step into the domain of Old England. Three
of her rural homesteads rise before us, red-tiled, many-gabled,
lattice-windowed, and telling of a kindly winter with external
chimneys that care not for the hoarding of heat. It is a bit of the
island peopled by some of the islanders. They are colonized here, from
commissioner in charge down to private, in a cheek-by-jowl fashion
that shows their ability to unbend and republicanize on occasion.
Great Britain's head-quarters are made particularly attractive, not
more by the picturesqueness of the buildings than by the extent and
completeness of her exhibit. In her preparations for neither the
French nor the Austrian exposition did she manifest a stronger
determination to be thoroughly well represented. Col. H.B. Sanford, of
the Royal Artillery, heads her commission.

Japan is a common and close neighbor to the two competitors for her
commercial good-will, England and New York. Modern Anglo-Saxondom and
old Cathay touch eaves with each other. Hemlock and British oak rub
against bamboo, and dwellings which at first sight may impress one as
chiefly chimney stand in sharp contrast with one wholly devoid of that
feature. The difference is that of nails and bolts against dovetails
and wooden pins; of light and pervious walls with heavy sun-repelling
roof against close and dense sides and roofs whose chief warfare is
with the clouds; of saw and plane that work in Mongol and Caucasian
hands in directions precisely reversed. To the carpenters of both
England and Japan our winter climate, albeit far milder than usual,
was alike astonishing. With equal readiness, though not with equal
violence to the _outer man_, the craftsmen of the two nations
accommodated themselves to the new atmospheric conditions. The
moulting process, in point of dress, through which the _Japanese_
passed was not untypical of the change the _institutions_ of
their country have been undergoing in obedience to similarly stern
requirements. It did not begin at quite so rudimental a stage of
costume as that of the porters and wrestlers presented to us on fans,
admirably adapted as that style might be to our summer temperature.
In preparing for that oscillation of the thermometer the English are
called on for another change, whereas the Orientals may meet it by
simply reverting to first principles.

[Illustration: NEW YORK BUILDING.]

The delicacy of the Asiatic touch is exemplified in the wood-carving
upon the doo