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I was surprised to learn that there was no record of any person having been injured by these monstrous creatures. Another meibutsu of Oki is much less known than it deserves to be the beautiful jet-black stone called bateiseki, or 'horsehoof stone. It is found only in Dogo, and never in large masses.
The great meibutsu of Oki is the same as that of Hinomisaki dried cuttlefish; an article of food much in demand both in China and Japan. The fisheries of Mionoseki and Hinomisaki are scarcely known; but the fisheries of Oki are famed not only throughout Japan, but also in Korea and China.
Nacre wares, however, are very cheap in Oki; and these form another variety of meibutsu. The shells of the awabi, or 'sea-ear, which reaches a surprising size in these western waters, are converted by skilful polishing and cutting into wonderful dishes, bowls, cups, and other articles, over whose surfaces the play of iridescence is like a flickering of fire of a hundred colours.
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.
Scarcely less beautiful than bateiseki, and equally black, is another Oki meibutsu, a sort of coralline marine product called umi-matsu, or 'sea-pine. Pipe-cases, brush-stands, and other small articles are manufactured from it; and these when polished seem to be covered with black lacquer. Objects of umimatsu are rare and dear.
Fine bamboo-ware is indeed the meibutsu, the special product of Mionoseki; and almost every visitor buys some nice little specimen to carry home with him. The Miojinja is not in its architecture more remarkable than ordinary Shinto temples in Izumo; nor are its interior decorations worth describing in detail.
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