it possible to express moral lessons in the design of a garden, and abstract ideas, such as charity, faith, piety, content, calm, and connubial bliss." In Japan, therefore, landscape-gardening is and always has been a fine art.1

The Japanese may be called vegetarians, for it is only within a recent period that meat has come to play any part in their diet. Fish, flesh, and fowl were once strictly forbidden as articles of food by the tenets of Buddhism, but gradually, one after another, came to be allowed as eatables. Even now meat, though becoming more and more popular as an article of diet, is not used in large quantities at one meal. Chicken, game, beef, ham, and pork may be found on sale in most large towns and cities. But beef is cut up into mouthfuls, and sold to Japanese by the ounce; chickens are carefully and minutely dissected, and sold by parts, as the wing, the leg, or an ounce or two of the breast. It was a matter of great amazement to the Japanese of Mito that the foreigners living there bought a whole chicken or two, or five or six pounds of beef, at one time, and devoured them all in two or three meals!

Rice is, of course, the staple article of diet, “the staff of life" of the Japanese; and yet, in povertystricken country districts, this may be a luxury, with

1 Besides Morse's ", 'Japanese Homes," Conder's "LandscapeGardening in Japan" (Transactions Asiatic Society of Japan, vol. xiv., and in book form, illustrated), is very valuable. An instructive short description of this subject may be found in chap. xvi., vol. ii., of Hearn's "Glimpses of Unfamiliar Japan."

barley or millet as the ordinary food. Various vegetables, particularly beans, are much used, fresh or pickled; seaweed, fish, eggs, and nuts are largely eaten; and a sauce, made of beans and wheat, and sold in America as "soy," is "the universal condiment." Thin vegetable soups are an important part of their meals, and, as no spoons are used, are drunk with a loud sucking noise, which is a fixed habit in drinking. The principal beverages, even more common than water, are tea and sake. The latter, an alcoholic liquor brewed from rice, is taken hot; the former, without milk or sugar, is also taken hot, and is served, not only at meals, but just about all the time. A kettle of hot water is always kept ready at hand, in house or inn, so that tea may be steeped in a moment and procured to drink at any time. It is always set before a guest as soon as he arrives, and is absolutely indispensable in every household.

At meal time each person sits on the floor before a small, low table on which his food is placed. They use no knife, fork, or spoon, only chop-sticks; and do not consider it in bad form to eat and drink with loud smacking and sucking sounds. Their food, when served, seems to foreigners more beautiful than palatable; it is "unsatisfying and mawkish." One who has probably had innumerable experiences during a long residence in Japan says: "After a Japanese dinner you have simultaneously a feeling of fulness and a feeling of having eaten nothing that will do

you any good."1 Yet, in time foreigners learn to like many parts of a Japanese bill of fare; and when travelling about the country, by carrying with them bread, butter, jam, and canned meats, can get along with rice, eggs, vegetables, and chicken or fish to complete the daily fare. In the summer resorts frequented by foreigners there are always hotels and restaurants where only European cooking is served. With the introduction of Western civilization came wine, ale, beer, etc., which are extensively used by the Japanese.

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Indeed, we must not fail to take notice of the change that is taking place in the diet of the Japanese. Bread and meat, which were long ago introduced into the diet of the army and the navy, are pretty generally popular; and many other articles of 'foreign food" are largely used. It is quite a common custom in well-to-do families to have at least one "foreign meal" per day; and "foreign restaurants," especially in the large cities, are well patronized. It is said, indeed, that first-class "foreign cooking" is cheaper than first-class "Japanese cooking." The standard of living has been considerably raised within the past decade.

It is important to touch briefly on the subject of costume, though it will not be possible or profitable to describe minutely every garment. It may not be

1 For descriptions of Japanese meals or banquets, see Miss Scidmore's "Jinrikisha Days in Japan," passim; "The Yankees of the East" (Curtis), vol. ii. chap. xiv.; and Norman's "Real Japan," chap. i.