1. Grapes, rapes, apes, pes. 2. Sago, ago, go. 3. Acorn, corn, orn. 4. Flax, lax, ax.
Does Progress Lie this Way?
My father is a teacher in a missionary school here, and on Sundays he assists in the mission services. I assist, too, playing an American cabinet organ and helping with the singing. The other evening a gentleman called at our house for a chat. He is a Japanese of perhaps forty, and he spent ten years in Europe and America. He speaks Spanish, French, English, German, and Chinese, besides his own tongue, in the latter of which he is perfectly versed. He has visited every city of importance in the western world, and is therefore a judge of customs. Suddenly he said to my father, "What an inconvenient man you are!"
Father looked up in astonishment, and inquired why.
"Why? Because you require, like all western people, so much to make you comfortable. And out of all you have you get no more comfort than do we Japanese from our little. No, not so much comfort by half. For instance, you pay to live here—how much?"
"Two dollars per day," replied my father.
"Ah," said our Japanese acquaintance, "I pay seventy-five sen, or about forty cents of your money. And I am just as happy and as comfortable as you are. To be sure, you have tables, and chairs, and bedsteads, and dressing-cases, wash-bowls, pitchers, mirrors, and goodness knows what in your rooms. I have nothing of the sort. They are too much trouble to care for. A nice cool mat and quilt form a good enough sleeping outfit for me. And you make yourself so much work at your meals, using all those pitchers and plates, goblets, spoons, pepper-pots, and the rest. Then, when you eat, you crowd yourselves into one room. I eat alone. My meals are served on a tray by a pretty maid, who kneels before me as I eat, chatting and making herself interesting.
"When you travel you take with you, either to tote about, or hire some one to carry for you, a great amount of luggage. As for me, the hotel furnishes me a dressing-gown and a night-robe, and I buy a fresh tooth-brush each morning for a sen. No; say what you please, you western folk are inconvenient people. You do not follow the line of the least resistance. You make too much effort to live, and the cost is too great in nerves, brains, flesh, blood, and worry."
G.
Kyoto, Japan.
Questions and Answers.
Helen Disosway asks whence comes the caper of which the caper sauce is made. It is a small bud that grows in very hot climates, especially in the East Indies. It is gathered before the petals have unfolded. The work of collecting these buds is very slow, hence the expensiveness of the sauce of commerce. The seed-pod of the caper is also used. It makes a delicious pickle. The caper plant is perennial, but dies down and seemingly disappears in the autumn. It grows best on dry and hot stony ground. It is sometimes used in the East to surmount rockeries, because it lives on little soil, while its foliage is delicate and its silvery flowers are ornamental.
Charles R. Botsford: Articles descriptive of magic have appeared in the following recent numbers of Harper's Round Table: 844, 852, 862, 866, 869, and 873. The numbers may be had by applying to the publishers. Eleanor Little, aged twelve, Marblehead, Mass., collects bicycle buttons. Perhaps you do too. If so, you will be glad to have Miss Eleanor's address. Earl L. Hendricks, Box 626, Savannah, Ill., collects fossils and mineral specimens and wants correspondents. So does Edith S. Lewis, 1418 Eighth Avenue, Kearney, Neb., who also writes verses and stories. She is fourteen. James Fahlberg, 520 Barbey Street, Brooklyn, wants to join the staff of an amateur paper in Brooklyn. We are not advised of any Brooklyn amateur paper that wishes to increase its staff, but suggest that Sir James apply to Beverly S. King, 1625 Atlantic Avenue.
"E. W. S." is fifteen and wants to enter the United States navy. He must apply to the member of Congress from his district. Had he given his address we could have told him the name and address of his member. Any local politician can tell him. So can his postmaster. Appointments are made only as vacancies occur at Annapolis. If you fail to hear from your Congressman, write to the Secretary of the Navy, Washington, D. C., asking when a vacancy will occur in your district. Hon. Hilary A. Herbert is the secretary's name. You will receive a prompt reply. Applicants must pass rigid physical and mental examinations, but the latter covers the common branches only. No, fifteen is not too old to enter. David B. Hendricks: "University Extension" means an extension of university teaching to men and women too old and perhaps too poor to attend universities—that is, carrying university lectures to those who cannot come for them. It was inaugurated by the universities of Oxford and Cambridge, in England, but soon copied by Columbia, Pennsylvania, and Chicago in this country. There is also an American Society for the Extension of University Teaching that is unconnected with any university, and sends out lecturers from Princeton, Columbia, Chicago, and other leading universities, and even business men and principals of high-schools. The course includes art, astronomy, biology, chemistry, civics, forestry, travel, history, literature, mathematics, music, philosophy, sanitation, and sociology. Lectures in courses may be had on any or all of these subjects. There are examinations and diplomas. The usual plan is for local societies, either existing ones or those formed for the purpose, to select their subjects and apply to the Extension Society for lecturers. The cost, when divided among a society, is moderate, and many courses are given in villages as small as Moodus.