spend for such things, because the one exquisite touch means less to us.
A Japanese, in his garden,—or in some one else’s, perhaps,—sits in the particular spot allotted to him; in his own garden, on the Master’s Stone; in another’s, on the Guest’s Seat of Honour, or on the Guest’s Isle, and drinks in the beauty as though it were golden saké,[1] tasting each honeyed, burning drop as it goes down, but never satiated. Sometimes he sits—like an image of Buddha, with a sensual face, perhaps, but with a spiritual mind teaching him how to look—sunk absorbed in the peaceful scene before him, in a very Nirvana of happiness—not himself, it would seem, but part of the spirit of the place.
I remember once, at Shimonoseki,—which, together with Moji, makes the Liverpool and Manchester, the New York and Pittsburg, of Japan; busy, bustling, dreadful places from the Oriental point of view,—seeing a young man in contemplation before a Rose. It was in a little nursery garden to which we had found our way by back streets and rather foul alleys, in search of flowers to take on board ship, and a stone lantern for our garden in Hong-Kong. A poor little spot it was, and the old Okka San,[2] who seemed the only one in charge of the place, had no word of English, and could not understand the few we had of Japanese. A lean young man
