Japan and the Japanese

A LIVE SAINT. 357
mentioned, the children at the bottom feel great relief, if they do
not obtain a full and effectual redemption." This lake has but one
outlet, falling over the mountains in a cataract, and running down
which the road is
through a craggy and precipitous valley, along
carried on a very steep descent to the mouth of the river in the bay
of Jedo. Here, on a
plain four miles in width, was found the
town of Odoicara, containing about a thousand small houses, very
neatly built, and evidently inhabited by a better class of people ;
but the empty shops evinced no great activity of trade or manufac-
tures. The castle and residence of the prince, as well as the
temples, were on the north side, in the ascent of the mountains.
The next day (Monday, March 12), the road following
the north-
west shore of the outer bay of Jedo crossed several very rapid
streams, till at length the mountains on their left disappeared, and
a broad plain spread out extending to Jedo. Off the shore was
seen the island of Kamokura, with high and rugged shores, but of
which the surface was flat and wooded. It was not above four
miles in circumference, and was used, like several other islands, as
a place of confinement for disgraced noblemen. There being no
landing-place, the boats that bring prisoners or provisions must be
hauled up and let down by a crane. After a time the road left
the shore, crossing a promontory which separates the outer from the
inner bay of Jedo ; but by sunset the shore of the inner bay was
struck.
The country now became exceedingly fruitful and populous, and
almost a continued row of towns and villages. In one of these
villages there lived in a monastery an old gray monk, four-score
years of age, and a native of "
Nagasaki. He had spent," says
Kiimpfer, " the
greatest part of his life in holy pilgrimages, running
up and down the country, and visiting almost all the temples of the
Japanese empire. The superstitious vulgar had got such a high
notion of his holiness, that even in his lifetime they canonized and
reverenced him as a great saint, to the extent of worshipping his
statue, which he caused to be carved of stone, exceeding in this
even Alexander the Great, who had no divine honors paid him
during his life. Those of his countrymen who were of our retinue
did not fail to ruu *hither to see and pay their respects to that holy
man."