Page:Japanese plays and playfellows (1901).djvu/236

200 voyage. Had time allowed, we would gladly have visited all the four provinces of this magnificent island—provinces which in earlier times were known as "Lovely Princess," "Prince Good Boiled Rice," "The Princess of Great Food," and "The Brave Good Youth." But we had only leisure to do homage to Iyo-Ehime, the Lovely Princess, who amply justified her title by the loveliness of her domain. Between her territory and that of Tosa or Take-yori-wake, the Brave Good Youth, whose sons are to-day the staunchest advocates of progress, runs a mountain ridge, varying in height from three to four thousand feet, so richly covered with forests that not only are the pines, maples, and alders as plentiful as elsewhere, but with these is intermingled an endless host of beeches, oaks, and horse-chestnuts. Except in the neighbourhood of Akakura, we had not seen a finer stretch of mountain-scenery.

But we never came close to these wooded heights, for Dōgō is only a short distance from the seashore, and is reached in half-an-hour by what I can only describe as a toy train. We crept into a first-class carriage, and just managed to avoid bumping our heads against the low-pitched roof. The fare was on the same scale as the compartments, for the cost of the ticket was three sen (farthings). The rickshaw-men were polite and reasonable, the landlord of the Iwai-ya both affable and honest; in a word, we had left the track of long-suffering and all-corrupting tourists, and had reached one of those districts, so pleasant to discover, where manners are as yet unspoiled by money. Delighted with our lot, we settled down to three days of paradise regained.

Our first care was to discover the bath-house. In