Author of "The Mikado's Empire" and "Japanese Fairy World" WITH MANY ILLUSTRATIONS, INCLUDING SEVEN FULL-PAGE PICTURES DRAWN AND ENGRAVED BY JAPANESE ARTISTS BOSTON, U.S.A. D. C. HEATH & CO., PUBLISHERS 1909 Copyright, 1901, By D. C. Heath & Co....

Over a quarter of a century ago, while engaged in introducing the American public school system into Japan, I became acquainted in Tokio with Mrs. Matilda Chaplin Ayrton, the author of "Child-Life in Japan." This highly accomplished lady was a graduate of Edinburgh University, and had obtained the degrees of Bachelor of Letters and Bachelor of Sciences, besides studying medicine in Paris. She had married Professor William Edward Ayrton, the electric engineer and inventor, then connected with the

In almost every home are Japanese fans, in our shops Japanese dolls and balls and other knick-knacks, on our writing-tables bronze crabs or lacquered pen-tray with outlined on it the extinct volcano [Fuji San] [1] that is the most striking mountain seen from the capital of Japan. At many places of amusement Japanese houses of real size have been exhibited, and the jargon of fashion for "Japanese Art" even reaches our children's ears. Yet all these things seem dull and lifeless when thus severed

T hese little boys all live a long way off in islands called "Japan." They have all rather brown chubby faces, and they are very merry. Unless they give themselves a really hard knock they seldom get cross or cry. In the second large picture two of the little boys are playing at snowball. Although it may be hotter in the summer in their country than it is here, the winter is as cold as you feel it. Like our own boys, these lads enjoy a fall of snow, and still better than snowballing they like ma

Little Good Boy had just finished eating the last of five rice cakes called "dango," that had been strung on a skewer of bamboo and dipped in soy sauce, when he said to his little sister, called Chrysanthemum:— "O-Kiku, it is soon the great festival of the New Year." "What shall we do then?" asked little O-Kiku, not clearly remembering the festival of the previous year. Thus questioned, Yoshi-san [4] had his desired opening to hold forth on the coming delights, and he replied:— "Men will come th

Yoshi-san and his Grandmother go to visit the great temple at Shiba. They walk up its steep stairs, and arrive at the lacquered threshold. Here they place aside their wooden clogs, throw a few coins into a huge box standing on the floor. It is covered with a wooden grating so constructed as to prevent pilfering hands afterward removing the coin. Then they pull a thick rope attached to a big brass bell like an exaggerated sheep-bell, hanging from the ceiling, but which gives forth but a feeble, t

T here was once upon a time a little baby whose father was Japanese ambassador to the court of China, and whose mother was a Chinese lady. While this child was still in its infancy the ambassador had to return to Japan. So he said to his wife, "I swear to remember you and to send you letters by the ambassador that shall succeed me; and as for our baby, I will despatch some one to fetch it as soon as it is weaned." Thus saying he departed. Well, embassy after embassy came (and there was generally

A  girl once lived in the province of Echigo, [13] who from her earliest years tended her parents with all filial piety. Her mother, when, after a long illness she lay at the point of death, took out a mirror that she had for many years concealed, and giving it to her daughter, spoke thus, "when I have ceased to exist, take this mirror in thy hand night and morning, and looking at it, fancy that 'tis I thou seest." With these last words she expired, and the girl, full of grief, and faithful to h

How curious that the daughter of a peasant dwelling in a obscure country village near Aska, in the province of Yamato, [15] should become a Queen! Yet such was the case. Her father died while she was yet in her infancy, and the girl applied herself to the tending of her mother with all filial piety. One day when she had gone out in the fields to gather some parsley, of which her mother was very fond, it chanced that Prince Shotoku, the great Buddhist teacher, [16] was making a progress to his pa

At Akita, in the province of Inaba, lived an independent gentleman, [17] who had two daughters, by whom he was ministered to with all filial piety. He was fond of shooting with a gun, and thus very often committed the sin (according to the teaching of holy Buddha) of taking life. [18] He would never hearken to the admonitions of his daughters. These, mindful of the future, and aghast at the prospect in store for him in the world to come, frequently endeavored to convert him. Many were the tears

A traveller arrived at a village, and looking about for an inn, he found one that, although rather shabby, would, he thought, suit him. So he asked whether he could pass the night there, and the mistress said certainly. No one lived at the inn except the mistress, so that the traveller was quite undisturbed. The next morning, after he had finished break-fast, the traveller went out of the house to make arrangements for continuing his journey. To his surprise, his hostess asked him to stop a mome

T he games we are daily playing at in our nurseries, or some of them, have been also played at for centuries by Japanese boys and girls. Such are blindman's buff (eye-hiding), puss-in-the-corner, catching, racing, scrambling, a variety of "here we go round the mulberry bush." The game of knuckle-bones is played with five little stuffed bags instead of sheep bones, which the children cannot get, as sheep are not used by the Japanese. Also performances such as honey-pots, heads in chancery, turnin

H ow often in Japan one sees that the children of a larger growth enjoy with equal zest games which are the same, or nearly the same, as those of lesser size and fewer years! Certain it is that the adults do all in their power to provide for the children their full quota of play and harmless sports. We frequently see full-grown and able-bodied natives indulging in amusements which the men of the West lay aside with their pinafores, or when their curls are cut. If we, in the conceited pride of ou

REVISED AND ILLUSTRATED The Heart of Oak Books A Collection of Traditional Rhymes and Stories for Children, and of Masterpieces of Poetry and Prose for Use at Home and at School, chosen with special reference to the cultivation of the imagination and the development of a taste for good reading. EDITED BY CHARLES ELIOT NORTON Book I. Rhymes, Jingles and Fables. For first reader classes. Illustrated by Frank T. Merrill. 128 pages. 25 cents. Book II. Fables and Nursery Tales. For second reader clas