Page:Things Japanese (1905).djvu/110

98 covered with an incipient forest of whitish, greenish matter. No match-box can be got to strike; envelopes stick together without being wetted; gloves must be kept hermetically sealed in bottles, or they will come out a mass of spots. The second half of July and all August are hotter, but less damp, the rain then falling rather in occasional heavy storms which last from one to three days, and are followed by splendid weather. The heat generally vanishes suddenly about the second week in September, when the rain sets in with renewed energy and continues about a month. Such is the common order of things. But scientific observations stretching over a quarter of a century past prove that seasons differ very widely from each other.

One striking peculiarity of the Japanese climate is the constant prevalence of northerly winds in winter and of southerly winds in summer. Rooms facing south are therefore the best all the year round, escaping, as they do, the chill blasts of January and February, and profiting by every summer breeze. Another peculiarity is the lateness of all the seasons, as compared with Europe. The grass, for instance, which dies down during the cold, dry winter months, does not become really fit for tennis-playing before the middle of May. On the other hand, winter is robbed of the gloom of short afternoons by the transparent clearness of the sky down to the end of the year, and even throughout January whenever it is not actually raining or snowing. Travellers are recommended to choose the late autumn, especially if they purpose to content themselves with the beaten tracks of Kyōto, Tōkyō, Miyanoshita, Nikkō, etc., where the Europeanisation of hotels has brought stoves in its train; for stoveless Japanese tea-houses are wofully chilly places. April and May, notwithstanding a greater chance of wet weather, will be better for the wilds. There is then, too, neither cold nor heat to fear. Japanese heat, after all, is not tropical, and many will enjoy travelling throughout the summer months. Mountain climbing must in any case be reserved for that time of year, as the mountains are not "open" at other seasons, that is to say,