422 JAPAN. 



and quicker route liy sea, by means of a regular line of mail 

 steamers. I was surprised to find that, towards the middle 

 part of the great road, where no open ports were near, we 

 afforded in our own persons a gratis exhibition of very great 

 interest. 



I was especially worth seeing, since I had a reddish beard 

 of some length. The Japanese consider beards and moustaches 

 excessively ugly, and they even used to put false beards and 

 moustaches, often red in colour, on the face-pieces of their 

 suits of armour, in order to assist the warriors in terrifying 

 their enemies. 



It was amusing to watch the faces of the people in some of 

 the towns as they glared at us. I saw one woman look as if 

 taken suddenly ill, on meeting me unexpectedly at a corner. 

 Others burst out into fits of laughter. Everywhere, the idea 

 uppermost in the minds of parents, was, that we were a sight 

 which the children should on no account be allowed to miss. 

 Mothers darted into the back premises and rushed back with 

 their children, and often when we were halting, came and 

 planted them in front of us, and pointed out to the children, 

 with their outstretched hands, the various points of interest in 

 the Tojins. 



I was, as Mr. Dickins said, a first-rate Tojin. "Tojin," 

 originally meaning Chinaman, the only foreigner the Japanese 

 knew, now means foreigner of any kind, and it is also at the 

 same time a term of reproach, like the well-known Chinese 

 " Fan kwai," " Aboriginal Imp." Impudent small boys shout 

 "Tojin, Tojin," at an Englishman in the streets. 



The Japanese being a race invariably black-haired, and with 

 a tolerably uniform tint of skin, are naturally somewhat asto- 

 nished at the great diversity in appearance of so mongrel a race 

 as the English, whose hair is of all possible colours, often 

 irrespective of that of the parents, and whose skin varies in 

 colour through so many different shades of brown, red, or 

 milky-white. 



The Japanese believe very strongly in the efficacy of natural 

 hot-springs, and also of certain cold-springs. At some springs 

 chapels are erected, and the patient combines the curative 

 effects of prayer with those of the cold douche. I saw a 

 number of bathers near Yokohama, standing one by one under 

 a small intensely cold waterfall, coming direct from a spring. 

 They were shivering and quaking, and half gasping, half bellow- 

 ing out with pain the prayer which had to be repeated a certain 

 number of times before they came from under the spout. A 

 stout healthy priest stood by to direct the ceremony and take 

 the money. 



