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THE CITY OF THE HAPPY WELL. 11
All this might be said and more, and it would all
be true, yet the reader would not have the faintest
idea as to how the city of Fukui looked. The word
" " castle calls up the picture of tall towers, castellated
ramparts, and rocky approaches. At the
mention of " theatre," there rises in the mind a
dazzle of upholstery, chandeliers, and gas-lights.
Do we say town-hall? What American never in
Japan can image in his mind the true picture
A ?
better method of description is
by a plentiful
use of negative particles. Society in Japan was
reduced to very simple elements. Even the miner
in the nearly inaccessible California gulch, far away
from city life and civilized society, was yet more of
a modern man than was the average Japanese citizen
in Fukui in 1852. For the newspaper can, with
more than Mohammed's power, bring the world to
the miner, without his going to the world. But here
in Japan was a people civilized for centuries; yet
there were in Fukui no hospital, no asylums, no
almshouse, no public hall, no bank, no lightning-rods,
no steam-engines, no gas-lights, and no newspaper.
" Oh, but these are all modern inventions !
" cries
the critic "
;
how could the Japanese have these ?
Of course they had all the ancient and universal
improvements, had they not?"
No ! There was a fine river flowing through the
city, and a seaport on the bay, but there, at Mikunion-the-Sea
of Japan, was not a single dock or pier.
There was not a wagon or carriage in the city,
nor a wheeled vehicle within leagues. Most of