Cure my
spine, and, as we were going to stay all day, he would go and fetch
an operator; but I rejected this as emphatically as the services of
the blind man! Yesterday a man came and pasted slips of paper over
all the "peep holes" in the shoji, and I have been very little
annoyed, even though the yadoya is so crowded.
The rain continues to come down in torrents, and rumours are hourly
arriving of disasters to roads and bridges on the northern route.
I. L. B.
LETTER XXVII
Good-tempered Intoxication - The Effect of Sunshine - A tedious
Altercation - Evening Occupations - Noisy Talk - Social Gathering -
Unfair Comparisons.
SHIRASAWA, July 29.
Early this morning the rain-clouds rolled themselves up and
disappeared, and the bright blue sky looked as if it had been well
washed. I had to wait till noon before the rivers became fordable,
and my day's journey is only seven miles, as it is not possible to
go farther till more of the water runs off. We had very limp,
melancholy horses, and my mago was half-tipsy, and sang, talked,
and jumped the whole way. Sake is frequently taken warm, and in
that state produces a very noisy but good-tempered intoxication. I
have seen a good many intoxicated persons, but never one in the
least degree quarrelsome; and the effect very soon passes off,
leaving, however, an unpleasant nausea for two or three days as a
warning against excess.
