s at her girdle is meant for use, and not
merely as a badge of her rank. Not long ago a tragedy took place in
the house of one of the chief nobles in Yedo. One of My Lady's
tire-women, herself a damsel of gentle blood, and gifted with rare
beauty, had attracted the attention of a retainer in the palace, who
fell desperately in love with her. For a long time the strict rules of
decorum by which she was hedged in prevented him from declaring his
passion; but at last he contrived to gain access to her presence, and
so far forgot himself, that she, drawing her poniard, stabbed him in
the eye, so that he was carried off fainting, and presently died. The
girl's declaration, that the dead man had attempted to insult her, was
held to be sufficient justification of her deed, and, instead of being
blamed, she was praised and extolled for her valour and chastity. As
the affair had taken place within the four walls of a powerful noble,
there was no official investigation into the matter, with which the
authorities of the palace were competent to deal. The truth of this
story was vouched for by two or three persons whose word I have no
reason to doubt, and who had themselves been mixed up in it; I can
bear witness that it is in complete harmony with Japanese ideas; and
certainly it seems more just that Lucretia should kill Tarquin than
herself.

The better the Japanese people come to be known and understood, the
more, I am certain, will it be felt that a great injustice has been
done them in the sweeping attacks which have been made upon their
women. Writers are agreed, I believe, that their matrons are, as a
rule, without reproach. If their maidens are chaste, as I contend that
from very force of circumstances they cannot help being, what becomes
of all these charges of vice and immodesty? Do they not rather recoil
upon the accusers, who would appear to have studied the Japanese woman
only in the harlot of Yokohama?

Having said so much, I will now try to give some account of the famous
Yoshiwara[13] of Yedo, to which frequent allusion will have to be made
in the course of these tales.

[Footnote 13: The name Yoshiwara, which is becoming generic for
"Flower Districts,"--_Anglice_, quarters occupied by brothels,--is
sometimes derived from the town Yoshiwara, in Sunshine, because it was
said that the women of that place furnished a large proportion of the
beauties of the Yedo Yoshiwara. The correct derivation is probably
that giv