--'No, I am sorry to say they are not. In England, more than elsewhere, all sorts of open-air sports have been invented and played, perhaps owing to the condition of the climate. Mr. Balfour, the Prime Minister, as everybody knows, is a great golfer. Professor Balfour, his brother, was a great cricketer. His premature death years ago, by an accident on the Alps, was lamented very deeply by the scientific world; and I, for one, grieved much, for he was very kind to me when I went up to Cambridge, and smoothed my way considerably for the University study. With us, however, outdoor sports have always been considered childish, and the rude sports of children have never been improved to suit grown-up men. In recent years, of course, Western open-air sports, such as base-ball or lawn tennis, are played by students very widely (at this moment some Japanese teams of base-ball players have gone to America to play against the Americans). But older people seldom indulge in that kind of sport. Billiards also is only of modern introduction.' --'But surely you must have some kind of pastimes?' --'Well, we have some, but before entering on that subject I will say a word about a letter written by an American on kindred subjects. It caught my eye accidentally in the _Japan Times_. It is rather interesting and, therefore, I will recite it to you _verbatim_. The heading of it is "Japan is a queer country." 'Such was the heading of an article in one of our American papers of recent date. As an example of the country being "queer" the writer stated among other things that "old men in Japan fly kites and spin tops, while children look on." Now, I for one have been in Japan a good while and have seen many flying kites and spinning tops. Yet I have never had the fortune of seeing the picture described above. It is easy to conceive how the kind-hearted Ojiisan might show his little grandson how to fly a kite or to spin a top while the little fellow looked on, but that is in no way peculiar to Japan. The same thing might be seen in almost any country. 'Again the writer says, "Japanese writers use paint brushes, not pens, and write from bottom to top," in which he has gotten his ideas more topsy-turvy than the Land of Topsyturvydom itself. And further, "in Japan there are no lawyers, and Japanese doctors never make any charges." Comment is unnecessary.