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to get them, and promised to study as earnestly as I could. But how unpleasant the first day at school was! When I went to the school, none of the students knew me, and I found myself without a friend. I entered a classroom. A teacher, with a whip in his hand, called my name in a large voice. I was very much surprised at it, and so frightened that I could not help crying. The boys laughed very loudly at me; but the teacher scolded them, and whipped one of them, and then said to me, 'Don't be afraid of my voice: what is your name?' I told him my name, snuffling. I thought then that school was a very disagreeable place, where we could neither weep nor laugh. I wanted only to go back home at once; and though I Felt it was out of my power to go, I could scarcely bear to stay until the lessons were over. When I returned home at last, I told my father what I had Felt at school, and said: ' I do not like to go to school at all.'"
    Needless to say the next memory is of Meiji. It gives, as a composition, evidence of what we should call in the West, character. The suggestion of self-reliance at six years old is delicious: so is the recollection of the little sister taking off her white tabi to deck her child-brother on his first school-day:—
    "I was six years old. My mother awoke me early. My sister gave me her own stockings (tabi) to wear,—and I Felt very happy. Father ordered a servant to attend me to the school; but I refused to be accompanied: I wanted to Feel that I could go all by myself. So I went alone; and, as the school was not far from the house, I soon found myself in front of the gate. There I stood still a little while, because I knew none of the children I saw going in. Boys and girls were passing into the schoolyard, accompanied by servants or relatives; and inside I saw others playing games which filled me with envy. But all at once a little boy among the players saw me, and with a laugh came running to me. Then I was very happy. I walked to and fro with him, hand in hand. At last a teacher called all of us into a schoolroom, and made a speech which I could not understand. After that we were free for the day because it was the first day. I returned home with my friend. My parents were waiting for me, with fruits and cakes; and my friend and I ate them together."
    Another writes:—
    "When I first went to school I was six years old. I remember only that my grandfather carried my books and slate for me, and that the teacher and the boys were very, very, very kind and good to me,—so that I thought school was a paradise in this world, and did not want to return home."
    I think this little bit of natural remorse is also worth the writing down:—
    "I was eight years old when I first went to school. I was a bad boy. I remember on the way home from school I had a quarrel with one of my playmates,—younger than I. He threw a very little stone at me which hit me. I took a branch of a tree lying in the road, and struck him across the face with all my might. Then I ran away, leaving him crying in the middle of the road. My heart told me what I had done. After reaching my home, I thought I still heard him crying. My little playmate is not any more in this world now. Can any one know my Feelings? "
    All this capacity of young men to turn back with perfect naturalness of Feeling to scenes of their childhood appears to me essentially Oriental. In the Occident men seldom begin to recall their childhood vividly before the approach of the autumn season of life. But childhood in Japan is certainly happier than in other lands, and therefore perhaps is regretted earlier in adult life. The following extract from a student's record of his holiday experience touchingly expresses such regret:
    "During the spring vacation, I went home to visit my parents. Just before the end of the holidays, when it was nearly time for me to return to the college, I heard that the students of the middle school of my native town were also