The palace is in the heart of the city, and I should say the grounds were two hundred acres in extent, all, including the neighboring streets, being lighted by the New York Edison Company. I saw the superintendent who had charge of the construction of the plant, who said it took them a year to do it.
The women to be seen in the streets and tea-houses are invariably small and very pretty, except some of the married ones, who have their teeth colored black in accordance with an ancient custom, which makes them look hideous.
It is very cool in this part of Japan at this season. There is not sufficient frost to affect the crops, but one gets cold riding about--and there is no efficient method of heating the houses. There is no coal used for domestic purposes, and wood is very scarce and high. If you ask for a fire, at most hotels, they bring you a copper pan containing ignited charcoal covered with ashes, which does about as much good as a kerosene lamp. I suffer greatly with the cold, and would be glad to pay a large price for a pair of Arctic overshoes.
The price of newspapers, printed in the English language, at Yokohama is twenty-five cents a copy, or thirty dollars per annum. They have very little news, and almost none from America.
We went through the museum, and saw many extraordinary curiosities of ancient and modern Japan. Among them was a stuffed rooster in a glass case, whose tail feathers were ten feet long. I thought there was some humbug about it, but I afterwards saw a live one with tail feathers twelve feet long.
The public buildings are modern, large, and handsome, and the people very polite and good-natured. The streets are narrow. Great crowds are everywhere. It seems to me that I must have seen a hundred thousand people to-day. Every thing about the city is strange, often disagreeable and offensive. A couple of days in it is quite sufficient, and I shall be very glad to go away to-morrow.
We left Tokio on the 17th, at 6.46 A.M., for a station called Utsumorama, ninety-three miles. Arrived at noon, and, after an excellent lunch, started in _jinrickishas_ for this place, and a most extraordinary and unique trip it proved to be.
The road was built hundreds of years ago by a Shinto king, and is an admirable example of engineering; well drained, and with an excellent foundation of small stones, which needed only a top-dressing and a steam roller to make it as good as any in Europe. It is lined on both sides with immense pine and cedar trees. Many of these trees are twelve feet in diameter; and often the roots are grown together, so that four or five trees look like one. They are sixty to eighty feet high, and afford an excellent shade.