12 
THE NATIONAL NURSERYMAN 
embracing some of the world’s largest steamship lines, 
trading to Australia, America, Europe and they are rap¬ 
idly extending this shipping trade—already vast. They 
are developing their new colonies of Formosa and Corea 
and they realize that in order to preserve their national 
independence and be a world power, they must compete 
with western nations according to western methods. 
Throughout the Orient, one is constantly impressed by 
the strange mingling of the east and west—the Orient 
with the Occident. This is very noticeable in China, 
India and the Phillipines. but still more so in Japan. To 
use an illustration of this from my own experience, I 
arrived at the railroad station for Yokohoma at 8 o’clock 
one evening and while there were hundreds of jinrick¬ 
shaws around—those little chairs on two wheels so 
paid 15 cents for a very long and hard day’s work. Like 
many Japanese ports, Nagasaki is a naval base, so no 
photographs may he taken atloat or ashore, hut we 
spent over two days there very pleasantly visiting the 
temples, shrines and shops and strolling up the narrow 
crowded streets. 
Our route took us through the inland sea of Japan, 
which we entered by a very narrow passage, with the 
cities of Shimonoseki and Moji on either side of us, nav¬ 
igation is difficult and tedious as there are so many 
junks and fishing boats around, in fact the water is 
studded with them and they have the right of way over 
steamers. We wormed our way for 400 miles through 
these islands to Kobe, the principal seaport of Japan, a 
city only 50 years old. though with a population of 
This explains why Mr. Jas. McHutchison was not at the last Convention 
Photo taken near Tokio, Japan 
familiar in the Orient, I was whisked away by my friends 
in an automobile through the crowded streets to a Jap¬ 
anese tea-house and in 20 minutes was sitting cross- 
legged on the floor clad only in a kimona, eating raw fish 
and other Japanese delicacies with chopsticks, while 
Geisha girls entertained us with music and dancing, 
thus one goes from the west to the east in a few minutes. 
The 4th of July we spent at Nagasaki, where we got 
our first view of Japan; the harbor is landlocked and 
very picturesque, with many small islands around and 
the rice fields running up the hillsides in terraces. 
Anchored alongside of us was the Pacific Mail liner 
“Mongolia” taking on coal. This operation occupied 
fully 1,000 Japs, mostly women, who passed the coal in 
small baskets from hand to hand up ladders ranging up 
the steamer’s side from the barges below; they stow 
away about 400 tons per hour that way, the women are 
375.000 people. 
The large cities such as Kobe, Yokohoma and Tokio 
have been much modernized. The European settlements 
of the seaport cities usually are along the water front or 
Bund, as in Chinese Cities, the streets have been widen¬ 
ed and excellent electric street cars run along them 
Some of the buildings are very fine, the hanks especially 
so. There are larger and finer bank buildings in Tokio 
than I have seen anywhere, not even excepting London, 
New York or Berlin. Of course, outside of these settle¬ 
ments, the cities are Japanese, with small shops and nar ¬ 
row streets, but clean everywhere. 
Tokio is a vast city, with a population of well over 
two millions. The center of Ihe city is occupied by the 
Imperial palaces, city and government buildings and em¬ 
bassies of foreign nations, the streets are as wide as in 
the best parts of Paris, there are many fine parks, 
