熊本から戸下・阿蘇山・大分経由で別府へ

42. From Kumamoto via Toshita, Aso-san and Oita to Beppu.

This is one of the finest cross-country trips in Japan. It affords one the opportunity of climbing an active volcano, of gazing down into its awe-inspiring crater, and of tramping through a rural section of Japan picturesque and unspoiled.

The most satisfactory way is to hire a motor-car (prices flexible) at Kumamoto and proceed thence (good road) to (12 M.) Otzu, and on to (9 M. further) Toshita, where one spends the night at the local Inn. Several handsome waterfalls in the neighborhood. Early the next morning the luggage can be put in the car and this sent round the base of the volcano to Boju, to be waiting in the afternoon. Or, if one travels lightly, one can send the car back from Toshita and pick up another car at Boju. A local guide (easily obtained at the Inn) should be secured at Toshita, as in some places the trail is obscure. He will carry the light luggage one may have. Amateur photographers who plan to take views of the crater are recommended to read the 2d paragraph at p. ci. See also p. 686.

From Ozu, a primitive town with streams of clear water running through its main street, the excellent road slopes gently upward through a region where much good tobacco is raised; the hillsides are usually scarlet with the leaves of the vegetable-wax trees, and in autumn they flame with many gorgeous tints. The valley lands are sown to grain. About 1 hr. out the road approaches a stupendous gorge (right) covered with dense forests of tall cedars that rise like exaggerated funeral plumes; lofty mts. stand behind, while far down at the S. the land falls away in a magnificent perspective; the mighty roar of a surging river comes up from the depths. The roadway winds down over terraces cut from the canon wall to the quaint stone Megane Bridge thrown across the river at a point where two streams converge. The Kurogawa (Black River) comes in at the right, the Shirakawa (White River) at the left. In the triangle formed by the streams and the lofty hills nestles the picturesque hamlet of Toshita, or Aso village.

Here the two rivers, which in early spring tear through the ravine with a deafening roar, merge their waters, and after flowing through a wild and lovely rift in the mts. emerge on the plain and wind placidly through Kumamoto as the Shirakawa. The hot sulphur and the gypsum (sekko) springs which abound are supposed to spurt direct from the glowing heart of the volcano. The numerous baths are as primitive as the habits and ideas of the people - the steaming sulphur water running through bamboo pipes into pools under flimsy sheds which afford no privacy and where men and women bathe together in nature's way.

The start for the ascent of the volcano should be made as early as possible in the morning (about 5 or 6 o'clock). The

sunrise effect over the surrounding peaks is beautiful. One should not fail to carry a good supply of drinking-water, as it will be welcome before the rim of the crater is reached. Tea, beer, etc., can be had at wayside tea houses in some places, but the drinking-water should be avoided.

The traveler should never forget that the water of which tea is made in Japan is rarely brought to a boil, hence it cannot be said to be properly sterilized. Usually it is easy to carry a bottle of boiled water in one's luggage, or, what is better still, a bottle or two of Clifford-Wilkinson Tansan water or lemonade.

Toshita looks very pretty in its rocky nest beside the rushing rivers as one looks down upon it from the broad macadam road that winds up out of the gorge. A 30 min. walk brings one to a point far below which Tochinoki-shinyu is descried perched like a swallow's nest in a gorge from which many wisps of steam drift upward. The view of the roaring, angry river as it rushes downward is inspiriting. The curious rock formation at the left of the road is worth looking at. The ravine soon widens and affords a vista (at the far right) of the (30 ft. high) Aigaeru-taki ('barrier,' or 'trout-return'), so called because the mt. trout bound upstream must turn back here. Here, too, one passes out of earshot of the resounding river. The tall mt. at the right is Tawara-yama. - A steady 45 min. ascent from Toshita brings one to a steepish rocky trail which leads up (left) at a sharp angle from the main road to (10 min.) a wide, rolling upland plain, on the far side of which a thin column of steam can be seen rising from the (3 1/2 M.) Yunotani Hot Springs, on the slope of what once formed the outer wall of the Aso-san crater.

The view from this elevated plane is singularly vivid and beautiful. The eye ranges over scores of peaks and gorges, and thousands of square miles of tumbled valley land sentineled by the ominous volcano pouring out clouds of black wrath, and they all make a lively impression upon the mind. If one can reach this spot when the sun's disk is just climbing above the surrounding mts., and broad fingers of yellow light are ripping aside the somber curtains of night and chasing the shadows out of the yawning chasms, one will experience a stirring of the blood such as one feels at the summit of the Matterhorn, on Tiger Hill in the Himalayas, with Mt. Everest in the foreground, or on the deathly silent uppermost rim of Popocatepetl. Another 10 min. walk brings one to a small cluster of trees girdling a deserted shrine on a summit of a rounded hill whence the view is even finer. Here perhaps better than at any other point one is able to appreciate the claim made for Aso-san that with its ancient crater 40 M. in circumference it is one of the most remarkable of terrestrial volcanoes. The present crater, 14 M. by 10, with the longest diameter running N. and S., is still of striking magnitude. The jagged girdle of

cliff and escarpment which cuts the horizon at the right and left anciently formed the outer rim of the volcano. The only gap in this vast circuit is seen straight ahead and was made by the Shirakawa perhaps aeons ago when it burst its way through the wall in its strenuous efforts to reach the sea. On the wide crater floor, now jumbled into a confused mass of hills, ravines, and smiling meadows, twenty or more populous villages stand in fancied security. All are far below the huge central cone, which rises bulkily to terminate in five squat peaks, the highest (Taka-dake) 5220 ft. above the sea. Each so-called peak - merely an unpricked mud-bubble on the lip of a gigantic vent - is separated from its mate by mud and ash walls, and but two are active. A series of gentle grassy slopes lead upward from the plain to the rim of the newer, yet unthinkably old, crater wall, over which one passes to the wide oval pit where the glowing heart of this Kyushu monarch still harbors some of its original fire.

Seen from our vantage-point the inclosed region reminds one of a titanic, sunlit amphitheater at the top of the world. Barring the ringing call of field-larks and the answering notes of other birds, the peace of a great silence broods above it. The tiny, blurred cluster of white houses glinting miles away through the great gash in the crater wall is Ozu. The blue mts. beyond the azure, satin-like sea rise in pointed grandeur from the Shimabara Peninsula. A myriad wild flowers deck the grassy slopes, prominent among them a dainty little stellate white flower like the Star-of-Bethlehem, and a singularly handsome purple thistle which the mountaineers call (perhaps too loosely) the Gobo, or burdock (Arctium Lappa) and which they sometimes cultivate as a vegetable. - The roar of a distant waterfall rides down on the wind as we follow the trail in its windings up and down and across the plateau to the bulky, smoking mt. At 7.30 we reach a commanding eminence whence a magnificent view is had of the vast sweep of land at our feet, and of the semi-circular crater wall with the ragged gash torn through its ribs countless ages ago by the impetuous Shirakawa. The impelling harmony of the scene causes one to turn again and again as one ascends. A sequestered hamlet with a cobble-paved street sloping upward beneath shade-trees is passed at 8 o'clock, and 40 min. later a lovely, shadowy, idyllic road leads through somber pines to (25 min.) Yunotani village, where there are many persimmon trees and a little teahouse, from the terrace of which a wonderful panorama is spread out below. While one is enjoying the view from a seat beneath flowering plum, peach, or cherry trees, or reddening maples, the nesans scurry around and brew the inevitable green tea, assemble yokan and sweet cakes, and tie on the new waraji (3 sen) with which the traveler will be wise to equip himself before tightening his belt, taking off his coat, and

starting for the real climb in a whirl of renewed energy. Before leaving the town one should pass into the yard at the left of the road (a minute's walk beyond the cha-ya), and inspect the huge steaming, boiling pool of mud there in the midst of sulphur fumes, and rocks that have been burned a dusky red by internal fires. The region, perhaps an old volcanic vent, looks very Plutonian and forbidding; the ground in the immediate vicinity is treacherous, and the water is led away in pipes to a primitive bath-house.

The trail is now uphill along a shaded woods-path, then for an hour or more over the shoulders of steepish, rounded hills where much pampas-grass grows, and whence the views are of a majesty which words fail to describe. Farmers from the microscopic towns far below come up to this point with pack-animals and cut the fine grass and take it down to the plains. Occasional subterranean grumbles beneath one's feet remind one of the hot fires that glow not far below, and these sounds are punctuated at intervals by thunderous explosions that shake the ground and start pebbles rattling down the mt. side. A leisurely ascent of 1 1/2 hrs. from Yunotani brings one (at 11.15) to the rim of another old crater overlooking the wide, grass-grown crater floor. The gray, tortured rocks of the massive walls are pictures of desolation, and they look as if they had passed through infernal fires. Before descending to the floor of Aso's deserted workshop, one gets a last look in retrospect over the land which seems to slope like a toboggan-slide into infinity. A 50 min. walk down to a small gorge where the Boju trail strikes off at the left, then up a stiffish winding trail, brings one to the rest-house just at the foot of Aso's frowning crest. Clouds of smoke ascend amid deafening noises. Light refreshments are obtainable here, and for 20 sen one buys a cane stamped with the assurance that one has reached the top.

The Active Crater is reached by passing behind the inn, then alongside the melancholy little Aso-san Shrine, and up (20 min.) a desolate, sloping path strewn with scoria and volcanic detritus. Great waves of molten lava are seen to have washed down the slag-encumbered side of the cone, and they have formed a fearsome atrium, like that of an expiring world, where deadly peril seems to stalk abroad, and where no flowers bloom or birds sing. Scrambling over the parched and dreadfully distorted lip, one finds one's self within the gaunt ribs of a still living skeleton of a volcano nearly 1/2 M. long, fire-scorched, streaked and smeared with all the colors of death's spectrum, and appalling in its dying agony. These scarified walls are among the most impressive things in the interior, since they tell all too plainly the terrible tortures to which they have been subjected; they bear a curious resemblance to the walls of an old paint-shop whose slipshod owner has for years tried out

colors on them. Lateral walls of crumbly mud and ashes (dangerous) separate the several vents (apt to change with each eruption) and from these vast sloping ridges avalanches slip down from time to time. Near the center is a fear-inspiring hole 200 or more ft. deep and 1/8 M. in diameter at the top, with a wall that dips sharply and narrows to a boiling, roaring pool of mud and fire and sulphur out of which shoot up streaks of snow-white steam or billowy eddies of dense black smoke. The roar is like that from a titanic blast-furnace, and the heat as great; the guide keeps the stench of brimstone out of his nostrils by tying a handkerchief over his face, but the turmoil in one's ears is almost deafening. This pit has a deadly attraction for persons afflicted with the suicidal mania, and many have jumped into it. Like Asama-yama in Shinano Province, Aso-san is a deceptive volcano - smoking quietly to-day and mayhap screeching hysterically and sending out terrifying volumes of smoke, hot stones, and ashes, to-morrow. There are several active vents inside the crater, one a wide pool of boiling mud which ejects jets of spiteful steam high in the air. Occasionally one gets a fugitive reflection of the incandescent throat beneath, glowing with unthinkable heat.

The scramble down from the cone to the rest-house takes 25 min., and 10 min. afterward one enters the Boju path. Thence it is downhill through a narrow valley, with the smoking crater at the right and high hills at the left. At times the trail is blind, and at others it loses itself entirely in the rocky ravines that serve as water-courses in the rainy season. The hillsides flame with wild azaleas in March and April (30-60 days earlier than in Central Japan), and in Oct. small magenta ones come out to herald the mild winter. Wild white hydrangeas are common, and goldenrod blooms in season as luxuriantly as in distant America. After 1 hr. Boju is descried far down on the plain, embowered in trees. The gigantic semi-circular wall cutting the sky-line beyond once formed a segment in the outer wall of the crater. The appearance of this at the right as we descend is strangely fantastic. Gigantic escarpments rise sheer from the plain like the turrets of a great castle, and are supported near the base by stupendous green buttresses that extend far out over the valley floor. Streaked with the effects of the awful fires through which they have passed, and seemingly ready to topple over, they look miles high when viewed from below. Behind this forbidding rampart rise the five cones which comprise the present mt. - Taka-, Kijimi-, Eboshi-, Neko-, and Naka-dake. Seen by moonlight from Boju or any of the towns on the plain, they constitute one of the most impressive sights in the Mikado's Empire.

The last part of the descent is over a grassy slope at the far right of which Miyaji village is seen clustering amid the trees. At the end of a leisurely walk of 2 hrs. or more from the rest-

house one comes to an old graveyard where the trail forks; the moss-grown road at the left takes one (10 min.) into the main street of Boju.

As a rule one will have no difficulty in finding a car here (or some sort of a vehicle) that will take him over the approximately 13 M. to Takeda, referred to below. The broad pike which leads to the right crosses the one-time floor of the crater, between this and the outer wall. The country is rolling, with no distinctive features.

Takeda, a delightfully situated little town in a highly volcanic region in Bungo Province, occupies what perhaps was anciently the crater of an extinct volcano. Hills surround it, and to reach it one must go through one of the score or more tunnels which pierce these hills and give access to it. Brawling brooks from the near-by mts. stream through the town. A half-mile to the E. is a miniature Niagara in the form of the splendid Uozumi Waterfall (36 ft. high), which plunges over upright basaltic columns at the E. base of Aso-san. Ten M. toward the S.E. is the magnificent (60 ft. high, 300 ft. wide) Chinda Fall, into which prisoners were formerly cast and pardoned if they came out alive. The entire region roundabout abounds in charming spots. The big hill near the town, Oka-yama, is the site of a one-time castle, the Oka-jo, from 1593 to 1868 the home of the powerful Nakagawa family. The adjacent country is covered with decomposed lava, and ranks as one of the most productive in Japan. Besides the ordinary agricultural products it yields tea, tobacco, vegetable-wax, fine shaddocks, and other citrus fruits, prominent among them delicious mandarin oranges. The surrounding mts. contain alum, copper, iron, antimony and lead.

Takeda is a one-time basha-station on the cross-country road between Boju and Beppu, and if one cannot find a Ford car to carry him across the intervening 20 miles, a basha will be available.

Trolley-lines are being built in various directions in Kyushu, and the Gov't Rly. is also extending its lines southward from Oita (see the Rly. Time Table, and the towns of Noya and Tamarai).

From Takeda the road crosses the rushing and sparkling Onogawa, then threads a cool tunnel cut through tufa and lined with moss and tiny vegetable life. The entire journey is over a charming country of hills and dales and dashing rivers, with mts. on the sky-line and picturesque farmsteads on the hill-slopes. A myriad wild flowers deck the country in spring and summer, and give place to glorious woodland tints in autumn. Certain reaches remind one strongly of the Austrian Tyrol, others of fertile stretches in Devonshire or Kentucky. Beyond (10 M.) Nukumi, there is a wild and picturesque

gorge in a region of singular beauty. The vegetation is almost as lush as that of the lower tropics, and it differs in character from that of northern Japan as sharply as that of Florida does from New England.

Imaichi, 6 M. beyond Nukumi, produces many oranges of great sweetness. The views hereabout, as the road winds down through the hills, and flanks deep ravines through which thunder angry rivers, are grand. The manner and customs of the people are quaint, and suggest those of Old Japan.

Notsuhara, 18 M. from Takeda, is but 10 M. from Oita, described below.

Oita (sometimes called by its old name, Funai), capital of Oita Prefecture, with 30,000 inhabs. (Inn: Yaoya, ¥5) 7 1/2 M. S.E. of Beppu, an important port on the Bungo Channel, in Bungo Province, is of historic rather than local interest, and it need not detain the traveler. From the 13th cent. onward it was the home of the Otomo daimyos, the most powerful among the Kyushu lords. In the latter half of the 16th cent. the domains of the Prince of Bungo extended from the Strait of Shimonoseki southward to the realm of the Lord of Satsuma. It was at Funai that the Portuguese adventurer Mendes Pinto, landed in 1543, and gave the astonished Japanese their first glimpse of firearms. The daimyo was friendly both to them and the Jesuit missionaries (who called him King Franciscus), and in accepting their religion he came into history as the first daimyo of Japan to go over to the Christian faith. He was represented in the memorable embassy to Rome, Portugal, and Spain, in 1585, by his nephew, the ruler of Hyuga, whom the Jesuits called Jerome. A specialty of Oita is the cotton yarn which one sees in almost every shop. - The rly. runs frequent trains to Beppu, the present starting-point (for Shimonoseki) of Rte. 43 (see below).

Beppu, a sort of Japanese Karlsbad in a highly volcanic region on the beautiful Beppu Bay (an inlet of Bungo Channel), in Bungo Province, at the W. end of the Inland Sea, though but little known to foreign tourists, is one of the most interesting places in the Empire - a natural masterpiece left unfinished by Nature in a region which Europeans often refer to as the Japanese Riviera. The entire country roundabout reminds one strongly of Italy or Sicily. The compact town (pop. 10,000) stands on the sea-edge of a small scorified plain which reaches back to, and up the sides of, three extinct volcanoes - Yufu, or Tsukushi Fuji (often called the Bungo Fuji), 4850 ft. high, and said to be the loftiest peak in Bungo; Tsurumi (3619 ft.), a bare mt. at the right of it; and Takasaki (2067 ft.), at the S. end of the town, often called Shikioku-san, and remembered by the natives for the splendid castle (destroyed during the war for the Restoration) which occupied a terrace on its side high above the sea. The last outburst from Tsurumi was

in the 17th cent. when it filled the valley with the clinker-like scoria of numerous lava streams. In due course much of this cindery stuff decomposed and gave rise to the rank vegetation which now clothes the skirts of the mts. in perennial green. But in places the old volcanic wounds failed to heal, and they now advertise their presence by suppurating sores in the form of furiously boiling chemical pools flush with the surface, or mineral springs that spurt out steam and water blistering to the touch. The district seems all underlaid with infernal fires, some of which are so close to the surface that the people cook their daily food over holes punched in the earth. In places the crust is so thin that to sink in means to have a foot parboiled or burned to a cinder, while at others there are agitated ulcers which spit out scarifying blobs of liquid mud accompanied by menacing sounds and noisome stenches. Streams of steaming water showing all the colors of the rainbow rush down from the hills through the gutters of the town, and impart a most infernal look to the place. Many of the adjuncts of the region are in strange keeping with its mediaeval appearance.

Hotels. There are nearly 200 inns and lodging houses that cater to the hordes of people who annually visit the city. Foreigners usually prefer to lodge at the clean, new, modern, comfortable, Kamenoi Hotel (Tel. add. 'Kamenoi Hotel,' Beppu), the English-speaking proprietor of which, Mr. K. Aburaya, is helpful in many ways. Rooms only, from 5 yen. With board from 10 yen. Double rooms, from 15 yen. With board from 20 to 25 yen. Meals in the restaurant at moderate prices.

Steamships of the Osaka Shosen Kaisha make Beppu a port of call on their delightful (fine ships, low fares, good food and service) Inland Sea Cruises (consult any O.S.K. agent, or the Japan Tourist Bureau, for rates, etc.).

The Great Daibutsu or Buddha, commemorates the millions of persons who have died in Japan without friends to perform the last rites (the bones and ashes of many of them are inside the figure). It was erected in 1928 by Mr. Eizaburo Okamoto, cost 100,000 yen, is the largest of its kind in Japan, and is inferior in beauty to the Kamakura Daibutsu. The dimensions are as follows: Height 80 ft.; diameter at the base 80 ft.; circumference of the base 248 ft.; length of face 23.8 ft.; circumference of head 63 ft.; length of eyebrows 9.48 ft.; length of eyes 6.58 ft.; length of mouth 6.8 ft.; length of nose 3.8 ft.; length of ear 9.8 ft.; circumference of thumb 6.48 ft.

The Beppu Baths constitute one of the "sights" of the city.

A magnificent panorama of the plain on which Beppu stands and of the lovely sea beyond can be had from the elevated Kankaiji (a hill and hamlet of the same name 1/4 M. back of the Beppu Hotel), poised like an eagle's nest high above a gorge. The path is easily followed as it ascends between hedges of orange blooms. Tinkling mt. streams slither down over the stones, and the bald cone of Yufu-yama rises brown and sere at the right. A flagged road leads into the (1/2 hr.) hamlet, where there are several hot baths. The view of the sea is beautiful, with its flashing sails, and its vast, azure surface rippled by the wind into a sea of crinkly silk crape. -

The Landscape Garden near the hotel, with waterfalls, ravines, and many flowers, is called Sansuikai. - The Sanatorium near by belongs to the Military Department of the Gov't.

The Hot Springs and Baths, with saline, alkaline, and chalybeate waters (temperature from 100° F. and upward) charged with carbonic-acid gas, are sustainedly interesting and have been known (it is said) from the 6th cent. Of the many thousands of persons who foregather here each year between Feb. and Sept. some remain throughout the winter, as the peasant farmer who subsists on a meager diet of grain or fish is said to find it cheaper to soak here in the warm water than to pay for fuel at home. The sands of the shore are heated by subterraneous fires and a sempiternal sun, and in them the indigent make beds in which they lie from morning till night, like piddocks, with only their heads and feet exposed. Through the sands numerous hot springs of sanatory water bubble up, and scores of nude men and women with ailments scoop out hollows near them, and half bury themselves by heaping piles of the sand over an ailing part. At times they sit up, squat about in semi-circles, chat with friends, and form bizarre pictures that are reproduced on the post-cards for sale in the shops. Aged persons of sluggish circulation frequent the bath-houses, and sometimes lie submerged for weeks at a stretch, their heads pillowed on a support, a heavy stone on their stomachs to keep them from floating. Here they eat, sleep, and have their being in a manner as primitive as that of a Maori, donning their scant clothing (often but a breech-clout or a snood) only when necessity urges. The fact that prolonged immersion in sulphurous or ferruginous water imparts a rusty tinge to the hair, and a general piebald look, does not deter them, and sometimes when they emerge they are as wrinkled as a choice piece of old crackled Satsuma faience and as spotted as a leper!

Chief among the 30 or more public baths (Furoya) are the Furo-sen (Longevity Bath), the Reicho-sen (so-called because the tubs are filled only when the tide makes in to cool the water), the Higashi-onsen (E. Hot springs), Nishi (W.) onsen, etc. The latter are at the S. end of the town, near one another, in the Hamawake district, beyond the river. A well-known bath is the Kusunoki-yu, or Camphor Tree Bath, so-named for the big camphor tree which grows up through the roof and has a tiny shrine in its branches. The open-air beach baths are called Suna-yu, or Gravel Baths. In all of them rosy, fat-paunched babies, rounded youth, buxom maturity, and shriveled age bathe promiscuously in all the abandon of perfect nudity, apparently as innocent as Eve was before the apple episode! Discreet travelers are not debarred from inspecting the baths and bathers at will, but the latter do not like to be photographed when nude. One of the most curious of the baths is at the adjacent village of Kannawa, mentioned herein-

after, where a cavern has been dug in the side of a volcanic hill, and where one enters a natural steam-chamber but a foot or two removed from Pluto's domain.

While a day will suffice for a cursory view of the chief points of interest around Beppu, it is a place in which one usually wishes to linger and loaf, to luxuriate in the hot baths, enjoy the many mt. walks, and the never-fading charm of the sea views. No one with a little time to spare should omit visiting the near-by Kannawa, Bozu Jigoku (Priest's Hell), Umi Jigoku (Suppurating Hell), Chi-no-ike Jigoku (Blood-lake Hell), and Shibaishi, all of which can be seen in the order named in about 6 hrs. (preferably on foot). A jinriki (¥1.50 for 1 man; ¥2.50 for 2) can be used part way only, as the steepness of the hills renders some walking necessary.

Leaving the hotel one descends to the town, passes the rly. station (left), and follows (N.) the contour of the bay, which customarily is a beautiful blue. A walk of 1 hr. brings one to the wide and partly shaded Kannawa road, which turns up left and goes to the (1 M.) village of the same name. Midway is a big rock (right) crowned by a shrine whence an entrancing view of the sea is had. Streams of poisonous mineral water rush down the slope, which here is steep and rocky enough to require two men for one's rikisha. On the outskirts of the village the road becomes rougher and narrower; at frequent intervals along the stony, tortuous streets, on the edge of the curbing, rise cement pots 15 or more in. high, like sections of drain-pipe, provided with wood or straw-mat covers. Steam pours up through the open ones, while on others sit kettles of boiling rice, vegetables, or iron tea-pots. The bath-house is near the center of the village; the hot cave is entered from the side of a big swimming-pool. It holds a dozen or more persons, the charge for each of which for the day is 10 sen; one waits his turn in an ante-room until some one comes out and relieves the crush inside. Foreigners will like neither the confined air, which reeks of all manner of smells, nor the hot mud which drops from the ceiling and feels like molten lead on one's skin. Persons with weak hearts and those unaccustomed to infernal heat should stay out. The bathers of both sexes wear only a clean skin, reddened like that of a cooked lobster.

Ascending a hill behind the town, and following a path alongside a cliff streaked with white, brown, and yellow, one comes soon to a small factory where white clay (Shirotsuchi) is mined and used for various purposes, chiefly as a base for tooth-powder. The hills which supply it furnish also heat and motive-power - an unusual and felicitous combination for a factory. Steam hisses from numerous holes in the ground and the air carries the odor of cooked chemicals. Beyond are a number of boiling-mud-holes girdled by miniature cones out of which noxious gases and blobs of hot mud shoot up. The prudent

will keep well in the path hereabout as the earth crust is as thin as it is treacherous. At the foot of a small tea-house (no fees, but one is expected to buy something) extends a wicked-looking slough 40 ft. or more in diameter, called Bozu Jigoku, and containing boiling mouse-gray, viscous mud which bubbles incessantly (stronger on cloudy days) with a menacing sound. The keeper of the tea-house produces a small bundle of straw, lights it on the bank so that the heat and smoke will blow over the surface of the pool, and by so doing sets the whole thing to boiling more furiously than ever. When a bamboo pole is plunged into the seething mass, the latter grunts and gurgles angrily and spurts up in scores of places - splashing the overhanging bushes with white flakes. Souvenir towels dyed in the liquid are on sale in the tea-house at 14-18 sen each. The region is the chosen home of many harmless snakes who like the warmth and the hideous toads which here are of a fatness unusual, weighing 1 lb. or more and measuring 6-8 in. across the back!

On the way back to the clay-factory one crosses a stream with stones stained a deep red by the iron-charged waters. At the factory one should diverge 5 min. to the left to a curious pond, the Umi Jigoku, of boiling water shot with blue and green, and in places the color of a robin's egg. Clouds of steam drift from its surface (60 ft. in diameter at the widest part) and the rocks roundabout are streaked with sulphur. The lethal but attractive place has a fascination for unfortunates with suicidal intentions. - The path now leads along a terrace high above the village, thence down a steepish hill to a gorge and a cluster of houses on the edge of a (40 min.) steaming pool (60 ft. in diameter) known as Chi-no-ike Jigoku, with iron-stained shores. About 3 cho (15 min. walk) back in the hills lie the Shibaishi Hot Springs, in a ravine where a mineral-stained brook rushes down to the sea. One of the streams is a light crimson, like thin carmine ink. A feature of the place is a waterfall diverted into bamboo pipes which carry the fluid outward and pour it over naked men and women standing below. There is another cave bath-house here which the foreigner won't want to go into, as one must crawl in through an approach like that to an igloo, then squat on a rush mat thrown over the stone floor. The water which runs beneath is prune-colored. Above the bath is another pool of dark maroon water, very poisonous-looking. Many of the rocks hereabout are of a tint known as ox-blood. The stone in the cage shows fossil leaves. - Returning over a different path across the hills one soon reaches the terrace overlooking the sea. Passing again through (30 min.) Kannawa village, one continues along the highroad (inspiring views) which follows the contour of the mt. to the (1 hr.) hotel.