Page:Brinkley - Japan - Volume 5.djvu/283

 almost a direct continuation of the skin of the forehead, instead of being recessed under the eyebrow, as is the case in Europeans. The cheeks are broad and flat; the chin, narrow; the legs are often crooked and graceless, especially in women; the calves are strongly developed; the ankles thick; the feet broad; the arms, hands, and neck remarkably graceful; the skin is light yellow, often not darker than that of southern Europeans, but sometimes as dusky as that of the Singhalese. The Japanese belong to the least hirsute of the human species. Their hair is black and straight. It turns grey at the age of forty-five to fifty, but baldness is comparatively rare. Dr. Baelz concludes that the finer type of the Japanese came from the borders of the Euphrates and Tigris, and that they belonged to the same stock as the Egyptians.  —The number of these students had reached two hundred by the middle of 1901.  —The highest rate of subscription to a daily journal is twelve shillings per annum, and the usual charge for advertisements is from sevenpence to one shilling per line of twenty-two ideographs (about nine words).  —The total local expenditures area little over 40 million yen annually. They increased from 25 millions to 40 millions in a period of five years (1895-1899), but the increase is not an evidence of extravagance in administration, as 11 millions of it was devoted to useful public works, and nearly 2 millions to education. Revenue to meet these outlays is derived from five taxes,—land-rate ($13 1/3$ millions), house-tax ($5 1/3$ millions), business tax ($2 3/4$ millions), and miscellaneous tax ($3 1/2$ millions). A large sum is obtained from property owned by the local administrations, and the Central Treasury grants aids to the extent of $4 1/2$ million yen. The system of local taxation is complicated, but, speaking generally, two kinds of impost have to be paid, first, a prefectural tax, and, secondly, a town or district tax. Some of the local taxes are levied on the basis of the national tax—in which case the former must not exceed a certain fixed fraction of the latter; some are levied independently, as taxes on houses, vehicles, and draft-animals. A marked distinction is made between vehicles or animals kept for hire and those maintained by private individ- 