the peculiarities of the country which will remain longest imprinted on my memory. From our neighbor's houses these no

move very badly, creak and make a h

completely the kind of open hall in which we live. Usually, it is Chrysantheme who undertakes this piece of household work, and a great deal of troub

lips on a more simple one of blue cotton, which has the same pagoda sleeves, the same shape al

dless to say-that is, all but the pins, which ar

ely be smoked before going to sleep; this is one of th

ittle bamboo pot serving at the same time as ash-tray and cuspidor. (Madame Prune's smoking-box downstairs, and every smoking-box in Japan, is exactly the same, and contains pre

ilver tube, which is perfectly straight and at the end of which, in a microscopic r

tly against the edge of the smoking-box to knock out the ashes, which never will fall; and this tapping, heard everywhere, in every house, at e

You must smoke too!"

uts the silver tube to my lips with a bow. Courtesy

the silent and deserted footpath, the other on the garden side, overlooking the terraces, so that the night ai

rates at night like a great dry violin, and th

nkling sound, like the harmonious murmur of a brook; outside, to the very farthest limits of the distance, the cicalas continue their sonorous and neve

ng upward from the sea and the deep harbor, reaches us, Ch

her little amber arms, and her graceful little hands, she sits up resolutely, with all the waking sighs and broken syllables of a child, pretty a

which wakes Madame Prune. This is fatal. Madame Prune is at once seized also with a longing to smoke which may not be denied; then,