The whole of the 9th Brigade of the 5th Army Division has returned to Japa Tokio is consequently en fete to-song these gallant soliier lids there is no small number of her own citizens, To understand the joy of the Javanese metropolis on the present occasion it will be necessary, however, for the reader to learn something of its sorrow on taking leave of its sons, which, thanks to conscri tion, it often has todo; and the imparting of such information will be all the more neesssary in the present connection, as the city is not only thronged to-day with men who have fought in North China, and with disbanded soldiers who return to. them.
to-day after having performed their period of services but also with conscripts come to join the Ist Army Division, and so loare-taki otherwise, are ter of Tokio.
Conscription is of course new in Japan, has of course been borrowed, but 2 show that they can at all events whit they' borrow, for the ceremonies which mak the departure of the new "recruity" are thoroughly original, national, amd beautiful. The motive of these ceremonies is the same as that which has originated the Trish convoy," an institution that sprang itself, I presume, from the "seeing off" of bouchaleen bound for Ameriky by a few of his immediate relatives, but has been developed by Ceiticenthusiasm and fondness until the "function now engrosses the night preceding the departure, and starts the emigrant on his trave's with more whisky in his inside than is gond for him. Tu Japan the formal seeing off it by his friends and acquaintances the same way a very. simple r originally, but is now quite complicated a function as ceremonial tea drinking. In the first place. the parents of the conscript erect a banner in front of the house. It consists of a long bar hoo with " sieve-like ball of bamboo strips fixed en top, and coy all over with uttering pieces of imitation gold leaf. The cross bar, which is suspended by twist: ed white and blue ribbons, is disproportion ately narrow, while on the other hand, the banner itself is dixproportionately lone, belugas long almost as the pole itself, or in other words, ry Japanese banner of the old style. The motto borne by this graceful and elongated fabric was somewhat follows: Messrs. Ss and So will see off Mr. Arimasu, who joins the—Regiment—Barracks to-day." Small flags of the 1 are attached to this banner or worked on to the fabric; vay white and blue tassels and ribbons hang from the extremities of the cross bar, and to the bottom corners of the banner itself often attached two tiny triangul ped lags of red silk. These contain charms similar to those sewed on the garments of every little childes oon as it commences to walk, or hung from the ring at the base of every geisha's big lantern. "Rich people have many banners such as these, a score or so of which are sometimes carried in front of the martial youth on his way to barracks, and engage. besides a brass bind which discourses most execrable music. When one sees a house with some dozens of bannermen—gillies red-shan Chinese ch: ed tea-chests—standing outside, and the band getting ready for work, he may be sure that the hero is inside parting with his mamma. Such partings are never in Japan made an occasion for seenes; there is seldom a wot eye, but one can see that there is brief, and that the banners and the band and the big breakfast at which the sake cup cetiing it. As for the sike cup, its use never results in a Donnybrook—I don't know why. The sake seems to have, if anything, a deadening effect, and on great occasions, like tha present one sees inebriated men being swiftly piloted through the streets in jinrieshas, out of which heads a little red and putly under the eyes lean sideways with a delicate suggestion of a faded lily ora languishing poppy. Yes, a wonderful country is Japan, where the schoolboy is politely birched, the criminal politely collared. and the murderer politely hanged (Henry Norman); where the man in the street exudes a sweet perfume from his warments (Sir Edwin Arnold) and where the " boys" get intoxicated with the utmost urbanity an} decorum, To come back to our recruit, however there he is in his best clothes, his face shining like brass-work, for he has just hada hot Mth, What matter is it that the European clothes which he has donned for the occasion are all awry, and that even ostentation does not condone the stuffing of trouser hems into elastic boots? It. is not he but a too fond mother is to blame for these anomalies, and her hand is to beseen too in the heaps of useless things with which he is encumbered on his way to the barracks,—a rug, a carpet bay and other European paraphernalia, as well Japanese straw-trunk and a number of things done up in silk handkerchiefs—perhaps they include old boots, for in Japan the wrapping is generally more preious than the object it encloses; they certainly include materials for the concostion of various Japanese dishes, although the recruit will ha much better fed in bir-racks than ever he was at home—will for instance make the acquaintance of bread there and taste meat for the first time, Aroma him are clustered his pretty sisters who kneel at his feet and con template him if he were a god—for in apan the superiority of the mate ix the first article in the girl's eveed; his younger brother in student's uniform, that is with blue Enrapon clothes, brass buttons, and German cap with dazed peak; his old other, outwardly hilarious and proud but sad enough at heart, clad in Japanse dress except at both! extremities for the upper part of his body is concealed henenth a very large and damaged bowler hab while his feet are encased in well-wor clastic-sides "evidently "thrown in with the head-dress at the second-hand clothes shop around the corner. There are other relives present and a crowd watching the banners and the band outside. The young man at length takes "of his women folk and, accompanied by ther and his male relatives, sets out. The neighbour give him a parting banzai the banners flutter from their tall poles, the wheezy band strikes up the national anthem, Kimiga yowa chiyoni yachiyoni Sazare ishing iwahotonatite, and another recruit is on his way to fall into line under the Sunburst banners and fight, if needs be, for the Mikado and the four hundred Isles.
Upwards of ten pounds sterling are sometimes laid out on these; banners which are occasionally of silk, and this—to a Japanese—enormous expense was wisely discouraged as much as possible by the superior officers because it is not only a source of great expense to the friends of the conseript—for it is always the friends who present it to the family—but because the gorgeous displays of the richer families make those of poorer people look shabby. The son of a popular actor has been enrolled this time and the silk crepe banners in his train number no less than 70 and each cost about £2 sterling.
One of the rich conscripts, a younger brother, I think of Baron Inasaki, dis. couraged it ona still more effective way by his own example, Hoe had had to serve
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.