Moronobu's first books appeared about 1660, and from that date to the time of his retirement he brought out more than a hundred books and albums and an unknown number of broadsheets. In all of these his vigorous, genial personality and his strong sense of decoration make themselves felt. Such a print as the album-sheet reproduced in Plate 1 exhibits his characteristic simplicity of sweeping line, the masterly use he makes of black and white contrasts, and the vivid force of his rendering of movement. The firm lines live; the composition is grouped to form a harmonious picture; a dominating sense of form has entered here to transform the chaotic raggedness of his predecessors' attempts. Distorted as these figures may appear to unaccustomed Western eyes, they have unmistakable style and their bold command of expression is the first great landmark in Japanese print history. All of Moronobu's work was printed in black and white only, but occasionally the sheets were roughly coloured by hand after they had been printed. His designs have little detail; as a rule the scene surrounding his main figures is barely suggested by a few lines; and the figures themselves are hardly more than intense shorthand notations of a theme. But how much life he gives them! No wonder that the populace loved his work, and that his many pupils bore away with them to their own productions the impress of his strong personality and animated style. Certain of Moronobu's large single-sheet compositions (such as the Lady Standing Under a Cherry Tree, in the Buckingham Collection, Chicago, or the noble Figure of a Woman in the Morse Collection, Evanston), display so fine a power of composition and so unsurpassable a mastery of rhythmic line that there can be no hesitancy in judging him, quite apart from his historical significance, to be an artist of the first order. Nothing that he ever did was undistinguished. The collector will not find it easy to procure adequate specimens of this artist's work. Moronobu's large single sheets are unobtainable to-day; they could never have been numerous, and the few that have survived the vicissitudes of almost three centuries are now in the hands of museums or collectors who will never part with them. Even his smaller single sheets are uncommon. His work is seldom signed. FOLLOWERS OF MORONOBU. The powerful impetus of Moronobu's art communicated itself to many pupils. MOROFUSA was the eldest son of Moronobu; he collaborated with his father, and produced designs that are in exact imitation of his father's style. His work comprises book illustrations and some large single sheets, and is very rare.