te in returning home, these three ladies are
asleep, so we are obliged to attend to the business ourselves.

We must therefore open all the closed doors, put on our boots, and go
down into the garden to draw water.

As Chrysantheme would die of fright all alone in the dark, in the midst
of the trees and buzzing of insects, I am obliged to accompany her to
the well. For this expedition we require a light, and must seek among
the quantity of lanterns purchased at Madame Tres-Propre's booth, which
have been thrown night after night into the bottom of one of our little
paper closets; but alas, all the candles are burned down! I thought as
much! Well, we must resolutely take the first lantern to hand, and stick
a fresh candle on the iron point at the bottom; Chrysantheme puts forth
all her strength, the candle splits, breaks; the mousme pricks her
fingers, pouts and whimpers. Such is the inevitable scene that takes
place every evening, and delays our retiring to rest under the dark-blue
gauze net for a good quarter of an hour; while the cicalas on the roof
seem to mock us with their ceaseless song.

All this, which I should find amusing in any one else,--any one I
loved--irritates me in her.

CHAPTER XLIV. TENDER MINISTRATIONS

September 11th.

A week has passed very quietly, during which I have written nothing.

By degrees I am becoming accustomed to my Japanese household, to the
strangeness of the language, costumes, and faces. For the last
three weeks no letters have arrived from Europe; they have no doubt
miscarried, and their absence contributes, as is usually the case, to
throw a veil of oblivion over the past.

Every day, therefore, I climb up to my villa, sometimes by beautiful
starlit nights, sometimes through downpours of rain. Every morning
as the sound of Madame Prune's chanted prayer rises through the
reverberating air, I awake and go down toward the sea, by grassy
pathways full of dew.

The chief occupation in Japan seems to be a perpetual hunt after curios.
We sit down on the mattings, in the antique-sellers' little booths,
taking a cup of tea with the salesmen, and rummage with our own hands in
the cupboards and chests, where many a fantastic piece of old rubbish is
huddled away. The bargaining, much discussed, is laughingly carried on
for several days, as if we were trying to play off some excellent little
practical joke upon each other.

I really make a sad abuse of the adjective little; I