sists of a cloak of a specific form, thrown over the other clothes. With the cloak is worn, by the higher classes, a very peculiar sort of trousers, called hakkama, which appears, both from the description given, and from the appearance of the article, so far as can be distinguished in the glass-cases of the Hague Museum, to be formed of an immensely full-plaited petticoat, sewed up between the legs, and left sufficiently open on the outside to admit of free locomotion.

The difference of rank signalized by these petticoat-trousers is only apparent upon occasions of ceremony: the constant criterion turns upon the wearing of swords. The higher orders wear two swords—on the same side, it should seem, and one above the other. The next in rank wear one; and, whether two or one, these are never, by any chance, laid aside. To the lower orders, a sword is strictly prohibited.

Within doors, socks are the only covering of the feet. Abroad, shoes are worn, but of the most inconceivably inconvenient kind. They are represented as little more than soles, of straw, matting, or wood, mainly kept on by an upright pin, or button, held between the two principal toes, which, for this purpose, project through an appropriate aperture in the socks; or, according to some older writers, by a horn ring. The impossibility of lifting a foot thus shod in walking, may amply account

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for the awkward gait ascribed to the Japanese.
Upon entering any house, these shoes are taken off.
The head-dress constitutes the chief difference,
The men

in point of costume, between the sexes.
shave the whole front and crown of the head; the
rest of the hair, growing from the temples and back
of the head, is carefully gathered together, drawn
upwards and forwards, and so tied as to form a sort
of tuft on the bald skull. Some professions, how-
ever, deviate from this general fashion; Budhist
priests and physicians shaving off all the hair,
while surgeons retain all theirs, gathered into a
knot at the top of the head.

The abundant hair of the women is arranged into the form of a turban, and stuck full of pieces of fine tortoiseshell, fifteen inches long, of the thickness of a man's finger, highly wrought, and polished to look like gold. They are said to be extremely costly; and the more of them project from a lady's hair, the better she is dressed. They wear no jewellery or other trinkets. The face is painted red and white, to the utter destruction of the complexion; the lips purple, with a golden glow; in addition to this, the teeth of a Japanese married lady are blackened and her eyebrows extirpated.

Neither men nor women wear hats, except as a protection against rain: the fan is deemed a sufficient guard from the sun; and, perhaps, nothing will more strike the newly-arrived European than

this fan, which he will behold in the hand or the girdle of every human being. Soldiers and priests are no more to be seen without their fans than fine ladies, who make of theirs the use to which fans are put in other countries. Amongst the men of Japan, it serves a great variety of purposes; visitors receive the dainties offered them upon their fans; the beggar, imploring charity, holds out his fan, for the alms his prayers may have obtained. The fan serves the dandy in lieu of a whalebone switch; the pedagogue instead of a ferule for the offending schoolboy's knuckles; and, not to dwell too long upon the subject, a fan, presented upon a peculiar kind of salver to the high-born criminal, is said to be the form of announcing his death-doom: his head is struck off at the same moment as he stretches it towards the fan.*

But we are getting beyond the objects that greet the eye on landing, and must pause.

* Siebold.

CHAPTER II.

LIFE AT DEZIMA.

Factitious island.-Factory.-Confinement of the Dutch therein. -Restrictions upon their intercourse with Natives-With Servants Female Servants.-Children by Japanese Women. -Restrictions upon their dealings.-Management of the Trade.- Police.-Interpreters.-Intercourse with Men in office.-Trampling upon the Picture of our Saviour.-Toleration and subsequent Persecution of Christianity.-Japanese Martyrs.-Anecdote of a wrecked Portuguese Brig.-Intercourse of subordinate Dignitaries.-Audiences of Governor of Nagasaki.-Dutch Sepulchres.

HAVING now landed the new member of the Dutch factory at Dezima, we must next take a survey of the spot in which he is, in most cases, to be immured for the next few years of his life. Like everything in Japan, it is original, being an artificial, or rather, perhaps, a factitious island, built in the bay, after the manner of a pier, or breakwater. The very object of its construction was to serve as a place of confinement, although not for the Dutch.

When the Japanese Government began to enter

tain jealousy and dislike of foreigners, the first measure taken, at the instigation of those feelings, was so to situate them as that they could conveniently be watched. For this purpose, the Europeans and their commerce were restricted to the two ports of Nagasaki and Firato, at which last place the Dutch factory was then established. The next step was to confine the Portuguese more closely still; with this view was their abode projected, and the island of Dezima directed to be built from the bottom of the sea. The emperor's pleasure being asked as to the form of the future island, he unfolded the ever actively-employed fan; and accordingly, in the shape of a fan, without the sticks upon which a fan is mounted, was the island constructed. When the Portuguese were finally expelled, the Dutch were transferred from Firato to their prison-house.

Dezima is about 600 feet in length by 240across, and is situated a few yards only distant from the shore, close upon which stands the town. of Nagasaki. The island and town are connected by a stone bridge, but a high wall prevents the dwellers in either from seeing those in the other. The view of the bay, teeming with life and bustle, appears indeed to be open to the inmates of the factory, secluded as they are; but the view is a distant one only, no Japanese boat being permitted to approach the island within a certain pre

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