m.s(.()Vi:HY 



a natural outcome of the highly volcanic mountain in the hills, whose favourite pastime is to beguile the 



ranges in which the country abounds and it is highly hours spent in the bath with the recital, in the loud 



prizt (1 by the pc;isantry and by the manyoutside visitors falsetto affected by the Japanese drama, of portions of 



attracted to the healing waters, either for the sake of popular plays, to which the damp air and confined 



health or in order to kill time pleasantly in the company space are held to lend enhanced effect. In this respect 



A SECIA'DRD VAI.I.rjY OX THK WRSTRRN OfTi^KIRT.S OI-' THIv MAIX R.VXGE 

 OK TUK XORTIIHRN JAI'ANKSE ALPS. 



of their friends. Although in some cases one now 

 finds separate compartments reserved for those who 

 prefer to bathe privately, it is much more usual for a 

 number of persons to bathe together without distinction 

 of age. sex, or class. At one time in some of the towns, 

 out of deference to European ideas of privacy, a cord 

 was stretched across the big wooden tanks with the 

 notice, " This side for ladies : that for gentlemen. " But 

 in the country-side such refinement is rarely observed, 

 yet everything is conducted with the utmost propriety 

 and decorum. 



Among the more educated habitues of the onsen are 

 found young men of the student class, holidav-making 



they differ seriously from the ancient Greeks, whom 

 in so many other ways they resemble, for the Athenians 

 considered noisy singing in the public baths a particular 

 sign of boorish behaviour. One of the onsen in the 

 Xorthern Japanese Alps, Shirahone in Shinshu. has 

 been in the possession of the family of its present 

 owners for three hundred years. WTien my wife and 

 I visited it in 1914. we noticed the edge of the main 

 public tank was hncd with a number of large water- 

 worn boulders from the bed of the neighbouring moun- 

 tain torrent. These, we were informed, were for the 

 use of the bathers, who lay them in their laps at night 

 when going to " bed " to prevent them from " turning 



