The Life and Letters of Lafcadio Hearn Volume I Part 11

"The emblems were all Buddhist. The portable hea.r.s.e, carried by six men in blue, was a beautiful object of unpainted, perfectly fresh, white wood trimmed with blue silk ta.s.sels and with gold and silver lotus flowers at the corners.... Priests carrying food for the dead, university professors, and a mult.i.tude of students formed the end of the procession.... In the comparative darkness of the temple, against the background of black lacquer and gold, eight priests chanted a dirge.

Their heads were clean-shaven and they were clothed in white, with several brilliantly tinted gauze robes imposed. After a period of chanting punctuated by the tinkling of a bell, the chief j.a.panese mourner arose from the other side and led forward the son. Together they knelt before the hea.r.s.e, touching their foreheads to the floor, and placing some grains of incense upon the little brazier burning between the candles. A delicate perfume filled the air.... The wife next stepped forward with expressionless face--her hair done in stiff loops like carved ebony, her only ornament the magnificent white _obi_, reserved for weddings and funerals. She and the younger sons also burned incense.

The chief mourner and the eldest son again bowed to the ground, and the ceremony was ended."

The students presented a laurel wreath with the inscription "In memory of Lafcadio Hearn, whose pen was mightier than the sword of the victorious nation which he loved and lived among, and whose highest honour it is to have given him citizenship and, alas, a grave!" The body was then removed to a crematory, the ashes being interred at the cemetery of Zoshigaya, his tombstone bearing the inscription "Shogaku In-den Jo-ge Hachi-un Koji," which literally translated means: "Believing Man Similar to Undefiled Flower Blooming like Eight Rising Clouds, who dwells in Mansion of Right Enlightenment."

Amenomori,--whom he called "the finest type of the j.a.panese man,"--writing of him after his death, said: "Like a lotus the man was in his heart ... a poet, a thinker, loving husband and father, and sincere friend.... Within that man there burned something pure as the vestal fire, and in that flame dwelt a mind that called forth life and poetry out of the dust, and grasped the highest themes of human thought."

Yone Noguchi wrote: "Surely we could lose two or three battleships at Port Arthur rather than Lafcadio Hearn."

After his death were issued a few of his last studies of j.a.pan under the t.i.tle of "A Romance of the Milky Way," and these, with his autobiographical fragments included in this volume, conclude his work.

The last of these fragments, three small pages, is named "Illusion":--

"An old, old sea-wall, stretching between two boundless levels, green and blue;--on the right only rice-fields, reaching to the sky-line;--on the left only summer-silent sea, where fishing-craft of curious shapes are riding. Everything is steeped in white sun; and I am standing on the wall. Along its broad and gra.s.s-grown top a boy is running towards me,--running in sandals of wood,--the sea-breeze blowing aside the long sleeves of his robe as he runs, and baring his slender legs to the knee. Very fast he runs, springing upon his sandals;--and he has in his hands something to show me: a black dragonfly, which he is holding carefully by the wings, lest it should hurt itself struggling.... With what sudden incommunicable pang do I watch the gracious little figure leaping in the light,--between those summer silences of field and sea!... A delicate boy, with the blended charm of two races.... And how softly vivid all things under this milky radiance,--the smiling child-face with lips apart,--the twinkle of the light quick feet,--the shadows of gra.s.ses and of little stones!...

"But, quickly as he runs, the child will come no nearer to me,--the slim brown hand will never cling to mine. For this light is the light of a j.a.panese sun that set long years ago.... Never, dearest!--never shall we meet,--not even when the stars are dead!

"And yet,--can it be possible that I shall not remember?--that I shall not still see, in other million summers, the same sea-wall under the same white noon,--the same shadows of gra.s.ses and of little stones,--the running of the same little sandalled feet that will never, never reach my side?"

The compression found necessary in order to yield room for the letters, which I think will bear comparison with the most famous letters in literature, has forced me to content myself with depicting the man merely in profile and giving a bare outline of his work as an artist. It has obliged me to abandon all temptation to dwell upon his more human side, his humour, tenderness, sympathy, eccentricity, and the thousand queer, charming qualities that made up his many-faceted nature. These omissions are in great part supplied by the letters themselves, where he turns different sides of his mind to each correspondent, and where one sees in consequence a shadow of the writers themselves reflected in his own mental att.i.tude.

In the turbid, shallow flood of the ephemeral books of our time Lafcadio Hearn's contribution to English letters has been partially obscured. But day by day, as these sink unfruitfully into the sands of time, more clearly emerge the stern and exquisite outlines of his patient work.

While still a boy he said playfully, in answer to an appeal to concede something to the vulgarer taste for the sake of popularity: "I shall stick to my pedestal of faith in literary possibilities like an Egyptian Colossus with a broken nose, seated solemnly in the gloom of my own originality."

To that creed he held through all the bitter permutations of life, and at the end it may be fitly said of him that "despite perishing principles and decaying conventions, despite false teaching, false triumphs, and false taste, there were yet those who strove for the immemorial grandeur of their calling, who pandered to no temptation from without or from within, who followed none of the great world-voices, were dazzled by none of the great world-lights, and used their gift as stepping-stone to no meaner life; but clear-eyed and patient, neither elated nor cast down, still lifted the lamp as high as their powers allowed, still pursued art singly for her own immortal sake."

LETTERS OF LAFCADIO HEARN

LETTERS

1877-1889

TO H.E. KREHBIEL

NEW ORLEANS, 1877.[5]

DEAR KREHBIEL,--I have just received your second pleasant letter, enclosing a most interesting article on music. The ill.u.s.trations interested me greatly. You could write a far more entertaining series of essays on the history of musical instruments than that centennial humbug who, as you say, did little more than merely to describe what he saw.

I have been reading in "Curiosites des Arts"--curious book now out of print--an article on the musical instruments of the Middle Ages, which is of deep interest even to such an ignoramus as myself. I would have translated it for your amus.e.m.e.nt, but, that my eyes have been so bad as to cripple me. Let me just give you an extract, and as soon as I feel better I will send the whole thing if you deem it worth while:--

"The Romans, at the termination of their conquests, had brought to this country and adopted nearly all the musical instruments they had discovered among the peoples they had conquered.

[5] Hearn rarely dated his letters, but in most cases internal evidence makes possible the a.s.signment of a fairly definite date.

Thus Greece furnished Rome with nearly all the soft instruments of the family of flutes and of lyres; Germany and the provinces of the North, inhabited by warlike races, taught their conquerors to acquire a taste for terrible instruments, of the family of trumpets and of drums; Asia, and in particular Judaea, which had greatly multiplied the number of metallic instruments for use in ceremonies of religion, naturalized among the Romans clashing instruments of the family of bells and tam-tams; Egypt introduced the sistrum into Italy together with the worship of Isis; and no sooner had Byzantium invented the first wind organs than the new religion of Christ adopted them, that she might consecrate them exclusively to the solemnities of her worship, West and East.

"All the varieties of instruments in the known world had thus, in some sort, taken refuge in the capital of the Empire; first at Rome, then at Byzantium; when the Roman decline marked the last hour of this vast concert, then, at once ceased the orations of the Emperors in the Capitol and the festivals of the pagan G.o.ds in the temples; then were silenced and scattered those musical instruments which had taken part in the pomps of triumphs or of religious celebrations; then disappeared and became forgotten a vast number of those instruments which pagan civilization had made use of, but which became useless amidst the ruins of the antique social system."

Following is the description of an organ,--a wonderful organ,--in a letter from St. Jerome to Dardanas,--made of fifteen pipes of bra.s.s, two air-reservoirs of elephant's skin, and two forge bellows for the imitation of the sound of thunder. The writer compiled his essay from eighteen ancient Latin authors, eight early Italian, about ten early French, and some Spanish authors--all antiquated and unfamiliar.

As you are kindly interested in what I am doing I shall talk about EGO,--I shall talk about ME.

I am (this is not for public information) barely making a living here by my letters to the paper. I think I can make about $40 per month. This will keep me alive and comfortable. I am determined never to resume local work on a newspaper. I could not stand the gaslight; and then you know what a horrid life it is. While acting as correspondent I shall have time to study, study, study; and to write something better than police news. I have a lot of work mapped out for magazine essays; and though I never expect to make much money, I think I shall be able to make a living. So far I have had a real hard time; but I hope to do better now, as they send me money more regularly.

I do not intend to leave New Orleans, except for farther South,--the West Indies, or South America. I am studying Spanish hard and will get along well with it soon.

I think I can redeem myself socially here. I have got into good society; and as everybody is poor in the South, my poverty is no drawback.

Yours truly, ?a??ad??.

TO H. E. KREHBIEL

NEW ORLEANS, 1877.

MY DEAR KREHBIEL,--I am charmed with your letter,--your paper, and your exquisite little jocose programme. The "Fantaisie Chinoise" was to me something that really smacked of a certain famous European art-cenacle where delightful little parties of this kind were given. That cenacle was established by the disciples of Victor Hugo,--_les Hugolatres_, as they were mockingly but perhaps also n.o.bly named; and the records of its performances are some of the most delicate things in French literature.

Hector Berlioz was one of the merry crowd,--and Berlioz, by the way, had written some fine romances as well as fine musical compositions.

There is a touch, a brilliant touch, of real art in all these little undertakings of yours, which gives me more enjoyment than I could tell you. Remember I am speaking of the _tout-ensemble_. Were I to make any musical observations you might rightly think I was talking about something of which I am disgracefully ignorant. Do you know, however, that I have never forgotten that pretty Chinese melody I heard at the club that day; and I sometimes find myself whistling it involuntarily.

I am indeed delighted to know that you have got Char Lee's instruments, and are soon to receive others. Were there any Indian instruments in use among the Choctaws here, I could get you some, but they are no longer a musical people. The sadness that seems peculiar to dying races could not be more evident than in them. Le Pere Rouquette, their missionary, tells me he has seen them laugh; but that might have been half a century ago. He is going to take me out to one of their camps on Lake Pontchartrain soon, and I shall try to pick you up something queer.

As yet I have not received the Chinese Play, etc., but will write when I do, and return it as promptly as possible.

I am just recovering from a week's sickness--fever and b.l.o.o.d.y flux--and I don't believe I weigh ninety pounds. You never saw such a sight as I am. I have been turned nearly black; and my face is so thin that I can see every bone as if it had only a piece of parchment drawn over it. And then all my hair is cut close to the skin. I have had hard work to crawl out of bed the last few days, but am getting better now. If I were to get regular yellow fever now I would certainly go to the cemetery; for I am only a skeleton as it is.

The newspaper generally gives only wages to its employees, and small wages,--and literary reputation to its capitalists; although in France the opposite condition exists. There are exceptions, of course, when a man has exceedingly superior talent; and his employer, knowing its value, allows its free exercise. That has been your case to a certain degree; you have not only won a reputation for yourself, but have given a tone and a standing to the paper which in my opinion has been of immense value to it.

I have got everything here down to a fine point--three hours' work a day!

There is but one thing here to compensate for the abominable heat--Figs.

They are remarkably cool, sweet, juicy, and tender. Unfortunately they are too delicate to bear shipment. The climate is so debilitating that even energetic _thought_ is out of the question; and unfortunately the only inspiring hour, the cool night, I cannot utilize on account of gaslight. When the night comes on here it is not the night of Northern summers, but that night of which the divine Greek poet wrote,--"O holy night, how well dost thou harmonize with me; for to me thou art all eye,--thou art all ear,--thou art all fragrance!"

The infinite gulf of blue above seems a sh.o.r.eless sea, whose foam is stars, a myriad million lights are throbbing and flickering and palpitating, a vast stillness filled with perfume prevails over the land,--made only more impressive by the voices of the night-birds and crickets; and all the busy voices of business are dead. The boats are laid up, cotton presses closed, and the city is half empty. So that the time is really inspiring. But I must wait to record the inspiration in some more energetic climate.

Do you get _Melusine_ yet? You are missing a great deal if you are not.

_Melusine_ is preserving all those curious peasant songs with their music,--some of which date back hundreds of years. They would be a delightful relish to you.