Kawakami, K. K.

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YAKUMO KOIZUMI: THE INTERPRETER OFJAPAN.BY K. K. KAWAKAMI."Yakumo fafsu;Izumo yaye-gaki;Tsuina gome niYaye-gaki tsukuru:Sono yaye-gaki wo.""Many clouds appear:Eightfold clouds a barrier raiseRound the wedded pair,Manifold the clouds stand guard;Oh, that eightfold barrier-ward."IN Iznmo, the Land of the Issuing of Clouds, Susa-no-wo-no-mi-koto, in the ages of the gods, built a bridal palace. Clouds rose upthence, and the god-bridegroom sang the august song of "EightfoldClouds." Here it was that Japanese history first gleamed throughthe mist of mythology. Attracted by its enchantment, an imagin-ative soul started on a pilgrimage from the far West—from theshores of the Atlantic, unto this Land of the Issuing of Clouds, aland of awesoine ghost-stories, of marvelous traditions, of grotesqueyet charming folklore. Short in stature, the pilgrim had but oneeye, carrying about him a weird and unearthly air. His poetictemperament was so captivated by the unspeakable charm of theland that he renounced his Christian name, adopting the Japanesename "Yakumo," the very first word of the sacred song, "EightfoldClouds." Touched with the rare picturesqueness and graceful sim-plicity of Japanese life, he married a daughter of a samurai, whosefamily name, Koizumi, he then assumed. •Ere long, Yakumo Koizumi converted himself into a subject ofthe Mikado, determined to devote his maturer years to those inti-mate delineations and charming pictures of Oriental life that weredestined to give the Western nations a new conception of the Easternspirit, revealing noble ciualities, and inspiring ideals either unde-YAKUMO KOIZUMI: THE INTERPRETER OF JAPAN. 62 qveloped by Occidental civilization or overshadowed by its com-mercialism.It was in the fifth month of the twenty-third year of Meiji(1890) that this strange pilgrim, whose original name was LafcadioHearn, first set his foot in Japan. His first day in Tokyo was oneof those Japanese spring-days of divine beauty, converting the land-scape into a bland expanse of soft lucidity under the wide canopyof a speckless azure sky. Thither he arrived as correspondent ofsome American newspaper syndicate, but it was not long before hesevered his connections with the syndicate, deciding to remain in-definitely in this fascinating land.Soon he wended his way to the Land of the Issuing of Clouds,and in the autumn of the same vear we find Hearn teaching a hieh-MATSUYE IN THE LAND OF THE ISSUING OF CLOUDS.school in Matsuye, the metropolitan city of this historic province.Here he made a little Japanese home with his Japanese bride, win-ning and dainty, yet with all the noble qualities fostered by a Spar-tan training of old. The view from this home was superb. Beforehis tiny paper windows glimmer the broad, placid waters of thegrand Shinji Lake, framed in a dreamy dim gray of hills and peaks,while, skirting his garden, the grand Ohashi River glides slowlyand majestically toward the lake, tremulously mirroring the treesand houses upon its further side. It was here that Hearn wrote themost of the chapters in Glimpses of Unfamiliar Japan—his first bookwritten in Japan.In the Matsuye high-school Hearn was required to teach Eng-626 THE OPEN COURT.lish composition, conversation, and pronunciation. The work wouldhave been a tiresome routine, were it not for the fact that, throughthe medium of compositions and conversations in the class-roomhe strove to unearth the hidden treasures of legends and traditions,to coax out the psychological peculiarities of his strange pupils, toenter into the emotional life of a race much read of, yet all unknown.Thus, he took a profound interest in the naive, often unintelligible,writings of his youthful students which he scanned with the eyesof a keen critic.Hearn's stay in Matsuye did not last longer than a year. Theharshness of the elements and the winter blast sweeping the northerncoast, told upon his constitution so harshly that before a secondwinter had set in he was forced to leave this historic town, with allits endearing surroundings. Accompanied by his dutiful Japanesespouse, Hearn journeyed thence to the city of Kumamoto to accepta position in a higher middle school, a counterpart of the Germangyiiiiiasium. The metropolis of an island stretching in a southerlydirection from the outlet of the world-famous Inland Sea, Kuma-moto enjoys the mild climate which was essential to the health ofthe litterateur long accustomed to semi-tropical climes. Here hiswork was of more advanced nature than in Matsuye, and includedEnglish rhetoric, conversation, history of English literature, andLatin.These six years in Kumamoto were the most fruitful period ofhis literary career. His crowning works Glimpses of UnfamiliarJapan (1894), Out of the East (1895), Kokoro (1896), and Glean-ings in Buddha Fields (1897), all appeared in this period.The pervading subtlety and exquisite delicacy of his style andworkmanship are perhaps yet further enhanced in his later writings,but by far the most serious of his thoughts,—his exposition of theJapanese spirit,—his critical study of Japanese estheticism,—his phil-osophical examination of Buddhist philosophy and Shinto cult,^—hisattempt, in short, to interpret Oriental life and ideals in the lightof modern theory of evolution as expounded by Spencer, Huxley,and others, are all clearly set forth in these four books. The first.Glimpses of Unfamiliar Japan, though essentially descriptive, is yetreplete with those thought-provoking observations, which bespeaka man of rare imaginative reach and extraordinary insight. In thoseearly years, devoted to the production of this book, Hearn was nodoubt bewildered with the maze of this strange world which musthave appeared to him a marvelous fairy-land full of baffling enig-mas. But after a sojourn of four years our pilgrim sees JapanYAKUMO KOIZUMI: THE INTERPRETER OF JAPAN. 627without its giamor. Thus, in the three books, foHowing- (jli)iipsesof Unfauuliar Japaii, we find the most admirable expositions of theinner springs of Japanese hfe, which have so far issued from thepen of foreign writers. In Kokoro, in Out of the East, in Gleaningsin Buddha Fields, he has infused a unicjuc spirit into English litera-ture in his delicately chiseled style reflecting- what his critic, Mr.Paul E. More, aptly terms "the meeting- of three ways,"^—a fusioninto one compound of Hindu philosoph}-, the esthetic sense ofTapan and the \\'cstern theory of evolution. In soft reverberatingelociuence. the true significance of Karma and Nirvana is unfoldedin the light of empiric philosophy, and in terms of evolutional psy-chology we are apprised that the tiny mortuary tablet in the house-hold sanctuary and the miniature lamplet nightly kindled before itare the emblem, indeed the fountain of the strong national spiritinherent in the Japanese. Even his later Japan: An Attempt athitevpretation, regarded by many as his monumental work, possessesperhaps no greater merit than these early works, save that it system-atizes what was there set forth, linking them together into one threadof historical discourses.But to come back to Kumamoto. Here Hearn continued hisJapanese life, declining the ofifer of an official residence built afterthe Western fasliion. His paper-screened home, his dainty futon.liis picturesque kimono, his tiny smoking-pipes, his artistic land-scape garden—these and many other things touched with the simpleserene taste of his Japanese wife, were adapted to realize a genuineJapanese home. As Hearn deeply loved everything Japanese, sointensely did he dislike those ugly foreign things so common innew Japan. His antipathy towards the Christian missionaries andchurches was trulv invulnerable. In fact, he had vow'ed never topermit a church to appear in his sight, and avoided all intercoursewith his missionary colleague in the Kumamoto school. His convic-tion was that in the practice of virtue, in purity of life and outwarddevotion, the Japanese quite outdo the Christians and have nothingwhatever to gain bv conversion to Christianity, morally or other-wise. "Old Japan came nearer," says Hearn, "to the achievementof the highest moral ideal than our far more evolved societies canhope to do for many a hundred years." To him, those simple,happy beliefs of the natives were far preferable to the Westernfancies of "an unforgiving God and an everlasting hell." Eventhe commonest superstitions of the simple-minded people were, tohim, of rarest value as fragments of the unwritten literature of theirprimitive efforts to find solutions for the riddle of the Linscen—628 THE OPEN COURT.some of which are even comparable for beauty of fancy to thostGreek myths which still furnish an inexhaustible source of inspira-tion for the noblest of our Western poets. He was not blind to thedarker side of Japanese life, but believed it compared very favorablywith the reversed side of Western civilization. To be brief, hisattitude towards Japanese life is summed up in this single sentence,"It has its foibles, its follies, its vices, its cruelties;yet the more onesees of it, the more one marvels at its extraordinary goodness, itsmiraculous patience, its never-failing courtesy, its simplicity of heart,its intuitive charity."Six summers had passed before Hearn resigned his position inthe Kumamoto higher middle school to assume the chair of Englishliterature at the Imperial University of Tokyo. In the University,sou KAZUWO.Hearn's oldest son.suzu. ™"'Hearn'sfourth child and only daughter.he was an inspiring teacher, sparing no effort to encourage his stu-dents. He had come to understand that to be a teacher in thefull Oriental sense it was not enough to lecture skilfully,—notenough, indeed, to impart his knowledge or his art as a trader sellshis merchandise for a certain price. No, he must do somethingmore, something nobler than that. In days of old the Japaneseteacher was expected to take a parental interest in his students, tolook after their welfare with fond sympathy even at the sacrifice ofhis own happiness and comfort. To his pupils, he was an instructor,a guardian, a confidant, a wise and affectionate adviser. A preciousbequest of a vanishing world, this beautiful relation between theteacher and his students has not yet wholly disappeared before theYAKUMO KOIZUMI : THE INTERPRETER OF JAPAN. 629devastating onslaught of Western commercialism. This the foreignteacher must understand first of all, or else he will surely toil invain, and this in spite of his utmost endeavors to come into touchwith the emotional life of his students, or to evoke that interest incertain studies which renders possible an intellectual tie. In fact,many a foreign professor, long resident in Japan, often wonderswhy he is so utterly unable t(^ come into close contact with hisstudents, why they so persistently maintain an attitude of apparentindifiference towards his efforts, finding himself, as our author ob-serves, "in the state of Antarctic explorers, seeking, month aftermonth, to no purpose, some inlet through endless clififs of everlastingtie." In Lafcadio Hearn we find a gratifying exception. His stu-dents, both in Kumamoto and Tokyo, looked upon him with fondIWAWO.Hearn's second son.KIYOSHI.Hearn's third son.esteem, referring to him with the touching honorific sensei, expres-sive of profound Oriental reverence toward the teacher. When theImperial University decided to discontinue Hearn's chair, all hisstudents rose in strong protest against this decision of the Govern-ment. Their protest proved unavailing, and Hearn's connection witlithe university was severed in the spring of 1904, never to be re-sumed. Upon his death, a literary magazine under the auspices ofthe university published a memorial number devoting its entire pagesto the life and reminiscences of the deceased scholar.During his seven years in the Imperial University, Hearn pub-lished six -works, Shadomings (1900), A Japanese Miscellany (1901),Kotto (1902), Exotics and Retrospectives (1898), Ghostly Japan(1899), and Kzvaidan (1904). The greater portion of his last book630 THE OPEN COURT.Japan: An Attempt at Interpretation (1904), was also written inthis period. All these books, excepting the last one, are largelymade up of short stories, legends, folk-lore, and popular songscommon in Japan, which the author interprets with his imaginativesense of the weird and picturesque coupled with the Spencerianphilosophy. Entertaining, and at the same time instructive, andwith all the delicacy of mellowed workmanship, they can hardly becompared in depth of thought to his earlier works already noted.Japan: An Attempt at Interpretation contains doubtless many sug-gestive ideas, but only after making great concessions could wecall it an authoritative work. It is easy to point out many a sweep-ing conclusion which is scarcely warrantable from a sound Japanesepoint of view. Nevertheless, it constitutes an invaluable contribu-tion to the critical study of Japanese history still deplorably neglectedby native scholars. In this book, as in others, Hearn looks backwith reluctant eyes towards a disappearing world governed by thesimple code of Samurai whose moral precepts were welded togetherby the Shinto cult and the teachings of Buddha and Confucius."Where Japan has remained," says he, "true to her old moral ideals,she has done nobly and well ; where she has needlessly departedfrom them, sorrow and trouble have been the natural consequences."But was it possible for Japan to plunge into the whirl of economiccompetition—and she was bound so to do if the basis of her newdeparture was to remain solid—without at the same time radicallychanging her moral conceptions? Is it not unreasonable to expectthe nation to retain the graceful simplicity, the amiability of man-ners, the daintiness of habits, the delicate tact displayed in pleasure-giving, the bright smile and courteous bow at once so artless and sofaultless—to retain all these and other charming old customs andideas, when her green valleys are murked by the sooty breath ofcountless factory chimneys and her sunny towns and picturesquevillages are startled by the busy tumult of the spinning jenny, thepower-loom weaving, the steam-hammer, and the locomotive engine ?Does not the introduction of the factory system, the advent ofa constitutional government inevitably spell the dissolution ofthose ideas, however winsome, which are the fruitage of a paternal-istic conception of society? And is not the knell of the old regimean invocation withal for a new spirit, on the whole more salutarythan the old? Verily, in the same breath lamenting the passingaway of the old Japan, Hearn unmistakably admits that withoutindividualism no modern nation can grow prosperous, that the fu-ture Japan must rely upon the efficacy of this new principle forYAKUMO KOIZUMI: THE 1 .\ TKKl'KF.TER OF JAPAN. 631success in the universal struij^ile for predominance, political andeconomic.Hearn was essentially an ascetic soul, restricting his acquaint-ances into a very narrow circle. Many a foreigner, attracted byhis literary fame, wended his way to the suburban home at Tokyoonly to meet with a blunt rebuff at his portal. At the Imperial Uni-versity he seldom participated in the conversation in the privatechamber where the j^rofessors retired between hours, but alone woulddirect his steps to the campus, strolling among the trees or poringupon the face of the pond. In later years he completely withdrewfrom societ}', even denying himself the comradeship of old and triedfriends, even of those to whom he had in an earlier period dedicatedhis works. It is not perhaps altogether just to liken I learn, as doesan Atuerican critic, to a sensitive plant which can not l)ear a breathof rudeness. His asceticism was the asceticism of man\- originalthinkers whose preoccupation permitted no leisure for relaxationof society. When some of his former students undertook to organ-ize a society for the stud\" of English literature, Hearn addressed tothem a touching letter, earnestlv o]:)])osing their undertaking. "Thestudy of literature or art," wrote he, "is never accomplished by so-cieties of this kind. The study of literature and art requires anddepends upon individual effort, and original thinking. The greatJapanese who wrote famous books and painted famous pictures didnot need societies to help them. They worked in solitude and si-lence. No good literary work can come ou.t of a society—no originalwork, at least. Social organization is essentially opposed to originaleffort, to individual effort, to original thinking, to original feeling.A society for the study of literature means a society organized soas to render the study of literature, or the production of literatureabsolutely impossible."Not only did Hearn object to the (Organization of a literarysociety, but he did not encourage the students to choose literatureor philosophy as a special study, believing that Japan for at leastfiftv A'ears to come must bend all her energies to practical matters.Writing to one of his students in Matsu^e high school, he once ex-pressed the same opinion as follows:"I think you ought not to stud}' what would not be of practicaluse to you in after-life. I am always glad to hear of a studentstudving engineering, architecture, medicine—or any branch of ap-plied sciences. I do not like to see all the fine boys turning to thestudy of law instead of to the study of science or technology. Hun-dreds of students leave the University without any practical ability632 THE OPEN COURT,to make themselves useful—their whole education has been of nouse to them, because it has not been practical. Men can succeedin life only by their ability to do something, and three-fourths of theuniversity students can do nothing."Hearn was probably led to this belief by the disappointingcareer in after life of most of the Japanese students of literature ormetaphysics or psychology, in marked contrast to the conspicuoussuccess of the scholars of applied science. In a comparatively briefperiod, Japan has achieved signal progress in the field of medicaland military, and engineering and physical, sciences, and even prac-tical law and administration. In the case of literature and philos-ophy it has been otherwise. That the Japanese mind lacks idealism,taking but little interest in philosophical problems, Hearn does notbelieve, as does many a cursory observer of Japan ; but he pointsout that the young Japan, like the United States of some forty yearsago, is impelled and ought to absorbingly engage herself in prac-tical undertakings.Hearn died at the age of fifty-six but a few months after hiswithdrawal from the Imperial University, leaving four children withhis Japanese wife. His funeral ceremony was conducted in strictobservance of the Buddhist rites at the Buddhist monastery, Jishoin,Tokyo. In the register of the monastery, you search in vain forthe name of "Lafcadio Hearn," but an acolyte apprises you thata foreigner by the Cjuaint name of "Yakumo Koizumi" lies interredhere, leading you presently into the inner sanctuary where standsa tiny lacquered tablet bearing in gold the "spirit-name" of thedeceased parishioner in artistic Chinese ideographs. The acolytethen curiously remarks, "I wonder what his original nationality is;he seems to have come from everywhere-—some say he was a Greek,some a Frenchman, some an Englishman, but many believe he wasan American." Verily, Yakumo Koizumi was a citizen of the world—this devout herald of Japanese culture to the Occidental nations.

Yakiimo Koizumi: The Interpreter of Japan. (Illustrated.)

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Yakiimo Koizumi: The Interpreter of Japan. (Illustrated.)

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