With their wooden legs, the Japanese knock terribly - chirp: it is very unpleasant from unfamiliarity. At the entrance to the house, they take it off, and there they sit only in socks on the floor, covered with clean mats of special grass; Therefore, in Japanese homes and in general among the Japanese, there is amazing cleanliness and neatness. And in general, the Japanese do everything as if for an exhibition: whether he makes a wooden fence or a stone house or the most elegant thing, he will apply the same diligence and cleanliness to everything and will do everything as for show, as in a picture. The houses are all clean and tidy, wooden, and all small one-story, with a few exceptions of European houses. The Japanese, of course, also looked at us, but not at all wildly and not intently: one can see an extraordinary people's self-restraint and at the same time a certain self-knowledge, a consciousness of their own dignity. Why, they have something to be pleased with, for they are a very developed and active people; even before the open entry of Europeans into Japan, there were already small steamers of Japanese invention; In general, any productivity here is very developed and exclusively Japanese. The Japanese language is very flexible and artistic, developed; Japanese writing is rich and meaningful. And in general, they have created for themselves a special culture and life, their own special way of life and customs. And when they met the Europeans, they quickly adopted their culture: as if this was all they lacked. Of course, as is characteristic of Oriental peoples with a fervent fantasy that prevents them from dwelling on anything thoroughly, the Japanese borrow everything that is foreign purely externally, imitatively; but it cannot be otherwise at first: after all, they perceive a culture that is alien and in a shell that is not at all similar to their character, it is alien to them, and therefore can at first be assimilated only externally, until the people become familiar with everything borrowed – then everything will go deeper; After all, Japanese life is very special.

An hour and a half later we were in Tokyo; I had to get on the eastern jinrikisha, that is, on a man-cart; of course, at first it is wild, but then you go wow, consoling yourself with the thought that you are not the first, not the last, and that in fact we ride on each other in life, as Fr. A. S-y put it on the same occasion. The city is very large and almost entirely Japanese; it is almost impossible to build large buildings here, as earthquakes are frequent; In the last earthquake two years ago, many buildings were destroyed, and our Orthodox cathedral was also slightly damaged – it cracked and swayed from the strong swing of the cross on the bell tower (so what an earthquake it was!). From a distance I saw our cathedral, which I knew from photographs; my head involuntarily bared, and I crossed myself with faith, asking God's blessing for this new serious work of preaching about Him among His creatures and children who do not lead Him. Jinrikisha asked where to take it; I said, "Nikora," and he understood; here everyone knows Sarugadai under the name of "Nicholas", and everyone also knows him himself; And how not to know. And some "Nikora" call our entire missionary place and household, and the bishop is considered the owner of this "Nikora". We found His Grace Nicholas very cheerful and amiable downstairs in the office. As he later said, he was cheerful because two Christian women had just told him that it was possible to buy land in the neighborhood with buildings for orphaned Christian families. His Grace Nicholas was very happy to see us and, due to his generally lively character, immediately began to talk to us. For some reason I seemed to him to resemble a Catholic priest – so he said and added: "Then you will be a good missionary"; To which, of course, I could only respond to myself with a good and sincere wish. Immediately he placed us in our cells, and there was some dispute between him and Father A. S., since His Grace took the worst apartment downstairs for himself, and gave us two beautiful and large rooms with all the furnishings, comfortable and very clean; But Vladyka said that he had already got used to this apartment, that he would die there. Indeed, he once lived in Father A.S.'s present apartment, but one of the missionaries who was then demanded this apartment, and Vladyka calmly gave it up. That is why now he says that once he has already made an attempt to live in these rooms, but it was unsuccessful.

At once he began to speak of business. First, he said, it was necessary to study the language in order to speak well, and Father A. S. had to begin to study Chinese signs thoroughly, since he could already speak Japanese, as he had previously been here for almost two years.

For this, he says, it is possible to have two teachers at once – for the morning and for the evening; Yes, to study all this so that later to write in Japanese in magazines. In the meantime, he said, we will live together at the mission in Tokyo. He immediately led us around the entire mission, took us to church, to the library, and so on, and all this very quickly – on the run. In general, Vladyka is very lively, as if he were still a very young man, zealous and energetic, about 27-30 years old, while he is already 62 years old; And in appearance he gives the impression of being very young, although he says that he has only 10 years left to live, if everything goes as usual, that is, if he does not kill or die a premature death, and so on. "Now I leave the whole task of the mission to you, and I have to deal with the translation of the Holy Scriptures and the divine services: after all, there is almost nothing yet, and this is my direct business, for someone else will have to stay in Japan for so many years (37)." Now he is translating the Gospel, and this is probably the third time or more: "It is necessary to translate thoroughly and correctly once for all, and therefore it is necessary to be very careful in the choice of signs and words, especially when it comes to concepts and terms." And they sit all day long at this work together: His Grace himself and the Japanese Nakai, although the latter does not understand Russian, Greek, or English, but he is very learned in the Japanese sense, that is, in Chinese.

Vladyka himself manages the entire mission household, delves into everything, knows everything; even in the library he himself manages and keeps records; in the church he himself showed everything to the smallest detail. They went to the seminary, to the catechetical school, to the women's school, and there he knew everyone. And how he has enough strength and time for everything! He is all embodied energy and a lively interest in everything. And he speaks about everything vividly with enthusiasm, as if it were his own cause, and the main thing is that his word and view of everything are filled with the most lively integral faith in the cause and in the Orthodox Church as the only true guardian of the gift of Christ's Gospel. We, says Vladyka, are the servants of the Mother Churches, the only true one, and it is our sacred duty to loudly and unceasingly proclaim the truth of Christ. And what a pity that all these corrupt Christian communities are shouting about Christ, while the mother of all, the Orthodox Church, is silent. Everywhere there is an interest in religion, all those who do not know God are looking for Him, thirsting for the true word of faith in God, and the mother of all mankind seems to be asleep and does not pay any attention to anything. The sheep run around looking for a shepherd, but he does not respond. Yes, it really is; but here is the evidence of the truth of his words. He himself alone in Japan laid a solid foundation for Orthodoxy, and now, during the 37 years of his stay here, there are already up to 25 thousand Christians under the leadership of exclusively Japanese priests and catechists. Is this a possible thing for a person? But the word of Christ is true: for man this is impossible, but for God all things are possible. Indeed, only He Himself showed in this the truth of our cause of Orthodoxy and the power of His Holy Church. And Christianity among our Orthodox Japanese is not only in name, but in reality: the morals here, amidst the great immorality of the people, are carefully preserved by the believers themselves, and in this way a whole church life will gradually be created, as was the case in our ancient Russia, when the ecclesiastical principle penetrated deeply and seriously into all aspects of life. And Vladyka has very broad assumptions and aspirations in this regard. He firmly believes in his Orthodox cause as the only work of God among all other Christian communities. He asserts that this is how it should be, so that Orthodoxy will eventually triumph over everyone: this is necessary, and therefore it must be, and it must be so, and it will be so (he directly said that he does not like the word "I can't"). In these assumptions, and partly with the aim of showing at once the height of Orthodoxy by the involuntary conversion of even the external gaze, he built a large Orthodox cathedral in the most prominent place in Tokyo, and moreover in a very significant place – on Sarugadai, near and in view of the imperial palaces.

And indeed, our cathedral seems to rise above the whole city and adorns it with its grandeur, harmony and beauty. Unwittingly, he attracts the attention of everyone; it has now become a landmark of the whole city, and every Japanese strives to visit and marvel at this important creation of the well-known Nicholas in the Russian church.

The cathedral is in the form of a cross, very spacious, with a beautiful gilded high iconostasis for three altars; it is richly supplied with both the sacristy and all the utensils; All this, of course, is still a gift from the generous Russian hand. In the sacristy of the cathedral there is a reserve of everything for numerous (in the future) Japanese churches. The Japanese go to the cathedral, bow before it (these are pagans), as if giving honor to the unknown but respected God, in Whose name one person works, so selflessly for the benefit of them, the Japanese, he created this shrine. Each of them will certainly put some kind of coin on the episcopal cathedra, even a copper one, and there are so many of them that His Grace wants to drain the bell. And the very buildings of the mission also attracted my wife on a grand scale and thoroughly: it is a pleasure and sublime to look at all this. Our mission kind of hovers above everything here. The seminary and the women's school are also built for a large number of students – the seminary for 120 people. The catechetical school is located at the mission, and students go to the seminary only for lessons. There are many students, only in catechetical schools: recent military events (the Sino-Japanese War) have completely drawn the interest of the Japanese away from the religious, as the non-Orthodox missions also declare in their reports. The girls' school is run by old Anna-san, that is, the mistress, she has been in charge of it for 20 years and has completely devoted herself to the school; She receives a pittance – 5 yen a month (1 yen is 13 kopecks less than our ruble), but even that she spends almost exclusively on her children. A remarkably good old woman. The teachers and educators are already her pupils, and all are good religious and devoted to the cause; One does not even want to marry and refuses numerous suitors. The library building is designed so that in case of fire it is fireproof.

It has three floors; The library is very rich, for starters; Most of the books are in many copies, since it is often necessary to give them to catechists and priests. There are many Japanese translations from the Holy Fathers as well; Local teachers who studied in Russian academies translate. In general, the mission has a special commission for translation from Russian and English. His Grace advised us to invite priests, teachers, translators, and others to dinner to get to know them, which we arranged in several receptions. Academicians, unfortunately, are somewhat similar to our Russian academicians, that is, with the usual lack of seriousness and devotion to church work, only in an even worse or, better said, petty childish form, since they have only been adopted from Russian students; but this does not need to be said about everyone; There are also very serious ones, but the trouble is that none of them wants to be a priest and a missionary in the narrow sense. There is only one of the old candidates for the Kiev Academy, a priest in Kyoto. The seminary is headed by the still young candidate Kawamoto. Among the translators there are very good ones; they are, perhaps, better than the candidates (for they have not yet seen anything Russian of low rank). The clergy here are all good and moral, but, with a few exceptions, not quite rich in gifted people. However, everyone does his job properly, diligently and well.

I also saw the very first Christian, the priest Father Pavel Sawabe. At first, he was a swordsman and traveled from city to city, challenging for a competition, for which he was very famous throughout Japan; then he became a Shinto priest and was distinguished in this regard by fanaticism. At that time, news about Christianity was just beginning in Japan, but it was in complete suppression and even persecution by the authorities. However, Bishop Nicholas, having already completely studied the Japanese speech, decided to begin the work of preaching little by little. He often went to Buddhists and Shinto temples in order to make acquaintance with priests or with the Japanese in general, of course, little by little starting a conversation about Christ. And so Paul Sawabe was the first person whom God decided to make a worker in His field. In his stubborn fanaticism, he looked sideways at His Grace Nicholas for a long time, and once he came to him and said: "What are you talking about some Christ?" – and began to angrily scold him for this. His Grace remarked to him: "Why are you angry? You don't even know what I'm saying; first listen, and then speak." "Well, speak," the fanatic Sawabe remarked angrily. And His Grace spoke to him about sin, about salvation in Christ, about God in general, and so on, and then offered Sawaba the Gospel to acquaint him with the new teaching.

Sawabe angrily took it and still grumbled away. The next day he came again and asked him to speak about the new faith, although he still seemed to be only an outside observer, and therefore glanced sideways at His Grace and angrily questioned him; His Grace explained to him all the Holy History and so on in order, and Sawabe carefully wrote it all down and then pondered it on his own at home, bringing to His Grace a mass of all sorts of questions, objections, and perplexities on this matter in the morning. Later Sawabe said that he did all this secretly and mainly read and wrote in a Shinto temple, conducting a divine service, at which he held a Christian Bible in front of him instead of a pagan prayer book, and secretly from everyone and without involuntarily attracting anyone's curiosity, he slowly became acquainted with the new teaching that was brought by the previously hated Nicholas. This lasted for a long time, and it was this stubborn priest of paganism who became an Orthodox Christian Paul (in the name of the Apostle Paul due to the similarity of fate).

Even before baptism, he himself began a secret sermon, and soon three of them were Christians. His Grace hastily translated the rite of baptism and secretly baptized them in the courtyard of the consular psalmist.

But immediately they, the baptized, had to flee from the persecution of the government. Sawabe Paul fled and on the road came across soldiers who considered him a spy (and then the war between the north and south of Japan for the liberation of imperial power began) and captured him; in prison they examined him all over and found notes on which he wrote down the lessons of His Grace about Christianity. The soldiers looked at him and drove him away, but the next day they themselves came to ask him about the new teaching, which greatly interested them, and they listened to him long and attentively about Christ. But it seems that there was no fruit from this sermon of his. And then the outbreak of the international war distracted the attention of the government from the persecution of Christianity, so that Sawabe was free and became a zealous assistant to His Grace in preaching, and then he was made the first priest from the Japanese. Thus began Christianity here by the grace of God, which makes up for the weak and the weak, and compares mountains and hills. Now Father Pavel Sawabe is already an old man, 62 years old, the same age as the Holy One, but he looks like an old man in front of him. Now he has a son, Alexei, a priest, and very religious and active, like his father. They are both priests at another church in Tokyo for Christians on the other side of the city.

We visited everyone: priests, candidates, and some catechists in their homes. The structure of a Japanese house is as follows. A wooden lattice opens from the courtyard, the door of which is so low that it is absolutely necessary to enter with a curve: after all, Japanese life is almost entirely filled with bows and squats, so the Japanese, already entering the house, bow and bend, and the person who meets him sits on his knees and, hissing out of courtesy, grovels on the ground, as if to say: I am such a little man in front of you, that I am not worthy to stand on a par with you. This is the most respectful reception in accordance with the European standing up when meeting. Behind the outer grille, in a very narrow square porch, it is imperative to take off your boots and leave them here, because the Japanese do not have shoes, they walk on wooden benches and they are taken off in this porch and remain in very clean socks.

Therefore, the floors in the house are covered with mats (for the rich with carpets) the cleanest. Almost usually a house consists of four departments: a reception room, an honorary hall, a bedroom and a kitchen. In the hall there is a particularly pride of place, like our front corner: it goes deep into one of the walls in the form of a cabinet open from floor to ceiling; all the most honorable things are placed there: the pagans have their shrine with idols, and our Christians have icons, as well as other important things. In the middle of the room, there is always a hibachi, that is, a brazier with a constant fire on coals, corrected not with a scoop, but with two metal sticks; it is around it that the home hearth in the proper sense is composed; there is a heart-to-heart conversation, and a treat... Everyone sits on the floor (in front of the hibachi) on their knees on pillows, which are usually served only for guests, and first of all greets and bows for a long time with soft smiles. Japanese green tea is always served: tea is brewed in a teapot and immediately poured into very small cups; It is difficult to drink more than one cup out of habit. Tea tastes bitter and strong, so you can really excite your nerves. Tea is certainly accompanied by very tasty Japanese cookies and all sorts of spices. Everything is very tasty, intricate and often the best of skillful European confectioneries. The Japanese almost constantly hold a long pipe in his hands, every now and then apply a small pinch of tobacco, light a cigarette from the hibachi, and after one inhalation knock it out into the hibachi; And this is very common. Japanese tobacco is a thin, long fiber of yellowish color, but not brown red like European tobacco. Farewell takes place with the same bows before the hibachi; Then the guest goes out on the porch and puts on his shoes, and the hosts sit on their knees in the hall and, bowing, see them off.