II

Curious indeed, but enormous by reason of it infinity of
tradition and detail. I am afraid even to think of the size of
the volume that would be needed to cover it.... Such a work would
properly begin with some brief account of the earliest knowledge
and use of aromatics in Japan. I would next treat of the records
and legends of the first introduction of Buddhist incense fron
Korea,--when King Shomyo of Kudara, in 551 A. D., sent to the
island-empire a collection of sutras, an image of the Buddha, and
one complete set of furniture for a temple. Then something would
have to be said about those classifications of incense which were
made during the tenth century, in the periods of Engi and of
Tenryaku,--and about the report of the ancient state-councillor,
Kimitaka-Sangi, who visited China in the latter part of the
thirteenth century, and transmitted to the Emperor Yomei the
wisdom of the Chinese concerning incense. Then mention should be
made of the ancient incenses still preserved in various Japanese
temples, and of the famous fragments of ranjatai (publicly
exhibited at Nara in the tenth year of Meiji) which furnished
supplies to the three great captains, Nobunaga, Hideyoshi, and
Iyeyasu. After this should fol-low an outline of the history of
mixed incenses made in Japan,--with notes on the classifications
devised by the luxurious Takauji, and on the nomenclature
established later by Ashikaga Yoshimasa, who collected one
hundred and thirty varieties of incense, and invented for the
more precious of them names recognized even to this day,--such as
"Blossom-Showering," "Smoke-of-Fuji," and "Flower-of-the-Pure-