Does Progress Lie this Way? My father is a teacher in a missionary school here, and on Sundays he assists in the mission services. I assist, too, playing an American cabinet organ and helping with the singing. The other evening a gentleman called at our house for a chat. He is a Japanese of perhaps forty, and he spent ten years in Europe and America. He speaks Spanish, French, English, German, and Chinese, besides his own tongue, in the latter of which he is perfectly versed. He has visited every city of importance in the western world, and is therefore a judge of customs. Suddenly he said to my father, "What an inconvenient man you are!" Father looked up in astonishment, and inquired why. "Why? Because you require, like all western people, so much to make you comfortable. And out of all you have you get no more comfort than do we Japanese from our little. No, not so much comfort by half. For instance, you pay to live here--how much?" "Two dollars per day," replied my father. "Ah," said our Japanese acquaintance, "I pay seventy-five sen, or about forty cents of your money. And I am just as happy and as comfortable as you are. To be sure, you have tables, and chairs, and bedsteads, and dressing-cases, wash-bowls, pitchers, mirrors, and goodness knows what in your rooms. I have nothing of the sort. They are too much trouble to care for. A nice cool mat and quilt form a good enough sleeping outfit for me. And you make yourself so much work at your meals, using all those pitchers and plates, goblets, spoons, pepper-pots, and the rest. Then, when you eat, you crowd yourselves into one room. I eat alone. My meals are served on a tray by a pretty maid, who kneels before me as I eat, chatting and making herself interesting. "When you travel you take with you, either to tote about, or hire some one to carry for you, a great amount of luggage. As for me, the hotel furnishes me a dressing-gown and a night-robe, and I buy a fresh tooth-brush each morning for a sen. No; say what you please, you western folk are inconvenient people. You do not follow the line of the least resistance. You make too much effort to live, and the cost is too great in nerves, brains, flesh, blood, and worry." G. KYOTO, JAPAN. * * * * * Questions and Answers.