incredible little dishes. Numberless young dandies are dining tete-a-
tete with the ladies of their choice, and sounds of dancing-girls and
music issue from the private rooms.

The fact is, to-day is the third and last day of the great pilgrimage to
the temple of the jumping Tortoise, of which we saw the beginning
yesterday; and all Nagasaki is at this time given over to amusement.

At the tea-house of the Indescribable Butterflies, which is also full to
overflowing, but where we are well known, they have had the bright idea
of throwing a temporary flooring over the little lake--the pond where the
goldfish live--and our meal is served here, in the pleasant freshness of
the fountain which continues its murmur under our feet.

After dinner, we follow the faithful and ascend again to the temple.

Up there we find the same elfin revelry, the same masks, the same music.
We seat ourselves, as before, under a gauze tent and sip odd little
drinks tasting of flowers. But this evening we are alone, and the
absence of the band of mousmes, whose familiar little faces formed a bond
of union between this holiday-making people and ourselves, separates and
isolates us more than usual from the profusion of oddities in the midst
of which we seem to be lost. Beneath us lies always the immense blue
background: Nagasaki illumined by moonlight, and the expanse of silvered,
glittering water, which seems like a vaporous vision suspended in mid-
air. Behind us is the great open temple, where the bonzes officiate, to
the accompaniment of sacred bells and wooden clappers--looking, from where
we sit, more like puppets than anything else, some squatting in rows like
peaceful mummies, others executing rhythmical marches before the golden
background where stand the gods. We do not laugh to-night, and speak but