第2巻第3章 中国・日本(承前)
あの時の私の感情は,インド暴動(注:Mutiny 1857年のインドのベンガル地方のインド人傭兵が英国支配に対して起こした反乱)に際して,インド在住の英国人(Anglo-Indian)がもったにちがいない感情 -すなわち 有色人種の叛徒にとり囲まれた時の白人の感情- と同じ種類のものであった。その時私は,異人種の手によって害を被ることから自分の家族を守りたいという欲求は,人間が持つことができる感情のうちで最も荒々しく情熱的なものであろうと実感した。日本での私の最後の体験は,日本国民への私のお別れのメッセージとして,日本人はもっと愛国的になれという趣旨のものを,愛国的な新聞に発表してほしいとの依頼であった。私はこの依頼のメッセージはもとより,他のどんなメッセージも,この愛国的な新聞あるいはその他のいかなる新聞にも送らなかった。 |
v.2,chap.3: China We made a ten hours' journey in great heat from Kyoto to Yokohama. We arrived there just after dark, and were received by a series of magnesium explosions, each of which made Dora jump, and increased my fear of a miscarriage. I became blind with rage, the only time I have been so since I tried to strangle FitzGerald. I pursued the boys with the flashlights, but being lame, was unable to catch them, which was fortunate, as I should certainly have committed murder. An enterprising photographer succeeded in photographing me with my eyes blazing. I should not have known that I could have looked so completely insane. This photograph was my introduction to Tokyo. I felt at that moment the same type of passion as must have been felt by Anglo-Indians during the Mutiny, or by white men surrounded by a rebel coloured population. I realized then that the desire to protect one's family from injury at the hands of an alien race is probably the wildest and most passionate feeling of which man is capable. My last experience of Japan was the publication in a patriotic journal of what purported to be my farewell message to the Japanese nation, urging them to be more chauvinistic. I had not sent either this or any other farewell message to that or any other newspaper. |