across it. Three or four different characters seem to be used indiscriminately, and some of them are certainly Chinese. The good folks of Dai Nippon are indebted to the Chinese for the first strong impulse to their civilization; not being themselves of Chinese origin, but a distinct branch of the Mongolian family. Their language is quite different, and has exceedingly long words, instead of being built up, like Chinese, of mono-syllables. Japanese written in Chinese character is understood by any Chinaman; but so would English be, since Chinese writing represents ideas. So, if a Spaniard writes five, an Englishman reads it as "five," and understands correctly, yet the Spaniard would tell you that he wrote not "five," but "cinco." Hovering still about this gentleman, and beguiled by the strangeness of all things we see into a curiosity like that of children, we admire his sword. The hilt is very beautiful, composed of various metals blended into a fine enamel. This enamel is used in Japan where Europeans would use jewels, because the art of cutting precious stones is not known to the Japanese. For the blade of this sword it is not impossible that a sum has been given not unlike a hundred pounds; the tempering of steel is carried to perfection in Japan, where gentlemen are connoisseurs in sword-blades. Young nobles lend their maiden swords to the executioner (who is always chosen from the defiled leather-selling race) that they may be tried upon real flesh and blood; as executions in Japan are generally cruel, and some criminals are hacked to death, rather than killed outright, the swords on such occasions are refreshed with a fair taste of blood. The mats upon the floor are the next things we notice. A thick matting of straw forms a substratum, over which are spread the fine mats, elegantly fringed. To see that lackered work inlaid with mother-of-pearl, which we familiarly call Japan, in its perfection, we must evidently visit it at home. Any thing of the kind so exquisitely beautiful as this little table, is not to be found in Europe. Whatever trinkets pass out of these islands into Europe, do so _nayboen_--that is, with secret connivance--but the first-rate manufactures are in no way suffered to come to us. Without _nayboen_, life would be insupportable in a minute wilderness of rules and customs. People even die _nayboen_--that is, a man lies unburied, and is said to be alive, when his death otherwise would lead to disagreeable results. Here, as elsewhere, when rules are made intolerably strict, evasion is habitual. The amount that cannot be evaded is astonishing enough, as we shall see ere we return to England. Now we are in the house of this gentleman at Nagasaki. His wife enters, and by their mutual behavior it is evident that ladies in Japan are to their husbands very much what ladies are in England. This lady passes to the garden; the room ends with a projecting angle open to the garden on each side, a sort of bay, which every house