"The opponents of the Mikado's government accuse it of acting in bad faith, but I do not see that the charge is just. As I understand the situation, the government acted honestly, and with good intent to expel the foreigner in case it should obtain power. But when the power was obtained, they found the foreigner could not be expelled so easily; he was here, and intended to remain, and the only thing the government could do was to make the best of it. The foreign nations who had treaties with Japan would not tear them up, and the government found that what it had intended at the time of the revolution could not be accomplished. Foreign intercourse went on, and the Japanese began to instruct themselves in Western ways. They sent their young men to America and other countries to be educated. They hired teachers to take charge of schools in Japan, and in every way tried to turn the presence of the foreigner to their advantage. There is an old adage that what can't be cured must be endured, and Japan seems to have acted upon it. The foreigner was here as an evil, and they couldn't cure him out. So they set about finding the best way of enduring him.
"But it is time we were getting ready for a start for Tokio, and so we'll suspend our discussion of Japanese political history. It's a dry subject, and I hesitate to talk to you about it lest I may weary you."
Both the boys declared the topic was interesting, and they would consider their study of Japan incomplete without some of its history. The Doctor promised to return to the subject at some future occasion; and with this understanding they separated to prepare for their journey to the capital.
[CHAPTER VII.]
FROM YOKOHAMA TO TOKIO.
One of the innovations in Japan since the arrival of the foreigners is the railway. Among the presents carried to the country by Commodore Perry were a miniature locomotive and some cars, and several miles of railway track. The track was set up, and the new toy was regarded with much interest by the Japanese. For some years after the country was opened there was considerable opposition to the introduction of the new mode of travel, but by degrees all hostility vanished, and the government entered into contracts for the construction of a line from Yokohama to Tokio. The distance is about seventeen miles, and the route follows the shore of the bay, where there are no engineering difficulties of consequence. In spite of the ease of construction and the low price of labor in Japan, the cost of the work was very great, and would have astonished a railway engineer in America. The work was done under English supervision and by English contractors, and from all accounts there is no reason to suppose that they lost anything by the operation.
Doctor Bronson and our young friends went from Yokohama to the capital by the railway, and found the ride a pleasant one of about an hour's duration. They found that the conductors, ticket-sellers, brake-men, and all others with whom they came in contact were Japanese. For some time after the line was opened the management was in the hands of foreigners; but by degrees they were removed, and the Japanese took charge of the business, for which they had paid a liberal price. They have shown themselves fully competent to manage it, and the new system of travel is quite popular with the people. Three kinds of carriages are run on most of the trains; the first class is patronized by the high officials and the foreigners who have plenty of money; the second by the middle-class natives—official and otherwise—and foreigners whose purses are not plethorie; and the third class by the peasantry, and common people generally. Frank observed that there were few passengers in the first-class carriages, more in the second, and that the third class attracted a crowd, and was evidently popular. The Doctor told him that the railway had been well patronized since the day it was first opened, and that the facilities of steam locomotion have not been confined to the eastern end of the empire. The experiment on the shores of Yeddo Bay proved so satisfactory that a line has since been opened from Kobe to Osaka and Kioto, in the West—a distance of a little more than fifty miles. The people take to it as kindly as did those of the East, and the third-class carriages are generally well filled.