Jinrikisha Days in Japan
old cryptomeria, now too sacred to be felled even for such purposes, and one, enmeshed in the coils of a wistaria, is a marvel even in Nara. Without the square, heavy-timbered, red gate-way of the court two avenues meet, both lined with rows and rows of tall stone lanterns covered with moss and overhung with the dense foliage of the meeting trees. One avenue leads to a smaller temple, and the other, dropping by a flight of stone steps, turns to the right and descends in a long slope, bordered with regiments of stone lanterns, to a large red torii. Thence it pursues its way, bordered still with massive lanterns, for three-quarters of a mile to the greater torii, marking the limit of the sacred grounds and the beginning of the village streets. Other lantern lines, paths, and staircases join it, and a bronze deer, sitting among rough, mossy bowlders under a dense canopy of trees and creepers, pours a stream of pure spring-water into a granite basin. There are more than three thousand of these stone lanterns along the Kasuga approaches, all of them gifts from daimios, nobles, and rich believers; and in days when the temples were rich and faith prosperous, they were lighted every night. At present it is only during great festivals that wicks and saucers of oil are set in all the lanterns, but some sixty points of flame flicker nightly in the dense shadows by the Kasuga gate, giving most weird effects.
From Kasuga gate the upper avenue of lanterns leads to the Wakamiya shrine, dedicated to the early gods of the Shinto religion. Here the old custom of the sacred dance is kept up, and a group of young priestesses is in waiting to repeat the measures danced by Suzume before the Sun Goddess's cave in prehistoric times. The little ministrants are all between the ages of nine and twelve, timid, gentle, and harmless as the deer that often stray in and watch them. Their dress is the old costume of the imperial court—a picturesque lower garment or di-
316
