ins of
incense upon the little brazier burning between the candles. The wife,
when they had retired, stepped forward, leading a little boy of seven,
in a sailor suit with brass buttons and white braid. She also unwrapped
some grains of incense from some tissue paper, and placed them upon the
brazier. Then, after a considerable amount of bowing and chanting, the
ceremony ended and the congregation left the church.

Outside it was intimated to the assembled congregation that the body
would be taken next day to the Zoshigaya Temple for the final rites of
cremation in the presence of the family. Then the university students
were dismissed by the professors with a few words, and the ceremony of
the day was at an end.

CHAPTER X
VISIT TO JAPAN

"Every dwelling in which a thinker lives certainly acquires a
sort of soul. There are Lares and Penates more subtle than
those of the antique world; these make the peace and rest of
a home."

On the 16th March, 1909, early in the morning, Mrs. Atkinson, Miss
Atkinson and myself, left Kobe, reaching Yokohama late in the evening.
Mrs. Atkinson, who had written from Kobe to her half-sister-in-law,
announcing our arrival in Japan, expected to find a letter from Nishi
Okubo awaiting us at the Grand Hotel. She had not made allowance for the
red tape--the bales of red tape--that surround social as well as
official transactions in Japan.

Before we left Kobe, Mr. Robert Young had given us a letter of
introduction to Mr. W. B. Mason, Professor Basil Hall Chamberlain's
coadjutor in the editing of Murray's "Handbook to Japan," late of the
Imperial Department of Communications, also custodian of the Club
library at Yokohama, and a person, we were told, to whom every one had
recourse in a difficulty. He cast sidelights on the probable reasons for
delay in the answer to Mrs. Atkinson's letter.

To begin with, Tokyo covers an area of one hundred square miles, and,
though ostensibly modelled on English lines, the Japanese postal system
leaves much to be desired, especially in dealing with English letters;
in finding fault on this score, I wonder what a London postman would do
with letters addressed in Japanese? Mr. Mason also reminded us that Mrs.
Koizumi did not understand a word of English; she must have recourse to
an interpreter before communicating with her Irish sister-in-law, but,
above all, in accou