eigner, and when he does it is often both sweeping and uncomplimentary. In conversation with a Japanese gentleman who is well known both in Japan and in Europe, on the question of the anti-foreign feeling, he remarked that the Englishman in England was of quite a different stamp from the Englishman in Japan; as the latter was totally unable to distinguish the difference between a Japanese gentleman and a coolie, with the result that "the local foreigners treated all Japanese like rikisha boys."

This may hold good with regard to certain local foreigners and tourists, but it is not at all justified in the case of many of the residents.

I feel that I am plagiarizing everybody who has written on the subject of Japan when I say that the term "Ketojin" or "hairy barbarian" is the contemptuous method employed by the Japanese to designate the foreigner. The freedom, however, with which this expression is employed by the Japanese of the present day, who usually take it for granted that no foreigner understands anything of their language, makes it very obvious that the spirit of contempt which centuries ago gave birth to this opprobrious title still holds good to a great extent.

After all, the people of most nations have methods of designating the people of others by means of epithets which are neither less forcible nor in better taste, and, while sometimes the employment of such terms may add to the gayety, it seldom affects detrimentally the relations of the nation in question.

CHAPTER IV

PRESENT DAY EDUCATION

THE earliest authenticated educational code in Japan was promulgated during the first years of the eighth century in the reign of the Emperor Mombu.

As educational codes go, it was of course primitive enough, providing as it did merely for a certain amount of instruction for Court officials. But all things must have a beginning, and the example afforded by this particular code, with its narrow scope, was soon followed and improved upon. The educational circle soon after expanded until it embraced the samurai, who, as a class, can perhaps best be described as corresponding to something between the knights and the squires who were retained in the service of our barons in the days of feudalism in England.

At that time the complete samurai was expected to be proficient in etiquette, horsemanship, archery, music, reading, writing, and arithmetic; that is to say, he had to attain seven accomplishments, the last four of which were not considered at all necessary to his British equivalent at the period in question.

However, it was not until the commencement of the Meiji era, a little over thirty years ago, when the Shogunate came to an end, that education of a solid description spread downward in any marked degree below the official classes.

Kioto, the ancient capital of Japan, may be said to have been the birthplace of the first properly or ganized attempt at a general system of academical instruction, and this event took place in 1868, when an Educational Board was started in that city.

The schools which had been authorized during the régime of the Tokugawa Shogunate, and had been run in an unsystematic manner, were reconstituted, and others were opened on somewhat new lines; and eventually the whole system was brought under the direct control of the Government Department of Education established in 1871.

This date may be fixed as the starting-point of education in Japan on modern or Western lines, for at this period commissioners were despatched by the Government to the various civilized countries to report as to the best means of bringing Japan into educational line with the most advanced of foreign nations.

The immediate result of this was the foundation of a code which, in substance and in fact, was practically identical with that in force in the United States at the time, and I believe I am right in stating that the first foreign adviser to the Japanese Government on educational matters was an American, Mr. David Murray.

The Mikado's edict as to the aims of the educational system, rendered freely in English, was as follows:

"All knowledge, from that essential for ordinary requirements, to the higher accomplishments necessary to prepare officers, landowners, merchants, artists, physicians, etc., for their respective callings, is acquired by learning. It is intended that henceforth education shall be so diffused that there may not be a village with an ignorant family, nor a family with an ignorant member."

Such a programme was ambitious enough in all conscience, and would seem to indicate an ideal which has not up till now been attained in any known country; but, ambitious as it was, the Japanese have never lost sight of it, and probably never will, until they have reached as near to its accomplishment as can ever be attained when one is striving after the impossible.

Education and the educational code encountered many vicissitudes, and underwent constant revision; but, however chaotic its condition, its progress was always in the right direction; the next notable step being the founding of the Imperial University of Tokio in 1877, out of a nucleus formed of various then existing schools.

By that time many foreign professors had been imported from England, America, Germany, and France, and the higher branches of learning, such as law, medicine, science, and art, were in full swing.

Passing to more recent times, I think in 1882 or 1883, the general system of education which prevails to-day was inaugurated by Viscount Mori Arinori,