The famous Horikiri Iris Garden in northeastern Tokyo, shown here in a hand-colored postcard from the late Meiji period, has attracted flower-loving visitors for more artists, from making the trek. Those who visit today will find a scene largely unchanged from those early days — save, of course, for the presence of rickshaws. Known in Japanese as (literally, “human-power-vehicle”), these were still a relatively new invention when this photograph was taken, having only been introduced circa 1869 after the lifting of a ban on wheeled transportation instituted by the country’s former shogunate. Prior to that, Japanese aristocrats would have been carted around on palanquins, a slower and even more manpower-intensive conveyance. Rickshaws proved so popular that by the late 1870s they were the country’s main mode of transport, with an estimated 40,000 of them operating in Tokyo alone. These days, of course, rickshaws are relegated to just a few tourist areas like Asakusa and Higashiyama in Kyoto, where they serve as a nostalgic reminder of an earlier age.
