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yet seeming always to see the same, are somewhat monotonous, yet with the distant hills in the east, the wood, the water and the undulating ground, combine to form a picture or rather a panorama, which is nearly always beautiful and possesses exquisite ‘bits.’
Still this is not the route to be chosen by the lover of scenery. To the road or rather track from Imaichi to Wakamatsu must be accorded the palm in this respect. The bold mountains, wooded from the peak to the torrent at their base, with almost tropical exuberance of foliage, trees growing out of a few inches of earth, plants seemingly springing from the very boulders, the dashing water and the varied tints give a fresh picture every mile, and every picture a gem.
From Fukushima the traveller to Yonezawa turns off to the north-west to cross the central range by the pass of Itaya over a ridge of the Adzuma mountain. The pass in about 2,500 feet above the sea. The first 212 ri are over level road to a village called Niwasaka, and from there the climbing commences. First up a mountain 1,500 feet above Niwasaka to the village of Su-momo-daira, then down again to the borders of a torrent at the point where it divides into two streams, that almost encircle the mountain and flow out past Fukushima; then up an ascent densely wooded, and down again to the same torrent immediately under Itaya. The climbing so far is all unnecessary: it would be easy to trace a level road, that with all its windings would not measure more than the present one; and it would be easier still to establish water communication. The banks of the gorge, at the bottom of which the stream passes, rise perpendicularly to a considerable height before commencing to slope upwards to the mountain-tops, so that there would be no difficulty in throwing a dam across a narrow part of each stream just before its issue to the plain, and raising the water, of which there is abundance, to any desired height between the stone walls that nature has provided for it. Crossing this torrent, a zigzag ascent leads to the village of Itaya enclosed by a thick belt of pine trees. Grassy slopes
