TWO:The great ship steamed onward, day after day and night after night. There was no storm to break the monotony; no sail showed itself on the horizon; no one left the steamer, and no new-comers appeared; nobody saw fit to quarrel with any one else; and there was not a passenger who showed a disposition to quarrel with his surroundings. Stories were told and songs were sung, to while away the time; and, finally, on the twentieth day, the captain announced that they were approaching land, and the voyage would soon be over.From Odiwara the roads were worse than they had found them thus far. They had come by jin-riki-shas from Yokohama, and had had no trouble; but from this place onward they were told that the roads were not everywhere practicable for wheeled carriages. The Japanese are improving their roads every year, and therefore a description for one season does not exactly indicate the character of another. Anybody who reads this story and then goes to Japan may find good routes where formerly there were only impassable gorges, and hotels and comfortable lodging-houses where, only a year before, there was nothing of the kind. In no country in the world at the present time, with the possible exception of the Western States of North America, are the changes so rapid as in the land of the Mikado. Wheeled carriages were practically unknown before Commodore Perry landed on Japanese soil, and the railway was an innovation undreamed of in the Japanese philosophy. Now wheeled vehicles are common, and the railway is a popular institution, that bids fair to extend its benefits in many directions. Progress, progress, progress, is the motto of the Japan of to-day.
