The wide-opened shutters showed brightly lighted rooms in which the families were entertaining friends or having tea and cakes; they sat on the floors, which were covered with scarlet blankets in honor of the Emperor.
In the shops were tempting displays of fruits, fish and toys, and in the distance Umé could see the fireworks which were being set off in the palace grounds.
Tara and his father were already at home, but the boy was far too excited over the grand review of the Emperor's troops to listen to anything his sister had to tell.
"He is an honorably wonderful man, our most illustrious Emperor," said Tara. "My admirable father told me that he never stood upon his own feet until he was sixteen years old."
"I think that is not so honorably wonderful," said Umé stoutly. But when she took both of her own feet up at the same time, to try how it could be done, she found herself suddenly upon the floor.
"Did he walk upon his august head?" she demanded.
"Umé," said her mother, "speak not so disrespectfully of the Son of Heaven!"
But Tara explained: "He was carried about all the time, and shown only to very noble people once in a while. But when he became a man, he said it should all be different. And he put down all the old nobility that had kept him so honorably helpless, and then he made everything as it is to-day in Japan.
"Under the old rule, no one was allowed to leave the country and we knew no other people except the Chinese. Now we know the whole world and can teach the other nations many things."
Just then old Maru entered the room with tea and cakes. The cakes looked exactly like maple leaves. There were also candies made to look like autumn grasses and chrysanthemums.