like beasts.

_Namu my[=o]h[=o] renge ky[=o]_.

Asako's relatives spent the day in eating, drinking and gossiping to
the rhythm of the interminable prayer.

It was a perfect day of autumn, which is the sweetest season in Japan.
A warm bright sun had been shining on the sumptuous colours of the
waning year, on the brilliant reds and yellows which clothed the
neighbouring hills, on the broad brown plain with its tesselated
design of bare rice-fields, on the brown villas and cottages huddled
in their fences of evergreen like birds in their nests, on the
red trunks of the cryptomeria trees, on the brown carpet of matted
pine-needles, on the grey crumbling stones of the old graveyard, on
the high-pitched temple roofs, and on the inconsequential swarms of
humanity drifting to their devotions, casting their pennies into the
great alms-trough in front of the shrine, clanging the brass bell with
a prayer for good luck, and drifting home again with their bewildered,
happy children.

Asako no longer felt like a Japanese. The sight of her countrymen in
their drab monotonous thousands sickened her. The hiss and cackle
of their incomprehensible tongue beat upon her brain with a deadly
incessant sound, like raindrops to one who is impatiently awaiting the
return of fine weather.

Here at Ikegami, the distant view of the sea and the Yokohama shipping
invited Asako to escape. But where could she escape to? To England.
She was an Englishwoman no longer. She had cast her husband off for
insufficient reasons. She had been cold, loveless, narrow-minded and
silly. She had acted, as she now recognised, largely on the suggestion
of others. Like a fool she had believed what had been told. She had
not trusted her love for her husband. As usual, her thoughts returned
to Geoffrey, and to the constant danger which threatened him. Lately,
she had started to write a letter to him several times, but had never
got further than "Dearest Geoffrey."

She was glad when the irritating day was over, when the rosy sunset
clouds showed through the trunks of the cryptomerias, when the night
fell and the great stars like lamps hung in the branches. But the
night brought no silence. Paper lanterns were lighted round the
temple; and rough acetylene flares lit up the tawdry fairings. The
chattering, the bargaining, the clatter of the _geta_ became more
terrifying even than in daytime. It was like being in the darkness in
a cage of wild beasts, heard, fel