be a good pedestrian all his life, and at that moment was ready to match himself against any professed mountaineer.

We had a fine passage, and no sickness on board that I heard of—but I thought the fewer inquiries the better-so that every one was in the highest possible spirits when we landed at Yokohama.

The next three months were a time of almost unremitting worry and trouble for me; and I had but little time to give to pleasure, or to bothering myself about the cholera, that in spite of all precautions had reached the capital. I had a staff with which I was totally unacquainted, to assist me in work that I had to find out everything about. My own cadets, that I had taken some trouble with during the last four years, I had to leave behind for the elder Tom, who made good use of them. The only English assistant-engineer had his special work to look after away from the head office. This was the renewal of the long bridge over the Rokugo river, the first and largest work of the renewals now required along the whole line; and was in itself fully as much as one man could be expected to look after.

The new bridge, which was constructed on a different line to the old one, was virtually complete structurally when I arrived; and after testing and connecting up with the existing line at each end, was opened by the Minister of Public Works, Mr. Ito Hirobumi, on the 29th of November, with some little festive ceremony. This was the largest iron bridge yet constructed in Japan, and was very creditable to Theodore Shann, the assistant

engineer, who had charge of the works under my two predecessors in succession, and who, owing to poor England's death, was the only available representative of the engineering talent employed upon it at the opening.

More remained behind, however, as there were over forty other bridges, varying from some hundreds to one ten of feet in length, to be renewed; and these were all on the existing line. Of general work there was no lack, and I had to go through my staff like a raging fire before I could get things straight. This little piece of railway of eighteen miles, the first constructed in the country, was a model almost of what things should not be, from the rotting wooden drains to the ambitious terminal stations, that always suggested by their arrangement the idea that they had been cast, from some region under heaven, with a pitchfork into the places where they were now visible. I also found that the ideas of work generally were very different in the metropolis to what we had been accustomed to in the provinces. I was so taken aback by what I saw at first, that I made excursions to various other scenes of building operations, and noted what was in progress, before I could believe that what was called work in Tōkiyō was really regarded in that light: and it was only by getting the Japanese authorities to introduce. piecework with a progressively declining scale of payment that I could succeed in approaching the efficiency of labour elsewhere. My native assistants were some of them of a dreamy temperament, and considered the first thing necessary in all calculations

involving inches, was to reduce every dimension into decimals of a foot, to six places of decimals at least; and then resorted to books of logarithms to throw some light upon their subject. In this way about a week was required to ascertain how many bricks went to a given-sized wall. However, the joy that there was in the cadets' office over one sum that had proved amenable to persuasion was so great that one could hardly regret the ninety and nine cases that ended in as many absurdities; and we did get along somehow.

I had succeeded also to my predecessor's house at the Shimbashi terminus in Tōkiyō, a good-sized residence for a large family, being a pair of semi-detached houses knocked into one. The garden was large and tolerably well stocked; and the situation pretty open and near the bay. Like many houses in Japan, it was a wooden framework disguised in the appearance of masonry by means of plaster, and as all houses do in Japan sooner or later, it came to a sad ending; but this in its place-not yet awhile, thank goodness.

So my fourth year of work came to its close, with much still to do in view before me; and surroundings that, I was happy to find, only wanted a little looking after to ensure that my leisure moments should not be devoid of a certain recreative pleasure, handmaid of useful effort.

CHAPTER IX.

TŌKIYŌ (1878).

THE first few days of 1878 were by no means such as the Japanese love to find about the new year. The last two days of December and the first three of January are official holidays; the 4th is appointed for a commencement of business, which means merely attendance for half an hour; the 5th is another holiday, and so on. The closing days of the year are supposed to be devoted to settling one's private affairs and providing for festivities, and the opening days of the new year are devoted to socialities, such as complimentary calls and receptions.

All persons of sufficient rank to entitle them to the calls of a large number of clients, subordinates, or intimates, provide a box and a boy to wait at the front door; and it is not necessary, unless some degree of intimacy exists between the caller and the "callee," for the former to go beyond inserting his card in the box, and receiving the thanks of the boy for his politeness. In bad weather this business of calling is rather a bore, but many give themselves up to it systematically, which compels those who are not fond of exchanging

civilities with ceremonious visitors, to go away for a week's shooting, or contrive otherwise so as not to be caught at home; and really bad weather is a nuisance. to them also. This year it was almost constantly raining up to the 9th of January; but at last it cleared up and allowed people to polish off all arrears.

A walk through the streets of any large town, on a fine day at the commencement of a year, is rather an amusing experience. The good people pervade the streets in holiday garments, on calling expeditions; or, in the case of women, armed with battledore, they occupy any available space near their own doors and fill the air with shuttle-cocks, while children and servants fly kites. One's progress has to be warily conducted, unless it is a joy to be beaten on the back and smitten on the nose (always with profuse apologies), or harried by whirring things, or entangled in strings, or butted in the chest by smiling persons whose eyes are fixed upon some acquaintance who is returning their bow from the other side of the road. The babies, carried on the back, are the only beings who don't come to grief in some way, for the occasional delivery of them on to the roadway, over their mothers' shoulders, like coals, is of course merely so much practice for them against they are big enough to butt the stranger.

On the 2nd of January was held the usual Imperial reception for officials of my degree, representative of the foreign element in the government departments. On the Ist, the Mikado receives the Ministers of State and the representatives of foreign Powers. We smaller luminaries assembled on the 2nd, at our different head