any years English
has been taught in Japan's schools, but thousands of boys and men in
cities and towns are each year acquiring the language by study in odd
hours.

Examine the dog-eared pamphlet in the hands of the lad assisting in the
shop where you are purchasing something, and you are almost certain to
find it an elementary English book. Merchants know English well, as a
rule; but with many of them the desire for knowledge is not satisfied
with the acquisition of English--they desire to know other languages. In
Yokohama I know a merchant of importance whose English is so good that
one is drawn to inquire where he learned it. The answer will be that he
studied odd hours at home and when not serving customers. And the
visitor may further be informed by this man that he is also studying
German and French. A teacher of German goes to his house at six o'clock
each morning and for two hours drills him in the language. Then, in the
evening, after a long day spent at business, a French teacher instructs
him in the graceful language of France. And this merchant is but a type
of thousands of Japanese who are daily garnering knowledge.

It is a pleasing incident for the visitor from America to read of a
meeting in the Japanese capital of the local Yale Alumni
Association--quite as pleasing as to see base-ball played in every
vacant field convenient to a large town. Returning schoolboys have
carried the game home to their companions, and in the voyage across the
Pacific it has lost none of its fine points. For thirty years and longer
the Japs have been learning English with the industry of beavers. And
ambition has been responsible for this, the dogged determination to be
somebody, and the patriotic wish to see Japan stand with the progressive
nations of the earth. The power to keep such a people down does not
exist. Preparation is a subject never absent from the thoughts of the
Japanese. It was preparation that gave them victory after victory over
the creatures of the Czar. Now they are fairly launched upon a brilliant
career in trade and commerce. But Japan can merely fabricate our raw
materials, thereby occupying a field in Asia that up to now Uncle Sam
has made no determined effort to secure.

INDEX

Agra, Indian city of unrivaled interest, 168;
its Taj Mahal, 168-184

Ambir, old capital of Jeypore state, 166

America, interest in Suez canal as forerunner of Panama, 16;
flag not represented by commercial