KOYASAN, THE JAPANESE VaLHALLA 



669 



square before Kongobuji's gateway to 

 the village street, green lanes lead to 

 other lanes, to deserted avenues and 

 aisles in koyamaki groves, where the 

 white walls, black rafters, and black 

 roofs of monastery gates and buildings 

 are continuous. Such a deserted monas- 

 tery is Muriojo-in, whose painted 

 wooden doors open to corridors, where, 

 in long series of rooms, the most beauti- 

 ful gold screens slumber in darkness and 

 icy, deserted dampness. 



On another afternoon we visited the 

 head priest of the Shojo-shin-in, the sec- 

 ond greatest establishment now existing 

 in Koyasan. It has been rebuilt since the 

 fire, which spared only its godown, and 

 the few screens, altar treasures, and 

 tablets that were carried to safety. The 

 hall of tablets is the largest on Koyasan, 

 severely splendid in its black lacquered 

 ceiling and shining dark floor, and the 

 walls are completely hidden by the thou- 

 sands of ihai rank on rank. 



The first reception-rooms blazed with 

 the glow of reflected sunlight on the new 

 gold-leaf screens that are without deco- 

 rative designs, and treasures incalculable 

 lay all over the floor of one room, where 

 the boxes of precious Kakemono had 

 been brought in, in preparation for an 

 airing. There was a glowing Okyo 

 screen, where the red rising sun rose 

 above tossing waves, and a pair of 

 Tanyu's dragon and tiger screens in sepia 

 on gold that held one reverent. Another 

 pair of Okyo screens were brought for- 

 ward and opened out in line to show the 

 greatest landscape view of Japan — Fuji- 

 yama rising from the plain, with the 

 forked peninsula of Mio-no-Matsubara at 

 its feet, central in a scene of ideal beauty. 

 Gold screens with white herons on snowy 

 pine trees and gold screens with snow- 

 laden bamboo branches excited our 

 strongest raptures ; and then we were 

 conducted past princely guest-rooms, up 

 a steep staircase, and up yet another 

 staircase, across a garden, and came out 

 on a large tea-room far up on the steep 

 hillside, the veranda overlooking the 

 monastery roofs, the line of village roofs 

 and commanding o-reen summits be- 



yond — the moon-viewing pavilion of the 

 hierarch. 



THE MOST WONDERFUL RELIGIOUS P.-VINT- 

 ING IN JAPAN 



We waited for the skies to clear before 

 making reverent pilgrimage to Shimbe- 

 sho-in to see that greatest religious paint- 

 ing in Japan — the Amida Ni-ju-go Bo- 

 satsu, or Buddha and the twenty-five An- 

 gels, painted by Eishin Sozu for one of 

 the Hiyeizan temples, and later bought 

 for the Koyasan shrine. Shimbe-sho-in 

 is the remotest and least visited of the 

 monasteries on remote Koyasan. "Koya 

 no Koya," said my priestly guide, who 

 wore a white cotton overcoat to keep the 

 rain drops from his rich silk coat, as he 

 followed the narrow path through the 

 woods, a minion following with the use- 

 less red-ribbed umbrella of ceremony 

 under his arm. It hardly seemed possi- 

 ble that a great temple and the supreme 

 shrine of Japanese art could lie beyond 

 the deserted foot path gullied by the rain, 

 where we brushed the undergrowth at 

 every step. The path led up steep slopes 

 and plunged down steep slopes between 

 koya, pine, and hinoki trees, and at last 

 we crossed a tiny foot-bridge of ap- 

 proach, before a massive white Chinese 

 gate, its solid arch topped by an intri- 

 cately bracketed roof. White-walled 

 buildings, showing rafters and timbers of 

 dark-brown, unpainted wood, surrounded 

 the small court-yard, and we entered the 

 severely plain waiting-rooms — white plas- 

 tered walls, white paper screens, un- 

 painted wood frames and beams, wholly 

 without decoration or ornament of any 

 kind. The Shimbe-sho-in belongs to the 

 Ritsuo sect, one of the six earlier sects 

 established at Nara in the early centuries 

 of Buddhism (753), when eighty priests 

 came from China to teach the Vinaya doc- 

 trines and were settled at the Todaiji by 

 the reigning empress. Meditation and 

 contemplation are great features of their 

 religious observances, but their ritual is 

 less elaborate, and the austere simplicity 

 of their temple and monastery halls is in 

 contrast to the gorgeous splendor of the 

 Shingon establishments in Koya proper. 



