Asa-giri ni
Shima-kakure-yuku
Fune wo shi zo omou._

My thoughts are with a boat
Which travels island-hid
In the morning-mist
Of the shore of Akashi
Dim, dim!

After Hongkong, they let the zone of eternal summer behind them. The
crossing from Shanghai to Japan was rough, and the wind bitter. But on
the first morning in Japanese waters Geoffrey was on deck betimes to
enjoy to the full the excitement of arrival. They were approaching
Nagasaki. It was a misty dawn. The sky was like mother-of-pearl,
and the sea like mica. Abrupt grey islands appeared and disappeared,
phantasmal, like guardian spirits of Japan, representatives of those
myriads of Shinto deities who have the Empire in their keeping.

Then, suddenly from behind the cliff of one of the islands a fishing
boat came gliding with the silent stateliness of a swan. The body of
the boat was low and slender, built of some white, shining wood; from
the middle rose the high sail like a silver tower. It looked like the
soul of that sleeping island setting out upon a dream journey.

The mist was dissolving, slowly revealing more islands and more boats.
Some of them passed quite close to the steamer; and Geoffrey could see
the fishermen, dwarfish figures straining at the oar or squatting at
the bottom of the boat, looking like Nibelungen on the quest for the
Rhinegold. He could hear their strange cries to each other and to the
steamer, harsh like the voice of sea-gulls.

Asako came on deck to join her husband. The thrill of returning to
Japan had scattered her partiality for late sleeping. She was dressed
in a tailor-made coat and skirt of navy-blue serge. Her shoulders were
wrapped in a broad stole of sable. Her head was bare. Perhaps it was
the inherited instinct of generations of Japanese women, who never
cover their heads, which made her dislike hats and avoid wearing them
if possible.

The sun was still covered, but the view was clear as far as the high
mountains on the horizon towards which the ship was ploughing her way.

"Look, Asako, Japan!"

She was not looking at the distance. Her eyes were fixed on an emerald
islet half a mile or less from the steamer's course, a jewel of the
seas. It rose to the height of two hundred feet or so, a conical
knoll, densely wooded. On the summit appeared a scar of rock like a
ruined castle, and, rising from the rock's crest, a single pine-tree.
Its trunk was twisted by all the winds of Heaven. Its long,