Mr. Percival Lowell states that the root of all the peculiarities of Oriental peoples is their marked lack of imagination. This is the faculty that "may in a certain sense be said to be the creator of the world." The lack of this faculty, according to Mr. Lowell, is the root of the Japanese lack of originality and invention; it gives the whole Oriental civilization its characteristic features. He cites a few words to prove the essentially prosaic character of the Japanese mind, such as "up-down" for "pass" (which word, by the way, is his own invention, and reveals his ignorance of the language), "the being (so) is difficult," in place of "thank you." "A lack of any fanciful ideas," he says, "is one of the most salient traits of all Far Eastern peoples, if indeed a sad dearth can properly be called salient. Indirectly, their want of imagination betrays itself in their everyday sayings and doings, and more directly in every branch of thought." I note, in passing, that Mr. Lowell does not distinguish between fancy and imagination. Though allied faculties, they are distinct. Mr. Lowell's extreme estimate of the prosaic nature of the Japanese mind I cannot share. Many letters received from Japanese friends refute this view by their fanciful expressions. The Japanese language, too, has many fanciful terms. Why "pass" is any more imaginative than "up-down," to accept Mr. Lowell's etymology, or "the being (so) is difficult" than "thank you," I do not see. To me the reverse proposition would seem the truer. And are not "breaking-horns" for "on purpose," and "breaking-bones" for "with great difficulty," distinctly imaginative terms, more imaginative than the English? In the place of our English term "sun," the Japanese have several alternative terms in common use, such as "_hi_," "day," "_Nichirin_," "day-ball," "_Ten-to Sama_," "the god of heaven's light;" and for "moon," it has "_tsuki_," "month," "_getsu-rin_," "month ball." The names given to her men-of-war also indicate a fanciful nature. The torpedo destroyers are named "Dragon-fly," "Full Moon," "The Moon in the Cloud," "Seabeach," "Dawn of Day," "Clustering Clouds," "Break of Day," "Ripples," "Evening Mist," "Dragon's Lamp," "Falcon," "Magpie," "White-naped Crane," and "White Hawk." Surely, it cannot be maintained that the Japanese are utterly lacking in fancy. Distinguishing between fancy as "the power of forming pleasing, graceful, whimsical, or odd mental images, or of combining them with little regard to rational processes of construction," and imagination, in its more philosophical use, as "the act of constructive intellect in grouping the materials of knowledge or thought into new, original, and rational systems," we assert without fear of successful contradiction, that the Japanese race is not without either of these important mental faculties.