310 
THE VOYAGE OF THE VEGA. 
[chap. 
gates. The first of these courts is ornamented with more than 
two hundred stone lanterns, presented to the temple by the 
feudal princes of the country, the name of the giver and the 
date at which it was given being inscribed on each. Some of 
these peculiar memorials are only half-finished, perhaps an 
evidence of the sudden close of the power of the Shoguns 
and the feudal princes in Japan. In another of the temple 
courts are to be seen lanterns of bronze, partly gilt, presented 
by other feudal princes. A third court is occupied by a temple, 
a splendid memorial of the old Japanese architecture, and of 
the antique method of adorning their sanctuaries with wooden 
carvings, gilding, and varnishing. The temple abounds in old 
book-rolls, bells, drums, beautiful old lacquered articles, &c. 
The graves themselves lie within a separate inclosure. 
The common Japanese gardens are not beautiful according 
to European taste. They are often so small that they might 
without inconvenience, with trees, grottos, and waterfalls, be 
accommodated in a small State’s department in one of the crystal 
palaces of the international exhibitions. All, passages, rocks, 
trees, ponds, yea, even the fishes in the dams, are artificial or 
artificially changed. The trees are, by a special art which has 
been very highly developed in Japan, forced to assume the 
nature of dwarfs, and are besides so pruned that the whole plant 
has the appearance of a dry stem on which some green clumps 
have been hung up here and there. The form of the gold fish 
swimming in the ponds has also been changed, so that they have 
often two or four tail-fins each, and a number of growths not 
known in their natural state. On the walks thick layers of 
pebbles are placed to keep the feet from being dirtied, and at the 
doors of dwelling-houses there is nearly always a block of granite 
with a cauldron-like depression excavated in it, which is kept 
filled with clean water. Upon this stone cauldron is placed 
a simple but clean wooden scoop, with which one can take water 
out of the vessel to wash himself with. 
