CHRYSANTHEME (continued 3)

Then by degrees, little by little, it becomes more animated, and the mousmés begin to listen. Now, tremblingly it grows into a feverish rapidity, and her gaze has no longer the vacant stare of a doll. Then the music changes again; in it there is the sighing of the wind, the hideous laughter of ghouls; tears, heartrending plaints, Japanesery within her own soul.

I listen, lying there with eyes half shut, looking out between my drooping eyelids which are gradually lowering, in involuntary heaviness, upon the enormous red sun dying away over Nagasaki. I have a somewhat melancholy feeling that my past life and all other places in the world are receding from my view and fading away. At this moment of nightfall I feel almost at home in this corner of Japan, amidst the gardens of this suburb; I have never had such an impression before.

L.

September 16th.

Seven o'clock in the evening. We shall not go down into the town to-day; but, like good Japanese citizens, remain in our loftly suburb.

In undress uniform we shall go, Yves and I, in a neighborly way, as far as the fencing gallery, which is only two steps off, just above our villa, and almost abutting on our fresh and scented garden.

The gallery is closed already and a little mousko seated at the door, explains with many

The evening is so mild and so fine, that we remain out of doors, following without any definite purpose the pathway which rises ever higher and higher, and loses itself at length in the solitary regions of the mountain among the upper peaks.

For an hour at least we wander on,—an unintended walk,—and finally find ourselves at a great height commanding an endless perspective lighted by the last gleams of daylight; we are in a desolate and mournful spot, in the midst of the little Buddhist cemeteries, which are scattered over the country in every direction.

We meet a few belated laborers, who are returning from the fields with bundles of tea upon their shoulders. These peasants have a half savage air, half naked too, or clothed only in long robes of blue cotton; as they pass, they salute us with humble bows.

No trees in this elevated region. Fields of tea alternate with tombs: old granite statues which represent Buddha in his lotus, or else old monumental stones on which gleam remains of inscriptions in golden letters. Rocks, brushwood, uncultivated spaces, surround us on all sides.

There are no more passers-by, and the light

But, close to the spot where we stand, a box in white wood provided with handles, a sort of sedan-chair, rests on the freshly disturbed earth, with its lotus of silvered paper, and the little incense-sticks burning yet, by its side; clearly someone has been buried here this very evening.

I cannot picture this personage to myself; the Japanese are so grotesque in life, that it is almost impossible to imagine them in the calm majesty of death. Nevertheless, let us move further on, we might disturb him; he is too recently dead, his presence unnerves us. We will go and seat ourselves on one of these other tombs, so unutterably ancient that there can no longer be anything within it but dust. And there, seated yet in the dying sunlight, while the valleys and plains of the earth below are already lost in shadow, we will talk together.

I wish to speak to Yves about Chrysanthème; it is indeed somewhat in view of this that I have persuaded him to sit down; but how to set about it without hurting his feelings, and without making myself ridiculous, I hardly know. However, the pure air playing round me up here, and the magnificent landscape spread beneath my feet, impart a certain serenity to my thoughts which makes me feel a

We speak, first of all, of the order for departure which may arrive at any moment, for China or for France. Soon we shall have to leave this easy and almost amusing life, this Japanese suburb where chance has installed us, and our little house buried among flowers. Yves perhaps will regret all this more than I shall, I know that well enough; for it is the first time that any such interlude has broken the rude monotony of his hard-worked career. Formerly, when in an inferior rank, he was scarcely more often on shore, in foreign countries, than the sea-gulls themselves; whilst I have, from the very beginning, been spoilt by residence in all sorts of charming spots, infinitely superior to this, in all sorts of countries, and the remembrance pleasurably haunts me still.

In order to discover how the land lies, I risk the remark:

"You will perhaps be more sorry to leave this little Chrysanthème than I am?"

Silence reigns between us.

After which I pursue, and, burning my ships, I add:

"You know, after all, if you have such a fancy for her, I haven't really married her; one can't really consider her my wife."

"Not your wife, you say? But, by Jove, though, that's just it; she is your wife."

There is no need of many words at any time between us two; I know exactly now, by his tone, by his great good-humored smile, how the case stands; I understand all that lies in the little phrase: "That's just it, she is your wife." If she were not, well then he could not answer for what might happen,—notwithstanding any remorse he might have in the depths of his heart, since he is no longer a bachelor and free as air, as in former days. But he considers her my wife, and she is sacred. I have the fullest faith in his word, and I experience a positive relief, a real joy, at finding my staunch Yves of bygone days. How could I have so succumbed to the demeaning influence of my surroundings as to suspect him even, and invent for myself such a mean, petty anxiety?

We will never even mention that doll again.

We remain up there very late, talking of other things, gazing the while at the immense depths below our feet, at the valleys and mountains as they become one by one indistinct and lost in the deepening darkness. Placed as we are at an enormous height, in the wide free atmosphere, we seem already to have quitted this miniature country, already to be freed

Seen from such heights as these, all the countries of the globe bear a strong resemblance to each other; they lose the imprint made upon them by man, and by races; by all the atoms swarming on the surface.

As of old, in the Breton marshes, in the woods of Toulven, or at sea in the night-watches, we talk of all those things to which thoughts naturally revert in darkness; of ghosts, of spirits, of eternity, of the great hereafter, of chaos—and we entirely forget little Chrysanthème!

When we arrive at Diou-djen-dji in the starry night, it is the music of her chamécen, heard from afar, which recalls to us her existence; she is studying some vocal duet with Mdlle. Oyouki, her pupil.

I feel myself in very good humor this evening, and, relieved from any absurd suspicions about my poor Yves, am quite disposed to enjoy without reserve my last days in Japan, and derive therefrom all the amusement possible.

Let us then stretch ourselves out on the dazzling white mats, and listen to the singular duet sung by these two mousmés: a strange musical medley, slow and mournful, beginning with two

But it is a soul which more than ever appears to me of a different species to my own; I feel my thoughts to be far removed from theirs, as from the flitting conceptions of a bird, or the dreams of a monkey; I feel there is betwixt them and myself a great gulf, mysterious and awful.

Other sounds of music, wafted to us from the distance outside, interrupt for a moment that of our mousmés. From the depths below, down in Nagasaki, arises a sudden noise of gongs and guitars; we rush to the balcony of the verandah to hear it better.

matsouri, a fête, a procession passing through the quarter which is not so virtuous as our own, so our mousmés tell us, with a disdainful toss of the head. Nevertheless, from the heights on which we dwell, seen thus in a bird's-eye view, by the uncertain light of the stars, this district has a singularly chaste air, and the concert going on therein, purified in its ascent from the depths of the abyss to our lofty altitudes, reaches us confusedly, a smothered, enchanted, enchanting sound.

Then it diminishes, and dies away into silence.

The two little friends return to their seats on the mats, and once more take up their melancholy duet. An orchestra, discreetly subdued but innumerable, of crickets and cicalas, accompanies them in an unceasing tremolo,—the immense far-reaching tremolo, which, gentle and eternal, never ceases on Japanese land.

LI.

September 17th.

During the hour of siesta, the abrupt order arrives to start to-morrow for China, for Tchefou (a horrid place in the gulf of Pekin). It is Yves who comes to wake me in my cabin to bring me the news.

"

He gazes through my port-hole, raising his glance towards the green summits, in the direction of Diou-djen-dji and our echoing old cottage, hidden from us by a turn of the mountain.

It is very nice of him to wish to help me in my packing; but I think he also counts upon saying farewell to his little Japanese friends up there, and I really cannot find fault with that.

He gets through his work, and does in fact get leave without help from me, to go on shore at five o'clock, after drill and manœuvres.

As for myself, I start off at once, in a hired sampan. In the vast flood of midday sunshine, to the quivering noise of the cicalas, I mount up to Diou-djen-dji.

The paths are solitary, the plants drooping in the heat. Here, however, is Madame Jonquille, taking the air, in the bright sunshine of the grasshoppers, sheltering her dainty figure and her charming face under an immense paper parasol, a huge circle, closely ribbed and fantastically striped.

She recognizes me from afar, and laughing as usual, runs to meet me.

I announce our departure, and a tearful pout

Ah, there indeed is a marriage tie which will be broken without much pain! But she fills me with impatience, poor empty-headed linnet, with her laughter, and I turn my back upon her to continue my journey.

Up above, Chrysanthème sleeps, stretched out on the floor; the house is wide open, and the soft mountain breeze rustles gently through it.

That same evening we had intended to give a tea-party, and by my orders flowers had already been placed in every nook and corner of the house. There were lotus in our vases, beautiful rose-colored lotus, the last of the season, I verily believe. They must have been ordered from a special gardener, out yonder near the Great Temple, and they will cost me dear.

With a few gentle taps of a fan I awake my surprised mousmé; and, curious to catch her first impressions, I announce my departure. She starts up, rubs her eyelids with the back of her little hands, looks at me, and hangs her head:

This little sinking at the heart is for Yves, no doubt.

The news spreads through the house.

Mdlle. Oyouki dashes upstairs, with half a tear in each of her babyish eyes; kisses me with her full red lips, which always leave a wet ring on my cheek; then quickly draws from her wide sleeve a square of tissue-paper, wipes away her stealthy tears, blows her little nose, rolls the bit of paper in a ball, and throws it into the street on the parasol of a passer-by.

Then Madame Prune makes her appearance; in an agitated and discomposed manner she successively adopts every attitude expressive of utter dismay. What on earth is the matter with the old lady, and why will she keep getting closer and closer to me, till she is almost in my way?

It is wonderful all I still have to do this last day, and the endless drives I have to make to the old curiosity shops, to my tradespeople, and to the packers.

Nevertheless before my rooms are dismantled, I intend making a sketch of them, as I did formerly at Stamboul. It really seems to me as if all I do here is a bitter parody of all I did over there.

I fetch, therefore, a leaf out of my album, and begin at once, seated on the floor and leaning on my desk, ornamented with grasshoppers in relief, while behind me, very, very close to me, the three women follow the movements of my pencil with an astonished attention. Japanese art being entirely conventional, they have never before seen anyone draw from nature, and my style delights them. I may not perhaps possess the steady and nimble touch of M. Sucre, as he groups his charming storks, but I am master of a few notions of perspective which are wanting in him; and I have been taught to draw things as I see them, without giving them ingeniously distorted and grimacing attitudes; and the three Japanese are amazed at the air of reality thrown in my sketch.

With little shrieks of admiration, they point out to each other the different things, as little by little their shape and form are outlined in black on my paper. Chrysanthème gazes at me with a new kind of interest: "Anata itchi-ban!" she says (literally "Thou first!" meaning: "You are really quite a swell!") Mdlle. Oyouki is carried away by her ad

"Anata bakari!" ("Thou alone!" that is to say: "There is no one like you in the world, all the rest are mere rubbish!")

Madame Prune says nothing, but I can see that she does not think the less; her languishing attitudes, her hand that at each moment gently touches mine, confirm the suspicions that her look of dismay a few moments ago awoke within me: evidently my physical charms speak to her imagination, which in spite of years has remained full of romance! I shall leave with the regret of having understood her too late!!

If the ladies are satisfied with my sketch, I am far from being so. I have put everything in its place most exactly, but as a whole, it has an ordinary, indifferent, French look which does not suit. The sentiment is not given, and I almost wonder whether I should not have done better in falsifying the perspective,—Japanese style—and exaggerating to the very utmost the already abnormal outlines of what I see before me. And then the pictured dwelling lacks the fragile look and its sonority, that reminds one of a dry violin. In the penciled delineation of the woodwork, the minute delicacy with which it is wrought is wanting; neither have I been able to render the extreme antiquity, the perfect cleanliness, nor the

Having sent out our invitations, we shall in spite of everything, give our tea-party this evening,—a parting tea, therefore, in which we will display as much pomp as possible. It is, moreover, rather my custom to wind up my exotic existences with a fête; in other countries I have done the same.

Besides our usual set, we shall have my mother-in-law, my relatives, and all the mousmés of the neighborhood. But, by an extra Japanese refinement, we shall not admit a single European friend,—not even the amazingly tall one. Yves alone shall be admitted, and even he shall be hidden away in a corner behind some flowers and works of art.

In the last glimmer of twilight, by the first twinkling star, the ladies, with many charming curtseys, make their appearance. Our house is soon full of the little crouching women, with their tiny slit eyes vaguely smiling; their beautifully dressed hair shining like polished ebony;

Chrysanthème, with somewhat a melancholy air; my mother-in-law Renoncule, with many affected graces, busy themselves in the midst of the different groups, where ere long the miniature pipes are lighted. Soon there arises a murmuring sound of discreet laughter, expressing nothing, but having a pretty exotic ring about it, and then begins a harmony of pan! pan! pan! sharp, rapid taps against the edges of the finely lacquered smoking-boxes. Pickled and spiced fruits are handed round on trays of quaint and varied shapes. Then transparent china tea-cups, no larger than half an egg-shell, make their appearance, and the ladies are offered a few drops of sugarless tea, poured out of toy kettles, or a sip of saki—(a spirit made from rice which it is the custom to serve hot, in elegantly shaped vases, long-necked like a heron's throat).

Several mousmés execute, one after the other, improvizations on the chamécen. Others sing in sharp high voices hopping about continually, like cicalas in delirium.

Madame Prune, no longer able to make a tête-à-tête.

At about nine o'clock, with a silken rustling, arrive the three guéchas in vogue in Nagasaki: Mdlles. Pureté, Orange, and Printemps, whom I have hired at four dollars a head,—an enormous price in this country.

These three guéchas are indeed the very same little creatures I heard singing on the rainy day of my arrival, through the thin paneling of the Garden of Flowers. But as I have now become thoroughly Japanized, to-day they appear to me more diminutive, less outlandish, and in no way mysterious. I treat them rather as dancers that I have hired, and the idea that I had ever thought of marrying one of them now makes me shrug my shoulders,—as it formerly did M. Kangourou.

The excessive heat caused by the respiration of the mousmés and the burning lamps, brings out the perfume of the lotus, which fills the heavy-laden atmosphere; and the scent of the

Mdlle. Orange, the youngest guécha, tiny and dainty, her lips outlined with gilt paint, executes some delightful steps, donning the most extraordinary wigs and masks in wood or cardboard. She has masks imitating old noble ladies which are valuable works of art, signed by well-known artists. She has also magnificent long robes, fashioned in the old style, and trains trimmed at the bottom with thick pads, in order to give to the movements of the costume something rigid and unnatural which, however, is becoming.

Now the soft balmy breezes blow through the room, from one verandah to the other, making the flames of the lamps flicker. They scatter the lotus flowers faded by the artificial heat, which, falling in pieces from every vase, sprinkle the guests with their pollen and large pink petals, looking like bits of broken opal-colored glass.

The sensational piece, reserved for the end, is a trio on the chamécen, long and monotonous, that the guéchas perform as a rapid pizzicato on the highest strings, very sharply struck. It sounds like the very quintescence, the paraphrase, the exasperation if I may so call it, of the eternal buzz of insects, which

Half-past ten! The program has been carried out, and the reception is over. A last general pan! pan! pan! the little pipes are stowed away into their chased sheaths, tied up in the sashes, and the mousmés rise to depart.

They light, at the end of short sticks, a quantity of red, gray or blue lanterns, and after a series of endless bows and curtseys, the guests disperse themselves in the darkness of the lanes and trees.

We also go down to the town,—Yves, Chrysanthème, Oyouki, and myself,—in order to conduct my mother-in-law, sisters-in-law, and youthful aunt, Madame Nénufar, to their house.

We want to take one last stroll together in our old familiar pleasure haunts, drink one more iced sherbet at the house of the Indescribable Butterflies, buy one more lantern at Madame Très-Propre's, and eat some parting waffles at Madame L'Heure's!

I try to be affected, moved, by this leave-taking, but without success. In this Japan, as with the little men and women who inhabit it, there is something decidedly wanting; pleasant

On our return, when I am once more with Yves and the two mousmés climbing up the road to Diou-djen-dji, which I shall probably never see again, a vague feeling of melancholy pervades my last stroll.

It is, however, but the melancholy inseparable from all things that are about to end without possibility of return.

Moreover, this calm and splendid summer is also drawing to a close for us,—since to-morrow we shall go forth to meet the autumn, in Northern China. I am beginning, alas! to count the youthful summers I may still hope for; I feel more gloomy each time another fades away, and flies to rejoin the others already disappeared in the dark and bottomless abyss, where all past things lie buried.

At midnight we return home, and my removal begins; while on board the amazingly tall friend kindly takes my watch.

It is a nocturnal, rapid, stealthy removal,—"dorobo (thieves) fashion" remarks Yves, who in frequenting the mousmés has picked up a smattering of the Niponese language.

Messrs, the packers have, at my request, sent in the evening several charming little boxes, with compartments and false bottoms,

It is a real treat to pack them, and everybody lends a helping hand,—Yves, Chrysanthème, Madame Prune, her daughter, and M. Sucre. By the glimmer of the reception-lamps, which are still burning, every one wraps, rolls, and ties up expeditiously, for it is already late.

Although Oyouki has a heavy heart, she cannot prevent herself from indulging in a few bursts of childish laughter while she works.

Madame Prune, bathed in tears, no longer restrains her feelings; poor lady, I really very much regret....

Chrysanthème is absent-minded and silent.

But what a fearful amount of luggage! Eighteen cases or parcels, containing Buddhas, chimeras, and vases, without mentioning the last lotus that I carry away tied up in a pink cluster.

All this is piled up in the djins' carts, hired at sunset, which are waiting at the door, while their runners lie asleep on the grass.

A starlit and exquisite night. We start off

The djins, stiffening their muscular legs, hold back with all their might the heavily loaded little cars which would run down by themselves if let alone, and that so rapidly, that they would rush into empty space with my most valuable chattels. Chrysanthème walks by my side, and expresses, in a soft and winning manner, her regret that the wonderfully tall friend did not offer to replace me for the whole of my night-watch, as that would have allowed me to spend this last night, even till morning, under our roof.

"Listen," she says, "come back to-morrow in the daytime, before getting under way, to bid me good-by; I shall only return to my mother in the evening; you will find me still up there."

And I promise.

They stop at a certain turn, from whence we have a bird's-eye view of the whole roadstead; the black stagnant waters reflect innumerable distant fires, and the ships—tiny immovable little objects, which seen from our point of view take the shape of fish, seem also to slumber,—little objects which serve to bear us elsewhere, to go far away, and to forget.

The moment has therefore come for Yves—who will not land again—to make his last tragic farewells to his friends the little mousmés.

Now I am very curious to see the parting between Yves and Chrysanthème; I listen with all my ears, I look with all my eyes, it takes place in the simplest and quietest fashion: none of that heartbreaking which will be inevitable between Madame Prune and myself; I even notice in my mousmé an indifference, an unconcern which puzzles me; I positively am at a loss to understand what it all means.

And I muse to myself as I continue to descend towards the sea. "Her appearance of sadness was not, therefore, on Yves' account. On whose, then?" and the phrase runs through my head:

"Come back to-morrow before setting sail, to bid me good-by; I shall only return to my mother in the evening; you will find me still up there."

Japan is indeed most delightful this evening, so fresh and so sweet; and little Chrysan

It is about two o'clock when we reach the Triomphante in a hired sampan, where I have heaped up all my cases till there is danger of sinking. The very tall friend gives over to me the watch that I must keep till four o'clock; and the sailors on duty, but half awake, make a chain in the darkness, to haul on board all my fragile luggage.

LII.

September 18th.

I had planned to sleep late this morning, in order to make up for my lost sleep of last night.

But behold, at eight o'clock, three persons of the most singular appearance, led by M. Kangourou, present themselves with endless bows at the door of my cabin. They are dressed in long robes bedizened with dark patterns; they have the flowing locks, high foreheads and pallid countenances of persons too exclusively devoted to the fine arts; and, perched on the top of their chignons, they wear sailor hats of English shape stuck jauntily on one side. Under their arms, they carry portfolios filled

At the first glance, even in the bewilderment of waking, I gather from their appearance what their errand is, and guessing with what visitors I have to deal, I say:—"Come in, Messieurs the tattooers!"

These are the specialists most in renown in Nagasaki; I had engaged them two days ago, not knowing that we were about to leave, and since they are come I will not turn them away.

My friendly and intimate relations with primitive man, in Oceania and elsewhere, have imbued me with a deplorable taste for tattoo work; and I had wished to carry away on me, as a curiosity, an ornament, a specimen of the work of the Japanese tattooers, who have a delicacy of finish which is unequaled.

From their albums spread out upon my table I make my choice. There are some remarkably odd designs amongst them, appropriate to the different parts of the human body: emblems for the arms and legs, sprays of roses for the shoulders, great grinning faces for the middle of the back. There are even, to suit the taste of their clients who belong to foreign navies, trophies of arms, American and French flags entwined, Journal Amusant.

My choice rests upon a singular blue and pink dragon a couple of inches long, which will have a fine effect upon my chest on the side opposite the heart.

Then follows an hour and a half of irritation and positive pain. Stretched out on my bunk and delivered over to the tender mercies of these personages, I stiffen myself and submit to the million imperceptible pricks they inflict. When by chance a little blood flows, confusing the outline by a stream of red, one of the artists hastens to staunch it with his lips, and I make no objections, knowing that this is the Japanese manner, the method used by their doctors for the wounds of both man and beast.

A piece of work as minute and fine as that of an engraver upon stone is slowly executed on my person; and their lean hands harrow and worry me with automatic precision.

At length it is finished, and the tattooers, falling back with an air of satisfaction to contemplate their work, declare it will be lovely.

I dress myself quickly to go on shore, and take advantage of my last hours in Japan.

The heat is fearful to-day: the powerful September sun falls with a certain melancholy

Like yesterday, it is during the drowsy noon that I ascend to my lofty suburb, by deserted pathways filled only with light and silence.

I noiselessly open the door of my dwelling, and enter cautiously on tiptoe, for fear of Madame Prune.

At the foot of the staircase, upon the white mats, by the side of the little clogs and little sandals which are always lying about the vestibule, there is a great array of luggage ready for departure, which I recognize at a glance,—pretty dark-colored dresses, familiar to my sight, carefully folded and wrapped in blue towels tied at the four corners. I even fancy I feel a little sad when I catch sight of a corner of the famous box of letters and souvenirs peeping out of one of these bundles, in which ray portrait by Uyeno now reposes among divers photographs of mousmés. A sort of long-necked mandolin, also ready for departure, lies on the top of the pile in its case of figured silk. It resembles the flitting of some gypsy, or rather it reminds me of an engraving in a book of fables I owned in my childhood: the whole thing is exactly like the slender wardrobe and the long guitar which the Cicala who had sung all the summer, carried upon her back

Poor little gypsy!

I mount the stairs on tiptoe, and stop at the sound of singing that I hear up in my room.

It is undoubtedly Chrysanthème's voice and the song is a cheerful one! This chills me and changes the current of my thoughts. I am almost sorry I have taken the trouble to come.

Mingled with the song is a noise I cannot understand: dzinn! dzinn! a clear metallic ring as of coins being flung vigorously on the floor. I am well aware that this vibrating house exaggerates every sound during the silence of night; but all the same, I am puzzled to know what my mousmé can be doing. Dzinn! dzinn! is she amusing herself with quoits, or the jeu du crapaud, or pitch and toss?

Nothing of the kind; I fancy I have guessed, and I continue my upward progress still more gently, on all fours, with the precautions of a Red Indian, to give myself for the last time the pleasure of surprising her.

She has not heard me come in. In our great white room, emptied and swept out, where the clear sunshine pours in, and the soft wind, and the yellowed leaves of the garden; she is sitting all alone, her back turned to the door: she is dressed for walking, ready to go to her

On the floor are spread out all the fine silver dollars which, according to our agreement, I had given her the evening before. With the competent dexterity of an old money-changer she fingers them, turns them over, throws them on the floor, and armed with a little mallet ad hoc, rings them vigorously against her ear, singing the while I know not what little pensive bird-like song which I daresay she improvises as she goes along.

Well, after all, it is even more completely Japanese than I could possibly have imagined it—this last scene of my married life! I feel inclined to laugh. How simple I have been, to allow myself to be taken in by the few clever words she whispered yesterday, as she walked beside me, by a tolerably pretty little phrase embellished as it was by the silence of two o'clock in the morning, and all the wonderful enchantments of night.

Ah! not more for Yves than for me, not more for me than for Yves, has any feeling passed through that little brain, that little heart.

When I have looked at her long enough, I call:—

"Hi! Chrysanthème!"

She turns confused, and reddening even to

She is quite wrong, however, to be so much troubled, for I am, on the contrary, delighted. The fear that I might be leaving her in some sadness had almost given me a pang, and I infinitely prefer that this marriage should end as it had begun, in a joke.

"That is a good idea of yours," I say; "a precaution which should always be taken in this country of yours, where so many evil-minded people are clever in forging money. Make haste and get through it before I start, and if any false pieces have found their way into the number, I will willingly replace them."

However, she refuses to continue before me, and I expected as much; to do so would have been contrary to all her notions of politeness, hereditary and acquired, all her conventionality, all her Japanesery. With a disdainful little foot, clothed as usual in exquisite socks with a special hood for the great toe, she pushes away the piles of white dollars and scatters them on the mats.

"We have hired a large covered sampan," she says to change the conversation, "and we are all going together,—Campanule, Jonquille, Touki, all your mousmés—to watch your vessel set sail. Pray sit down and stay a few minutes."

"

Chrysanthème bows her head and says no more, but seeing that I am really going, rises to escort me.

Without speaking, without the slightest noise, she follows me as we descend the staircase and cross the garden full of sunshine, where the dwarf shrubs and the deformed flowers seem, like the rest of the household, plunged in warm somnolence.

At the outer gate I stop for the last adieu: the little sad pout has reappeared, more accentuated than ever on Chrysanthème's face; it is the right thing, it is correct, and I should feel offended now were it absent.

Well, little mousmé, let us part good friends; one last kiss even, if you like. I took you to amuse me; you have not perhaps succeeded very well, but after all you have done what you could: given me your little face, your little curtseys, your little music; in short, you

She prostrates herself on the threshold of the door, her forehead against the ground, and remains in this attitude of superlatively polite salute as long as I am in sight, while I go down the pathway by which I am to disappear for ever.

As the distance between us increases, I turn once or twice to look at her again; but it is a mere civility, and meant to return as it deserves her grand final salutation.

LIII.

On entering the town, at the turn of the principal street, I have the good luck to meet No. 415, my poor relation. I was just at that moment in want of a speedy djin, and I at once get into his vehicle; besides, it will be an alleviation to my feelings, in this hour of departure, to take my last drive in company with a member of my family.

Unaccustomed as I was to be out of doors

In front of all the shops hang white shades, adorned here and there with slight designs in black, in the quaintness of which lurks I know not what,—something mysterious: dragons, emblems, symbolical figures The sky is too glaring; the light crude, implacable; never has this old town of Nagasaki appeared to me so old, so worm-eaten, so bald, notwithstanding all its veneer of new papers and gaudy paintings. These little wooden houses, of such marvelous cleanly whiteness inside, are black outside, time-worn, disjointed and grimacing. When one looks closely, this grimace is to be found everywhere: in the hideous masks laughing in the shop fronts of the innumerable curio-shops; in the grotesque figures, the playthings, the idols, cruel, suspicious mad;—it is even found in the buildings: in the friezes of the religious porticos, in the roofs of the thousand pagodas; of which the angles and gable-ends writhe and twist like the yet dangerous remains of ancient and malignant beasts.

And the disturbing intensity of expression reigning over inanimate nature, contrasts with the almost absolute blank of the human counteobjects of art."

Is it because I am about to leave this country, because I have no longer any link to bind me to it, any resting-place on its soil, and that my spirit is already on the wing? I know not, but

It is getting late; little by little, the siestas are everywhere coming to an end; the queer little streets brighten up and begin to swarm in the sunshine with many-colored parasols. Now begins the procession of uglinesses of the most impossible description,—a procession of long-robed, grotesque figures capped with pot-hats or sailors' head-gear. Business transactions begin again, and the struggle for existence, close and bitter here as in one of our own artisan quarters, but meaner and smaller.

At the moment of my departure, I can only find within myself a smile of careless mockery for the swarming crowd of this Liliputian curtseying people,—laborious, industrious, greedy of gain, tainted with a constitutional affectation, hereditary insignificance, and incurable monkeyishness.

Poor cousin 415, how right I was to have held him in good esteem; he is by far the best and most disinterested of my Japanese family. Triomphante, to watch over my final purchases in the sampan which conveys me to the ship, and to see them himself safely into my cabin.

His, indeed, is the only hand I clasp with a really friendly feeling, without a suppressed smile, on quitting this Japan.

No doubt, in this country as in many others, there is more honest friendship and less ugliness among the simple beings devoted to purely physical work.

At five o'clock in the afternoon we set sail.

Along the line of the shore are two or three sampans; in them the mousmés, shut up in the narrow cabins, peep at us through the tiny windows, half hiding their faces on account of the sailors; these are our wives, who have wished, out of politeness, to look upon us once more.

There are other sampans as well, in which other Japanese women are also watching our departure. These stand upright, under great parasols decorated with big black letters and daubed over with clouds of varied and startling colors.

We move slowly out of the great green bay. The groups of women become lost in the distance. The country of round and thousand-ribbed umbrellas fades gradually from our sight.

Now the great sea opens before us, immense, colorless, solitary; a solemn repose after so much that was too ingenious and too small.

The wooded mountains, the charming capes disappear. And Japan remains faithful to itself in its last picturesque rocks, its quaint islands on which the trees tastefully arrange themselves in groups—studied perhaps, but charmingly pretty.

LV.

In my cabin, one evening, in the midst of the Yellow Sea, my eyes chance to fall upon the lotus brought from Diou-djen-dji;—they had lasted for two or three days; but now they have faded, and pitifully strew my carpet with their pale pink petals.

I, who have carefully preserved so many

I pick them up, however, with a certain amount of consideration, and I open my port-hole.

From the gray misty sky a livid light falls upon the waters; a wan and gloomy kind of twilight creeps down, yellowish upon this Yellow Sea. We feel that we are moving northwards, that autumn is approaching.

I throw the poor lotus into the boundless waste of waters, making them my best excuses for giving to them, natives of Japan, a grave so solemn and so vast.

LVI.

O Ama-Térace-Omi-Kami, wash me clean from this little marriage of mine, in the waters of the river of Kamo.

THE END

COMPLETE LIST OF TITLES IN THE MODERN LIBRARY

For convenience in ordering please use number at right of title

AUTHOR TITLE AND NUMBER

AIKEN, CONRAD A Comprehensive Anthology of American Verse 101

AIKEN, CONRADModern American Poetry 127

ANDERSON, SHERWOODPoor White 115

ANDERSON, SHERWOODWinesburg, Ohio 104

ANDREYEV, LEONIDThe Seven That Were Hanged, and the Red Laugh 45

APULEIUS, LUCIUSThe Golden Ass 88

BALZAC Short Stories 40

BAUDELAIREProse and Poetry 70

BEARDSLEY, AUBREY64 Reproductions 42

BEEBE, WILLIAMJungle Peace 30

BEERBOHM, MAXZuleika Dobson 116

BIERCE, AMBROSEIn the Midst of Life 133

BLAKE, WILLIAMPoems 91

BRONTE, EMILYWuthering Heights 106

BROWN, GEO. DOUGLASThe House with the Green Shutters 129

BUTLER, SAMUELErewhon 136

BUTLER, SAMUELThe Way of All Flesh 13

CABELL, JAMES BRANCH Beyond Life 25

CABELL, JAMES BRANCHThe Cream of the Jest 126

CARPENTER, EDWARDLove's Coming of Age 51

CARROLL, LEWISAlice in Wonderland, etc. 79

CASANOVA, JACQUESMemoirs of Casanova 165

CELLINI, BENVENUTOAutobiography of Benvenuto Cellini 3

CERVANTESDon Quixote 174

CHAUCER The Canterbury Tales 161

CHESTERTON, G. K.Man Who Was Thursday 35

CRANE, STEPHENMen, Women and Boats 102

D'ANNUNZIO, GABRIELE Flame of Life 65

D'ANNUNZIO, GABRIELEThe Child of Pleasure 98

D'ANNUNZIO, GABRIELEThe Triumph of Death 112

DAUDET, ALPHONSESappho 85

DEFOE, DANIELMoll Flanders 122

DEWEY, JOHNHuman Nature and Conduct 173

DOSTOYEVSKY, FYODORThe Brothers Karamazov 151

DOSTOYEVSKY, FYODORPoor People 10

DOUGLAS, NORMANOld Calabria 141

DOUGLAS, NORMANSouth Wind 5

DOWSON, ERNESTPoems and Prose

DUMAS, ALEXANDRECamille 69

DUMAS, ALEXANDREThe Three Musketeers 143

DUNSANY, LORDA Dreamer's Tales 34

ELLIS, HAVELOCK The Dance of Life 160

ELLIS, HAVELOCKThe New Spirit 95

FLAUBERT, GUSTAVE Madame Bovary 28

FLAUBERT, GUSTAVESalammbo 118

FLAUBERT, GUSTAVETemptation of St. Anthony 92

FRANCE, ANATOLECrime of Sylvestre Bonnard 22

FRANCE, ANATOLEThe Queen Pedauque 110

FRANCE, ANATOLEThe Red Lily 7

FRANCE, ANATOLEThe Revolt of the Angels 11

FRANCE, ANATOLEThais 67

GAUTIER, THEOPHILE Mlle. De Maupin 53

GEORGE, W. L. A Bed of Roses 75

GILBERT, W. S.The Mikado, Iolanthe, etc. 26

GILBERT, W. S.Pinafore and Other Plays 113

GISSING, GEORGENew Grub Street 125

GISSING, GEORGEPrivate Papers of Henry Ryecroft 46

GONCOURT, E. & J. DERenee Mauperin 76

GORKY, MAXIMCreatures That Once Were Men and Other Stories 48

GOURMONT, REMY DEA Night in the Luxembourg 120

GOURMONT, REMY DEA Virgin Heart 131

HARDY, THOMAS Jude the Obscure 135

HARDY, THOMASThe Mayor of Casterbridge 17

HARDY, THOMASThe Return of the Native 121

HAUPTMANN, GERHARTThe Heretic of Soana 149

HAWTHORNE, NATHANIEL The Scarlet Letter 93

HEARN, LAFCADIOSome Chinese Ghosts 130

HECHT, BENErik Dorn 29

HEMINGWAY, ERNESTThe Sun Also Rises 170

HOMERThe Iliad 166

HOMERThe Odyssey 167

HUDSON, W. HGreen Mansions 89

HUDSON, W. H.The Purple Land 24

HUNEKER, JAMES O.Painted Veils 43

HUXLEY, ALDOUSA Virgin Heart 131

IBSEN, HENRIK A Doll's House, Ghosts, etc. 6

IBSEN, HENRIKHedda Gabler, Pillars of Society, The Master Builder 36

IBSEN, HENRIKThe Wild Duck, Rosmersholm, The League of Youth 54

JAMES, HENRY Daisy Miller, etc. 63

JAMES, HENRYThe Turn of the Screw 169

JAMES, WILLIAMThe Philosophy of William James 114

JOYCE, JAMESDubliners 124

JOYCE, JAMESA Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man 145

KIPLING, RUDYARD Soldiers Three 71

KOMROFF, MANUELOriental Romances 55

LAWRENCE, D. H. Sons and Lovers 109

LEWISOHN, LUDWIGUpstream 123

LOTI, PIERRE Mme. Chrysantheme 94

MACY, JOHN The Spirit of American Literature 56

MAUPASSANT, GUY DELove and Other Stories 72

MAUPASSANT, GUY DEMademoiselle Fifi, and Twelve Other Stories 8

MAUPASSANT, GUY DEUne Vie 57

MENKEN, H. L. Selected Prejudices 107

MELVILLE, HERMANMoby Dick 119

MEREDITH, GEORGEDiana of the Crossways 14

MEREDITH, GEORGEThe Ordeal of Richard Feverel 134

MEREJKOWSKI, DMITRIThe Death of the Gods 153

MEREJKOWSKI, DMITRIPeter and Alexis 175

MEREJKOWSKI, DMITRIThe Romance of Leonardo da Vinci 138

MISCELLANEOUSAn Anthology of American Negro Literature 163

A Modern Book of Criticism 81

Best Ghost Stories 73

Best American Humorous Short Stories 87

Best Russian Short Stories 18

Four Famous Greek Plays 158

Fourteen Great Detective Stories 144

Great Modern Short Stories 168

Edited by Grant Overton and including stories by Joseph Conrad, D. H. Lawrence, Katherine Mansfield, Sherwood Anderson, Glenway Westcott, E. M. Forster, etc.

Outline of Abnormal Psychology 152

Outline of Psychoanalysis 66

MOLIEREPlays 78

MOORE, GEORGEConfessions of a Young Man 16

MORRISON, ARTHURTales of Mean Streets 100

NIETZSCHE, FRIEDRICH Beyond Good and Evil 20

NIETZSCHE, FRIEDRICHEcce Homo and the Birth of Tragedy 68

NIETZSCHE, FRIEDRICHGenealogy of Morals 62

NIETZSCHE, FRIEDRICHThus Spake Zarathustra 9

O'NEILL, EUGENE The Emperor Jones and The Straw 146

O'NEILL, EUGENESeven Plays of the Sea 111

PAINE, THOMAS Writings 108

PATER, WALTERThe Renaissance 86

PATER, WALTERMarius the Epicurean 90

PEPYS, SAMUELSamuel Pepys' Diary 103

PETRONIUS ARBITERThe Satyricon 156

POE, EDGAR ALLANBest Tales 82

PREVOST, ANTOINEManon Lescaut 85

PROUST, MARCELSwann's Way 59

PROUST, MARCELWithin A Budding Grove 172

RODIN 64 Reproductions 41

ROSTAND, EDMONDCyrano de Bergerac 154

RUSSELL, BERTRANDSelected Papers of Bertrand Russell 137

SALTUS, EDGAR The Imperial Orgy 139

SCHNITZLER, ARTHURAnatol, Green Cockatoo, etc. 32

SCHNITZLER, ARTHURBertha Garlan 39

SCHOPENHAUERThe Philosophy of Schopenhauer 52

SCHOPENHAUERStudies in Pessimism 12

SCHREINER, OLIVE The Story of an African Farm 132

SHAW, G.B. An Unsocial Socialist 15

SMOLLETT, TOBIASHumphrey Clinker 159

SPINOZAThe Philosophy of Spinoza 60

STENDHALThe Red and the Black 157

STERNE, LAURENCETristram Shandy 147

STRINDBERG, AUGUSTMarried 2

SUDERMANN, HERMANNDame Care 33

SUDERMANN, HERMANNThe Song of Songs 162

SWINBURNE, CHARLESPoems 23

SYMONDS, JOHN A.The Life of Michelangelo 49

TCHEKOV Rothschild's Fiddle, etc. 31

TCHEKOVSea Gull, Cherry Orchard, Three Sisters, etc. 171

THOMPSON, FRANCISComplete Poems 38

TOLSTOY, LEOAnna Karenina 37

TOLSTOY, LEORedemption and Other Plays 77

TOLSTOY, LEOThe Death of Ivan Ilyitch and Four Other Stories 64

TOMLINSON, H. M.The Sea and The Jungle 99

TURGENEV, IVANFathers and Sons 21

TURGENEV, IVAN Smoke 80

VAN LOON, HENDRIK W. Ancient Man 105

VAN VECHTEN, CARL Peter Whiffle 164

VILLON, FRANCOIS Poems 58

VOLTAIRE Candide 47

WELLS, H.G. Ann Veronica 27

WHISTLER, J. MCNEIL The Art of Whistler with 32 Reproductions 150

WHITMAN, WALTLeaves of Grass 97

WILDE, OSCAR An Ideal Husband, A Woman of No Importance 84

WILDE, OSCAR De Profundis 117

WILDE, OSCAR Dorian Gray 1

WILDE, OSCAR Poems 19

WILDE, OSCARFairy Tales, Poems in Prose 61

WILDE, OSCARSalome, The Importance of Being Earnest, etc. 83

WILDER, THORNTONThe Cabala 155

WOOLF, VIRGINIA Mrs. Dalloway 96

YEATS, W.B. Irish Fairy and Folk Tales 44