* * The army was under French instructors, while the naval commission was British. Education generally was in the hands of Americans; Engineering, mining and the like were taught in a college manned by Englishmen, while the medical school was taught by Germans. * * For six or seven years this distribution continued; but by that time the Japanese began to feel able to walk in some measure alone. * * The Japanese were learning their work from Europeans in Japan, and they had studied independently abroad (in Europe,) so that in the course of 8 or 10 years a new generation had arisen which was fairly capable of doing most of the work which had hitherto been performed by strangers. The places of highly paid Europeans were taken by Japanese."
And now a representative assembly and parliamentary institutions will be granted to the people in 1889, on the German model, and Germans are specially in favor in Japan to help in the Inauguration of the scheme. Young nations are thus rapidly acquiring the civilization and the free institutions of the West,—almost before our eyes!
Malta with its fine harbour and its quaint streets going up and down, and its fine cathedral pleased us all. We passed Gibralter by day-light and had a smooth voyage over the Bay of Biscay,—and at last we touched at Plymouth. How lovely the green and sloping hills of Devonshire looked from the sea, how beautiful the wooded hills and gentle valleys, how picture-like the houses on the shore! It was English scenery and no mistake, and the hearts of the Englishmen and Englishwomen on
