ir piled up on their heads in feminine fashion. Gradually, as
we advanced farther up the green channel, the perfumes became more
penetrating, and the monotonous chirp of the cicalas swelled out like an
orchestral crescendo. Above us, against the luminous sky, sharply
delineated between the mountains, a kind of hawk hovered, screaming out,
with a deep, human voice, "Ha! Ha! Ha!" its melancholy call prolonged by
the echoes.

All this fresh and luxuriant nature was of a peculiar Japanese type,
which seemed to impress itself even on the mountain-tops, and produced
the effect of a too artificial prettiness. The trees were grouped in
clusters, with the pretentious grace shown on lacquered trays. Large
rocks sprang up in exaggerated shapes, side by side with rounded,
lawn-like hillocks; all the incongruous elements of landscape were
grouped together as if artificially created.

When we looked intently, here and there we saw, often built in
counterscarp on the very brink of an abyss, some old, tiny, mysterious
pagoda, half hidden in the foliage of the overhanging trees, bringing to
the minds of new arrivals, like ourselves, a sense of unfamiliarity and
strangeness, and the feeling that in this country the spirits, the sylvan
gods, the antique symbols, faithful guardians of the woods and forests,
were unknown and incomprehensible.

When Nagasaki appeared, the view was rather disappointing. Situated at
the foot of green overhanging mountains, it looked like any other
ordinary town. In front of it lay a tangled mass of vessels, flying all
the flags of the world; steamboats, just as in any other port, with dark
funnels and black smoke, and behind them quays covered with warehouses
and factories; nothing was wanting in the way of ordinary, trivial,
every-day objects.

Some time, when man shall have made all things alike, the earth will be a
dull, tedious dwelling-place, and we shall have even to give up
travelling and seeking for a change which can no longer be found.

About six o'clock we dropped anchor noisily amid the mass of vessels
already in the harbor, and were immediately invaded.

We were visited by a mercantile, bustling, comical Japan, which rushed
upon us in full boat-loads, in waves, like a rising sea. Little men and
little women came in a continuous, uninterrupted stream, but without
cries, without squabbles, noiselessly, each one making so smiling a bow
that it was impossible to be angry with them, so that by re