(What agitation I shall feel when I write my first “Mrs.” before my name! Woman must grow tired of being addressed “Miss,” sooner or later.) I have often said that I hardly saw any necessity for corresponding when one lives on such a small island as Japan. I could see my friends in a day or two, at whatever place I was. I have now the ocean between me and my home. Letter writing is worth while. I did not know it was such a sweet piece of work. I should declare it to be as legitimate and inexpensive a game as ever woman could indulge in. * * * * * I was stepping along the courtyard of this hotel. I have seen a gentleman kissing a woman. I felt my face catching fire. Is it not a shame in a public place? I returned to my apartment. The mirror showed my cheeks still blushing. * * * * * The Japanese consul and his Meriken wife—she is some inches higher than her darling—paid us a call. I said to myself that they did not match well. It was like a hired haori with a different coat of arms. The Consul looked proud, as if he carried a crocodile. Mrs. Consul invited us for luncheon next Sunday. “Quite a family party—O ho, ho!” Her voice was unceremonious. I noticed that one of her hairpins was about to drop. I thought that Meriken woman was as careless as I. How many hairpins do you suppose I lost yesterday? Four! Isn’t that awful? My uncle innocently stated to her I was a great belle of Tokio. I secretly pinched his arm through his coat-sleeve. My little signal did not influence him at all. He kept on his hyperbolical advertisement of me. She promised a beautiful girl to meet me on Sunday. I fancied how she looked. I thought my performance of the first interview with Meriken woman was excellent. But my rehearsal at home was useless. 26th—I lost my little charm. It worried me awfully. It was given me by my old-fashioned mother. She got it after a holy journey of one month to the shrine of Tenno Sama. I should be safe, Mother said, from water, fire and highwayman (what else, God only knows) as long as I should carry it. I sought after it everywhere. I begged my uncle to let me examine his trunk. “Cast off an ancient superstition!” Uncle scorned. I sat languidly on the large armchair which almost swallowed my small body. I imagined many a punishment already inflicted on me. The tick-tack of my watch from my waist encouraged my nervousness. There is nothing more irritating than a tick-tack. I locked up my watch in the drawer of the dresser. I still felt its tick-tack pursuing my ears. Then I put it under the pillow. 27th—How I wished I could exchange a ten-dollar gold-piece for a tassel of curly hair! American woman is nothing without it. Its infirm gesticulation is a temptation. In Japan I regarded it as bad luck to own waving hair. But my tastes cannot remain unaltered in Amerikey.