n Nature makes of herself of her own accord, man has multiplied
her manifestations. Spots suitable to their growth have been peopled by
him with trees. Sometimes they stand in groups like star-clusters, as in
Oji, crowning a hill; sometimes, as at Mukojima, they line an avenue
for miles, dividing the blue river on the one hand from the blue-green
rice-fields on the other,--a floral milky way of light. But wherever the
trees may be, there at their flowering season are to be found throngs
of admirers. For in crowds people go out to see the sight, multitudes
streaming incessantly to and fro beneath their blossoms as the time of
day determines the turn of the human tide. To the Occidental stranger
such a gathering suggests some social loadstone; but none exists. In the
cherry-trees alone lies the attraction.

For one week out of the fifty-two the cherry-tree stands thus glorified,
a vision of beauty prolonged somewhat by the want of synchronousness
of the different kinds. Then the petals fall. What was a nuptial veil
becomes a winding-sheet, covering the sod as with winter's winding-sheet
of snow, destined itself to disappear, and the tree is nothing but a
common cherry-tree once more.

But flowers are by no means over because the cherry blossoms are past. A
brief space, and the same crowds that flocked to the cherry turn to the
wistaria. Gardens are devoted to the plants, and the populace greatly
given to the gardens. There they go to sit and gaze at the grape-like
clusters of pale purple flowers that hang more than a cubit long over
the wooden trellis, and grow daily down toward their own reflections in
the pond beneath, vying with one another in Narcissus-like endeavor.
And the people, as they sip their tea on the veranda opposite, behold a
doubled delight, the flower itself and its mirrored image stretching to
kiss.

After the wistaria comes the tree-peony, and then the iris, with its
trefoil flowers broader than a man may span, and at all colors under the
sky. To one who has seen the great Japanese fleur-de-lis, France looks
ludicrously infelicitous in her choice of emblem.

But the list grows too long, limited as it is only by its own annual
repetition. We have as yet reached but the first week in June; the
summer and autumn are still to come, the first bringing the lotus for
its crown, and the second the chrysanthemum. And lazily grand the lotus
is, itself the embodiment of the spirit of the drowsy August air, the