SWORD-FURNITURE
beauties summons to Japanese sight a picture of concrete loveliness and to the Japanese mind a poem of abstract ideas. Thus, when Michitaka speaks of "a light shower sweeping across the verdant slope of a mountain," or of "a soft haze" resting on the bosom of a limpid lake," or of "white sails on a wide sea, their outlines softened by the brooding breath of spring," he knows that he is recalling to educated minds, not only delightful images, but also certain subtleties of artistic conception and certain shades of emotion which convey his meaning with accuracy such as no mere verbal analysis could achieve.
The above remarks apply to the style and the technique only of the art. The author of the Sōken Kishō seldom makes reference to decorative motives, unless a sculptor's fame is connected with some special departure in that direction. The quality of the chiselling is, in fact, the first point to which the Japanese connoisseur directs his attention. On the other hand, the decorative design is the prime object of the Occidental dilettante's admiration. In "L'Art Japonais" that most appreciative critic, M. Gonse, says:—
On se blase vite sur l'adresse technique des ciseleurs Japonais, tant elle semble chez eux un don de nature; mais on éprouve une jouissance toujours nouvelle dans l'étude du décor lui-même. Quel tact, quelle souplesse! Comme les deux cotês so complètent harmonieusement! Car, bien souvent, le sujet se continue sur le face et sur le revers et presente dans chacune de ces parties le même intérêt. Quelquefois même il chevauche sur le grand et le petit sabre. On verra Shōki, sur la grande garde poursuivant le diable qui se cache sur la petite; dans l'une, Komachi nous apprait jeune et resplendissante de beauté; dans l'autre, vielle et courbée par l'âge, &c. L'étude du microcosme de cet art pourrait conduire à l'infini.
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