Travel in Old Japan

Travelling around Japan in olden times was complicated by the shoguns' prohibition of wheeled transport, excepting the carts that were used to carry goods.

This meant that ordinary people, like the seventeenth-century poet, Matsuo Basho, were obliged to walk or make use of palaquins or some other colourful contraption.

In this piece Lesley Downer, an expert of Japanese culture and history and the author of The Shortest History of Japan and On the Narrow Road to the Deep North, explains how an advanced society sought to move without wheels.

This year, the second year of Genroku, I have decided to make a long walking trip to the distant provinces of the far north ...’

On 16 May 1689 the poet Matsuo Basho set off for the north of Japan. He recorded his journey in a travel diary of prose interspersed with haiku, seventeen syllable poems, which he named The Narrow Road to the Deep North.

Fire was a commonplace hazard in nineteenth-century London. Although much had changed since the days of the Great Fire of 1666, when much of the capital was constructed from combustible materials, people continued to live at close quarters with candles still a common method of illumination.

A fire at the Houses of Parliament, though, was a terrible prospect. Inside the Lords, behind the door that Cottle had recently pushed closed, the flames continued to spread. As they did so they progressed towards artefacts of immense cultural value. The most notable object—one that was dwelt upon by many newspapers in the aftermath—was a celebrated sixteenth-century tapestry, which portrayed in vivid and thrilling detail the defeat of the Spanish Armada. Each section of the tapestry was kept inside a wooden frame.

Then, not far away, was 'St Stephen's Chapel'. The chamber of the House of Commons retained the form of a choir. Six rows of wooden benches, covered with green cloth, rose up at either side of the Clerks' Table and the Speaker's Chair. The whole room was lined with oak.

At seven o'clock the fire was clearly visible from the streets outside. By now 'detachments of police'—still a novelty themselves—were present at the scene, as were 'engines from the different fire-stations.'

The Morning Chronicle took up the story:

While many watched in horror as the buildings collapsed, others threw their energy into salvaging what they could. Inside the Houses of Parliament were public records that documented England's deepest past. The challenge of saving these was taken up by John Hobhouse, one of the first senior politicians to arrive on the scene.

Hobhouse issued an order that every effort be made for the 'immediate removal' of these papers, 'an operation which he actively and anxiously superintended'.

Those watching the fire from outside were now met with the sight of Hobhouses's frantic operation. Everything was requisitioned that could be of use: hackney carriages, coaches, cabs, waggons, hand carts.

Many of the records were thrown in heaps, through the doors of private homes in the nearby streets. Others were carried with more decorum to governmental offices. Hobhouse would receive great credit for his actions on the night, but the salvaging of so many papers of such historical significance was also due to the selfless application of the firemen. Many of them, ran one report, 'incurred great danger, but nothing could exceed their zeal and disregard of personal risk'.

With a fire so ferocious, there was every chance that lives would be lost through smoke inhalation or worse. One of the first and narrowest of escapes was that of 'Mrs Wright', the Housekeeper of the House of Lords, who was very nearly penned in her apartment by the advancing flames.

Lord Frederick FitzClarence, meanwhile, had been in one of the 'uppermost rooms'. FitzClarence was an army officer and an illegitimate son of King William IV and on the night of 16 October he was in a top floor room when the fire broke out.

He remained unaware of the danger until someone spied him through a window. His rescue was aided by a new piece of technology, 'the fireman's ladder'. This innovation, the London Chronicle explained, 'is formed of parts that slide on each other'. One of these was brought and erected outside his window. FitzClarence, the Chronicle reported, was 'the last who got upon the ladder'.

As the smoke rose over the wreckage in the morning, Londoners were left with the dismal prospect of a lost landmark. Seventy three Parliaments had sat in the destroyed buildings since the accession of King Henry VIII in 1509.

Gone was the place where Lord Chancellor Clarendon was impeached in 1667; gone was the chamber where Matthew Prior had stood in 1715 on charges of high treason; gone was the House of Commons in which the MP John Wilkes had been declared an outlaw in 1764.

Extent of Damage Done

The following is the official report upon the damage done to the buildings, furniture, etc. of the two Houses of Parliament, the Speaker’s Official Residence, the official residence of the Clerk of the House of Commons, and to the Courts of Law at Westminster Hall.

Opinions Respecting the Cause of the Fire

Naturally, pinpointing the cause of the fire was a central concern for the newspapers in the days immediately afterwards.

There was so much conjecture that The Morning Herald cautioned, 'the mystery which hangs over the destruction of the two houses of parliament is not yet cleared up. Any statement as to whether it was the result of accident or design must yet be premature, because the confusion attendant upon the calamitous event, and the necessity of making unceasing efforts to get the flames completely under, afforded no time or opportunity, in fact, for deliberate investigation of the cause.'

One theory though, was printed in the Globe and Courier. It were said to be 'very extraordinary, if true'.