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The interest attaching to the vast majority of kembutsu depends altogether upon the exercise of imagination; and the ability to exercise such imagination again depends upon one's acquaintance with the history and mythology of the country. Knolls, rocks, stumps of trees, have been for hundreds of years objects of reverence for the peasantry, solely because of local traditions relating to them.
I went to the Sai-no-ike, and to Tama-Wakasu-jinja, as these two kembutsu can be reached by boat. The Sai-no-ike, however, much disappointed me. It can only be visited in very calm weather, as the way to it lies along a frightfully dangerous coast, nearly all sheer precipice. But the sea is beautifully clear and the eye can distinguish forms at an immense depth below the surface.
I asked permission to see the cups from which the exiled emperor drank, and other relics of his stay said to be preserved by the family; but in consequence of illness in the house I could not be received. So I had only a glimpse of the garden, where there is a celebrated pond a kembutsu. The pond is called Shikekuro's Pond, Shikekuro-no-ike.
The meibutsu of any place are its special productions, whether natural or artificial. The kembutsu of a town or district are its sights its places worth visiting for any reason religious, traditional, historical, or pleasurable. Temples and gardens, remarkable trees and curious rocks, are kembutsu.
It seemed to me a curious thing, when I saw Oki ponies for the first time, that Sasaki Takatsuna's battle-steed not less famous in Japanese story than the horse Kyrat in the ballads of Kurroglou is declared by the islanders to have been a native of Oki. And they have a tradition that it once swam from Oki to Mionoseki. Almost every district and town in Japan has its meibutsu or its kembutsu.
According to a little book published at Matsue, the kembutsu of Oki-no- Kuni are divided among three of the four principal islands; Chiburishima only possessing nothing of special interest. Nakanoshima possesses the tomb of the exiled Emperor Go-Toba, at Amamura, and the residence of the ancient Choja, Shikekuro, where he dwelt betimes, and where relics of him are kept even to this day.
Though Chiburishima has no kembutsu, her poor little village of Chiburi the same Chiburimura at which the Oki steamer always touches on her way to Saigo is the scene of perhaps the most interesting of all the traditions of the archipelago. Five hundred and sixty years ago, the exiled Emperor Go-Daigo managed to escape from the observation of his guards, and to flee from Nishinoshima to Chiburi.
I could discover no trace of any human labour on that savage hillside; there was certainly no habitation within miles of the place; it was the very abomination of desolation. It is never wise for the traveller in Japan to expect much on the strength of the reputation of kembutsu.
And when the men of Chiburi were questioned they invented a story, and gave to the enemies of the emperor a false clue to follow. And so, by means of the cuttlefish, the good emperor was enabled to escape from banishment. I found there were various difficulties in the way of becoming acquainted with some of the kembutsu.
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