Jinrikisha Days in Japan
wrapped in the inevitable blue-and-white cotton towel, along the stony road, that has been worn smooth and slippery by the straw-covered feet of generations of men and horses.
From the Fuji no taira (terrace for viewing Fuji), in the village of Yamanaka, we looked sheer down to the plain of Mishima and saw, almost beneath us, the town that would mark the end of our day’s journey. The villages of Sasabara and Mitsuya have each a single row of houses on either side of the road replacing the shade-trees of the Tokaido, and, like all Japanese villages, they overflow with children, to whom Ijin san, the foreigner, is still a marvel.
Mishima is a busy, prosperous little town, with a gay main street and shops overflowing with straw hats, baskets, matting, rain-coats, umbrellas, tourist and pilgrim necessities. Shops for the sale of foreign goods are numerous, and besides the familiar cases of “Devoe’s Brilliant Oil for Japan, 150° test,” American trade is advertised by pictures of the Waterbury watch, and long hanging signs declaring the merits of the American time-keepers sold at three yen apiece. Even the chief of the jinrikisha men, who came to make the bargain for wheeling us down the Tokaido, pulled out such a watch to tell us the time of day.
Mishima’s best tea-house, where daimios rested in the olden time, is a most perfect specimen of Japanese architecture, full of darkly-shining woods, fantastic windows, and tiny courts. In one of our rooms the tokonoma held a kakemono, with a poem written on it in giant characters, and three tall pink peonies springing from an exquisite bronze vase. In another, smiled a wooden image of old Hokorokojin, one of the household gods of luck, and on a low lacquer table rested a large lacquer box containing a roll of writing-paper, the ink-box, and brushes. These, with the soft mats, a few silk
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