Page:Japanese Gardens (Taylor).djvu/97

Rh who has been through the Inland Sea will appreciate the association. This allusion occurs not infrequently in poetry:

But, again, a real science governs the placing of these slabs. If the distances are planned for the scale of their own people’s size, and not for our large feet and longer stride, it only proves their careful accuracy. Steps are shorter where legs are shorter too, and there is no doubt that these sturdy little people have dwarfed theirs by incessant suari-ing—their hereditary custom of sitting on their feet instead of on chairs. The length of pace is also restricted by the bind of the kimono; and even when this is tied back, as it so often is in the case of the men, or tucked up, as in the case of working-women, who have no false modesty about their legs, the habit of taking short steps has been formed irrevocably.

Of course if these stones were all of a size and shape, and were laid down according to our mathematics, in the shortest line between two objects, the effect would be hideous, but the longest way round is usually the fittest way home for them, as it generally provides