o the hotel to find
the entire force standing at attention, ready to receive me. I
pass on to my room with a procession of bearers and bearesses
strung out behind me like the tail of a kite, anything from a
tea-tray to the sugar tongs being sufficient excuse for joining the
parade.

When dressing for dinner, if I press the button, no less than six
little, picture maids flutter to my door, each begging for the
honor of fastening me up the back. How delighted Jack would be to
assign them this particular honor for life. Such whispers over the
wonders of a foreign-made dress as they struggle with the curious
fastenings! (They should hear my lord's fierce language!) Each
one takes a turn till some sort of connection is made between hook
and eye. All is so earnestly done I dare not laugh or wiggle with
impatience. I may sail into dinner with the upper hook in the
lower eye and the middle all askew, but the service is so
graciously given, I would rather have my dress upside down than to
grumble. Certainly I pay for it. I tip everything from the
proprietor to the water-pitcher. But the sum is so
disproportionate to the pleasure and the comfort returned that I
smile to think of the triple price I have paid elsewhere and the
high-nosed condescension I got in return for my money. Japanese
courtesy may be on the surface, but the polish does not easily wear
off and it soothes the nerves just as the rain cools the air. It
goes without saying that I did not arrive in Nikko without a
variety of experiences along the way.

Two hours out from Yokohama, the train boy came into the coach, and
with a smile as cheerful as if he were saying, "Happy New Year,"
announced that there was a washout in front of us and a landslide
at the back of us. Would everybody please rest their honorable
bones in the village while a bridge was built and a river filled
in. The passengers trailed into a settlement of straw roofs,
bamboo poles and acres of white and yellow lilies. I went to a
quaint little inn--that was mostly out!--built over a fussy brook;
and a pine tree grew right out of the side of the house. My room
was furnished with four mats and a poem hung on the wall. When the
policeman came in to apologize for the rudeness of the storm in
delaying me, the boy who brought my bags had to step outside so
that the official would have room to bow properly. I ate my supper
of fish-omelet and turnip pickle served in red lacquer bowls, an