hung the edicts prohibiting Christianity, and
told them I believed in that doctrine, and that Christ was the One
adored and loved by us. A volley of _naru hodos_, spoken with bated
breath, greeted this announcement, and I could only understand the
whispered "Why, that is the sect whose followers will go to hell!"
The old ladies could not walk fast, and we soon parted, after many
a strange question concerning morals, customs and the details of
civilization in the land of the foreigner. Be it said, in passing,
that the present liberal and enlightened government of Japan, in spite
of priestly intolerance and the bigotry of ignorance, resisting even
to blood, has decided upon the recission of the slanderous falsehoods
against the faith of Christendom; and Japan, though an Asiatic nation,
will soon grant toleration to all creeds.

The path wound up through higher valleys, revealing bolder scenery.
Afar off, in the sheen of glorified distance, the water slanted to the
sky. The white bosoms of the square-sailed junks heaved with breezy
pulses, the mountains were thrones of stainless blue, the floods
of sunny splendor and the intense fullness of light, for which the
cloudless sky of Japan is remarkable, told the reason for the naming
of Niphon, of which "Japan" is but the foreigner's corruption,
"Great Land of the Fountain of Light." Anon we entered the groves
of mountain-pines anchored in the rocks, and with girths upon which
succeeding centuries had clasped their zones. They seemed like
Nature's senators in council as they whispered together and murmured
in the breeze that reached us laden with music and freighted with
resinous aroma. Reaching a hamlet called Mute ("six hands"), I sit
outside an inn on one of the benches which are ever ready for the
traveler, and shaded overhead by a screen of boughs. A young girl
brings me water, the ever-ready cup of tea, and fire for the pipe
which I am supposed to smoke. A short rest, another hour's climb and
walk, and we are in the village of Kanozan, which is scarcely more
than a street of hotels. Situated on the ridge of the mountain, it
rises like an island in a sea of pines.

In imagining a Japanese hotel, good reader, please dismiss all
architectural ideas derived from the Continental or the Fifth Avenue.
Our hotels in Japan, outwardly at least, are wooden structures, two
stories high, often but one. Their roofs are usually thatched, though
the city caravansaries are tiled. They