22 
BEAUTIFUL SCENERY. 
Chap. I. 
its summit. It was a glorious autumnal day, such 
a day as one rarely sees in our own changeable 
climate. The sky was cloudless, so that when we 
reached the top our view on all sides was bounded 
only by the horizon. Looking to the south-east, 
far below us we saw the town of Nagasaki, with 
the beautiful bay in its front. On its smooth 
waters were the ships of several nations at anchor, 
besides a number of boats and junks of native 
build, and rather picturesque in their way. Turn- 
ing round and looking to the north-west, the eye 
rested on many hundreds of little hills having a 
conical form, and covered to their summits with 
trees and brushwood. Behind them were moun- 
tains, apparently 2000 or 3000 feet in height, and 
a deep bay looking like an inland sea. Amongst 
the hills there were many beautiful and fertile 
valleys, now yellow with the ripening rice crops ; 
and numerous villages and farmhouses gave life 
to the scene, which was one of extraordinary 
beauty and interest. 
On our way home we visited a little garden 
belonging to an interpreter to the Japanese 
Government. Here again I noticed some azaleas 
remarkable for their great size, and an extra- 
ordinary specimen of a dwarfed fir-tree. Its 
lower branches were trained horizontally some 
twenty feet in length ; all the leaves and branch- 
lets were tied down and clipped, so that the whole 
was as flat as a board. The upper branches were 
trained to form circles one above another like so 
