lines, and the latter means the same on martial lines. They are very antique terms, contradistinguishing each other. The term Bushido is not so ancient as those two, but still it is by no means modern. The term Budo is used when one wishes to refer the matter more to the system or the principle as a unit; and the term Bushido is used when one wishes to designate more the individuals. In China the term Bushi had existed, as is natural from the antiquity of her history, many centuries before it did in j.a.pan; I have seen it used in the history of the Hung dynasty. The term of course signifies military men; nevertheless, it has not acquired so much prominence as it has done in j.a.pan, because in China military men have never attained the same importance and organisation as in j.a.pan, and naturally enough there exists in China no such term as Bushido in its concrete sense, Bushido being peculiarly unique to the j.a.panese.

Bushido consists of three Chinese characters, as the reviewer says. In the colloquial j.a.panese it is read as Bushi-no-michi, _do_ being the Chinese way of p.r.o.nunciation, and _michi_ being the colloquial j.a.panese p.r.o.nunciation of the one and the same character; and therefore _do_ and _michi_ are both the same thing. In _Hogen Monogatari_, an historical record of the events which took place in the middle of the twelfth century A.D., and written not longer after that period, a great hero, Tametomo, is represented to have said, in the course of a speech, as follows:

'For a Bushi, an act of killing is inevitable. Nevertheless Bushi-no-michi [_i.e._ Bushido] forbids to kill an unfit object, and therefore, though I have fought more than twenty battles, and put an end to countless lives, I have always fought legitimate foes, and not illegitimate foes [in modern phraseology combatants and non-combatants]. And more! I have neither killed a deer nor fished a fish.

'In the fourteenth century A.D., a book called _Chiku-ba-sho_ (the reminiscence of the bamboo-horse), which is ethical teaching for Bushi, was written by Shiwa Yoshimasa, a j.a.panese general, born 1349, died 1410 A.D.

'Within the last three hundred years, when Bushido has made a great systematic progress on its literary and intellectual side, many treatises on the subject have been written by eminent scholars and expounders of that doctrine. Nakaye-toju, born in 1608 A.D., wrote a book called _Questions and Answers on Bun and Bu_, in which the terms Bundo and Budo are used. In the collection of the epistles of k.u.mazawa Banzan, born 1619 A.D., the same terms are much used. In _Lectures by Yamaga Soko_, who was born in 1622, and was the founder of a school of our military science, there is one part called Shido. Shido and Bushido are one and the same thing, for the term _bu_ is added to _shi_ when one particularly wishes to denote the idea of the military profession. Thus, for instance, the old cla.s.s of Samurai is now known as Shizoku, and not as Bushi-Zoku. Kaibara Yekken, born 1630 A.D., wrote a book called _Buk.u.m_, namely, "Instructions on Bu," in which the term Bushi-no-michi is freely used. The _Elementary Lessons on Budo_ is a book written by Daidoji Yiuzan, born 1639. In that book the term Bushido is freely used, and we see therein such phrases: "What is most important in Bushido is the three conceptions of loyalty, justice, and bravery"; and "if a Bushi comprehend the two opposing notions of justice and injustice, and endeavour to do justice and refrain from doing injustice, Bushido will be attained." Izawa Hanrioshi, born 1711 A.D., published a book called _Bushikun_, namely, "Instructions for Bushi." In that book, also, the term Bushi-no-michi is repeatedly used, and at the end of the fourth volume of it there is a short postscript in which he says:

'These four volumes have been written to record the outlines of Bushido, in order to supplement the points left untouched in books published in recent generations, such as ... so that one must not say after reading this book that it is not minute.

'I could mention several more books, but I might weary you. The names I have just cited are, in j.a.pan, no less household words than Voltaire or Rousseau in France, and Johnson or Goldsmith in England. Satow, Aston, Chamberlain, or Brinkley might not have had time enough to touch upon the Bushido, but if one says that because they have not touched upon it there is no such thing as Bushido in j.a.pan, it is tantamount to saying that there is no such thing as a diamond in South Africa because some travellers have not mentioned it in their diaries.'

--'You appear always to be making use of the names Bushi and Samurai indiscriminately. No doubt they signify one and the same category of people. But what is the difference?'

--'You are right in raising that question. The term Samurai is a pure and simple j.a.panese word, derived from a verb meaning "to wait" or "to serve." In ancient times military men on guard at the Imperial palace were called by that name; but when one wished to make the appellation more concise and appear more scholastic, the term Bushi was used. The Chinese character Shi is uniformly translated in j.a.panese as Samurai, but one preferred to employ the term Bushi more commonly because it gave more prominence to the military calling. At first the guards were recruited from ordinary people, but in course of time the recruiting became hereditary in certain families. They also began gradually to form a sort of cla.s.s in different provinces, having their leaders, and at last formed a regular cla.s.s of military men. Those men were universally called Bushi, and their families, when collectively spoken of, were called _Buke_ namely, "Houses of Bu."'

--'I understand. But what is the difference between Daimio and Samurai?'

--'A Daimio is the lord under whom the Samurai served. There were nearly three hundred feudal lords of different standing in j.a.pan. And the number of them therefore, when spoken of roughly, was called "three hundred." In the broad signification the lords were also included in the category of Samurai. In a popular drama, in which a child lord is represented as being in want of food on account of an intrigue, he pathetically says, "A Samurai does not feel hungry even with an empty stomach." Feudal lords belonged to the category of Buke, in contradistinction to _Kuge_, namely, n.o.ble families attached direct to the Imperial courts. At present, of course, there is no such distinction, all former feudal lords and court n.o.bles form the j.a.panese n.o.bility as one cla.s.s.'

--'I see, it is quite plain,' said the duke. 'The reviewer appears to have some knowledge of j.a.pan, but judging from what I have just heard from you, I am more convinced than ever of the saying that "a little knowledge is a dangerous thing." One is apt to commit errors on account of such knowledge, especially if he has any feeling of spite and tries to find fault with others. It amuses me all the more, because he further says:

'If one ignored history, it would be easy to draw a picture of Napoleon as a good-natured man of genius who was kind to his relations, and evolved order out of chaos;

and he himself ignores all the history of Bushido, which you have just given me.'

--'I do not think,' I said, 'the reviewer could have any spite against us, nor do I think he has intentionally committed the error you have just mentioned, but it is unfortunate that it has that appearance.'

--'Again,' said the duke, 'what does this mean? The reviewer says here:

'The meaningless quasi-military formalism of the Bakufu, under which the sword, undrawn from its scabbard, came to be almost worshipped, a system of merciless vendetta, often based upon trivial forms of injury, was established.'

--'Well, I will begin with answering the second point first. In thus giving vent to his vindictiveness, the reviewer seems to have forgotten, for instance, how few decades ago it was that in England a personage no less eminent than the prime minister was engaged, if not killed, in a duel. He forgets how widely duels are practised and connived at even now by the law on the Continent, and that men die, conceivably, in consequence of a sword-thrust or a pistol-shot. In j.a.pan duels have been altogether forbidden by the law, as there were signs of duelling being introduced with European customs, and the prohibition has proved to be very effective. In the feudal period a custom similar to duelling, which the reviewer calls vendetta, existed, as he says; but its purport was very different from what he describes. The act was called Kataki-uchi, that is, "revenge." When a man lost his life on account of an unlawful and malicious injury, the children of the deceased regarded it as inc.u.mbent on them to take the matter in their hands, if no legal adjustments could be obtained. In the feudal times redress in such matters was not always easy, because the different clans had autonomy; and the Samurai's fighting generally originated from some quarrel of a political nature, and not from robbery or any other felonious act. On the other hand, Confucian ethics held it unworthy of a pious son to "share the same heaven" with a person who wrongfully murdered his father. From these circ.u.mstances arose the notion of the necessary vindication of the father's wrongs by the hands of the son. Thus the j.a.panese vendetta (Kataki-uchi) came to be officially recognised--a step further than the official connivance of the Western duels. As a matter of fact, our Kataki-uchi was of a far more serious nature, but of much rarer occurrence, than the Western duels. The same sentiments and practices were applicable to a lord and his retainers, though in a lesser degree, as in the case of blood relations. With us the avenger had always to stake much on his own part--life, position, and fortune--for although the principle of revenge was recognised in a measure, the avenger seldom got off scot-free from the responsibility of his act, which by the technical points of law was generally amenable to punishment. Thus you will see in the case of the famous forty-seven "Ronin," they avenged the death of their lord, because the latter had had to put an end to his own life, which was accompanied by an order for the total extinction of his house and clan, the cause of all of which was the injurious acts of the wrongdoer. The action of the forty-seven Ronin was morally approved by public sentiment, but they had to commit suicide because they were offenders in the eyes of the law. How, then, can one say that the j.a.panese Kataki-uchi was a merciless system, based upon trivial forms of injury, as the reviewer pleases to put it.'

--'But,' said the duke, 'suppose the revenge went on endlessly, to be handed down from generation to generation, as it was with the Scottish clans, that would be awful.'

--'No, in that respect, there was a limit. No second revenge was recognised in any form whatever. Thus, if A. murdered B. and B.'s son killed A. in revenge, A.'s son had no claim legally or morally to avenge his fathers death. I may also add that under the new Imperial regime Kataki-uchi has been totally discountenanced by law. There is no connivance of it at all. The law promises redress to every wrong, and every possible care is taken to protect the sufferers. Therefore, nowadays, if one kills another in revenge, he would be accounted an ordinary murderer in the eyes of the law.'

--'What about the sword?' interposed the duke.

--'The sword,' I answered, 'was considered the soul of Samurai. They regarded it as the symbol,--nay, the very embodiment of n.o.ble sentiment and spirit. It has been so more or less with almost every nation, but it was especially so with us j.a.panese. The j.a.panese swords are known to be unrivalled by those of any other nation. Our sword was the envy of all the continental peoples of the Far East. There is a famous poem composed by a great Chinese statesman and scholar, in which he pays high tribute not only to the sword itself, but to the nation which produces it. Even from a merely artistic point of view, our swords deserve to rank high; but that is not all. A latter-day author writes as follows:

The sword-smith was not a mere artisan, but an inspired artist, and his workshop his sanctuary. Daily he commences his craft with prayer and purification, or, as was said, he committed his soul and spirit into the forging and tempering of the steel. Every swing of the sledge-hammer, every plunge into the water, every friction on the stone, was a religious act of no slight import. Was it the spirit of the master or his tutelary deity that cast such a spell over our sword? Perfect as a work of art, setting at defiance its Toledo and Damascus rivals, there was more than art could impart.

Its cold blade collecting on its surface, the moment it is drawn, the vapours of the atmosphere: its immaculate texture, flashing light of bluish hue; its matchless edge, upon which histories and possibilities hang, the curve of its back uniting exquisite grace with utmost strength--all these fill us with mixed feelings of power and beauty, of awe and terror.

'Such was, then, the "sword" which our Samurai adored. There were two or three at least of such swords, which were heirlooms of a Samurai family. Just imagine a Samurai going forth to the battlefield and reflecting what a distinction his ancestors had made in similar battlefields, or what devotions he had displayed to his lord by that very sword, now being borne in his hand or in his girdle: why! the very thought would fire his soul and make him emulate the deeds of his ancestors and despise cowardice. No mean thought could enter his mind; the spirit of the sword radiating from the pure cold l.u.s.tre of the blade handed down by his ancestors could not but thrust such thought from his mind. Such would at least be the sentiments of a real Samurai. The sword was not unsheathed wantonly, but when drawn it was a maxim that it should not be sheathed until its legitimate mission had been fulfilled.

No wonder, then, that a Samurai should almost have worshipped his sword, even when undrawn from its scabbard, as the reviewer sarcastically describes. The sword of a Samurai, even when in the scabbard, was not a thing to be trifled with. A Samurai worshipped sword, but not money-bags. If they had worshipped the latter instead of the former, they might have met with the approval of the reviewer. From the utilitarian point of view, if they had done so, it might have benefited their country more materially, and, therefore, their worshipping a sword might have been the weakest point of their ideals, but we do not see cause for regret for all that. The tide of time has brought changes on all such matters. The Government has forbidden not only Samurai, but also all others who were privileged, to wear swords in their girdles.

Hundreds and thousands of our best blades have left the houses of Samurai and been either exported, or turned into other implements, for mere trifling sums, often for the gold and silver used for the ornaments of the scabbard. For us, it is sad to think of, though it is of course a necessary outcome of the great changes which have pa.s.sed over us. It is, however, my earnest desire that the spirit of devotion to the swords with which the Samurai was animated may always be preserved. The same feeling explains why some of our officers carry with them their heirloom swords, even in the present war, as you must have noticed now and then in the press. The traditions of the sword, I am glad to say, have not as yet died in the b.r.e.a.s.t.s of the j.a.panese. There is an a.s.sociation in Tokio, the members of which meet periodically, bringing their own choice swords, and offering their comments on those of others. It may be difficult to appreciate how one can enjoy oneself looking at the blades of swords, but with us it gives great pleasure, if only from an artistic point of view. There have been many different schools of swordsmiths, and even amongst the workers of one school there is some special characteristics of their work. It is the pleasure of the j.a.panese who are fond of good sword blades to judge of the school and maker by inspecting the blades only. It pleases me to tell you of a gentleman in England who has made the study of j.a.panese swords a special subject, and his attainment of knowledge in the subject has been recognised by the a.s.sociation in Tokio, which has cheerfully elected him its honorary member. I may add a word or two. When Port Arthur was on the brink of falling, a cartoon was published in the London _Punch_ representing General Stoessel standing at the top of a fortified hill under a half-torn Russian flag. He was holding up a broken sword and uttering a few words of devotion to the Emperor of Russia. That cartoon took the English public very much, and was reproduced on the pages of many papers. It appealed very deeply to the imagination of the j.a.panese, in particular, though I am not quite sure if Stoessel deserved such sympathy at the last stage of the siege.'

--'That cartoon was very good,' said Lady Modestina. 'I have seen it.'

--'So have I too,' chimed in Lady Dulciana.

--'Let us proceed to the latter part of the review,' said the duke. 'The reviewer says of the author of the other book that "he takes rather a pessimistic view of j.a.pan," and proceeds to say:

'Professor S. takes rather a pessimistic view of j.a.pan. He admits to the full, as every one must, the five n.o.ble qualities of j.a.panese character, viz. bravery, loyalty, alertness, thoroughness, and self-control, to which list courtesy should be added.

But he goes on to quote from the author:

'The two cancers at the core of j.a.panese character are deep-set dishonesty and abandoned impurity; either would be sufficient to wreck the life of any nation.

And it seems, according to the reviewer, the author tells us that j.a.pan is still a country where the word lie is not a term of reproach, but rather implies a jocular compliment, and then dilates upon the undesirable occupations of some females. The words employed are very strong. Let us have your opinion.'

--'We are at times vexed with some of the occidental writers,' I replied, 'even with Anglo-Saxon writers occasionally, who write in such a strain as though they lived high in the pure air, while we j.a.panese live in the muddy marshes. They pick out some dark spots in our customs, and magnify them to suit their own purpose, as though for all the world they had nothing similar, or even worse, in their own countries. Some of them do this from an excess of zeal which they display in their particular calling, without any particular bad intention of defaming j.a.pan; but the results are the same. My answer to your question is very simple. The Yellow Peril alarmists may rest a.s.sured, for, according to the author, j.a.pan must die a natural death. What an idea, to indict a whole nation as a den of liars! Does he not know that truthfulness and honesty is the highest ideal of our ethical notions? The commonest of our ethical sayings is: "Shozikino atama ni kami yadoru" (Deity rests on the heads that are honest). The commonest of the ethical poems is:

'Kokoro dani makoto no michi ni kanai naba Inorazu totemo kami ya mamoran.

(If only one's thoughts be in accord With the way of truthfulness, Deity will protect him, though he may not pray.)

'Does he not know another forcible and common saying of Bushido: "Bushi no ichigon" (One word of a Bushi), which means that a word uttered by a Bushi shall never be idle; or, expressed otherwise--"A word is sufficient; he will remain faithful to it"? It is the watchword of Bushi, and if ever a Bushi were doubted, that phrase sufficed for an answer. And it still governs our social ideal of truthfulness. "Yes" or "No," when once definitely uttered by a Bushi, was no more alterable than the ebb and flow of the tide. Does he not know another of our sayings? "Ichidaku senkin" (One "Yes" is equal to a thousand pieces of gold). Does he not know "Usotsuki" (a liar) is with us an everyday word of scathing contempt? Does he not know an "untruthful word," namely, a lie, is accounted a great sin in the Ten Commandments of Buddhism? Does he not know "Yamashi" (a speculator), a term akin to "a liar," is with us a common word of contempt? Does he not know that in large European towns waiters and drivers are constantly cheating strangers by giving wrong change or bad money? I particularly mention these incidents because I myself have often been a victim. Fancy the idea of saying that the word _lie_ is not a term of reproach in j.a.pan! I would feign go a step further. This kind of charge is the commonest method which the Occidentals employ when they talk about the character of other races which they generally regard as inferior to themselves. But mere common-sense will tell them that there can be no human community, even amongst undeveloped tribes, where the word _lie_ is not a word of reproach, if only the smallest element of a moral notion exist, and there can hardly be any human community where there is no such moral notion at all. Such, at least, is my sociological view. With regard to the second accusation, the refutation I am going to make may not be quite in unison with social delicacy, but for that I ask your pardon.

You say the author speaks of the undesirable life of some females. The matter is ugly enough, we admit. Of course, metaphorically speaking, we could restore by explanation the paint which had been blackened to its original colour, but still it would not be snow-white. Pure such matters cannot be, we admit, but is there any nation on earth which has no dark spot at all? I ask the author: Does he not know the real condition of the Western countries, whence he springs? How is it with Paris, London, Berlin, or Vienna? Pick, for instance, one hundred pedestrians at random, one afternoon or evening, in Regent Street, or on the Boulevards, the best thoroughfares of London and Paris. What percentage of them can be held up as the ideals of "purity" the writer seems to imagine them to be? I might go much further if I wished, but I prefer not. Taken as a whole, I venture to think that the social structure of j.a.pan is in reality far cleaner than that of most countries. Of course, I do not say "two wrongs make a right," but I do say this: It is nave to accuse us in such harsh terms, as though believing that we j.a.panese have no idea of the dark spots of other nations. Men after the style of this writer admit such of our n.o.ble characteristics as those enumerated by the writer because they have become manifest, not during an epoch of peace, but in the time of war. Could any one say that they were manufactured specially for the war--at a minute's notice? Did not the greatest error of our opponents lie in the fact that they had not perceived these qualities in the time of peace? It saddens us to think that such a writer either cannot see, or intentionally ignores, some of the essential points of our character, unless they are incontestably demonstrated by incessant slaughter.

--'Pardon me,--I have been a little excited, and have spoken, perhaps, more than I should. Once a Frenchman told Lord Palmerston that English thieves were cleverer than Continental ones; whereupon Palmerston answered: "I am glad of that, for it shows that our intellectual faculty is more developed all round." That is one way of looking at things. At any rate, I have no intention of attacking any occidental vices: our writers do not indulge in writing on these matters either. I rather believe that vices are necessary outcomes of modern progress. Every nation has its virtues and vices. I dare say we shall have to add more vices as we make further progress. Cards, for instance, are much played nowadays among our people, since we have learned that they are played generally among our occidental benefactors. Ah! but I must not forget to mention that there are in the West, especially in England and America, many writers for whose fairness we have much grat.i.tude. One does not like to see, still less to acknowledge, any point of superiority in a fellow-creature or a fellow-nation one has been accustomed to look down upon: such is human nature. Our sense of grat.i.tude is, therefore, all the more due to those unbia.s.sed writers.