Three years in Tibet : with the original Japanese illustrations / by the Shramana Ekai Kawaguchi.

  • Ekai Kawaguchi
Date:
1909
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Three years in Tibet : with the original Japanese illustrations / by the Shramana Ekai Kawaguchi. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    28/772 (page 2)
    TIIHEE VEAE-S IN TIBET. vi.sit wliich 1 jiaid him, 1 found liim in a very despondent mood. He volunteered to tell me that he had just lost a three-year old child of his, and the loss had left his wife the most distracted woman in the world, while he himself conld not recover the peace of his mind, even fishing having heconie devoid of its former charms for him. I said to my host, who had always heen a very ir.timate friend of mine and a member of my former flock : “ l)o you really find it so hard to bear the death of your child I* W hat would you think of a j)erson who dared to bind u)) and kill a beloved child of your.s, and roast and eat its flesh’:'” ‘M)h! devilish! 'I’he dbvil only could do that; no man coidd,” answered he. 1 ([uickly rejoined : “ You are a fiend then, at least, to the fishes of the deej)”. Strong were the words I used then, but it was in the fulness of my heart that T s])oke them, and Mr. 'J'akabe finally yielded and ])i'omised me to fish no more. He was very obdurate at first; but when 1 jiointed out to him that it was at the risk of iny life that 1 was going to 'J’ibet, and that for the sake of my religion, which was also Ids, he stood 11]) with a Icok of determination. He excused himself from my presence for awhile, and then returned with some fishing-nets, which he forthwith handed over to me, saying that those were the weajions of murder with which he had caused the death of innumerable denizens of the brine, and that 1 ndght do with them as 1 liked, for he had no longer any u.'^e for them. T thereu})on asked a daughter of the host’s to build a fire for me in the yard ; and, when it was ready, 1 consigned the nets to flames in the ])resence of all—there were all the members of the family and some visitors, besides, to witness the scene. .Among the vi.sitors was Mr. Ogawa Katsutaro, a relative of the family. 'I'his gentleman had also bemi an excellent sjiortsman, with