MAIL SKETCHES.—No. VII.

Mount Ida Chronicle, Volume VI, Issue 326, 4 June 1875, Page 3

MAIL SKETCHES.—No. VII.

MEINOSHTA. IdoubtTcan hardly describe thehouses to you so,that ; you can. understand The whole floor of the house is raised about two feet above.the ground. When you step up you go on to a wooden floored stripe that, runs all round the house. On the outside of this passage (about three feet wide) there are wooden screens or shutters, which slide, in grooves,, and can be all > : pushed back into cupboard places ; at the. corners. These are put back every morning, and drawn out at night, or when it rains heavily. This rnakes the house quite close, warm, and secure. There are no doors. You can step in any where, only when the wooden panels are down they must be opened from the inside. The thatch roof projects a good yard beyond 'the wooden shutters. Then at the other side of this passage are the paper walls. They are arranged on the same principle,; and slide back arid fore in grooves. These wal's are. made of thin bars of woodr—like window frames—only with very" fine, tough, white paper, instead of glass. tYou can draw them all close, and shut yourself in, or open them all back by pushing them into a corner—and so have your house open on all sides with only the roof over you. The divisions between - the rooms are all of paper arid you hear everything all oyer the,house. The floors are all covered with thick white mats of very fiiie straw or grass. You are always expected to leave your shoes outside. There are no fireplaces used—only in ; winter they have a portable brass or clay thing full ot charcoal put on a stand in the rooms. Whenever we ,went,,inside the gate the laridlord and his wife ("who knew of our coming by the arrival of the pack horses in the afternoon) came out to meet us, and bowed down, going on their knees, and putting their foreheads on the ground, and saying, " ohio," ■'" ohio" "How are you," &c. The house is large, but in separate wings. We chose one wing close over the waterfalls on the one side, and on the other close to the garden. It had four rooms—two bedrooms, a diningroom and a Btoreroom. There was no furniture—■ not a scrap—only the bare white walls, and the clean matted floor softer than any carpet. But we soon found that they knew, foreign ways, for they speedily brought iri three little stools and a very low white; wooden' table, almost a toy affair, about two feet high, but big enough. These we put in the diningrOom. There are a large staff of young girls kept as attendants, and three ot them were appointed to .attend to us. One was so pretty, and always wore a scarlet and grey figured gown, with a blue girdle. The other two —one had a blue gown and red girdle, the other a white gown and green girdle ; and were always so neat and clean. We washed in copper basinß, set in the floors of our rooms, and by the time it was dark, and candles Bet in empty bottles were brought in, we were ready for dinner.

One thing we had I may mention. I was fresh trout, out of the tumbling river. They were delicious. We were tired, and soon went to bed. Our rooms were lighted by small paper lamps, but they gave little light—however, enough for sleeping with. We had an air bed ; and, with that inflated and laid on the floor, and with our bedding which we sent on before us, we were as snug as we could be, and were soon fast asleep. We were awoke at six by the pretty maid servant drawing back the wooden shutters with a noise and a rattle fit to awaken any sleeper. Then she pulled open one of the paper panels, put in her head, and said " ohio " and made a long yarn, of which we knew not a word, except the one for tea. So we said " urisy," which is all light, and off she ran ? returning soon after with a three legged' tray, arid on it two cups of tea and two little bits of toast. We pulled back all the slides, and I could have lain there for hours, looking out at the lovely views, and listening o the noise of the river, and the singing of the, birds. Everything was lovely. : DAY'S EXCURSION. . But we had a long day's excursion before us, and.could not waste our time.. One great thing in this village is the hot sulphur springs. The water bubbles out of some rock behind the village, so hot that you dare not put your hand into it. This water is conducted in bamboo pipes to this little inn, and on a ledge of rock a few'steps lower than the house they have some nice little wooden bath-houses built. Some are set apart entirely for the use of foreigners. The water runs constantly; so they are always clean. We all had baths. The water, by the time it reaches the bath-houses, is considerably cooled, and can, if desirable, be farther reduced by water from the river, conducted into each bath-room also by bamboo pipes. We had breakfast at seven, and, after having furnished ourselves with a basket of tiffin, we set off again, walking for a good way, but at length taking to our norimons. We went up the village street, and followed a path running over the hills. Our place of destination was eighteen miles farther into the interior, called Hiconi, where there is a very beautiful lake. The.road Jed over, ridges of hills, now up, now down, through much the same scenery as that of the, previous day. The path was narrow, and at times very steep, but we at length reached the highest part, and there the view was wonderfully grand—ranges after ranges of hills towering the one above the other. The day was lovely, and the air so clear. The descent on the other side was steep, but short, and we soon came to a little village called Ash-shu-no»ya, where there are more sulphur springs—very much stronger than those at the other village. This place is greatly frequented by the Japanese. They try the baths for all sorts of diseases, rheu- : matism especially. We halted here only a short time—had some tea, and a fresh, relay of coolies, and then on we went down to the lake, which soon was in sight, and a very glorious sight it is too, lying in the heart of those towering mountains as calm and as clear as glass. One or two rocky wooded islands in it, and all the hills covered with the densest wood, now in all the varied tints of spring, the flowering trees, dark cedars and pines, bright red maple, and some of, the hills topped with snow, which shone and glittered in the sun —it was like dream-land. The path was now soft and good, and our coolies trotted on manfully, and soon we were in the small village close by the lake. Here we hired a boat—rather a queer, ricketty coble, much in the shape of a Turk's shoe, turned lip' .-it the : toe,' but it was stanch enough. So in .we.all" got, leaving the coolies on shore. ; We had two very lightly clad but strong:boatmen, and we were rowed away over the lake, to nowhere in particular, but went lazily along; looking almost in silence at the scenery, for it wt.s j beyond speaking about. From one part we had a glorious view of the sacred mourir tain .of Japan—Fusiyama. You might fiave" seen pictures' of it. It .is often painted on, .their ; dishes and lacquered ware. '' It is an extinct volcano, pyramids shaped; nearly 15,000 feet high; and was covered with snow irom base to summit; | The effect of the snow upon the upper | part,pf the hills,. and the rich vegetation and 'varied shades of the woods on the .lower, parts, was very fine. We could have gone round on'the lake for days ; but,!alas, our; visit was limited to two short hours. So we landed on a little island, and, seating ourselves on the mosscovered steps of a little temple, we ate our tiffin with keen appetites, and gave our scraps to' the faithful "Bosear" whicli had,followed, us in all our travels, andthen vei-y reluctantly rowed back to the shore, and started on bur homeward journey. Boscar enjoyed a fine swim, and quite won my heart by the way in which he scattered the little crowd which had come; to look at us, and of which 1 felt half afraid, j We were beyond the treaty limits a mile or two, and foreigners were rare, sights there. : Our men trotted off with us at a good pace, and, when we were ence more on the mountain path, we walked a long way—-almost'as far as the sulphur Village,:.. where - we again had - tea, and picked up our first lot of coolies; rested and refreshed.. By the time we got. to the topmost range , the sun was setting, and die view.was fgrandv The snow-topped hills were red and glistening in its light, and then the-cool freshness, coming after our rather hot day, was delightful. We went .down faster than we. canie up, for at one part we set to run, and left our norimons and coolies far behind. It was almost dark when we heard the noise of the river and the falls, and felt quite glad when we saw through the trees the twinkling lights of the little village, where in ten minutes more we had arrived. Dinner was almost ready, and we went and had a delicious warm bath, and then felt so refreshed arid ready for dinner. Soon after, we retired —weary, but highly delighted with our day's excursion. IN MEIKOSHTA. Next day was Sunday. The musnie was

as early as the day before with our teaWe did not get up, but had the whole side ofour room thrown open, and lay sleeping, or looking out as we liked until eight, when we got up, had our baths and breakfast, and then wandered about in all directions—round the village, by the river, dawdled about, most thoroughly enjoying ourselves, and finding some lovely place at every step—fresh views, each lovelier thin the other. At one we had tiffin, then I retired to my room with my Bible, and the Christian Treasury. Such a dear quiet Sunday it was, with such glorious" views on all sides. Soon after four we went out again; and went down into: the valley below thehouse to the foot of the falls, where we sat on the rocks, watching soive Japanese fishing." We wandered about again, and climbed the hill, by another path, and went and saw an old man's garden. He entertained us with tea and sweatmeats, and gave us some fine flowers. We then went through the village, and watched the wood-carvers at their work, for Sunday and Saturday are all the same to them. They carve,very pretty • things in wood—cups, dishes, boxes, and little cabinets. When'it grew dark we went in, j had dinner, and retired:atteri. | THE RETURN. j On Monday we were astir early, for j we were to return to = Yokohama that day. It had rained on the night, and in the early morning the place, if possible, looked lovlier than ever ; and it was with manyregrets we left it. However, it had to be, so we had breakfast, packed up our clothes, 'and sent off the pack horses, and made some provision for the road. At last we called for the bill, which looked a very peculiar document, and, without the smallest meaning to us, being written in Japanese. We judged from the number of fingers the landlord held up that it was so many rios, and so many boos. So we paid, and he signed it with many bows and expressions of thanks. At last all was ready, the little musnie girls had had their small donations, and we could linger no longer ; so we said goodbye—Tyonaia—to all, and turned our backs on—without exception—the loveliest spot it has ever been my lot to see. If we ever re-visit Yokohama we will certainly go theie again for a week or two, and if we never see it again, I don't think we can over forget Meinoshta cr Hi_ coni. We came leisurely down the mountains, walking most of the way, gathering roots of ferns and flowers, and wrapping them in moss. My norimon was so full that when we got near the high road I could hardly get room to double myself into it. -. At the foot of the valley-we came upon a man fishing. He had a great basket of trout, which we bought for a boo —fourteen pence. A.t one we reached Odawsra, where we* found our driver and carriage. They had waited our -return.. We made a start almost at once, and soon reached Fugisawa, where we picked up our heavy hoi ses, and went on again, arriving at Yokohama about seven, extremely sorry to have to return and leave so much beautiful scenery, behind. ..