Volume II Part 4 (1/2)

I have had the shoryo-bune boxed and addressed to you, and a priest wrote forto the usual custo before three weeks, as I a it by express, and you kno the process is!

As foryou wish, and, if you desire, my nae as an author that I am much in doubt whether the use of ive the opinion ht than if expressed iood for the book I leave the decision entirely to you

I have been reading Mr Lowell's book over again; for it is one thing to read it in Philadelphia, and quite another thing to read it after having spent a year and a half in japan And the power and the charm impress me more than ever But I am so much horrified by its conclusions--at least a few of them--that I try very hard to find a flaw therein I think the idea that the degree of the development of individuality in a people necessarily reat ued about For as the tendency of the age is toward class specialization and interdependent subdivision of all branches of knowledge and all practical application of that knowledge, the developer of a community would seem to me to unfit the unit to form a close part of any specialized class In brief, I doubt, or rather I wish to doubt, that the development of individuality is a lofty or desirable tendency Much of what is called personality and individuality is intensely repellent, and makes the principal misery of Occidental life It ressive selfishness: and its extraordinary developland seems a confirmation of Viscount Torio's theory that Western civilization has the defect of cultivating the individual at the expense only of theunbounded opportunities to huious senti

[Illustration: THE CITY OF MATSUE]

What you say about your experience with japanese poetry is indeed very telling and very painful to one who loves japan Depth, I have long suspected, does not exist in the japanese soul-stream It flows much like the rivers of the country,--over beds three quarters dry,--very clear and charly beshadowed;--but made temporarily profound only by some passional storm But it seeive hope of soo in the _Asahi shi+ht tears to my eyes, as slowly and painfully translated by a friend There was tenderness and poetry and pathos in it worthy of Le Fanu (I thought of the exquisite story of Le Fanu, ”A Bird of Passage,”

sih, of course, I don't knohat the style is But the japanese poeie japonaise,” seems tomuch more Still, how the sensation of that which has been is flashed into heart and memory by the delicious print or the sio to-et the shoryo-bune, let me know Any of your servants can, I think, fix the little masts and pennons in place A so_, or ht be added by Dr

Tylor to the exhibit; but I suppose these are not essential

With sincerest regards, ever truly,

LAFCADIO HEARN

TO BASIL HALL CHAMBERLAIN

MATSUE, August, 1891

DEAR MR CHAMBERLAIN,--Before leaving, I s japanese,” I would like to estion about the article ”Theatre” The reference to O-Kuni seems to me extre She was a _miko_ in the Great Teoya Sanza, and she fled aith her lover to Kyoto On the way, another _ronin_, who fell in love with her extraordinary beauty, was killed by Sanza Always the face of the dead irl

At Kyoto she supported her lover by dancing the Miko-kagura in the dry bed of the river Kaan to act Sanza hiether until Sanza died

Then she careat poet in the style called _renga_ After Sanza's death she supported herself, or at least occupied herself, in teaching this poetic art But she shaved off her hair and became a nun, and built the little Buddhist teht her art And the reason she built the teht pray for the soul of the _ronin_ whoht of her beauty had ruined The te is now left of it but a broken statue of Jizo Her family still live in Kizuki, and until the restoration the chief of the family was always entitled to a share of the profits of the Kizuki theatre, because his ancestress, the beautiful _est that poor O-Kuni have a kind word said for her And I ahly of her if she were alive

There is a little japanese book about her history; but I do not know the title With best regards,

LAFCADIO

TO PAGE M BAKER

MATSUE, August, 1891

DEAR PAGE,--I answer your dear letter at once, as you wished me to do It reached me to-day, on my return from Kizuki, the Holy City of japan,--where I have becoh pontiff of the most ancient and sacred shrine of the land,--which no other European was ever per at home only on my way to other curious and unknown places For this part of japan is so little known that I was the first to furnish Murray's Guidebook editors with some information thereabout

But I had unknown friends here who knew h my ”Chinese Ghosts”--so they applied to the Governot an educational position under contract The contract was renewed last March for a year--the extreme term allowed by law My salary is only 100 per month; but that is equal here to more than double the sum in America

So that I am able to keep up nearly the nicest house in town,--outside of a few very rich ive dinners, and to dress my little wife tolerably nicely Moreover, life in japan is soentle--that it is just like one of those drea The missionaries have no reason to like ed to secure me; and I teach the boys to respect their own beautiful faith and the Gods of their fathers, and not to listen to proselytism However, the missionaries leave me alone We have a tiff about Spencer in the _japan Mail_ sometimes; but as a rule I a intervals one ever gets so far,--with the exception of an austere fe a convert