Boston Ticknor and Company 1887, 1st edition.

This story is an original tale of Old Japan, written almost from a Japanese point of view. It might be translated into that language and rendered in book form or told on a street corner by one of the itinerant story-tellers, the reader or listener would think it to accord fully with the traditions of the period in which it is supposed to have been enacted. Whether such a treatment will meet with approval here, it remains for the public to say. I have adhered to it against the advice of several eminent literary friends, to bring the story more into accord with our canons of style and construc- tion. From the standpoint of a Japanese, none of the incidents or situations are in the slightest degree strained or exaggerated, and none of the characters overdrawn. All the historical allu- sions are strictly true and authentic, — as far as present knowl- edge on the subject goes, — and have been carefully and painstakingly culled from native chronicles.

The five engravings on copper have been executed by a Japanese, Mr. Nakamura Munehiro, of Tokyo, one of the best engravers in Japan, who also made the original drawings for the same. The other pictures were drawn by Shirayama Dani, a young porcelain painter in the employ of Fujiyama, of this city. It shows the versatility of Japanese artists, that although the young man had never in his life done anything but porcelain painting, which is done in pure wash, he suc- ceeded without instruction, in a very few days, in making pictures for reproduction. In spite of their sharp outline they are done not with pen and ink, but with a Japanese brush.

LOUIS WERTHEIMBER.