Letters from China and Japan

								

their cheerfulness and realize what a really old and overcrowded
country is and how Buddhism and stoic fatalistic cheerfulness develop.
Don't ever fool yourself into thinking of Japan as a new country; I
don't any longer believe the people who tell you that you have to go
to China and India to see antiquity. Superficially it may be so, but
not fundamentally. Any country is old where birth and death are like
the coming and dropping of leaves on a tree, and where the individual
is of as much importance as the leaf. Old world and New world are not
mere relatives; they are as near absolutes as anything.
We heard a whistle making its cry outside and Mamma thought it was the
bank messenger, so I rang the bell for the boy to bring him in--but
alas, it was much less romantic; it was the call of the macaroni
peddler.

TOKYO, February.

Here we are, one week after landing, on a hill in a beautiful garden of
trees on which the buds are already swelling. The plums will soon be in
bloom, and in March the camellias, which grow to fairly large trees. In
the distance we see the wonderful Fuji, nearby the other hills of this
district, and the further plains of the city. Just at the foot of our
hill is a canal, along which is an alley of cherry trees formerly
famous, but largely destroyed by a storm a few years ago.
We have a wonderful apartment to ourselves, mostly all windows, which in
this house are glass. A very large bedroom, a small dressing room, and a
study where I now sit with the sun coming in the windows which are all
its sides. We need this sun, though the hibashi, or boxes of charcoal,
do wonders in warming up your feet and drying hair, as I am now doing.
We are surrounded by all the books on Japan that modern learning has
produced, so we have never a waiting moment. The house is very large,
with one house after another covering the hilltop and connected by the
galleries that are cut off the sides of each room in succession. I shall
try to get a photo. At the extreme end of the house is Mr. X----'s
library of several rooms, and at the limit of that the tea room for the
tea ceremonies. Our host is not one of the new rich who buy sets at a
million dollars for performing this ceremony. He laughs at that. But
there is a gold lacquer table which is like transfixed sunshine, and
there are other pieces of old furniture, which are priceless now, and
which have come down in his family. You would be amused to see us at
breakfast, which O-Tei, the maid assigned to us, serves in our sun
parlor. First we have fruit. Two little lacquer tables to move wherever
we want to sit. The dishes and service are in our fashion in this house.
Nice old blue Canton plates and other things Japanese. After fruit she
makes toast over the charcoal in the hibashi, two little iron sticks
stuck in the bread to hold it. On these prongs she hands us the toast.
Meantime she teaches us Japanese and we teach her English which she