At an inn there was an evident desire to do us honour by providing a special dinner. One bowl contained transparent fish soup. Lying at the bottom was a glassy eye staring up balefully at me. (The head, especially the eye, of a fish is reckoned the daintiest morsel.) There was a relish consisting of grapes in mustard. A third dish presented an entire squid. I passed honourable dishes numbers two and three and drank the fish soup through clenched teeth and with averted gaze. I interrogated several chief constables on the absence of assaults on women from the lists of crimes in the rural statistics I had collected. Various explanations were offered to me: if there were cases of assault they were kept secret for the credit of the woman's family; no prosecution could be instituted except at the instance of the woman, or, if married, the woman's husband; women did not go out much alone; the number of cases was not in fact as large as might be imagined, because the people were well behaved. An official who had had police experience in the north of Japan declared that the south was more "moral and more civilised and had higher tastes." In Ehime, for example, there was very little illegitimacy and fewer children still-born than in any other prefecture. Nevertheless four offences against women had occurred in villages in Ehime within the preceding twelve months. One of the most interesting stories of rural regeneration I heard was told me by a blind man who had become headman of his village at the time of the war with Russia. His life had been indecorous and he had gradually lost his sight, and he took the headmanship with the wish to make some atonement for his careless years. This is his story: