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268 HONDA THE SAMUKAI.
invitation to Honda to reenter the service of the
house of Echizen."
The favorite route of the samurai, in making a
winter's journey from the City of the Happy Well
to the City of the Bay Door, was over the highlands
of Echizen and Omi to Lake Biwa, and thence along
the Tokaido or Eastern Sea Road.
Master and servant therefore went over the same
pass at Yu-no-o, where the same chattering girls, like
a flock of magpies, invited them to stop for refreshments.
Snow had already fallen heavily, and in one
place stout mountaineers stood ready with saddles
of straw and leather strapped over their shoulders
and held on their loins. Mounting these two-legged
steeds, sitting astride the saddles, and holding on
with their arms around the men's necks, the two
travelers rode man-back to the plains below. Then
they took basket-palanquins to Odani, near the blue
mountain-bordered lake, the largest in Japan and
named after the four-stringed lute. They were now
in the country of mulberries, and immense orchards
of the trees, kept low-topped for the rearing of food
for the silk-worms, were passed in the lowlands, while
above them towered the glorious form of Okubi, or
Great Head Mountain. They were now entering
into the classic region
and richest in historic associations.
Though Mr. Rai had been over the same route a
score of times, he enjoyed every foot of the journey.
At one spot they passed three stone tombs, one of
which was that of Tokiwa, the mother of Yoshit-