Glimpses of Unfamiliar Japan Second Series by Lafcadio Hearn
Glimpses of Unfamiliar Japan Second Series by Lafcadio Hearn CONTENTS 1 IN A JAPANESE GARDEN …........................................P3 2 THE HOUSEHOLD SHRINE ….....................................P23 3 OF WOMEN'S HAIR …................................................P36 4 FROM THE DIARY OF AN ENGLISH TEACHER …..........P43 5 TWO STRANGE FESTIVALS …....................................P73 6 BY THE JAPANESE SEA …..........................................P79 7 OF A DANCING-GIRL …..............................................P89 8 FROM HOKI TO OKI …................................................P102 9 OF SOULS ….............................................................P137 10 OF GHOSTS AND GOBLINS …...................................P142 11 THE JAPANESE SMILE …..........................................P152 12 SAYONARA! …........................................................P165 NOTES …....................................................................P170 CHAPTERONE In a Japanese Garden Sec. 1 MY little two-story house by the Ohashigawa, although dainty as a bird- cage, proved much too small for comfort at the approach of the hot season—the rooms being scarcely higher than steamship cabins, and so narrow that an ordinary mosquito-net could not be suspended in them. I was sorry to lose the beautiful lake view, but I found it necessary to remove to the northern quarter of the city, into a very quiet Street behind the mouldering castle. My new home is a katchiu-yashiki, the ancient residence of some samurai of high rank. It is shut off from the street, or rather roadway, skirting the castle moat by a long, high wall coped with tiles. One ascends to the gateway, which is almost as large as that of a temple court, by a low broad flight of stone steps; and projecting from the wall, to the right of the gate, is a look-out window, heavily barred, like a big wooden cage. Thence, in feudal days, armed retainers kept keen watch on all who passed by—invisible watch, for the bars are set so closely that a face behind them cannot be seen from the roadway.
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