o, a
far more seaworthy craft than the latter. They carry an immense sail of
pure white canvas, save where a black cloth is let in--for contrast
perhaps--on the huge characters composing the owner's name, mar its fair
surface; and a stout, heavy mast placed well abaft the centre of the
vessel, and curved at its upper end, the better to form an overhanging
derrick to hoist the sail by. The sail is made of any number of cloths
laced together vertically--not sewn--by which method each cloth has a
bellying property and wrinkled appearance, independent of its
neighbours, thus the whole surface holds far more wind than one
continuous sheet would do. The vessels, despite their unnautical
appearance, sail well on a wind. Some writers have affirmed, that
instead of reefing as we do, and as is pretty universal all over the
world--namely, by reducing the perpendicular height of the sail--that
the Japanese accomplish this by taking in sail _at the sides_, or
laterally, by unlacing a cloth at a time. This seems to me highly
absurd, and is certainly not borne out by the testimony of my own
observation; and that they should not conform to the common usage of
maritime nations--both savage and civilized--in this particular is
improbable. Even the Chinese--who are generally admitted to be the most
_unconforming_ and irrational people in the world--reef their sails, at
least, in the orthodox way. Besides taking a practical view of the
matter, how are they in any sudden emergency, and with their limited
crews, to undo the elaborate lacing, without going out on the yard and
climbing _down_ the sail, unlacing as they go? So far as I am able to
judge, their method is a most simple and effective one, for all that
they do is to lower the sail, gather in the slack at the bottom, and as
there are several sheets up and down the breech of the sail, the thing
is done with the utmost facility.

The build of a junk's stern is somewhat peculiar, for there is a great
hollow which, apparently, penetrates the body of the vessel; a mode of
construction said to be due to an edict of one of the tycoons, to
prevent his subjects from leaving the country; for though it seems
incredible, these junks have been known to voyage to India. The sampan
has a similar faulty arrangement of stern. Though the people obeyed the
spirit of the law, they evaded the letter of it by placing sliding
watertight boards across the aperture.

By noon we had anchored off Yokohama, n