familiar individuality, as King Edward, for instance, and Kaiser Wilhelm are to us. Such a question as "Is the Mikado popular?" which we have sometimes been asked in England, shows the questioner to be ten thousand miles from an appreciation of the attitude of men's minds in Japan, or indeed in any Far-Eastern land,—an attitude entirely reverential and distant, as to a god. Future generations of Japanese will probably know the present monarch as Meiji Tennō, the word Tennō, as already explained, signifying "Heavenly Emperor," and Meiji being the chronological designation of the years comprised in his reign. The reign itself will doubtless stand out in Japanese history as prominently as those which witnessed Japan's first great revolution,—her conversion to Buddhism and Chinese civilisation.
A point of etiquette which foreigners should bear in mind, is that neither the Emperor himself nor any member of the Imperial Family must ever be looked down on. Should an Imperial procession pass by, do not stand at an upper window or on any commanding height. The occasional infraction of this rule has given great offence, and produced disagreeable results.
Book recommended. Failing something more vivid and "intimate," "Am japanischen Hofe," by O. von Mohl, who was entrusted during the eighties of the past century with the delicate task of reorganising the etiquette of the Imperial Japanese Court on European lines, may perhaps interest the general reader.
Mineral Springs. Japan, the land of volcanoes and earth quakes, is naturally rich in mineral springs: and the Japanese, with their passion for bathing, make the fullest use of them. The most noted of the many hundreds of Japanese spas are: for sulphur baths, Kusatsu, Ashinoyu, Yumoto near Nikkō, Nasu, Shiobara, and Unzen near Nagasaki; for iron baths, Ikao, Arima, and Beppu; for salt baths, Atami and Isobe. Miyanoshita, one of those best-known to foreigners, has only traces of salt and soda. Its waters may therefore be used without medical advice, simply for pleasure's sake. There are powerful iron and sulphur springs at Oji-
