But Japan is a country where the people do everything in an original way. The carpenter pulls his saw toward him when he saws, and the planer pulls his plane toward him when he planes a board. Everybody sits down to work, and the horse goes into the stall tail first. The Japanese school children can never understand how the English children can make sense out of books that one reads from left to right and from the top to the bottom of the page. Umé's teacher read the lesson aloud and the children read it after her. They read from the bottom to the top of the page, from right to left, and from the end of the book to the beginning. From seven until twelve o'clock the children were busy with their lessons and recitations, stopping to eat their lunches in the middle of the forenoon, and for a short recess at the end of every hour. Umé loved to go to school. Tara always said, "It is because I am obliged to, that I go to school," but Umé knew that her school-days were the happiest she would have for many years. After they were over, she would go to her husband's house and take the lowest place in his family, as is the custom of Japanese maidens. Before that time she must learn to sew, cook and direct the servants in every household duty; she must also learn the tea-ceremony and the ceremony of flower arrangement. All these things she learns, as well as reading, writing and music. The tea-ceremony, which sounds so simple, is a very old and difficult one. Every position of the one who conducts it, as well as that of the bowl, spoon, tea-caddy and towel, is regulated by rule. Bowls are used instead of teapots, and tea powder instead of tea leaves. There is a sweeping of the room at the right time, and a walking out into the garden at another right time. Oh, it is not so simple as it sounds! The ceremony of arranging flowers is also very hard to learn. People who have learned it thoroughly are said to have charming dispositions as a reward of merit. They are gentle, self-controlled, peaceful-hearted and always at ease in the presence of their superiors, besides having many other virtues. Umé enjoyed it all. Everything she did was prettily and gracefully done. Whether she bent over a difficult, unruly spray of blossoms, or over her writing brush to make the difficult characters, her sweet oval face was never clouded. After the writing lesson was over on this opening day, she took her copy book, which was soggy with much India ink and water, and beckoned Tei to take hers also into the yard. There they spread the books in the sun to dry. Tei's family had been away for a month for the sake of Baby Onda's health, and the two little girls had not seen each other until now. "What did you see at Nikko?" asked Umé. "We saw the most beautiful building in Japan; the tomb of the great Iyeyasu," answered Tei. "I also was at Nikko and played with Tei in the temple yard," said a third child who overheard their talk.