case, if like the ancient Romans all a man
wanted was the continuance of the family line, he would naturally wait
until the last practicable moment; for he would thus save both care and
expense. In the Far East adoption is quite a different affair. There
it is a genealogical necessity--like having a father or mother. It is,
indeed, of almost more importance. For the great desideratum to these
peoples is not ancestors but descendants. Pedigrees in the land of
the universal opposite are not matters of bequest but of posthumous
reversion. A man is not beholden to the past, he looks forward to the
future for inherited honors. No fame attaches to him for having had an
illustrious grandfather. On the contrary, it is the illustrious grandson
who reflects some of his own greatness back upon his grandfather. If
a man therefore fail to attain eminence himself, he always has another
chance in his descendants; for he will of necessity be ennobled through
the merits of those who succeed him. Such is the immemorial law of the
land. Fame is retroactive. This admirable system has only one objection:
it is posthumous in its effect. An ambitious man who unfortunately lacks
ability himself has to wait too long for vicarious recognition. The
objection is like that incident to the making of a country seat out of
a treeless plain by planting the same with saplings. About the time the
trees begin to be worth having the proprietary landscape-gardener dies
of old age. However, as custom permits a Far Oriental no ancestral
growth of timber, he is obliged to lay the seeds of his own family
trees. Natural offspring are on the whole easier to get, and more
satisfactory when got. Hence the haste with which these peoples rush
into matrimony. If in despite of his precipitation fate perversely
refuse to grant him children, he must endeavor to make good the omission
by artificial means. He proceeds to adopt somebody. True to instinct, he
chooses from preference a collateral relative. In some far-eastern lands
he must so restrict himself by law. In Korea, for instance, he can only
adopt an agnate and one of a lower generation than his own. But in
Japan his choice is not so limited. In so praiseworthy an act as the
perpetuation of his unimportant family line, it is deemed unwise in that
progressive land to hinder him from unconsciously bettering it by the
way. He is consequently permitted to adopt anybody. As people are by no
means averse to being adopted,