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166 HONDA THE SAMURAI.
" You cast me off because I am a merchant's
daughter, as I have said you would. I never believed
since my father is a street man and yours is
a castle-dweller that you would make me your
wife. Now I suppose that your father is to betroth
you to a lady of samurai rank :
I have so heard."
" You have heard falsely, then. Let me go on to
say that, though I am a samurai and you a merchant's
daughter, my affection was real, and I hoped in time to
overcome my honored father's prejudice, and to have
our betrothal arranged and marriage consummated
regularly, in form according with the strictest rules
of etiquette. Yet now I have left off all association
with you, secret or open, because I am a changed
man."
" But what is it that has changed you who is
she?"
" Miss Hoshi, it is the gods, not a woman, that have
changed me. I can not explain all, but our Mikado,
the Son of Heaven, owns me now. The foreigner is
coming to drain our country of its gold and silver,
its rice and tea and silk, to impoverish it by trade,
perhaps to conquer it as India was conquered, but in
any event to insult our country, and I have laid aside
every other thought except to drive him off. I can
not now think of love or marriage, and as no formal
word of betrothal has ever passed between us, you
can not in fairness reproach me with unfaithfulness."
" But listen, Mr. Honda, one moment."
" I can not ; you must excuse me, for here comes
a party of people, some of whom I know by their