Pathway to Japanese Literature

I

Amidst the splendor of the heavens, the beauty of the earth, and the mystery of all creation—human beauty, too sublime to vow eternity—poured its soul's fierce passion into fragile mortality, compelling us to perceive beauty in even the most fleeting of instants.

Beauty transcended all moral precepts and was singularly granted the power to live with pride.
However much the actual lives of these beauties may have been condemned, scorned, and demeaned by the people of their time, that fact could not in the slightest erase their individual worth.
On the contrary, their legendary visages have contributed dreams and poetry to human life for all eternity.

As a small dreamer and seeker of beauty, I sought out numerous women through historical texts, oral traditions, and even chance encounters along the way—all drawn by the visages of beauties past and present—recording fragments of these women's lives, never failing to introduce them to the world when occasion permitted.
The (brief biographies) of these beautiful women were compiled into several volumes and read by the world.

And my detailed appreciations of beauties and carefully crafted essays were recorded in those volumes.
Here, I shall attempt to record the "Meiji bijin"—the mothers who birthed modern women—through a general perspective.

Before proceeding, I must here attempt to write somewhat briefly about the distinctive characteristics of modern women’s beauty.
This was because societal standards of beauty had changed too abruptly.
It goes without saying that every period since antiquity has had its own distinctive type of beauty, but just as someone declared “modern times are astonishing,” the same could be said of beauty itself.

In modern times, concepts like 'excess' and 'eccentricity' have been struck from dictionaries—everything has become commonplace.
It is indeed an era where 'astonishment' runs rampant—an age of explosion.
In each person’s heart, they harbor the confidence that they could even fly through the sky.
Moreover, women who have recently kicked down cages and cast off shackles naturally harbor a certain exhilaration in their hearts; here, all those old notions of (harmony) and antiquated ideas of (resonance) need not be considered. Modern women excel at revealing harmony within (disharmony) and discerning music amidst cacophony.
The free thought burning in women’s breasts kicked away traditions across all social classes in the realms of (makeup), (attire), and (adornment), outwardly declaring both (destruction) and (liberation).
Discordant complexity, half-formed transformations, chaotic disorder—it all truly exhibits the distinctive character befitting this era.

The core of the zeitgeist was freedom.
Constraints were the enemy; leaps were the ally.
Women began adorning themselves according to their own sensibilities.
Forms of beauty came to be recognized in all varieties.

Even if the black fox fur's taxidermied animal face rested upon a formal kimono, no one questioned this disharmony.
Ten years prior, Mme. Maeterlinck's leopard coat had been said to be highly prized in France and America alike, but in modern Japan we had already moved beyond such things within our aesthetic imagination.

This unbridled spirit now churns in chaos, unaware of its destination.

Yet, I love and respect this bold eccentricity of this era's fashions.
For evolution must always pass through chaos, and the first step of reform can only be rooted in courage.
No matter how domesticated beauty may be, once it grows old and loses vitality, it ceases to harmonize with the vibrant spirit of the age.
We must discover a new style of beauty from within the chaos.
For it is there that the feminine beauty of New Japan is expressed—

The nostalgic sentiment that delights in gentle yet humid flavors worth savoring—though making even me who appears quite radical regress against modernity—compels one to demand dynamic beauty through radical living; it may indeed be said that modern feminine beauty signals contemporary aesthetic standards while poignantly expressing humanity’s fundamental desires regarding existence itself.
When examining earlier beauty ideals that shaped that era—briefly put—early Meiji beauties possessed something heroic rather than today’s homogenized uniformity where nearly every woman appears conventionally attractive.
“‘Would she have been deemed ugly in antiquity yet counts as beautiful today?’” lament those shackled by obsolete aesthetic values—eyes blind to contemporary vision—though truthfully late Tokugawa and Meiji beauty standards were not so divergent after all.

Of course, with the advent of the Meiji period, round faces had come to be favored.
The phrase "fair-skinned and plump-cheeked" emerged.
The adage from previous eras urging that "women’s eyes should resemble bells" gained renewed vigor.
Yet the melon-seed face with its rounded chin—the oval form—still commanded respect, while angular features, broad foreheads, and protruding jaws were never embraced as exotic charm or individual beauty.

The melon-seed face had of course been beauty’s standard mold since Tokugawa times.
In this regard, the Meiji era neither shattered beauty’s paradigms nor achieved revolution.
Moreover, the melon-seed countenance remained the mark of aristocratic lineage.
Thus Meiji beauties stayed bound by tradition—still prisoners of convention, one might say.
Those urban-born spoke of the Restoration’s upheaval as "peasants rising in status," though by this they meant provincial samurai unaffiliated with the shogunate—far from today’s age of commonfolk.
Beauty’s standards too followed their own immutable laws.

That said, even during the three-century Tokugawa period, beauties were not necessarily of the same mold. The transition becomes evident even through examining what master ukiyo-e artists left depicted. From Harunobu, Shunchō, Utamaro to Kunisada—their works trace a transition from voluptuous bodies and round faces to slender figures; from the fleshy fullness of limbs and rounded hips to high, rounded foreheads; tactilely speaking, from flavors dripping with soft benevolence to those containing a harsh bitterness by the late Edo period. The figures grew somewhat more angular, their hair taking on a loosely coarse texture. No longer the tactile sensations of habutae silk, figured silks, reed-patterned textures, or dappled silks—it had become the gritty feel of coarse crepe silk, glossy silk, or cotton kimono fabric. However, this was primarily Edo art and customs. The transplanted beauty standards of Kyoto and Osaka had finally become something rooted in Edo with its own individuality. Even when viewed through brocade pictures and theater, one could say it was a culture that sought to refine Edo lineage qualities—akin to favoring exposed wood grain textures—and a post-Bunsei era preference. Meanwhile, in mid-Meiji, the importation of Chūkyō beauties dominated the pleasure quarters—yet this went unchallenged as the spirit of the age, with such trends revealing transformations in facial features and physiques even among imperial dolls primarily produced in Kyoto. It was during the late Meiji and early Taishō periods that the faces of imperial dolls became sharply pointed and acquired a drawn quality.

The beauties of ancient times were largely transmitted to us solely through those of the upper class.
On rare occasions were maidens from various lands praised as having countenances that smiled like flowers and shone like moonlight—their complexion radiant with peerless luster, foreheads broad without even a dewdrop’s worth of sorrow’s shadow, features clear and luminous beneath heavy eyelids, eyes elongated at the corners, cheeks plump with fragrant fullness, noses neither large nor overly high but bearing a soft grace, all harmonizing into a demeanor of serene dignity.
In Buddhist statues said to reverently depict the visage of Empress Kōmyō and other artifacts too could one glimpse the countenances of beauties of that time.
This could also be discerned from the facial features seen in statues such as Kichijōten at Ueno Museum and Kushinadahime at Izumo Taisha.

By the Heian period, beauty was being extolled as "radiant as red groundcherries."
"The term 'akakagachi' denotes an archaic name for the red groundcherry fruit; one might infer that beauties of that age were envisioned as round, ruddy, and glossy like these berries."
When they spoke of "red," it likely described a luminous complexion with an almost perfumed quality.
Even in antique picture scrolls, one finds faces portrayed with delicate bone structure yet plump flesh—broad foreheads, ample cheeks, perfectly rounded contours—all slightly short-necked.
In that era, when lengthy tresses and copious tears were deemed women's vital attributes—their tales privileging lustrous hair over form, sensitive weeping over action—they differed from late Tokugawa-period Edo women who valued fortitude and poise, shedding pent-up tears in torrents. These earlier figures instead dampened slender, elongated eyes brimming with sentiment, weeping mutedly like spring rain behind silk screens—their mien restrained yet steeped in emotion.

From the Kamakura period through the Muromachi era, if one were to liken women of earlier times to scarlet cherry blossoms or wisteria flowers, one could discern in the elegance both the fragrance of plum blossoms and the heartless beauty of mountain cherries.
The beauties, compelled to harbor both profound attachment to life and resignation, may be said to lack the resplendent, moist charm of women from earlier eras yet possess an added quality of solitude and subdued elegance.
For women of this period, it was precisely this lack of emotion and resignation that became truly crucial—though such matters need not be recorded in discussions of beauty standards.

By the Tokugawa period, the beauty ideals of the Genroku era and those post-Bunka had become entirely dissimilar in preference.
What now stood out with striking clarity was how everything had taken on a commoner character, shifting from an age when only upper-class noblewomen commanded attention.
One contributing factor was that daimyo wives and princesses deemed upper-class had been confined like caged birds, which naturally caused the aspirations of lower-class women to flare.
Bathhouse attendants, courtesans, teahouse serving women—through openly interacting with multitudes—saw their beauty rapidly proliferate.

The contemporary ideal features a slightly rounded face with pale complexion patterning; all four essential facial elements perfectly arranged—eyes disdaining narrowness, brows thickly drawn; nose bridge neither crowded nor abrupt in its gradual ascent; small mouth housing slightly uneven yet white-aligned teeth; ears elongated with shallow rims, their roots visible through translucent skin when viewed from behind; hairline naturally receding without artifice; neck tendons tautly extended beneath flawlessly coiffed back hair; fingers delicate yet elongated with thin nails; feet conforming to prescribed measurements—eight bu and three sun—with upturned big toes revealing hollowed soles; chest span exceeding ordinary proportions; waist cinched without muscular bulk; hips amply rounded; garments draping flawlessly over posture; demeanor composedly dignified; womanly arts mastered to avoid vulgarity in all matters; not a single mole marring the skin—as Ihara Saikaku enumerated in his work *Life of an Amorous Woman*.

as Ihara Saikaku enumerates in his work *The Life of an Amorous Woman*.

The beauties of the Meiji period, in terms of their essence, became far coarser than Saikaku’s specifications (which demanded not a single mole on the body)—contrary to this, they even came to adorn their foreheads with Western-style moles.

During the Tokugawa period, the pleasure quarters of Yoshiwara and Shimabara served as social venues where courtesans—having imitated upper-class customs with heightened flamboyance while cultivating feminine refinement—came to be regarded by their leading representatives as the women who defined their era.
Following this, one could say the Meiji period found its representation in geisha beauty.
Though noblewomen's social circles expanded and though the momentum for women's advancement grew vigorous—and though schoolgirl fashions gradually drove out the dominance of pleasure-quarter denizens—these developments belong to today's Taishō era; there had likely been no period when geisha proliferated as rampantly as during the Meiji years.
Just as social gatherings of the previous era had centered on Yoshiwara, meetings between Meiji government officials and political merchants frequently convened in Shinbashi and Akasaka's districts of floral allure and shadowed dealings.
Geisha grew audacious in bearing, looking down upon serious daughters from respectable families while treating influential dignitaries and merchant princes as comrades.
Thus it came that this minister's wife and that gentleman's spouse—the legitimate wives of illustrious figures—were all former geisha; though needless to say in ancient times, even until yesterday when shogunate officials like minor hatamoto would never have permitted such status for legal spouses—now through sudden ascension granting access to Kumoi's exalted circles—this trend of carriages of jade seduced even households with strict family codes into proudly installing these pleasure-quarter professionals as household mistresses overnight, treating their backgrounds as vulgar theatrical props—this became the corrupted wellspring of middle-class morality.

However, this situation arose from unavoidable romantic entanglements—rather than mere recklessness—of those too consumed by national affairs to tend to household matters or who, despite their prominence, never sought to become societal pillars; moreover, among these beautiful courtesans were many exceptional women who had the resolve to support reformers. Yet society erred in venerating these reformist figures and taking even such circumstances as models to emulate.
In any case, under the lingering influence of the previous era, respectable daughters remained in their secluded chambers—none casting aside propriety to leap into society—so from the early years through the mid-Meiji period, there had been no choice but to entrust such social ascension to women of that class.

What shone resplendent here was when Her Majesty Haruko, Empress Shōken—that white chrysanthemum bathed in morning light, exuding crystalline fragrance—was graced to become consort to the Great Emperor of Meiji.

Her Majesty had been a beauty rarely witnessed.
One could not help but feel that "bright eyes and pearly teeth" found perfect embodiment in Her Majesty.
Even when her extraordinary erudition lay veiled, it revealed itself through verses she composed.

If the Sacred Emperor Meiji reigned as divine incarnation of Japan's radiant majesty, then this Empress personified womanhood's quintessence in our cherry-blossomed land.
If His Majesty emerged from solar radiance, then this noble lady came into being amidst fragrant pistils where heaven and earth overflowed with blossoming perfumes.
Having been born in the august Meiji era, I have always held this truth as my pride.
Only through this Empress gracing the Great Sovereign's side did Yamato prove itself true scion of Amaterasu Ōmikami—a Land of Noble Princesses in Eastern Seas worthy of its name, bearing Fuji's jade-like peak in eightfold luminosity, a nation where cherries bloom beneath dawn's brilliance; only then did tales like *The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter* naturally arise.

The gifts from this Empress that we women must never forget are her imperial teachings—through which, breaking with long-standing customs, she opened the eyes of women whose hearts had been blind, awakened dreams within slumbering spirits, and urged us to cultivate and nurture the beautiful fruits inherent to womanhood ourselves—and her having guided the arts and literature to such flourishing heights.
She was not merely one who revived what had declined and ushered in the new; beyond just music and arts, she remains an unforgettable figure for all cultural education—Her Majesty who must never be forgotten.
To His Majesty, she was an excellent consort; to the nation’s people, she was revered as a blessed national treasure—such was Her Majesty’s exalted stature.

By Her Majesty’s side were gathered many accomplished women who rivaled those of the Heian court’s inner palace. The selection and dispatch of five girls for overseas study, along with the discoveries of Ms. Shimoda Utako and Ms. Kishida Toshiko (Shōen)—both recognized at sixteen—testified to Her Majesty’s gracious resolve to broaden women’s scholarly paths; in time, when female geniuses of rare caliber would emerge, her abundant virtue would be fondly recalled. She was the noble daughter of Lord Ichijō, the Minister of the Left.

Two

I shall here record the names of several representative Meiji beauties.
And from among them, I shall select several more to record brief biographies.
Among the upper class, one could count Her Imperial Highness Princess Tomiko, Grand Dowager of Kitashirakawanomiya; the late Her Imperial Highness Princess Nagako, Consort of Arisugawanomiya; Lady Shinki; Naishi-no-Tsukasa Takakura; the grandmother of the present Marquis Iwakura; the wife of the late Marquis Saigō Jūdō; the mother of the present Marquis Maeda; the late mother of Duke Konoe; Marquess Ōkuma's wife Ayako; and Count Toda's wife Kiwako.
Her Imperial Highness Princess Chikako of Higashifushiminomiya, Madame Sadako Yamauchi, Madame Teiko Arima, Madame Yōko Maeda, Madame Takeko Kujō, Madame Teruko Itō, Madame Sadako Ogasawara, Madame Kyōko Terashima, Madame Eiko Inagaki, Madame Sakurako Iwakura, and Madame Fujiko Furukawa—many of whom became figures discussed in the Taishō period—were thought to merely line the records of Meiji’s past.

The former wife of Duke Yamagata had been his beloved spouse, but after over twenty years of mandarin duck-like marital harmony came to an end, the Duke became a solitary bird.
Thereafter, the present Madame Sadako came to attend closely by his side.
Though rumors repeatedly surfaced about her becoming the official wife—some claiming she humbly declined the position herself—the principled Duke would not permit it, nor would certain clan members consent, leaving matters unresolved.
Regardless of formal appearances, it was said even the late Marquis Katsura had been treated as a legal wife; needless to say, this applied all the more to others of their circle.
Thus in reality she was Duchess Sadako.

Madame Sadako's elder sister Takiko was the concubine of Baron Masuda Takashi, a gentleman merchant.
Baron Masuda and Duke Yamagata were not merely friends who shared tea ceremonies.
Those who knew of this relationship described the sisters as being in a mutually supportive partnership.
The Kikian Retreat of Duke Yamagata in Sōshū Itabashi and Baron Masuda’s neighboring villa attested to the intimacy of their relationship.

Takiko, the elder sister, was a thin woman with large eyes.
Sadako, the younger sister, was a fair-skinned woman of modest disposition.
In this present age, Madame Sadako—wife to a Grand Cordon Duke who adorned his brow with the luster of being a Restoration-era statesman and marshal, dominated bureaucratically, and even bore the honorific of elder statesman—carried in her upbringing a pitifully sorrowful scar upon her heart.
When the sisters were around twelve or thirteen, their father died in a double suicide with the geisha Utakichi of Nihonbashi.
How such dark shadows must have wounded innocent girl hearts!
To abandon one's children—leaving behind daughters who were already quite grown—and commit love suicide as the family head did; this was no longer just an old tale like Chikamatsu’s "The Love Suicides at Amijima," but rather the very manner of their father’s death vividly shown before their eyes.
In the summer of Meiji 16, during the grand festival of Sannō—the Hie Shrine in Kōjimachi—it occurred.
Geisha Utakichi participated in the tekomai dance alongside Nihonbashi geisha; having summoned a boy from Umibori—then apprenticed at a blacksmith’s—to watch her performance, she exchanged distant farewells with him before summoning their father to the third floor of the inner storehouse in Hinokimachi’s Wagaya residence, where they committed lovers’ suicide by blade.

What emotions must they have felt when later seeing "The Love Suicides at Amijima" performed on stage? For them, Jihē the Paper Merchant was not some stranger's parent from a puppet theater tale—he was their own father as he had been. He was Yoshida Kichibē, proprietor of a Chinese goods store in Kyōbashi Hakkōchō.

Their father had been a live-in son-in-law. Mother was a resolute woman. Moreover, Utakichi the geisha's mother and sister also possessed strong-willed temperaments. Caught between them, the weak-willed man and woman ended up leaving behind their beloved children and losing their lives. There must exist in this the darkness of human existence and the turmoils of hearts. Intertwined and entangled, there must have been a tragic element that ultimately led them to their deaths.

According to newspaper articles from that time, Utakichi's mother faced the man's surviving children and admonished them—"Though you will all mature, you must never make such a mistake"—without shedding a single tear; it was recorded that she was a woman of resolute character.
At that time, the girls who nodded while being admonished were the sisters Takiko and Sadako; their mother had placed these sisters under the geisha—who likely harbored both hatred and resentment—that had lured their father to his death.
They soon appeared in Shinbashi.

I shall cease dissecting these complex inner workings.
After all, they managed to gain good fortune.
A young woman who surely had passions and loves attended upon that old marquis for thirty years—her youth slipping away in vain.
What must her reflections have been a century after the old duke’s passing?

Her mother—whose husband had been taken in a double suicide by a geisha—ran a geisha house called Yoshida-ya in Shinbashi. Her subsequent husband was Hakuchi, a kōdan performer. With a spouse bearing imperial pride as a Grand Cordon Duke and a father-in-law who was Hakuchi the kōdan performer, Sadako’s fate must indeed be counted among Meiji’s most extraordinary beauties.

The late Duke Itō’s virtuous wife Umeko had been geisha Koume of Bakan; Count Yamamoto Gonnohyōe’s spouse descended from Shinagawa’s brothels; Countess Kashiwa’s wife Kanako came from Nagoya’s Kōsetsuken restaurant; Countess Kuroda Seiki gained renown through Yanagibashi; Madame Okura Kihachirō originated from Yoshiwara’s hikite-jaya teahouses; while Kosei-san—mother to Toranosuke Furukawa, the Copper King—made her name in Yanagibashi.

The downfall of Nozawaya—the shop of Mogami, the raw silk king flamboyantly renowned as "Mogami of Yokohama" and "Mogami of raw silk"—remained fresh in public memory alongside the Seventy-Fourth Bank's run.
Few knew that behind both enabling Mogami's prosperity and ruining it lay Ochō, grandmother of the present young master.
When Edo had just become Tokyo, she emerged in Akasaka playing Tokiwazu shamisen—neither fully a master nor a town geisha—but finding little success. Thus she came to rely on a relative's koto teacher in Yokohama, that free-spending open port then thriving with popularity. Her boldness as an Edo-bred woman of audacious spirit and crisp articulation matched perfectly with the speculative public sentiment gambling on great fortunes, and she rapidly rose to prominence.
What satisfied her ambition then was capturing Nozawaya's master—a wealthy man growing prosperous alongside Yokohama.

Mr. Mogami of Nozawaya had a wife who had shared his humble beginnings.
Though she had risen from courtesan ranks, she became a devoted wife who single-mindedly supported her husband and brought prosperity to their household.
Nozawaya also employed a chief clerk manager—a man of great merit who had established the shop’s reputation as a raw silk dealer.
For the sake of these two, even the infatuated master could not immediately bring her into his household.
For many long years, she had to live as an outside concubine.

The Mogami couple had no biological children.
They summoned their niece and nephew, paired them, and established them as the second generation.
However, the outside concubine bore a child.
As the child was female, they later adopted [an heir], but it was she—as the grand matriarch of Nozawaya—who sowed the seeds for the parents of present-day Mr. Sōbee to indulge in every possible luxury.

At the time of that recent downfall commotion, those who had long set their sights on Yokohama but failed to grasp fortune like Mr. Mogami—leading lives even more wretched than when they had resided in their hometowns—said this:

“The legal wife’s punishment has finally been meted out.”
“Even bad fortune has finally begun to wane at its end.”

Indeed, she had experienced rather severe and tragic ordeals.
She had become steeped in luxury surpassing even royalty and nobility.
And her extreme indulgences—those gatherings of entertainers for karuta games and immersions in floral diversions that she had believed gave life meaning, which she thought she could never cease even for a day while alive—had been stricken by an illness that forced their abandonment.
Whether from the retribution of long-term dissipation and profligacy, her body had become immobile.
Even so, her extravagant habits compelled aging courtesans from Yoshiwara and daughters of Nagoya’s Ōmasu restaurant to attend upon her, keeping them in constant efforts to appease her.
Along with nurses, ten to fifteen people attended to her, serving as her hands and feet to provide comfort.
When entering the bath, curtains would be hung and screens arranged around; then, with utmost care—swathed in a plush down-filled futon—she would be transported through the room via a smoothly gliding vehicle operated by those attendants.
It is said that Nozawaya’s shop disbursed monthly living expenses of 10,000 yen for these three family members—she being the grandmother, the daughter having become a widow, and the master still being unmarried.
Needless to say, they even maintained a kitchen steward position for just three people, with those staff members operating a proper household at middle-class or higher means.

A household where upper maids, lower maids, and over thirty servants bustled ceaselessly throughout the day without a moment to sit idly.
The kitchen too was divided into upper and lower kitchens, with utensils and other implements varying accordingly; even guests were treated with marked distinctions based on their status.

She accelerated her senescence through that lifestyle and the exhaustion born of such indulgence.
At the worst possible juncture, she had to steal away one night from the very Yokohama soil that had swelled with such pride.
Guarded by several automobiles, she hid away at a pleasure spot she had frequented during previous visits to Tokyo—or rather, at the former residence of actor Onoe Baikō in Akasaka Naka-no-machi, which she had even purchased out of excessive favoritism.

That said, she was after all a woman who had endured hardships; perhaps having realized she had indulged in glory beyond her station, it is said she did not adopt an undignified attitude regarding her household’s downfall. I heard that she on her sickbed had completely resigned herself, having attained the insight that this was her original state—how things were meant to be—yet it became clear she was a woman of no ordinary qualities.

Among these fortunate people was Prime Minister Hara Takashi's wife.
His former wife had been Nakai Ōshū's beloved daughter, renowned for her beauty, but having entered into a household of unconventional boldness, she found herself ill-suited to manage a home for an ambitious young man of promise, leading to their divorce—though I heard arrangements were discreetly made to ensure her want for nothing.
The current wife was said to have been a courtesan of Momijikan.
Beyond knowing her as a round-faced hysteric, I can say little more.
The same Momijikan maiko who achieved extraordinary prominence would be Sumako-san, wife of Mr. Ōhashi Shintarō, proprietor of Hakubunkan.
She was the daughter born during the wanderings of a certain inn's young master who had abandoned his household and come to Tokyo—excelling in dance and possessing beauty that outshone her peers, she was taken as Mr. Ōhashi's wife while still young.
She maintained undiminished beauty even after bearing eight children.
Mr. Ōhashi, who had emerged from Echigo as a mere bookseller, now stood central in economic circles, undoubtedly numbered among our nation's great industrialists.
Residing in Kōsō—the stately edifice adjoining Ōhashi Library—their daughter Miss Toyoko had become the new wife of Viscount Kaneko's heir.
They must have weathered every conceivable vicissitude.
The Golden Demon by Ozaki Kōyō—literary colossus of Meiji—was rumored to draw from Iwaya Sazanami and Mrs. Sumako, though Mr. Sazanami proved indispensable to Hakubunkan and pioneered as a writer of children's stories.
He too possessed a beautiful and wise companion.

Mrs. Ōhashi accumulated numerous scandalous rumors and misconceptions precisely due to her beauty.

A wealthy person constitutes more than just a title derived from riches alone.
While Baron Shibusawa truly personified both the demeanor and virtues befitting affluence, Mrs. Kaneko too had been celebrated as a great beauty in her younger days.
There exists a poignant account of how she came to join the Shibusawa household.
This stemmed neither from complications involving children of a prior marriage nor any such circumstances.
It chronicles the dramatic reversals of Kaneko, born to Isehachi—a prosperous merchant family of Fukagawa Aburabori.

Aburabori was a wholesale district where Ise Hachi—actually Ito Hachibei—served as gold purveyor to the Mito domain lord. The name Iseya Hachibei rivaled that of the legendary Tanaka Heihachi celebrated throughout Yokohama, wielding influence over both rice markets and foreign silver exchanges. Kaneko, one of twelve siblings, had summoned a husband from Kōshū at eighteen. For ten years, this household daughter lived unconstrained, passing her days in sightseeing and leisure as in her maiden years—yet when decline came, even such an established house could not withstand it, collapsing from a mere misstep. Though the son-in-law now had a child of his own, he was sent back to Ōmi. (This would have been around Meiji 13 [1880]?) A great cholera epidemic swept through the city, intensifying the tremors in already crumbling hearts.

She pleaded with everyone she met to let her become a geisha: “I want to become a geisha—it’s what I truly desire!” How many tears must have been hidden behind those words? Wanting to give her family even a little breathing room while concealing the anguish of self-sacrifice, she—out of stubborn pride—insisted “I want this because I desire it,” going so far as to carefully avoid wounding her listeners’ feelings as she sought to convert herself into money. There had been an offer from the employment agency Ryōgoku no Sushiya, which handled such arrangements. Then, the employment agency proposed a concubine position.

"If it's to be a concubine, I absolutely refuse," she declared, thoroughly vexing the employment brokers. She who had preserved her dignity even in ruin was taken to the Shibusawa household to manage subsequent affairs after their lady perished from cholera. When she crossed that kitchen threshold—the house likely being her former Aburabori home where Ise Hachi had gone bankrupt—her head spun with vertigo.

She now flourishes as Baroness to a financial titan indispensable to economic circles. Though dwelling at her Asukayama villa, the Fukagawa main house persists as her life's origin point—a repository of memories.

Three

Now, today’s women must know that the Prostitution Emancipation Edict was issued at the beginning of the Meiji period.
It soon pioneered widespread mixed-gender social interaction, ushering in what became known as the Rokumeikan era of Meiji 17-18—a time when nobility, ministers, and industrialists alike became enraptured with nightly ballroom dancing alongside their esteemed wives and daughters, marking the vanguard of Japan’s Western infatuation.
At that time in Yoshiwara, Kinpeirō Imasashi stood among the renowned figures.
She was a woman of talent and beauty who preserved the dignity of high-ranking courtesans from eras past, captivating feudal lords during the abolition of domains and establishment of prefectures.
Lord Yamauchi Yōdō presented her with an exceptionally large standing mirror—a rarity for that age.
She made modern male dances her specialty.
Clad in scarlet hakama trousers, a suikan hunting robe, and tall eboshi court hat, this striking costume—combined with her artistry—heightened her renown.
In Meiji 24 (1891), when Venerable Yoda Gakkai organized a mixed-gender theatrical production, she hastened to join Chitose Beiha and Morizuki Kekka of the Ichikawa Kunyūhachi troupe as part of a women’s contingent.
Thereafter too, she toured regional circuits under the Imasashi name as her hallmark, reviving the male dances of her youth.
For a period, she even operated what resembled a meeting house in Negishi.
In her later years, the man she married became entangled in his Sōma Incident—a succession dispute between half-brothers from different mothers within Viscount Sōma’s household.
The brother known as Viscount Seitane had been confined and declared mad until former retainer Nishikiori Gōsei rescued him—this very Nishikiori Gōsei.

Where there was Imasashi among courtesans, there was Yonehachi of Yonemachi among geishas. Later taking the name Chitose Beiha, she appeared on stage and performed in variety halls, singing ballads like tonkobushi. She had a tendency for her hair to quickly become disheveled. Even when appearing at variety halls—wearing something like a headband with her prized hair—there were times she abruptly cut it to shoulder length. In her days as Yonehachi, she had possessed such elevated pride that suitors abounded—including the only two brilliant men recognized by contemporaries: Suematsu Kenchō and Kōmyōji Saburō—over whom she had agonized which to choose. In the end she became wife to one—Kōmyōji Saburō—but heaven granted no longevity to that capable talent, rendering all his ambitions vain. Afterward she lost all will to live straightforwardly in this world, spending her days quaffing sake while singing kouta ballads at entertainment halls and gazing endlessly into mirrors. Yet even that bold, stubbornly persistent woman could not contend with advancing years. One night boarding a Sotobori Line streetcar, she found herself sharing the ride with a beautiful yet agelessly mysterious woman—their eyes met, and sensing recognition, she turned sharply away to stand rigidly despite ample empty seats; she must have loathed exposure. The lustrous black mane spilling from under her headband betrayed itself as an artfully arranged wig at the hairline. And most cruelly—on the hand gripping the strap—the years refused concealment.

There was Ichikawa Kunyūhachi—formerly Iwai Kumehachi—who, with skills that made her tower imposingly over male actors as a female performer, gathered comrades in the modest Misaki-za theater, later becoming an indispensable mentor figure to a certain faction’s new theater and literati plays without disgracing the name of Women’s Theater Island; and there was the remarkable woman called Okura—a courtesan at Shinjuku’s Toyokura-ro who became proprietress of Yokohama’s Fukuki-ro, befriending this and that Meiji statesman while participating in various stratagems.
While in Shinjuku, Okura competed with the famous Horidana geisha Koman for a man and splendidly succeeded in winning him over.
She raised many adopted daughters as connections to high-ranking officials—Mr. Untei Hayashida Kamekichi, known as the Chief of Elegant Correspondence—the Cabinet Correspondence Secretary was also Okura’s son-in-law.
Okura was a woman who maintained impeccable grooming even in old age, her face retaining its glossy luster well into her elderly years.
With her short bob neatly styled and wearing a haori, trailing the long hem of her kimono, she carried herself like a widow of some standing.

Ariake-ro’s Oki was so fond of white Hakata silk that she became known as "Oki of the White Hakata." Moreover, during that time, she had married the popular actor Sawamura Sōjūrō—Sukedakaya Takasuke—and the female roles he portrayed on stage perfectly matched Oki’s tastes, which made her especially renowned. Moreover, Sōjūrō’s real brother had the highly regarded Tanosuke, and Ariake-ro was a house frequented by many literati and painters—so Oki was quite a popular figure. Backed by Matsuchiyama hill at the foot of Imadobashi Bridge, adjacent across Takeya Ferry and Sanya Canal, overlooking Kototoi on the Sumida Embankment and the towering torii of Mimeguri Shrine on the opposite bank—this sprawling complex was the renowned banquet hall Ariake-ro. The house where her son Sōjūrō now resides, even with that spaciousness, is said to be but a quarter of the scale of the former Ariake-ro.

Here was O-Kane, who in her youth had been a high-ranking tōchō courtesan in Yoshiwara—she became embroiled in scandal with Tanosuke, their rushed affair reaching such intensity that on a snowbound day when they could not meet, she had another patron’s discarded garments delivered to the man waiting beyond the lattice, keeping herself upstairs until finally managing to usher him in—a tale of passion she carried with her. As proprietress of the Kiraku meeting house, her very name sent ripples through the demimonde—a figure one cannot overlook.
This woman, too, was one who could not be omitted when recounting the hidden romantic histories and dark undercurrents of the Meiji era.

Kiyomoto Oha was the daughter of Master Tahee—not only a virtuoso of Kiyomoto narrative music who elevated her husband Enju Dayu and trained her adopted son Enju Dayu, but herself an indispensable figure who must not be forgotten.
Kyoto's veteran courtesan Nakao Kimio appeared in her later years as no more than a thrifty Kyoto woman who enshrined at her bedside the gold she had gathered into rounded lumps—a profit-minded figure. Yet during the nation's turbulent pre-Restoration era, she aided patriotic loyalists and became renowned for her chivalrous spirit.
When Marquis Inoue was still a samurai called Kikuta, they deeply loved each other, and due to the hand mirror—bronze—that she had entrusted to Marquis Inoue’s keeping as her very soul, he once narrowly escaped an assassin's blade.
She, alongside Ikumatsu—who became Mrs. Kido—wife of Katsura Kogorō, was among those beauties representing the Kyoto women of the Loyalist Party.

The waka poet Matsunomoto Sansōshi also possessed an eventful destiny.
Nearly eighty years old and paralyzed on one side, she ended her days being cared for in her sister's humble house.
Until that year, she remained a woman who surprisingly retained disciples and had not been forgotten by people.
Due to her career having been that of a geisha and a concubine—a path marked by adversaries—many disciples gathered from the flower-and-willow world, drawn by the approachable familiarity of such companions.
Her calligraphy was as beautiful as her countenance.
Her final work was likely the scattered writings on the fusuma sliding doors of Tatsumiya.
Miss Ohina of Tatsumiya too was born in Kanda, became the adopted daughter of Yoshiwara's Hikitejaya Kirisaku tea house, turned into the proprietress of Nihonbashi-Ku Nakasu's banquet hall Tatsumiya, captured the attention of Count Yamada ○○—a prominent official renowned for his extravagance—then transformed into a female poet at Chikuhakuen garden, became a devout Christian intimate with the Bible, changed course again to become supervisor of Kawakami Sadayakko's "Actress Training Institute," traveled to America for theatrical research, and when she died abroad in Boston, USA, left what could be called her entire fortune to a former lover—a woman who owned this fine tale yet left no writings herself.

Sansōshi’s sister was also a beautiful woman; even in her later years when she went by the names Onoe Iro and Ogino Yaekiri, she worked as a dance instructor and lived modestly on Honjo’s outskirts.
In their prime, the sisters lived such that the elder—working as Kosan of Kogawa-ya geisha house in Fukagawa, then as Yagurashita geisha of Yatchōbori—pursued various livelihoods while spending her days freely. Still, she gained considerable recognition as a poet, was granted the artistic name Matsunomoto by Inoue Fumio, and had her reputation celebrated among literati and artists as she moved through their circles.
At that time when geisha delighted in stylish affectations and barefooted nonchalance was considered spirited, she stood out with heavy makeup and flamboyant costumes that startled onlookers.
Being favored by Lord Yamauchi; being so admired by Mito’s Takeda Kōunsai that he took her on a Sumida River boat and challenged her with drawn blade—all became traces of her youthful dreams.
They had been beloved daughters of a household serving as purveyors to Ueno no Miya during the shogunate era.
“Foremost fashion plate of Shitaya”—that song could describe her maiden years.
After their shop declined, she reportedly became a daimyo’s concubine—but for a girl who couldn’t foresee her path, heaven-bestowed beauty and talent proved greatest blessings.
She sought to build her life through talent.
And became a live-in disciple to Inoue Fumio—master of Japanese literature in Hatchōbori Kayabachō.
They were called live-in disciples; others whispered “concubines.”
Yet concubines then still dwelled in untainted, excessively beautiful maidenhood—one imagines such beauty invited envy—though later their conduct earned poor repute.

IV

Ms. Shimoda Utako—renowned as Japan’s foremost female educator—had already been recognized by Her Majesty’s court on another occasion reserved for separate discussion; though it was at sixteen that she received the imperial bestowal of the name ‘Utako,’ she had been a prodigy since childhood, astonishing her father with her mastery of Japanese and Chinese classics. In her prime during middle age, she was highly reputed as a beauty; even during her travels abroad, there were clamorous rumors of an affair with Duke Itō. Ms. Shōen—wife of Nakajima Nobuyuki, former vice-president of the Liberal Party—had long secluded herself in Ōiso due to a lung ailment, remaining distant from public attention; having outlived Nobuyuki, her later years were not well-known, but she was born in Kyoto and had been called Kishida Toshiko. One of the talented women summoned to the imperial court in her youth, she was a woman of particular beauty. This woman could not long remain at court due to her ambitious spirit; upon leaving the imperial household, she championed civil rights and freedom, joined the Liberal Party to become a female politician, and vigorously stumped across regions. Possessing a charming figure along with fervent theories of gender equality and women’s rights expansion, the seventeen- or eighteen-year-old young lady in the bloom of youth—her hair in a Shimada chignon and wearing a yellow Hakōjō silk furisode—stood at podiums as what they called the Liberal Party’s sheltered daughter. In her lonely later years, she attempted to take up writing novels, but this too proved fruitless due to illness, and she departed this world under her mother’s care.

Religions pioneered by women—at a time when many corrupt monks could no longer maintain their facades—that female founders emerged to establish new sects, whether called Tenrikyo or Omoto-kyo, was in any case a remarkable phenomenon.
Among them stood Murakumo Niko—steadfast in spirit as an imperial family member who soothed hearts through Buddhism—her countenance resembling polished jade.
Gentleness, compassion, and pure beauty manifested in her with peerless elegance and crystalline refinement.
The regal harmony of her attire—a purple robe paired with crimson kesa embroidered in gold chrysanthemums—inspired secret comparisons to a face blending Fukusuke (Nakamura Utaemon in his prime) with Matsushima-ya (father of today's popular actor Kataoka Gado), or so I recall hearing.
Then there was Mitsuko—wife of self-styled prophet Miyazaki Toranosuke of "Shinseikyōdan"—who preached from Ueno Park's stones until death, traversing provinces to spread teachings among the lost. Learning her illness was terminal, she intensified her efforts only to hasten her demise.
Her bones rest beneath a natural boulder by Lake Towada in Aomori.
Faith and reason had chiseled her features into solemn beauty.
She walked beside her husband with their only child Teruko strapped to her back.
Always she moved among paupers' crowds.
Some days found her in Tsukishima tenements; others taking single meals at cheap eateries.
She stood like sculpture from chestnut-hued marble.

Though not a religious figure, Okumura Ioko—founder of the Patriotic Women’s Association—possessed splendid features.
The significance of her founding the association was not as meaningless then as it might appear today.
Having associated with patriots since her youth, her blood burned with patriotic fervor.
She possessed too much fortitude to live as an ordinary housewife.
Born the daughter of a temple near Chikushi no Chiyo no Matsubara, her father—descended from Lord Konoe—and elder brother being patriots, she from childhood disdained feminine pursuits and undertook dangerous errands.
Yet upon taking a husband, she became a chaste, gentle, and loyal wife.
Her husband would cross rivers to peddle sencha tea, but when he accidentally soaked his wares, he retreated into mountains—spending days drying leaves while absorbed in books—then returned home carrying useless dregs without earning a single sen.
Raising four children while serving such a husband, she tasted poverty’s depths.
At times she peddled goods; at times pushed a cart; at times lacking funds to visit his hometown, walked door-to-door playing shamisen.
Even when achieving some success in later years, she never slackened her resolve—comforting soldiers in Korea and China while carrying a medicine bottle, fully aware of her worsening lung ailment.

V

Takahashi Oden and Mamushi no Omasa were born with unfortunate traits by chance, yet they too were beauties.
Both Oden and Omasa saw their wickedness escalate until they ended up committing everything from theft to murder.
In contrast, while Hanai Oume had unintentionally killed someone and consequently endured prolonged imprisonment, they continued to treat her as a prisoner even after release—cruelly parading her former convict status like a sideshow attraction on stages and vaudeville theaters—which was excessively inhumane.
Society was too cruel.
She had prospered as a geisha in Shinbashi but opened a restaurant called Suigetsu on Hamachōkishi in Nihonbashi Ward.
She had a father who was far too respectable for such a family business and who suppressed her single-mindedness in love too severely.
When that self-centered, headstrong woman—who had always been a top performer and carried herself with arrogance—became hysterical due to her low alcohol tolerance, one could not help but sympathize with how she lost all restraint after being subjected to excessive rudeness by a mean-spirited box maker of ill intent.
When she learned of the grave crime she had committed without conscious intent, she promptly turned herself in.
Even in prison, she remained penitent; however, due to severe hysteria, she felt tormented nightly by the one she had killed, and it was said that on the anniversary of the death, her temperament grew particularly violent.
Through several pardons, she regained her freedom and could once more bask in the light of day, but she ended up dying in misfortune.

VI

Sasaya Momokichi, Harumoto Banryū, Terai Omi no Oko, Tomitaya Yachiyo, Kawakatsu Kochō, Tomigiku, and others were likely among the most prominent women as representatives of the singing courtesans from the three cities. And yet another unforgettable figure was Shinbashi's Ponta—Madame Kashima Etsuko.

Momokichi’s “Sasaya” was not the business name she used during her courtesan years.
The name “Sasaya” derived from Duke Iwakura Tomoharu’s family crest—a bamboo and gentian motif—and served as the business title for the three-story café they opened at Yūraku Bridge’s corner during their cohabitation, or so it was said.
Momokichi had been at Oko’s Terai Omi establishment.
From Terai Omi, the first Oko became Lord Katsura’s favored concubine, while the second Oko became the object of Marquis Saionji’s favor.
Since two successive generations of Oko had been favored by sitting prime ministers who were marquises, Momokichi must have been spurred on as well—she transformed Duke Iwakura into something only she could achieve.
She forced him to leave the mansion, severing his relationship with the beautiful Madame Sakurako who had borne him numerous children.
The two built and resided in a residence so opulent it was called Momokichi Palace; yet ultimately, under the pretext of needing to earn money due to debts, she opened a shop closer to her original profession—one facilitating contact with numerous members of the opposite sex—to escape the dollhouse-like sheltered existence she had grown weary of.
She became the proprietress of Sasaya, adorned with diamonds glittering like an illumination and said to possess assets amounting to tens of thousands of yen—yet pitifully, the ducal household had squandered over a million yen to such an extent that the duke’s mother had to be taken back to her parental home, their mansion fell into the hands of ruthless loan sharks, while Tomoharu—once a young man of promise—ended up a retired recluse on Sasaya’s second floor.
As Momokichi grew into a wealthy individual and accrued increasing influence, Tomoharu—who had by now relinquished his peerage to his son and become a man without rank or office—ended up a recluse.
At last, the day of ruin came between the two, and Tomoharu returned in desolate form to Madame Sakurako’s side.
To the person who emerged from Sasaya’s third floor, the sunlight must have blazed down with unbearable harshness.
Like the emptiness and harsh glare left after the nine-tailed fox Tamamo-no-Mae had fled—the world must have seemed suddenly too bright.
That Momokichi was born in Kōshū as the child of a traveling actor but was raised in Nihonbashi’s fish market.

Ponta was renowned for her chastity; according to Osaka people of the time, Japan had Mount Fuji, Ganjiro (the Osaka actor Nakamura), and Yachiyo.
Tomitaya Yachiyo became the exemplary wife of Painter Sugi, while Harumoto Banryū of Akasaka—dubbed "10,000 yen"—transformed into an elegant academic’s wife.
Gion's Kochō was known as a political geisha, briefly convicted of election law violations before entering the Zen priesthood, while Tomigiku gained renown as a beauty after receiving ordination from Abbot Kubutsu of Honganji.

The Yoshichō courtesan once famed for her coquettish allure became Kawakami Otojirō’s wife and achieved renown across Europe and America—more so than in Japan—as Madame Sadayakko, progenitor of the new actresses.
With Fukuzawa Momosuke's patronage, she came to own a cotton thread factory in Nagoya; as president maintaining imposing residences in both Tokyo and Nagoya, her daily routine focused primarily on factory supervision and wool knitting.
Following Sadayakko, the one resounding Japanese women's reputation in overseas artistic circles would likely be Madame Shibata Tamaki of opera.
While these individuals enhanced their reputations by distancing themselves from Japan—though ultimately not venturing abroad—we must particularly note Matsui Sumako’s presence as the foremost of the new actresses.
After being bereaved of Shimamura Hōgetsu—both her mentor and lover—she came to understand life and love's preciousness for the first time, then hanged herself on the fourth night of portraying Carmen.

Compared to them, Tenkatsu the magician—alas, how I want to call her Tenkatsu the Forlorn—
She maintained her bewitching allure eternally, ceaselessly repeating the same acts.
Her sorrows were hers alone to fathom.

Of Toyotake Rōshō and Takemoto Ayanojo—their eras of glory diverged: Rōshō's prime arrived late, Ayanojo's early.
When Madame Egi Kinkin—that genius woman who demanded recognition—began fading from memory, there emerged reports of Madame Takayasu Yasuko from Osaka, another doctor's wife; meanwhile Madame Hyūga Kinuko, dubbed the Serpentine Madame, found her path muddled by an excess of talents—yet she reinvented herself as Hayashi Kinko the dancer.

Kujō Takeko and Itō Teruko must be reserved for Taishō-era beauty chronicles.
Among those who must not be omitted are Ms. Higuchi Ichiyō, Ms. Tazawa Inafune, and Ms. Ōtsuka Kusuo; however, as this would grow overlong, I believe I shall defer them to another day.

―October 1921, published in Kaihō’s special issue "Studies on Meiji Culture"―

Postscript: Ms. Higuchi Ichiyō, Ms. Ōtsuka Kusuo, Tomitaya Yachiyo, Kochō, and Toyotake Rōshō died of illness; Ms. Tazawa Inafune took poison; Matsui Sumako and Madame Egi Kinkin died by hanging—now all is in vain.