A history of Japan was prepared by Japanese scholars under appointment from the government and sent to the Columbian Exposition in 1893; it makes the following statement, already referred to on a previous page: "Despite the issue of several proclamations ... people were governed by such strong aversion to the sight of sickness that travelers were often left to die by the roadside from thirst, hunger, or disease, and householders even went to the length of thrusting out of doors and abandoning to utter destitution servants who suffered from chronic maladies.... Whenever an epidemic occurred, the number of deaths that resulted was enormous."[N] This was the condition of things after Buddhism, with its civilizing and humanizing influences, had been at work in the land for about four hundred years, and Old Japan was at the height of her glory, whether considered from the standpoint of her government, her literature, her religious development, or her art. Of a period some two hundred years earlier, it is stated that, by the assistance of the Sovereign, Buddhism established a charity hospital in Nara, "where the poor received medical treatment and drugs gratis, and an asylum was founded for the support of the destitute. Measures were also taken to rescue foundlings, and, in general, to relieve poverty and distress" (p. 92). The good beginning made at that time does not seem to have been followed up. As nearly as I can make out, relying on the investigations of Rev. J.H. Pettee and Mr. Ishii, there are to-day in Japan fifty orphan asylums, of which eleven are of non-Christian, and thirty-nine of Christian origin, support, and control. Of the non-Christian, five are in Osaka, two in Tokyo, four in Kyoto, and one each in Nagoya, Kumamoto, and Matsuye. Presumably the majority of these are in the hands of Buddhists. Of the Christian asylums twenty are Roman Catholic and nineteen are Protestant. It is a noteworthy fact that in this form of philanthropy and religious activity, as in so many others, Christians are the pioneers and Buddhists are the imitators. In a land where Buddhism has been so effective as to modify the diet of the nation, leading them in obedience to the doctrines of Buddha, as has been stated, to give up eating animal food, it is exceedingly strange that the people apparently have no regard for the pain of living animals. Says the editor of the _Mail_ in the article already quoted: "They will not interfere to save a horse from the brutality of its driver, and they will sit calmly in a jinrikisha while its drawer, with throbbing heart and straining muscles, toils up a steep hill." How often have I seen this sight! How the rider can endure it, I cannot understand, except it be that revolt at cruelty and sympathy with suffering do not stir within his heart. Of course, heartless individuals are not rare in the West also. I am speaking here, however, not of single individuals, but of general characteristics.