イザベラ・バード、日本の鉄道旅行記：文明開化の象徴と異文化体験

横浜で通訳兼助手の「伊藤」を得たイザベラ・バードは、最初の目的地でもある東京へ旅立った。横浜（現在の桜木町）と新橋の間には明治5（1872）年に日本初の鉄道が開通しており、文明開化の象徴のような交通手段をバードも楽しんだ。旅行記「Unbeaten Tracks in Japan」を見てみよう。

H.B.M.'s LEGATION, YEDO, May 24.

The journey between the two cities is performed in an hour by an admirable, well-metalled, double-track railroad, 18 miles long, with iron bridges, neat stations, and substantial roomy termini, built by English engineers at a cost known only to Government, and opened by the Mikado in 1872. The Yokohama station is a handsome and suitable stone building, with a spacious approach, ticket-offices on our plan, roomy waiting-rooms for different classes? uncarpeted, however, in consideration of Japanese clogs?and supplied with the daily papers. There is a department for the weighing and labelling of luggage, and on the broad, covered, stone platform at both termini a barrier with turnstiles, through which, except by special favour, no ticketless person can pass. Except the ticket-clerks, who are Chinese, and the guards and engine-drivers, who are English, the officials are Japanese in European dress. Outside the stations, instead of cabs, there are kurumas, which carry luggage as well as people. Only luggage in the hand is allowed to go free; the rest is weighed, numbered, and charged for, a corresponding number being given to its owner to present at his destination. The fares are -- 3d class, an ichibu, or about 1s.; 2d class, 60 sen, or about 2s. 4d.; and 1st class, a yen, or about 3s. 8d. The tickets are collected as the passengers pass through the barrier at the end of the journey. The English-built cars differ from ours in having seats along the sides, and doors opening on platforms at both ends.On the whole, the arrangements are Continental rather than British.

The first-class cars are expensively fitted up with deeply-cushioned, red morocco seats, but carry very few passengers, and the comfortable seats, covered with fine matting, of the 2d class are very scantily occupied; but the 3d class vans are crowded with Japanese, who have taken to railroads as readily as to kurumas. This line earns about $8,000,000 a year.

The Japanese look most diminutive in European dress. Each garment is a misfit, and exaggerates the miserable physique and the national defects of concave chests and bow legs. The lack of "complexion" and of hair upon the face makes it nearly impossible to judge of the ages of men. I supposed that all the railroad officials were striplings of 17 or 18, but they are men from 25 to 40 years old.

You don't take your ticket for Tokiyo, but for Shinagawa or Shinbashi, two of the many villages which have grown together into the capital. Yedo is hardly seen before Shinagawa is reached, for it has no smoke and no long chimneys; its temples and public buildings are seldom lofty; the former are often concealed among thick trees, and its ordinary houses seldom reach a height of 20 feet. On the right a blue sea with fortified islands upon it, wooded gardens with massive retaining walls, hundreds of fishing-boats lying in creeks or drawn up on the beach; on the left a broad road on which kurumas are hurrying both ways, rows of low, grey houses, mostly tea-houses and shops; and as I was asking "Where is Yedo?" the train came to rest in the terminus, the Shinbashi railroad station, and disgorged its 200 Japanese passengers with a combined clatter of 400 clogs -- a new sound to me.

車両やインフラはもちろん英国製で、車掌や機関手までもが英国人というのだから、バードにとってはつかの間、本国に帰ったかのような気分だっただろう。手続きのため、東京との間を1往復半しているが、最初に乗ったのは5月24日。「うららかな日で、英国の6月に似ているが、少し暑かった」と書いている。近づく梅雨の空気が、まだほとんどが従来の田園風景だった東海道沿線を包んでいた。

東京に着いたバードが向かったのは、麴町にあった英国公使館。当時は、ハリー・パークスが公使を務めていた。パークスは幕末の日本に駐在し、動乱の中、開国に向けて薩長を中心に画策したことで知られる。話が前後するが、パークスはこの2日前に横浜でバードを訪ねているので、そこで初出する。

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