Down below in the streets of the town the lights of art are paling in that of Nature’s lantern. The harbour is a huge replica of the glass of frosted silver I bought last week in a curio-shop for twenty yen. The ships at anchor are mere spectres, narrow lines of ink, some of them with dots of light along their sides; the shadow of the hills, over which the moon peeps with cold, white face, just the breath on the glass as when a woman looks too closely into it.
The sounds of singing and dancing appear fewer now it is less sombre. Why does darkness exaggerate noise?
A steamer is going out; it is the mail, a thin thing like the match P. and O. boats I often swam in a bowl when a boy the lights of her saloon mere glow-worms at this distance. But my companion must have seen all this many times before. Of course he has. And being more interested
