First, we swooped down upon the banks to change our money, but the yen
and sen counted out to us seemed as valueless as stage money. However,
we grew to respect it, after visiting Benton Dori and departing with
elaborate kimonos that the shrewd businessmen and women of the party
would have passed by as being too expensive, at home.

It was great fun after being extravagant to figure out that a yen is
only a little over half as much as one of our dollars and that one had
only spent half as much as one thought.

Our party met the ladies (some of them American college graduates) and
gentlemen of the Yokohama Chamber of Commerce at a big reception in a
theatre. The governor, through his interpreter, said that our arrival
was on the first sunny day they had had in some time, that the
chrysanthemums were just blooming, and that this was a good omen, for
the war clouds had vanished. Geisha girls danced while singing a
specially composed chant of welcome, and an elaborate luncheon was
served in an adjoining hall. A. I. Esberg and F. R. Eldridge answered
the welcome saying, "That we hoped to establish much more friendly and
permanent relationship with the people of Japan."

Most of the party had the inevitable tea in the foreign settlement,
known as the Bluff. Most of these houses are of the vintage of fifty
years ago and range in rental from $125 to $150, unfurnished, the tenant
having to install his own plumbing if he wishes such a luxury. We wanted
to know why some better arrangement was not made and were reminded of
the law that does not permit of any foreign ownership of land.

Louis Mooser, former head of the San Francisco Real Estate Board, was
much interested in the situation. It seems that about one-seventh of the