Nikko
Ito stands with open watch and warning finger, and the priest bends low and drinks in the music with ecstatic countenance. Iyemitsu’s temple was spared, and there stand the rows of superb lacquered boxes containing the sacred writings. There, too, are the gilded images, golden lotus-leaves, massive candlesticks, drums, gongs, banners and pendent ornaments, besides the giant koros, breathing forth pale clouds of incense, that accompanied the rites of the grand old Buddhist faith.
Each temple has a fine water-tank in its outer court; an open pavilion, with solid corner posts supporting the heavy and ornate roof above the granite trough. Each basin is a single, huge block of stone, hollowed out and cut with such exactness that the water, welling up from the bottom, pours over the smooth edges so evenly as to give it the look of a cube of polished glass. The fountain at the Iyemitsu temple was the gift of the princes of Nabeshima, and its eaves flutter with the myriad flags left there by pilgrims who come to pray at the great shrine. All about the temple grounds is heard the noise of rushing water, and the music and gurgle of these tiny streams, the rustle of the high branches, and the cawing of huge solitary rooks are the only sounds that break the stillness of the enchanted groves between the soft boomings of the morning and evening bells. The noise of voices is lost in the great leafy spaces, and the sacredness of the place subdues even the unbelieving foreigner, while native tourists and pilgrims move silently, or speak only in undertones, and make no sound, save as their clogs clatter on stones and gravel.
It is impossible to carry away more than a general and bewildered impression of the splendid walled and lanterned courts, the superb gate-ways, and the temples themselves, but certain details, upon which the guides insist, remain strangely clear in memory. Over the doors of the stable where the sacred white pony is kept are
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