The hotel was much like an American house in its general characteristics, both in the arrangement of the rooms and the style of furniture. The proprietors and managers were foreigners, but the servants were native and were dressed in Japanese costume. The latter were very quiet and orderly in their manners, and made a favorable impression on the young visitors. Frank was so pleased with the one in charge of his room that he wished he could take him home with him, and have a Japanese servant in America. Testimony as to the excellent character of servants in Japan is nearly universal on the part of those who have employed them. Of course there will be an occasional lazy, inattentive, or dishonest fellow, but one finds them much more rarely than in Europe or America. In general, they are very keen observers, and learn the ways and peculiarities of their masters in a remarkably short time. And once having learned them, they never forget. "When I was last here," said the Doctor, "I was in this very hotel, and had one of the regular servants of the establishment to wait on me. The evening after my arrival, I told him to have my bath ready at seven o'clock in the morning, and to bring a glass of ice-water when he waked me. Exactly at seven he was at my bedside with the water, and told me the bath was waiting; and as long as I remained here he came at precisely the same hour in the morning, offered me the glass of water, and announced the readiness of the bath. I never had occasion to tell him the same thing twice, no matter what it was. Occasionally I went to Tokio to spend two or three days. The first time I went, I showed him what clothes I wished to take, and he packed them in my valise; and afterwards I had only to say I was going to Tokio, when he would immediately proceed to pack up exactly the same things I had taken the first time, or their equivalents. He never made the slightest error, and was a trifle more exact than I wished him to be. On my first journey I carried a bottle of cough-mixture to relieve a cold from which I happened to be suffering. The cold had disappeared, and the bottle was empty before my second trip to Tokio; but my faithful servant wrapped it carefully in paper, and put it in a safe corner of my valise, and continued to do so every time I repeated the excursion." [Illustration: A JAPANESE STREET SCENE.]