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“It will be clear profit, Samantha, for I want to get rid on ’em, and all the Jonesvillians do, and if I can sell their carcasses I will throw in the hide and taller. Why, I can make a corner on rats and mice in Jonesville; I can git ’em by the wagon load of the farmers and git pay at both ends.” But I told him that the freightage would eat up the profits, and he see it would, and gin up the idee onwillin’ly.
Though I don’t love such hot stuff as we had to eat, curry, and red peppers, and chutney, not to home I don’t, but I see it wuz better to eat such food there on account of the climate. Some of our party had to take quinine, too, for the stomach’s sake to keep up, for you feel there like faintin’ right away, the climate is such.
It must be that the Chinese like amusements, for we see sights of theatres and concert rooms and lanterns wuz hangin’ everywhere and bells. And there wuz streets all full of silk shops, and weavers, and jewelry, and cook shops right open on either side. All the colors of the rainbow and more too you see in the silks and embroideries, and jewelry of all kinds and swingin’ signs and mat awnings overhead, and the narrer streets full of strange lookin’ folks, in their strange lookin’ dresses.
We visited a joss house, and a Chinaman’s paradise where opium eaters and smokers lay in bunks lookin’ as silly and happy as if they wouldn’t ever wake up agin to their tawdy wretchedness. We visited a silk manufactory, a glass blowing shop. We see a white marble pagoda with several tiers of gilded bells hangin’ on the outside. Inside it wuz beautifully ornamented, some of the winders wuz made of the inside of oyster shells; they made a soft, pleasant light, and it had a number of idols made of carved ivory and some of jade stun, and the principal idol wuz a large gilded dragon.
Josiah said the idee of worshippin’ such a looking creeter as that. Sez he, “I should ruther worship our old gander.” And Miss Meechim wuz horrified, too, at the wickedness of the Chinese in worshippin’ idols.
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But Arvilly walked around it with her head up, and said that America worshipped an idol that looked enough sight worse than that and a million times worse actin’. Sez she, “This idol will stay where it is put, it won’t rare around and murder its worshippers.”
And Miss Meechim sez coldly, “I don’t know what you mean; I know that I am an Episcopalian and worship as our beautiful creed dictates.”
Sez Arvilly, “Anybody that sets expediency before principle, from a king to a ragpicker; any one who cringes to a power he knows is vile and dangerous, and protects and extends its influence from greed and ambition, such a one worships a far worse idol than this peaceable, humbly-lookin’ critter and looks worse to me enough sight.”
I hearn Miss Meechim say out to one side to Dorothy, “How sick I am of hearing her constant talk against intemperance; from California to China I have had to hear it. And you know, Dorothy, that folks can drink genteel.”
But Dorothy, with her sweet lips trembling and her white dimpled chin quivering, sez, “I should think we had suffered enough from the Whiskey Power, Auntie, to hear anything said against it, and at any time.”
And Robert Strong jined in with Dorothy, and so Miss Meechim subsided, and I see a dark shadder creep over her face, too, and tears come into her pale blue eyes. She hain’t forgot Aronette, poor little victim! Crunched and crushed under the wheels of the monster Juggernaut America rolls round to crush its people under. I wuz some like Arvilly. When I thought of that I didn’t feel to say so much aginst them foreign idols, though they wuz humbly lookin’ as I ever see. And speakin’ of idols, one day we see twelve fat hogs in a temple, where they wuz kept as sacred animals, and here agin Miss Meechim wuz horrified and praised up American doin’s, and run down China, and agin Arvilly made remarks. Sez she:
“The hogs there wallowing in their filth are poor lookin’181things to kneel down and worship, but they’re shut up here with priests to tend to ’em; they can’t git out to roam round and entice innocents into their filthy sties and perpetuate their swinish lives, and that is more than we can say of the American beastly idols, or our priesthood who fatten them and themselves and then let ’em out to rampage round and act.”
Miss Meechim sithed deep and remarked to me “that the tariff laws wuz a absorbin’ topic to her mind at that time.” She did it to change the subject.
We went to a Chinese crematory and the Temple of Longevity, where if you paid enough you could git a promise of long life. Josiah is clost, but he gin quite a good deal for him, and wuz told that he would live to be one hundred and twenty-seven years of age. He felt well. Of course we had a interpreter with is who talked for us. Josiah wanted me to pay, too, for a promise. Sez he with a worried look:
“I shall be wretched as a widower, Samantha; do patronize ’em, I had ruther save on sunthin’ else than this.”
So to please him I gin ’em a little more than he did, and they guaranteed me one hundred and forty years, and then Josiah worried agin and wanted me to promise not to marry agin after he wuz gone. He worships me. And I told him that if I lived to be a hundred and forty I guessed I shouldn’t be thinkin’ much about marryin’, and he looked easier in his mind.
One day we met a weddin’ procession, most a mild long, I should say. The bride wuz ahead in her sedan chair, her dress wuz richly embroidered and spangled, a veil fringed with little pearls hung over her face. Pagodas with tinkling gilt bells, sedan chairs full of silk and cloth and goods of all kinds wuz carried in the procession by coolies. Idols covered with jade and gilt jewelry, a company of little children beatin’ tom-toms and gongs, and the stuffed bodies of animals all ornamented with gilt and red paper riggers wuz carried,182and at the tail end of the procession come the friends of the family.
The bridegroom wuzn’t there, he wuz waitin’ to hum in his own or his father’s house for the bride he’d never seen. But if the bride’s feet wuz not too large he would most likely be suited.
Miss Meechim said, “Poor young man! to have to take a wife he has never seen; how widely different and how immeasurably better are such things carried on in America.”
Sez Arvilly, “What bridegroom ever did see his bride as she really wuz? Till the hard experience of married life brought out her hidden traits, good and bad? Or what wife ever see her husband’s real temper and character until after years of experience?”
Sez I, “That’s so; leaves are turned over in Josiah Allen’s mind now as long as we’ve been pardners that has readin’ on ’em as strange to me as if they wuz writ in Chinese or Japan.”
But then it must be admitted that not to see your wife’s face and know whether she’s cross-eyed or snub-nosed is tryin’. But they say it is accordin’ to the decree of Feng Shui, and therefore they accept it willingly. They have a great variety of good fruit in Canton––some that I never see before––but their vegetables don’t taste so good as ours, more stringy and watery, and their eggs they want buried six months before usin’ ’em. I believe that sickened me of China as much as anything. But then some folks at home want their game kep’ till it hain’t fit to eat in my opinion. But eggs! they should be like Cæsar’s wife, above suspicion––the idee of eatin’ ’em with their shells all blue and spotted with age––the idee!
183CHAPTER XVI
We wuz all invited one day to dine with a rich Chinaman Robert Strong had got acquainted with in San Francisco. Arvilly didn’t want to go, and offered to keep Tommy with her, and the rest of us went. The house wuz surrounded with a high wall, and we entered through a small door in this wall, and went into a large hall openin’ on a courtyard. The host met us and we set down on a raised seat covered with red cloth under some big, handsome lanterns that wuz hung over our heads. Servants with their hair braided down their backs and with gay dresses on brought in tea––as good as any I ever drank––and pipes. Josiah whispered to me:
“How be I agoin’ to smoke tobacco, Samantha? It will make me sick as death. You know I never smoked anything but a little catnip and mullen for tizik. I wonder if he’s got any catnip by him; I’m goin’ to ask.”
But I kep’ him from it, and told him that we could just put the stems in our mouths, and pretend to smoke enough to be polite.
“Hypocrasy,” sez Josiah, “don’t become a deacon in high standin’. If I pretend to smoke I shall smoke, and take a good pull.” And he leaned back and shut his eyes and took his pipe in his hand, and I guess he drawed on it more than he meant to, for he looked bad, sickish and white round his mouth as anything. But we all walked out into the garden pretty soon and he looked resuscitated.
It was beautiful there; rare flowers and exotics of all kinds, trees that I never see before and lots that I had seen, sparklin’ fountains with gold fish, grottos all lit up by colored184lanterns, and little marble tablets with wise sayings. Josiah said he believed they wuz ducks’ tracks, and wondered how ducks ever got up there to make ’em, but the interpreter read some on ’em to us and they sounded first rate. Way up on a artificial rock, higher than the Jonesville steeple, wuz a beautiful pavilion with gorgeous lanterns in it and beautiful bronzes and china.
In the garden wuz growin’ trees, trimmed all sorts of shapes, some on ’em wuz shaped like bird cages and birds wuz singin’ inside of ’em. There wuz one like a jinrikisha with a horse attached, all growin’, and one like a boat, and two or three wuz pagodas with gilt bells hangin’ to ’em, another wuz shaped like a dragon, and some like fish and great birds. It wuz a sight to see ’em, all on ’em a growin’, and some on ’em hundreds of years old. Josiah says to me:
“If I ever live to git home I will surprise Jonesville. I will have our maple and apple trees trimmed in this way if I live. How uneek it will be to see the old snow apple tree turned into a lumber wagon, and the pound sweet into a corn house, and the maples in front of the house you might have a couple on ’em turned into a Goddess of Liberty and a statter of Justice, you are such a hand for them two females,” sez he. “Of course we should have to use cloth for Justice’s eye bandages, and her steelyards I believe Ury and I could trim out, though they might not weigh jest right to the notch.”
And I sez, “Justice has been used to that, to not weighin’ things right, it wouldn’t surprise her.” But I told him it would be sights of work and mebby he’ll give it up.
Soon afterwards we wuz all invited to dinner in this same house. And so ignorant are the Chinese of Jonesville ways that at a dinner the place of honor is at the left instead of the right of the host. Everything that can be in China is topsy tervy and different from us. I wuz chose for that honorable place at the left of our host. We all stood for quite a while, for it is China table etiquette to try to make the guest185next to us set down first, but finally we all sot down similtaneous and at the same time. Josiah thinks that it is because China is right down under us the reason that she gits so turned over and strange actin’, but ’tennyrate, endin’ our dinner as we do with sweets, it didn’t surprise me that we begun our dinner by havin’ sweetmeats passed, each one helpin’ ourselves with chop sticks, queer things to handle as I ever see, some like the little sticks I have seen niggers play tunes with. Josiah seemed to enjoy hisen the best that ever wuz, and to my horrow he took both on ’ern in his right hand and begun to play Yankee Doodle on ’em.
I stepped on his foot hard under the table, and he broke off with a low groan, but I spoze they would lay it to a foreigner’s strange ways. After the sweetmeats wuz partook of we had dried melon seeds, the host handin’ ’em round by the handful. Josiah slipped his into his pocket. I wuz mortified enough, but he said:
“Of course he wants us to plant ’em; nobody but a fool would expect us to eat melon seeds or horse feed.”
I wuz glad Josiah didn’t speak in China, I guess they didn’t understand him. A rice-wine wuz passed with this, which of course I did not partake of. Much as I wanted to be polite I could not let this chance pass of holdin’ up my temperance banner. I had seen enough trouble caused by folks in high station not holdin’ up temperance principles at banquets, and I wuzn’t to be ketched in the same way, so I waived it off with a noble and lofty jester, but Miss Meechim drinked wine every time it wuz passed, and she got real tonguey before we went home, and her eyes looked real kinder glassy––glassier than a perfessor’s eyes ort to look. Then we had bird’s-nest soup, which is one of the most costly luxuries to be had in Canton. They are found on precipitous rocks overhanging the sea, and one must risk his life to get them. It didn’t taste any better to me than a chip. It seemed to be cut in little square yeller pieces, kind186of clear lookin’, some like preserved citron only it wuz lighter colored, and Josiah whispered to me:
“We can have bird’s-nest soup any day to hum, Samantha. Jest think of the swaller’s nest in the barn and robin’s nest and crow’s nest, why one crow’s nest would last us a week.”
“It would last a lifetime, Josiah, if I had to cook it; sticks and straw.”
“Well, it would be real uneek to cook one, or a hornet’s nest, and would be a rarity for the Jonesvillians, and in the winter, if we run out of bird’s-nest, you could cook a hen’s nest.”
But I sez, “Keep still, Josiah, and let’s see what we’ll have next.”
Well, we had ham, fish, pigeon’s eggs and some things I didn’t know the name of. The host took up a little mess of sunthin’ on his chop stick and handed it to me. I dassent refuse it, for he meant it as a honor, but I most know it wuz rat meat, but couldn’t tell for certain. I put my shoulder blades to the wheel and swallered it, but it went down hard.
Bowls of rice wuz passed round last. Between the courses we had the best tea I ever tasted of; only a few of the first leaves that open on the tea plant are used for this kind of tea, and a big field would be gone over for a pound of it. After it is cured it is flavored with the tea blossom. I had spozed I had made good tea to home on my own hot water tank, and drinked it, but I gin up that I had never tasted tea before.
On our way home we went through the Street of Benevolence and I wuz ashamed to run Miss Meechim in my mind.
They name their streets real funny; one street is called Everlasting Love, or it means that in our language, and there is Refreshing Breezes, Reposing Dragons, Honest Gain, Thousand Grandsons, Heavenly Happiness, and etc., etc.
Josiah said that he should see Uncle Sime Bentley and187Deacon Henzy about naming over the Jonesville streets the minute he got home. Sez he, “How uneek it will be to trot along through Josiah’s Never Ending Success, or Prosperous Interesting Josiah, or the Glorious Pathmaster, or the Divine Travellin’ Deacon, or sunthin’ else uneek and well meanin’.”
Sez I, “You seem to want to name ’em all after yourself, Josiah. Uncle Sime and Deacon Henzy would probable want one or two named after them.”
“Well,” sez he, “we could name one Little Uncle, and one Spindlin’ Deacon, if they insisted on’t.”
Josiah wuz in real good sperits, I laid it partly to the tea, it wuz real stimulating; Josiah said that it beat all that the Chinese wuz so blinded and out of the way as to do things so different from what they did in Jonesville. “But,” sez he, “they’re politer on the outside than the Jonesvillians, even down to the coolers.”
Sez I, “Do you mean the coolies?”
“Yes, the coolers, the hired help, you know,” sez he. “Catch Ury fixin’ his eye on his left side coat collar when he speaks to me not dastin’ to lift it, and bowin’ and scrapin’ when I told him to go and hitch up, or bring in a pail of water, and catch him windin’ his hair in a wod when he wuz out by himself and then lettin’ it down his back when he came to wait on me.”
Sez I, “Ury’s hair is too short to braid.”
“Well, you can spozen the case, can’t you? But as I wuz sayin’, for all these coolers are so polite, I would trust Ury as fur agin as I would any on ’em. And then they write jest the other way from we do in Jonesville, begin their letters on the hind side and write towards ’em; and so with planin’ a board, draw the plane towards ’em. I would like to see Ury try that on any of my lumber. And because we Jonesvillians wear black to funerals, they have to dress in white. Plow would I looked at my mother-in-law’s funeral with a white night gown on and my hair braided down my back188with a white ribbin on it? It would have took away all the happiness of the occasion to me.
“And then their language, Samantha, it is fixed in such a fool way that when they want a word different, they yell up the same word louder and that makes it different, as if I wuz to say to Ury kinder low and confidential, ‘I shall be the next president, Ury;’ and then I should yell up the same words a little louder and that would mean, ‘Feed the brindle steer;’ there hain’t no sense in it. But I spoze one thing that ails them is their havin’ to stand bottom side up, their feet towards Jonesville. Their blood runs the wrong way. Mebby I shouldn’t do any better than they do if I stood so the hull of the time; mebby I should let my finger nails grow out like bird’s claws and shake my own hands when I meet company instead of theirn. Though,” sez Josiah, dreamily, “I don’t know but I shall try that in Jonesville; I may on my return from my travels walk up to Elder Minkley and the bretheren in the meetin’-house, and pass the compliments with ’em and clasp my own hands and shake ’em quite a spell, not touchin’ their hands. I may, but can’t tell for certain; it would be real uneek to do it.”
“Well,” sez I, “Josiah, every country has its own strange ways; we have ourn.”
Sez he, “How you would scold me if I wuz to wear my hat when we had company, and here it is manners to do it, and take off your specs. Why should I take off my specs to meet Elder Minkley?”
“Well,” sez I, “there hain’t anything out of the way in it, if they want to.”
Sez Josiah, “You seem to take to China ways so, you and Arvilly, that I spoze mebby you’ll begin to bandage your feet when you git home, and toddle round on your big toes.”
And I sez, “I d’no but I’d jest as soon do that as to girt myself down with cossets, or walk round with a trailin’ dress wipin’ up all the filth of the streets to carry home to make my family sick.”
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But it is a awful sight. I had the chance right there in Canton to see a foot all bound up to make it the fashionable size.
The four small toes wuz twisted right under the ankle, and the broken, crushed bones of the foot pressed right up where the instep should be. The pain must have been sunthin’ terrible, and very often a toe drops off, but I spoze they are glad of that, for it would make the little lump of dead flesh they call their feet smaller. They wear bright satin shoes, all embroidered and painted, and their little pantelettes cover all but the very end of the toe. They all, men and wimmen, wear a loose pair of trowsers which they call the foo, and a kind of jacket which they call a sham.
“A fool and a sham,” Josiah called ’em all the time. The wimmen have their hair all stuck up with some kind of gum, making it as good as a bunnet, but I would fur ruther have the bunnet. Sometimes they wear a handkerchief over it. Wimmen hain’t shut up here as they are in Turkey, but no attention is paid to their education and they are looked down on. Men seem to be willin’ to have wimmen enjoy what religion they can, such as they have. But her husband won’t let her set to the table with him, and he can whip her to death and not be touched for it, but if she strikes back a single blow he can get a divorce from her.
I thought wimmen wuz worse off here than they wuz in America, but Arvilly argyed that our govermunt sold stuff and took pay for it that made men beat their wives, and sold the right to make wicked wimmen and keep ’em so, and took wimmen’s tax money to keep up such laws. And she went over such a lot of unjust laws that I didn’t know but she wuz right, and that we wuz jest about as bad off in some things. They marry dretful young in China. Little babies are engaged to be married right whilst they’re teethin’, but they can’t marry I guess till they are ten or twelve years old.
From Canton we went back to Hongkong, intendin’ to go from there to Calcutta. But Dorothy felt that she must see190Japan while she wuz so near, and we concluded to go, though it wuz goin’ right out of our way in the opposite direction from Jonesville. But when Dorothy expressed a wish Robert Strong seemed to think it wuz jest as bindin’ on him as the law of the Medes and Persians, whatever they may be, and Miss Meechim felt so too, so though as I say it wuz some as though I should go to she that wuz Submit Tewksberrys round by the widder Slimpsey’s and Brother Henzy’s. We found some mail here to the tarven, letters from the dear children and our help. Thomas J. and Maggie wuz gittin’ better, and the rest well, and all follerin’ our journey with fond hearts and good wishes. Philury and Ury writ that everything was goin’ well on the farm and the Jonesvillians enjoyin’ good health. Arvilly got a paper from Jonesville and come in to read it to us. It had been a long time on the road. It said that a new bill was a-goin’ to be introduced to allow wimmen to vote, but she didn’t seem to be encouraged about it much. Sez she: “The law won’t do anything about that as long as it is so busy grantin’ licenses to kill folks via Saloon and other houses of death and ruin and canals and trusts and monopolies to protect to steal the people’s money.”
But I sez, “I do hope the bill will pass for the sake of Justice, if nothin’ else. Justice,” sez I, “must have been so shamed to see such things goin’ on that she wuz glad she wore bandages over her eyes; and her hands have shook so she hain’t weighed even for some time; to see her sect taxed without representation, punished and hung by laws she has no voice in makin’.”
Josiah sez, “I admit that that is ruther hard, Samantha, but that hain’t the nick on’t. The pint is that wimmen hain’t got the self-control that men has. The govermunt is afraid of her emotional nater; she gits wrought up too quick. She is good as gold, almost a angel, in fact, as we male voters have always said. But she is too hasty; she hain’t got the perfect calmness, the firm onmovable sense of right and wrong, the patience and long sufferin’ that we men have;191she flies off too sudden one way or t’other; govermunt well fears she would be a dangerous element in the body politick.”
Jest as Josiah finished this remark Arvilly read out a thrillin’ editorial about the war between Russia and Japan; the editor commented on the wickedness of men plungin’ two great empires into warfare, slaughterin’ thousands and thousands of men, bringin’ ontold wretchedness, distress, pestilence and destitution just to gratify ambition or angry passion. For it wuz this, he said, in the first place, whatever it became afterward.
A war of defence, of course, argued an aggressor, and he talked eloquent about Courts of Arbitration which would do away with the wholesale butchery and horror of war. And he called eloquent on Peace to fly down on her white wings bearing the olive branch, to come and stop this unutterable woe and crime of war.
(Arvilly left off readin’ to remind Josiah that Peace wuz always depictered as a female, and then resoomed her readin’.)
In conclusion, the editor lamented the fact that in the annals of our nation men so often forgot the Golden Rule and gin vent to voylent passions and onbecomin’ behavior.
Sez Josiah, “I guess I will take Tommy and go out for a little walk, Samantha, I feel kinder mauger.”
“I should think you would!” sez Arvilly, lookin’ hull reams of by-laws and statutes at him.
And I sez, “Whilst you’re walkin’, dear Josiah, you might meditate on the danger to the govermunt from wimmen’s emotional nature, and the patience and long sufferin’ of men voters.” I said it real tender and good, but he snapped me up real snappish.
Sez he, “I shall meditate on what I’m a minter. Come, Tommy,” and they went out.
192CHAPTER XVII
And the next day we started for Yokohama. I had felt kinder dubersome about goin’ through countries that wuz plunged in a great war, but we got along all right, nobody shot at us or made any move to, and we didn’t see anybody hurt. But knowed that the warfare wuz ragin’ away somewhere out of our sight.
Death wuz marchin’ along on his pale horse in front of the army, and hearts wuz breakin’ and the light of the sun and of life darkened in thousands and thousands of grand and humble homes.
I felt dretful when I thought on’t, but hain’t goin’ to harrow up the reader’s feelin’s talkin’ about it, knowin’ it won’t do any good, and anyway they’ve all read the particulars in the daily papers.
Well, we reached Yokohama with no fatal casualties to report, though my pardner wuz real seasick, but brightened up as we drew nigh to shore. Here and there a little village with quaint houses could be seen, and anon a temple or shrine riz up above the beautiful tropical foliage and further off the Fujiyama, the sacred mountain, riz up above the other mountains.
We come into the harbor about half-past three and arrove at our tarven about five. When we drew nigh the shore almost naked boatmen come out to meet us in their sampans, as they call their little boats (Josiah called ’em “sass pans” right to their face, but I don’t spoze they understood it). They wuz to take us into the shore and they wuz yellin’ to each other fearful as they pushed their boats ahead. Their toilettes consisted mostly of figgers pricked into their skins,193dragons and snakes seemed their favorite skin ornaments, the color wuz blue mostly with some red. Josiah sez to me as we looked down on ’em from the dock:
“Them coolers wouldn’t have to carry a Saratoga trunk with ’em when they travel; a bottle of ink and a pin would last ’em through life.” It wuz a real hot day, and Josiah continered, “Well, their clothin’ is comfortable anyway, that’s why they are called coolers, because they’re dressed so cool,” and, sez he, “what a excitement I could make in Jonesville next summer in dog-days by introducin’ this fashion.”
I looked on him in horrow, and he added hastily, “Oh, I should wear a short tunic, Samantha, comin’ down most to my knees, with tossels on it, and I shouldn’t wear snakes or dragons on my skin, I should wear some texts of Scripter, or appropriate quotations, as Josiah the fair, or Josiah the pride of Jonesville, runnin’ down my legs and arms, and I shouldn’t have ’em pricked in, I could have ’em painted in gay colors.”
“Oh, heavens!” sez I, lookin’ up to the sky, “what won’t I hear next from this man!”
“I hadn’t said I should do it, Samantha; and ’tennyrate it would be only through dog-days. I said what a excitement it would make if I concluded to do it.”
Sez I, “It is a excitement that would land you in Jonesville jail, and ort to.”
But at that minute Arvilly and Miss Meechim come up to us and broke off the conversation. Japan boatmen jest wear a cloth round their loins, and some of ’em had a little square of matting fastened by a rope round their necks to keep the rain offen their backs.
After goin’ through the custom house, where we got off easy, we went to a tarven called the Grand Hotel and had a good night’s rest.
194CHAPTER XVIII
The next mornin’, after tiffen, which wuz what they call breakfast, bein’ just so ignorant of good Jonesville language, Josiah and I and Tommy sallied out to see what we could see, the rest of our party havin’ gone out before.
Wantin’ to go a considerable ways, we hired two jinrikishas, and I took Tommy in my lap, and I must say that I felt considerable like a baby in a baby carriage carryin’ a doll; but I got over it and felt like a grandma before I had gone fur. How Josiah felt I don’t know, though I hearn him disputin’ with the man about his prices––we had took a interpreter with us so we could know what wuz said to us. The price for a jinrikisha is five sen, and Josiah thought it meant five cents of our money, and so handed it to him. But the man wuz so ignorant he didn’t know anything about Jonesville money, and he kep’ a-callin’ for sen, and the interpreter sez “Sen,” holdin’ up his five fingers and speakin’ it up loud, and I hearn Josiah say:
“Well, you fool, you, I have given you five cents! What more do you want?” But at last he wuz made to understand; but when Josiah made him know where he wanted to go the interpreter said that the sedan carriers wanted a yen, and my poor pardner had another struggle. Sez he:
“You consarned fool, how do you spoze I can give you a hen? Do you spoze I can git into my hen house ten thousand milds off to git you a hen? Or do you want me to steal one for you?”
“A yen,” sez the interpreter, and the way he said it it did sound like hen.
“Well, I said hen, didn’t I?” said my pardner.
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But I leaned out of my baby cart and sez, “Y-e-n, Josiah. A yen is their money, a dollar.”
“Oh, why don’t they call it a cow or a brindle calf?” He wuz all het up by his efforts to understand. They call one of their dollars a yen, a sen is a cent, and a rin is the tenth part of a cent. Josiah fell in love with the copper rins with square holes in the centre. Sez he:
“How I would love to furnish you with ’em, Samantha, when you went to the store in Jonesville. I would hand you out five or six rins and you could string ’em and wear ’em round your neck till you got to the store.”
“Yes,” sez I, “half a cent would go a good ways in buyin’ family stores.”
“Well, it would have a rich look, Samantha, and I mean to make some when I git home. Why, Ury and I could make hundreds of ’em out of our old copper kettle that has got a hole in it, and I shouldn’t wonder if I could pass ’em.”
Miss Meechim had a idee that the Japans wuz in a state of barbarism, but Arvilly who wuz always at swords’ pints with her threw such a lot of statistics at her that it fairly danted her. There are six hundred newspapers in Japan. The Japanese daily at Tokio has a circulation of 300,000. She has over 3,000 milds of railroads and uses the American system of checking baggage. Large factories with the best machinery has been built late years, but a great part of the manufacturing is done by the people in their own homes, where they turn out those exquisite fabrics of silk and cotton and rugs of all the colors of the rainbow, and seemingly as fadeless as that bow. Slavery is unknown, and there is very little poverty with all the crowded population. The Japans are our nearest neighbors acrost the Pacific and we’ve been pretty neighborly with ’em, havin’ bought from ’em within the last ten years most three hundred millions worth of goods. She would miss us if anything should happen to us.
Yokohama is a city of 124,000 inhabitants, most all Japans, though in what they call the settlement there are196fifteen or twenty thousand foreigners. There are beautiful homes here with flower gardens containing the rarest and most beautiful flowers, trees and shrubs of all kinds.
The day Josiah had his struggle with the interpreter and Japan money we rode down the principal streets of Yokohama. And I would stop at some of the silk shops, though Josiah objected and leaned out of his jinrikisha and sez anxiously:
“Don’t spend more’n half a dozen rins, Samantha, on dress, for you know we’ve got more than 10,000 milds to travel and the tarven bills are high.”
Sez I in real dry axents, “If I conclude to buy a dress I shall have to have as much as a dozen rins; I don’t believe that I could git a handsome and durable one for less.” My tone was sarcastical. The idee of buyin’ a silk dress for half a cent! But I didn’t lay out to buy; I wuz jest lookin’ round.
I saw in those shops some of the most beautiful silks and embroideries that I ever did see, and I went into a lacquer shop where there wuz the most elegant furniture and rich bronzes inlaid with gold and silver. They make the finest bronzes in the world; a little pair of vases wuz fifteen hundred dollars and you couldn’t get ’em for less. But why shouldn’t there be beautiful things in a country where every one is a artist?
We stopped at a tea house and had a cup of tea, delicious as I never spozed tea could be and served by pretty young girls with gay colored, loose silk suits and hair elaborately dressed up with chains and ornaments; their feet and legs wuz bare, but they wuz covered with ornaments of brass and jade. Afterwards we passed fields of rice where men and wimmen wuz working, the men enrobed in their skin toilette of dragons and other figures and loin cloth and the wimmen in little scanty skirts comin’ from the waist to the knees. Their wages are eight cents a day. I wondered what some of our haughty kitchen rulers, who demand a dollar a day and the197richest of viands would say if they wuz put down on a basis of eight cents a day and water and rice diet.
The little bamboo cottages are lovely lookin’ from the outside with their thatched roofs, some on ’em with little bushes growin’ out on the thatch and little bunches of grass growin’ out under the eaves. The children of the poor are entirely naked and don’t have a rag on ’em until they’re ten or twelve. A lot of ’em come up to the jinrikishas and called out “oh-hi-o” to Josiah, and he shook his head and sez affably:
“No, bub, I’m from Jonesville.”
But the interpreter explained oh-hi-o means good mornin’; and after that for days Josiah would say to me as soon as I waked up, “Ohio,” and wanted to say it to the rest, but I broke it up.
One thing Josiah thought wuz wicked: a Japanese is not allowed to wear whiskers till he is a grandpa, so old bachelors have to go with smooth faces.
Sez Josiah, “What if Cousin Zebedee Allen couldn’t wear whiskers? Why,” sez he, “his whiskers are his main beauty, and naterally Zeb is more particular about his looks than if he wuz married. Such laws are wicked and arbitrary. Why, when I courted my first wife, Samantha, my whiskers and my dressy looks wuz what won the day. And I d’no,” sez he inquiringly, “but they won your heart.”
“No,” sez I, “it wuzn’t them, and heaven only knows what it wuz; I never could tell. I’ve wondered about it a sight.”
“Well,” sez he, “I didn’t know but it wuz my whiskers.”
We passed a number of temples where the people worship. The two principal religions are the Shinto and the Buddhist. The Shinto means, “The way of the gods,” and they believe that their representative is the Mikado, so of course they lay out to worship him. The Buddhists preach renunciation, morality, duty, and right living. Bein’ such a case to cling to Duty’s apron strings I couldn’t feel towards198the Buddhists as Miss Meechim did. Sez she, “Oh, why can’t they believe as we do in America? Why can’t they all be Episcopalians?”
But ’tennyrate all religions are tolerated here, and as Arvilly told Miss Meechim when she wuz bewailin’ the fact that they wuzn’t all Episcopals and wuzn’t more like our country.
Sez Arvilly, “They don’t drownd what they call witches, nor hang Quakers, nor whip Baptists, nor have twenty wives. It don’t do for us to find too much fault with the religion of other nations, Miss Meechim, specially them that teaches the highest morality, self-control and self-sacrifice.”
Miss Meechim was huffy, but Arvilly drove the arrer home. “Gamblin’ is prohibted here; you wouldn’t be allowed gamble for bed-quilts and afghans at church socials, Miss Meechim.”
Miss Meechim wouldn’t say a word. I see she wuz awful huffy. But howsumever there are lots of people here who believe in the Christian religion.
We passed such cunning little farms; two acres is called a good farm, and everything seemed to be growin’ on it in little squares, kep’ neat and clean, little squares of rice and wheat and vegetables.
And Josiah sez, “I wonder what Ury would say if I should set him to transplantin’ a hull field of wheat, spear by spear, as they do here, set ’em out in rows as we do onions. And I guess he’d kick if I should hitch him onto the plow to plow up a medder, or onto the mower or reaper. I guess I’d git enough of it. I guess he’d give me my come-up-ance.”
“Not if he wuz so polite as the Japans,” sez I.
“And what a excitement it would make in Jonesville,” sez Josiah, “if I should hitch Ury and Philury onto the mowin’ machine. I might,” he continered dreamily, “just for a change, drive ’em into Jonesville once on the lumber wagon.”
But he’ll forgit it, I guess, and Japan will forgit it too199before long. Their tools are poor and fur behind ourn, and some of their ways are queer; such as trainin’ their fruit trees over arbors as we do vines. Josiah wuz dretful took with this and vowed he’d train our old sick no further over a arbor. Sez he, “If I can train that old tree into a runnin’ vine I shall be the rage in Jonesville.”
But he can’t do it. The branches are as thick as his arm. And I sez, “Children and trees have to be tackled young, Josiah, to bend their wills the way you want ’em to go.” They make a great fuss here over the chrysantheum, and they are beautiful, I must admit. They don’t look much like mine that I have growin’ in a kag in the east winder.
Their common fruits are the persimmons, a sweet fruit about as big as a tomato and lookin’ some like it, with flat black seeds, pears, good figs, oranges, peaches, apples. There is very little poverty, and the poorest people are very clean and neat. Their law courts don’t dally for month after month and years. If a man murders they hang him the same week.
But mebby our ways of lingerin’ along would be better in some cases, if new evidence should be found within a year or so, or children should grow up into witnesses.
We went into a Japanese house one day. It is made on a bamboo frame, the roof and sides wuz thatched with rye straw, the winders wuz slidin’ frames divided into little squares covered with thin white paper. The partitions wuz covered with paper, and movable, so you could if you wanted to make your house into one large room. Josiah told me that he should tear out every partition in our house and fix ’em like this. “How handy it would be, Samantha, if I ever wanted to preach.”
And I told him that I guessed our settin’ room would hold all that would come to hear him preach, and sez I, “How would paper walls do with the thermometer forty below zero?” He looked frustrated, he had never thought of that.
The house we went into wuz sixteen feet square, divided into four square rooms. It wuz two stories high, and little200porches about two feet wide wuz on each story, front and back. There wuz no chimney; there wuz a open place in the wall of the kitchen to let the smoke out from the little charcoal furnace they used to cook with, and one kettle wuz used to cook rice and fish; no spoons or forks are needed. The doors and frame-work wuz painted bronze color. There wuzn’t much furniture besides the furnace and tea-kettle that stands handy to make tea at any time. A few cups and saucers, a small clock, a family idol, and a red cushioned platform they could move, high and wide enough for a seat so several can set back to back, is about all that is necessary.
Their floors are covered with a lined straw matting, soft as carpet; they sleep on cotton mats put away in the daytime; their head-rest is a small block of wood about one foot long, five inches wide and eight inches high. A pillow filled with cut rye straw and covered with several sheets of rice paper isn’t so bad, though I should prefer my good goose feather pillows. The Japanese are exceedingly neat and clean; they could teach needed lessons to the poorer classes in America.
We one day made an excursion twenty milds on the Tokiado, the great highway of Japan. It is broad and smooth; five hundred miles long, and follers the coast. Part of the way we went with horses, and little side trips into the country wuz made with jinrikishas. Quaint little villages wuz on each side of the road, and many shrines on the waysides. That day we see the famous temple of Diabutsu with its colossal bronze idol. It wuz fifty feet high and eighty-seven feet round. The eyes three feet and a half wide. One thumb is three and a half feet round. He seemed to be settin’ on his feet.
A widder and a priest wuz kneelin’ in front of this idol. The priest held in one hand a rope and anon he would jerk out melancholy sounds from a big bronze bell over his head. In his other hand he held some little pieces of wood and paper with prayers printed on ’em. As he would read ’em201off he would lay one down on the floor, and the widder would give him some money every time. I thought that wuz jest about where the prayers went, down on the floor; they never riz higher, I don’t believe.
Josiah wuz kinder took with ’em, and sez he, “How handy that would be, Samantha, if a man wuz diffident, and every man, no matter how bashful he is, has more or less wood chips in his back yard. Sometimes I feel diffident, Samantha.”
But I sez, “I don’t want any wooden prayers offered for me, Josiah Allen, and,” sez I, “that seen shows jest how widders are imposed upon.”
“Well,” sez he, “she no need to dickered with the priest for ’em if she hadn’t wanted to.”
And I did wish that that little widder had known about the One ever present, ever living God, who has promised to comfort the widder, be a father to the orphan, and wipe away all tears.
But the Sunrise Land is waking up, there is a bright light in the East:
In the beauty of the lilies Christ is born acrost the sea,With a glory in his bosom that transfigures you and me.
In the beauty of the lilies Christ is born acrost the sea,With a glory in his bosom that transfigures you and me.
In the beauty of the lilies Christ is born acrost the sea,
With a glory in his bosom that transfigures you and me.
With the sweet gentleness and amiable nater of the Japans what will not the divine religion of the Lord Jesus do for them? It will be plantin’ seed in good ground that will spring up a hundredfold.
I spoze that it wuz on Robert Strong’s account (he is acquainted with so many big Chinamen and Japans) that we wuz invited to a elegant tiffen in one of the Mikado’s palaces at Tokio. The grounds wuz beautiful, the garden containing some of the most beautiful specimens of trees, trained into all shapes, some on ’em hundreds of years old, but havin’ their faculties yet, and growin’ jest as they wuz told to, and all the beautiful flowers and shrubs that Japan can boast of,202and palm trees, bananas, giant ferns and everything else beautiful in the way of vegetation.
The palace is one of the oldest in Tokio. It wuz only one story high, but the rooms wuz beautiful. The fan chamber wuz fifty feet square, the walls covered with fans of every size and shape and color. The only furniture in this room wuz two magnificent cabinets of lacquer work and four great, gorgeous bronze vases.
The tiffen wuz gin by a high official; there wuz fifty guests. The hour was two in the afternoon. There wuz ten ladies present––two beautiful Japanese ladies, dressed in the rich toilette of Japan. The lunch cards wuz little squares of scarlet paper, with black Japanese writing. Josiah looked at the card intently and then whispered to me:
“How be I goin’ to know what I am eatin’ from these duck tracks?”
But I whispered, “Le’s do what the rest do, Josiah, and we’ll come out all right.”
But we had a dretful scare, for right whilst we wuz partakin’ of the choice Japan viands a loud rumblin’ sound wuz hearn, and I see even as we rushed to the door the timbers of the ceilin’ part and then come together agin and the great bronze chandelier swing back and forth. My pardner ketched hold of my hand and hurried me along on a swift run and wouldn’t stop runnin’ for some time. I tried to stop him, for I got out of breath, but he wuz bound to run right back to Yokohama, thirty miles off. But I convinced him that we would be no safer there, for you can’t argy with earthquake shocks and tell when they’re comin’, they are very common in all parts of Japan. After the first heavy shock there wuz two lighter ones, and that ended it for that time. But though we all went back to the table, I can’t say that I took any great comfort in the tiffen after that.
A blow has fell onto me I wuzn’t prepared for. We found a number of letters waitin’ for us here at the tarven that Robert Strong had ordered to be forwarded there. It203seemed so good, whilst settin’ under a palm tree, seein’ jinrikishas go by, and Chinas and Japans, to set and read about the dear ones in Jonesville, and the old mair and Snip.
The letters wuz full of affection and cheer, and after readin’ ’em I gathered ’em up and sought my pardner to exchange letters with him, as I wuz wont to do, and I see he had quite a few, but what was my surprise to see that man sarahuptishushly and with a guilty look try to conceal one on ’em under his bandanna. And any woman will know that all his other letters wuz as dross to me compared to the one he was hidin’. I will pass over my argyments––and––and words, before that letter lay in my hand. But suffice it to say, that when at last I read it and all wuz explained to me, groans and sithes riz from my burdened heart deeper and despairener than any I had gin vent to in years and years.
And I may as well tell the hull story now, as I spoze my readers are most as anxious about it as I wuz. Oh, Josiah! How could you done it? How I do hate to tell it! Must I tell the shameful facts? Oh, Duty! lower thy strongest apron strings and let me cling and tell and weep. And there it had been goin’ on for months and I not mistrustin’ it. But Duty, I will hold hard onto thy strings and tell the shameful tale.
Josiah owned a old dwellin’ house in the environs of Jonesville, right acrost from Cap’n Bardeen’s, who rented it of him to store things in. The town line runs right under the house, so the sink is in Zoar, and the cupboard always had stood in Jonesville. But owin’ to Ernest White’s labors and prayers and votes, his and all other good ministers and earnest helpers, Jonesville went no-license now jest as Loontown did last year.
And jest as Satan always duz if he gits holt of souls that he can’t buy or skair, he will try to cheat ’em, he is so suttle. It seems that after we got away that Cap’n Bardeen moved that cupboard over to the other side of the room into Zoar204and went to sellin’ whiskey out on’t. Awful doin’s! The minute I read the letter I sez:
“Josiah Allen, do you write this very minute and stop this wicked, wicked works!” Sez I: “No knowin’ how many Jonesvillians will feel their religion a-wobblin’ and tottlin’ just by your example; naterally they would look up to a deacon and emulate his example––do you stop it to once!”
“No, Samantha,” sez he, “Cap’n Bardeen and his father owns more cows than any other Jonesvillians. If I want to be salesman agin in the Jonesville factory I mustn’t make ’em mad, and they pay a dretful high rent.”
“I wouldn’t call it rent,” sez I, “I’d call it blood-money. I’d run a pirate flag up on the ruff with these words on it, ‘Josiah Allen, Deacon.’”
He wuz agitated and sez, “Oh, no, Samantha; I wouldn’t do that for the world, I am so well thought on in the M. E. meetin’ house.”
“Well, you won’t be well thought on if you do such a thing as this!” sez I. “Jest think how Ernest White, that good devoted minister, has labored and prayed for the good of souls and bodies, and you tryin’ your best to overthrow it all. How could you do it, Josiah?”
“Well, I may as well tell you, Samantha, I writ to Ury and kinder left it to him. He knows my ambitions and my biziness. He knows how handy money is, and he fixed it all straight and right.”
“Ury!” sez I, “why should you leave it to Ury? Does he keep your conscience and clean it off when it gits black and nasty by such doin’s as this?”
“No, Samantha, I’ve got my conscience all right. I brought it with me on my tower.”
“Why should you leave it to Ury? He’s your hired man, he would do as you told him to,” sez I. “For a Methodist deacon such acts are demeanin’ and disgustin’ for a pardner and Jonesville to witness, let alone the country.” And agin I sez, “You can stop it in a minute if you want to, and you205know right from wrong, you know enough to say yes or no without bringin’ Ury into the scrape; Ury! spozein’ you git him into it, I can tell you he won’t bear the brunt of it before the bar of this country or that bar up above. You’ll have to carry the responsibility of all the evil it duz, and it will be a lastin’ disgrace to you and the hull Methodist meetin-house if you let it go on.”
Agin he sez, “Ury fixed it all right.”
“How did Ury fix it?” sez I, in the cold axents of woman’s skorn and curiosity.
“Well, Ury said, make Bardeen stop sellin’ whiskey out of the cupboard, make him sell it out of the chist. There is a big chist there that Bardeen bought to keep grain in, sez Ury; let Bardeen move that cupboard acrost the room back into Jonesville, set the chist up on the sink in Zoar and sell it out of that. Ury said that in his opinion that would make it all right, so that a perfessor and a Methodist deacon could do it with a clear conscience.”
Sez I, “Do you write to once, Josiah Allen, and tell Bardeen to either stop such works, or move right out.”
“Well,” sez he blandly, real bland and polite, “I will consider it, Samantha, I will give it my consideration.”
“No, no, Josiah Allen, you know right from wrong, truth from falsehood, honesty from dishonesty, you don’t want to consider.”
“Yes, I do, Samantha; it is so genteel when a moral question comes up to wait and consider; it is very fashionable.”
“How long do you lay out to wait, Josiah Allen?” sez I, coldly.
“Oh, it is fashionable to not give a answer till you’re obleeged to, but I will consult agin with Ury and probable along by Fall I can give you my ultimatum.”
“And whilst you are a considerin’ Bardeen will go on a sellin’ pizen to destroy all the good that Ernest White, that206devoted minister of Christ, and all the good men and wimmen helpers have done and are a doin’.”
“Well,” sez Josiah, “I may as well tell you, you would probably hear on’t, Ernest White writ me some time ago, and sent me a long petition signed by most all the ministers and leadin’ men and wimmen, beggin’ me to stop Bardeen.”
“Well, what did you tell him, Josiah Allen?”
“I told him, Samantha, I would consider it.”
“And,” sez I, “have you been all this time, months and months, a considerin’?”
“Yes, mom,” sez he, in a polite, genteel tone, “I have.”
“Well, do you stop considerin’ to once, Josiah Allen.”
“No, Samantha, a pardner can do a good deal, but she can’t break up a man’s considerin’. It is very genteel and fashionable, and I shall keep it up.”
I groaned aloud; the more I thought on’t, the worse I felt. Sez I, “To think of all the evils that are a flowin’ out of that place, Josiah, and you could stop it to once if you wuz a minter.”
“But,” sez Josiah, “Ury sez that if it wuzn’t sold there by Cap’n Bardeen the factory folks would go over into Zoar and git worse likker sold by low down critters.”
Sez I, “You might as well say if Christians don’t steal and murder, it will be done by them of poor moral character. That is one strong weepon to kill the evil––confine the bizness to the low and vile and show the world that you, a Methodist and a deacon, put the bizness right where it belongs, with murder and all wickedness, not as you are sayin’ now by your example, it is right and I will protect it.”
“Well,” sez Josiah, as sot as a old hen settin’ on a brick bat, “it is law; Ury has settled it.”
My heart ached so that it seemed to clear my head. “We’ll see,” sez I, “if it can’t be changed. I’ll know before a week has gone over my head.” And I got up and dragged out the hair trunk, sithin’ so deep that it wuz dretful to hear,207some like the melancholy winter winds howlin’ round a Jonesville chimbly.
“What are you a goin’ to do, Samantha?” sez Josiah anxiously.
“I am goin’ back home,” sez I, “to-morrer to see about that law.”
“Alone?” sez he.
“Yes, alone,” sez I, “alone.”
“Never!” sez Josiah. “Never will I let my idol go from Japan to Jonesville unprotected. If you must go and make a town’s talk from China to Jonesville I’ll stand by you.” And he took down his hat and ombrell.
“What would you do if you went back?” sez I. “I should think you had done enough as it is; I shall go alone.”
“What! you go and leave all the pleasures of this trip and go alone? Part from your pardner for months and months?”
“Yes,” sez I wildly, “and mebby forever. It don’t seem to me that I can ever live with a man that is doin’ what you are.” And hot tears dribbled down onto my sheep’s-head night-caps.
“Oh, Samantha!” sez he, takin’ out his bandanna and weepin’ in consort, “what is money or ambition compared to the idol of my heart? I’ll write to Ury to change the law agin.”
“Dear Josiah!” sez I, “I knew, I knew you couldn’t be so wicked as to continue what you had begun. But can you do it?” sez I.
Sez he cheerfully, as he see me take out a sheep’s-head night-cap and shet down the trunk led, “What man has done, man can do. If Ury can fix a law once, he can fix it twice. And he done it for me.” Sez he, “I can repeal it if I am a minter, and when I am a minter.” And he got up and took a sheet of paper and begun to write to repeal that law. I gently leggo the apron-string dear Duty had lowered to me; it had held; pure Principle had conquered agin. Oh,208the relief and sweetness of that hour! Sweet is the pink blush of roses after the cold snows of winter; sweet is rest after a weary pilgrimage.
Calm and beautiful is the warm ambient air of repose and affection after a matrimonial blizzard. Josiah wuz better to me than he had been for over seven weeks, and his lovin’ demeanor didn’t change for the worse for as many as five days. But the wicked wrong wuz done away with.
I writ a letter to Ernest White tellin’ him I never knowed a word about it till that very day, and my companion had repealed the law, and Cap’n Bardeen had got to move out or stop sellin’ whiskey. He knows how I worship Josiah; he didn’t expect that I would come out openly and blame him; no, the bare facts wuz enough.
I ended up the letter with a post scriptum remark. Sez I: “Waitstill Webb is sweeter lookin’ than ever and as good as pure gold, jest as she always wuz, but the climate is wearin’ on her, and I believe she will be back in Jonesville as soon as we are, if not before. She is a lovely girl and would make a Christian minister’s home in Loontown or any other town a blessed and happy place.”
I thought I wouldn’t dast to do anything more than to give such a little blind hint. But to resoom. Folks seem to have a wrong idee about the education of the Japanese. There are twenty-eight thousand schools in Japan, besides the private and public kindergartens. There are over three million native students out of a school population of seven million. There are sixty-nine thousand teachers, all Japanese, excepting about two hundred and fifty American, German and English. Nearly ten million dollars (Japanese) is raised annually for educational purposes from school fees, taxes, interest on funds, etc. They have compulsory school laws just like ours. And not a drunken native did we see whilst in Japan, and I wish that I could say the same of New York for the same length of time or Chicago or Jonesville.
And for gentle, polite, amiable manners they go as fur209ahead of Americans as the leaves of their trees duz, and I’ve seen leaves there more’n ten feet long. The empire of Japan consists of three thousand eight hundred islands, from one eight hundred milds long to them no bigger than a tin pan, and the population is about forty-three million. I don’t spoze any nation on earth ever made faster progress than Japan has in the last thirty years: railways, telegraph postal system. It seems as if all Japan wanted wuz to find out the best way of doin’ things, and then she goes right ahead and duz ’em.
Robert Strong wuz talking about what the word Japan meant, the Sunrise Land. And he said some real pretty things about it and so did Dorothy. They wuz dretful took with the country. Robert Strong has travelled everywhere and he told me that some portions of Japan wuz more beautiful than any country he had ever seen. We took several short journeys into the interior to see the home life of the people, but Robert Strong, who seemed to be by the consent of all of us the head of our expedition, thought that we had better not linger very long there as there wuz so many other countries that we wanted to visit, but ’tennyrate we decided to start for Calcutta from Hongkong, stopping on the way at Shanghai.