of blossom you loved the most--whether you preferred, as
he did, the single cherry-blossom, or the double. This Danjuro was
unable to find out; if he had known he would have chosen a kakemono of
flowers for you. But I am glad you like the picture." I was amazed at
the kindness of this man Danjuro. There was no accident about this
picture that I admired so vastly: it had been chosen for a definite
reason--to give me pleasure. And I afterwards learnt that there is no
end to the amount of trouble a Japanese gentleman will take in the
choosing of the picture that is to hang in the room where you are being
entertained.

When you enter a house in Japan, the first and one idea is to give you
pleasure, and the people of the house will take elaborate pains, almost
the care that a detective will take in detecting a crime, to find out,
as delicately as possible, your taste in regard to this picture. They
will send their servant round to your hotel to find out what flower you
have expressly asked to have placed on your table, and that will be the
flower that you will find adorning either a kakemono or a vase when
entering the house of your friend.

[Illustration: SUN AND LANTERNS]

This room where Fukuchi and I were waiting looked out upon the garden--a
miniature garden, no bigger than an ordinary dining-room, yet perfectly
balanced, one that held infinite joys: there were the miniature bridges,
lakes, and gold-fish, the mountains, the valleys, and the ancient
turtles--all correct as to colour and marked by that exquisite taste
which only a Japanese landscape-gardener can display. It was a bright
sunlit day, and looking from this room with its perfect masterpiece to
the little jewel of a garden, you felt that you were living in another
world. And it was all so pure and so "right" that I began to feel
hopelessly "wrong." It seemed that I was the only blot in these perfect
surroundings. And at last I became so shy that I really didn't know what
to do with myself, and I felt that the only thing left for me was to
take off my clothes and dig a hole in the ground, and then be ashamed
that I had left my clothes behind me. However, I controlled my emotions
and waited on with Fukuchi until the sliding doors dividing us from the
adjoining room were quietly opened and Danjuro appeared. So unlike an
actor!--no moving of the eyebrows, no stroking of the hair, but just a
simple dignified gentleman, and an old gentleman, quite old. He was a
s