"Well, it would have a rich look, Samantha, and I mean to make some
when I git home. Why, Ury and I could make hundreds of 'em out of our
old copper kettle that has got a hole in it, and I shouldn't wonder if
I could pass 'em."

Miss Meechim had a idee that the Japans wuz in a state of barbarism,
but Arvilly who wuz always at swords' pints with her threw such a lot
of statistics at her that it fairly danted her. There are six hundred
newspapers in Japan. The Japanese daily at Tokio has a circulation of
300,000. She has over 3,000 milds of railroads and uses the American
system of checking baggage. Large factories with the best machinery
has been built late years, but a great part of the manufacturing is
done by the people in their own homes, where they turn out those
exquisite fabrics of silk and cotton and rugs of all the colors of the
rainbow, and seemingly as fadeless as that bow. Slavery is unknown,
and there is very little poverty with all the crowded population. The
Japans are our nearest neighbors acrost the Pacific and we've been
pretty neighborly with 'em, havin' bought from 'em within the last ten
years most three hundred millions worth of goods. She would miss us if
anything should happen to us.

Yokohama is a city of 124,000 inhabitants, most all Japans, though in
what they call the settlement there are fifteen or twenty thousand
foreigners. There are beautiful homes here with flower gardens
containing the rarest and most beautiful flowers, trees and shrubs of
all kinds.

The day Josiah had his struggle with the interpreter and Japan money
we rode down the principal streets of Yokohama. And I would stop at
some of the silk shops, though Josiah objected and leaned out of his
jinrikisha and sez anxiously:

"Don't spend more'n half a dozen rins, Samantha, on dress, for you
know we've got more than 10,000 milds to travel and the tarven bills
are high."

Sez I in real dry axents, "If I conclude to buy a dress I shall have
to have as much as a dozen rins; I don't believe that I could git a
handsome and durable one for less." My tone was sarcastical. The idee
of buyin' a silk dress for half a cent! But I didn't lay out to buy; I
wuz jest lookin' round.

I saw in those shops some of the most beautiful silks and embroideries
that I ever did see, and I went into a lacquer shop where there wuz
the most elegant furniture and rich bronzes inlaid with gold and
silver. They make the finest bronzes in the world; a l