would not think of burdening her son with any larger
expenses, and could not be induced to accept the offered increase.

Another effort was made to get along upon the meagre fare, but the
youngest boy fell ill and had to be taken to a hospital, and the mother
decided that something must be done if all the family did not wish to
follow him. The happy thought occurred to her of buying something that
would be an addition to their scanty menu, and giving it as a present
to her mother-in-law. Now a present in Japan can never be refused, so it
seemed to the younger woman that she must have found a way of escape
from her difficulties. Of course, the present was accepted with many
thanks and expressions of unworthiness, and when the meal-hour arrived,
each member of the family found an infinitesimal quantity of the
delicacy in a small plate at his side. But as soon as the meal was over,
the dear old lady, who had by strict economy managed to leave the
greater part of the gift untouched, sent out to all the neighbors
presents from what had been intended to feed the hungry children at
home. The experiment was tried again and again, but always with the same
result. No present could be kept for family use alone. Of everything but
the barest necessaries, the greater part must be sent out in gifts to
others.

At last the husband and wife put their heads together to decide on some
course of action that, without hurting the feelings of the older lady,
would secure sufficient nourishment for the children, and forthwith
began a series of all-day picnics to the noted places in the
vicinity,--picnics that included always a good meal at some well-kept
restaurant before the return to the old-fashioned fare of the
grandmother's house. In this way the summer was passed without further
illness, though the poor mother on her return to T[=o]ky[=o] spent several
weeks in bed,--what with starvation and worry and the effort to bear
heroically, and with a smiling face, the hard life and scanty fare that
were the life and fare of most of Japan only a few years ago.

In the changes that the past few years have wrought, perhaps nothing is
more striking than the new openings for work that Japan now offers to
women. The growth of the public school system has made a demand for
women as teachers that is steadily increasing. Although in the normal
schools the proportion of women to men is still only one to six, and
while teaching, even in the primary schoo