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The only consolation lay in the memory of what travel over the Musashi plain used to be before trains hurried one, or otherwise, into the heart of the land. In those days the journey was done in jinrikisha, and a question of days, not hours, it was in the doing, two days' worth of baby carriage, of which the tediousness lay neither in the vehicles nor in the way, but in the amount of both.
On our right, looking downward, were the sea and the city rising in terraces from the water, the hillsides covered with foliage, all sparkling in the morning light; on our left, foothills, and beyond these the mountains. We stopped at a Japanese tea-house to rest the jinrikisha men, and soon after, we came to a point in the landscape said to be represented in the opera of "Madame Butterfly."
While there were carriage drives, this was our first introduction to the jinrikishas, and we found them most convenient and a novelty; only there was an uncomfortable feeling that the jinrikisha man in Ceylon was too slight for his occupation. The street scenes presented almost as cosmopolitan an aspect as those at Rangoon, and with quite as varied a mixture of nationality.
Yuki Chan watched the back of the jinrikisha and the swinging brown legs of the jinrikisha man that showed beneath. She had forgotten the cat, but she still remembered the kind look in the blue eyes of the boy. "Yuki, Yuki!" came the voice of the mother in her native tongue. "Come, the feast is prepared, and the sandals are worn from my feet running to seek you.
A steam launch conveyed us to Nagasaki, and once there we took a jinrikisha for a memorable mountain ride of five miles, along a road called the Mogi. We ascended gradually from the sea-level, and soon the loveliest view was spread before us.
He was not quick enough to arrest the force of the blow, but he succeeded in deflecting its course, and the blade, which would have given the sailor a decent burial at sea, sharply grazed Percival's wrist, and buried itself in the side of the jinrikisha.
In out-of-the-way districts I had refused offers of the kind before. For Japanese beasts of burden run in a decreasing scale as follows, according to the poverty of the place: jinrikisha, horses, bulls, men, women. I draw my line at the last. I am well aware how absurd the objects themselves regard such a protective policy, but I cling to my prejudices. To the present proffer I was adamant.
It was still raining, and all the jinrikisha men wore their large rain hats and rain cloaks, made either of reeds or of oiled paper. Most of the jinrikishas, too, had oiled paper hoods and aprons. The drive to our hotel, through long, narrow, crowded, picturesque streets, seemed long and wearisome.
After reaching the foot of the mountain we found our jinrikisha men, each with his little chaise, ready to trot off for Yokohama, about thirty-five miles distant. Along the road, as we progressed, evidences met the eye of fine agricultural results; the fields and meadows were cultivated to the highest point, entirely by hand. No plows are used; every foot of the soil is spaded by men and women.
We went ashore to make the necessary arrangements, and it was settled that we should start at ten o'clock, which we did, with the Consulate constable as our guide. We had three men to each jinrikisha, and went along at a merry pace through the long straggling towns of Kobe and Hiogo.
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