will take Fuji at sunset, and
the colouring of my baby's dress shall be of old rose and white snow."
She does not grab at nature in this crude way; but the artistic and
poetical feelings innate in her unconsciously find expression in the
little frock. When the mother and her neighbours have finally decided
upon a scheme of decoration, the designs are placed in the hands of some
great artist, who carries them out in water-colour drawings on silk,
which the friends gather together again to examine and generally enjoy.
Then the designs are handed over to some expert stencil-cutter, go
through the regular elaborate course, and are finally retouched, by the
artist himself, directly on to the silk. If the parents are rich enough
the stencils are destroyed, and the dress consequently becomes unique.
Such a dress will doubtless be an exquisite work of art, and very
costly. Indeed, a dress for a Japanese baby can cost quite as much as a
picture by a leading Academician, and is of far greater artistic value.
But no price can be too great, no colouring too gorgeous, for the
dresses of these little butterflies, the children of Japan. The poorest
mother will scrape together sufficient money, and the father sacrifice
one half of his daily portion of rice, in order that a child may attend
a festival in the bright hues befitting its age. The younger the child,
the more brilliant is its dress. You will see a mite, a little baby girl
that cannot walk or talk, clothed in silk crepe of the most brilliant
colour possible--rainbow colour, almost prismatic in its brilliancy. As
the child grows older the colours fade, and become duller, until by the
time she is a full-grown woman they have sobered down almost to Quaker
hues--except here and there, where some tiny edging of colour shows
itself.

[Illustration: A JAP IN PLUM-COLOUR]

The science of deportment occupies quite half the time of the Japanese
children's lives, and so early are they trained that even the baby of
three, strapped to the back of its sister aged five, will in that
awkward position bow to you and behave with perfect propriety and
grace. This Japanese baby has already gone through a course of severe
training in the science of deportment. It has been taught how to walk,
how to kneel down, and how to get up again without disarranging a single
fold of its kimono. After this it is necessary that it should learn the
correct way to wait upon people--how to carry a tray, and how t