ds from the West are blowing over Horai; and the magical
atmosphere, alas! is shrinking away before them. It lingers now in
patches only, and bands,--like those long bright bands of cloud that
train across the landscapes of Japanese painters. Under these shreds of
the elfish vapor you still can find Horai--but not everywhere...
Remember that Horai is also called Shinkiro, which signifies
Mirage,--the Vision of the Intangible. And the Vision is fading,--never
again to appear save in pictures and poems and dreams...

INSECT STUDIES

BUTTERFLIES

I

Would that I could hope for the luck of that Chinese scholar known to
Japanese literature as "Rosan"! For he was beloved by two
spirit-maidens, celestial sisters, who every ten days came to visit him
and to tell him stories about butterflies. Now there are marvelous
Chinese stories about butterflies--ghostly stories; and I want to know
them. But never shall I be able to read Chinese, nor even Japanese; and
the little Japanese poetry that I manage, with exceeding difficulty, to
translate, contains so many allusions to Chinese stories of butterflies
that I am tormented with the torment of Tantalus... And, of course, no
spirit-maidens will even deign to visit so skeptical a person as myself.

I want to know, for example, the whole story of that Chinese maiden
whom the butterflies took to be a flower, and followed in
multitude,--so fragrant and so fair was she. Also I should like to know
something more concerning the butterflies of the Emperor Genso, or Ming
Hwang, who made them choose his loves for him... He used to hold
wine-parties in his amazing garden; and ladies of exceeding beauty were
in attendance; and caged butterflies, se free among them, would fly to
the fairest; and then, upon that fairest the Imperial favor was
bestowed. But after Genso Kotei had seen Yokihi (whom the Chinese call
Yang-Kwei-Fei), he would not suffer the butterflies to choose for
him,--which was unlucky, as Yokihi got him into serious trouble...
Again, I should like to know more about the experience of that Chinese
scholar, celebrated in Japan under the name Soshu, who dreamed that he
was a butterfly, and had all the sensations of a butterfly in that
dream. For his spirit had really been wandering about in the shape of a
butterfly; and, when he awoke, the memories and the feelings of
butterfly existence remained so vivid in his mind that he could not act
like a human being... Finally I