FORE:"Precisely. And because you have seen[Pg 179] more than I have you are less able to understand the matter than I am. You cannot see the wood for the trees. Again, you were frightened out of your life. Your scientific instincts were stampeded. You saw only a hideous malformation, a neural freak, a preposterous human machine. It was inconceivable that you should have been able to think clearly under the circumstances. Consider the matter in the sober aftermath of reason, and you must agree with me that it is really not more extraordinary that a man should function by mechanical means than that he should function at all." "We have seen so many things since we came here that I don't exactly know where to begin in telling the story of our sight-seeing. The names by which this city is known are so numerous that the reader of Japanese history of different dates is liable to be puzzled. Many of the natives speak of it as Miako, or the Capital; others have called it, and still call it, Saikio, or the Central City, and others know it only as Kioto, or the Western Capital. This last name has become the official one since the removal of the Mikado to Yeddo, which then became Tokio, or the Eastern Capital. But, by whatever name we know it, the city is a most delightful one, and the traveller who comes to Japan without seeing it is like one who goes to New York without visiting Central Park, or a stranger in Boston who does not see the famous Common. In many of its features Kioto is superior to Tokio, and any one of its inhabitants will[Pg 292] tell you so. The city stands on a plain of nearly horseshoe shape, the mountains almost encircling it and giving an abundance of charming views. On one side the houses climb a considerable distance up the slopes, so that you may sit on a balcony and see Kioto lying at your feet.
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