380 
THE VOYAGE OF THE VEGA. 
[chap. 
constituent giving rise to the report that their value is very 
considerable. To give an idea of the size of some Daibutsu 
statues it may be mentioned that the one at Nara is fifty-three 
and a half feet high, and that one can crawl into the head 
through the nose orifices. 
Nearly all the DaihuUu images are made after nearly the 
same design, which has been improved from generation to 
generation until the countenance of the image has received a 
stamp of benevolence, calm, and majesty, which has probably never 
been surpassed by the productions of western art. Daihutsit 
images evidently stand in the same relation to the works of 
private sculptors as folk-poetry to that of individual bards. 
As I have before pointed out, the Western taste for the 
gigantic was not prevalent in Old Japan. It was evidently 
elegance and neatness, not grandeur, that formed the object 
towards which the efforts of the artist, the architect, and 
the gardener were directed. Only the Daibutsu images, some 
bells, and other instruments of worship form exceptions to 
this. During our excursion at Kioto we passed an inclosure 
where the walls were built of blocks of stone so colossal, that 
it was difficult to comprehend how it had been possible to 
lift and move them with the means that were at the dis¬ 
posal of the Japanese in former times. In the neighbourhood 
of that place there was a grave, probably the only one of its 
kind. It is described in the following way in an account of 
the curiosities of Kioto written by a native:— 
“ Mimisuka, or the grave of the noses and the ears, was 
erected by Hideyoshi Taiko, who lived about A.D. 1590. When 
the military chiefs of this famous man attacked Corea with 
a hundred and fifty thousand soldiers, he gave orders that they 
should bring home and show him all the ears and noses of the 
enemies who were killed in the contest, for it was an old 
practice in 'Japan to cut off the enemies’ heads to show them 
to the king or the commander of the army. But it was now 
impossible to bring the heads of the dead Corean warriors to 
