THE AMERICAN DIARY OF A JAPANESE GIRL

My new page of life is dawning. A trip beyond the seas—Meriken Kenbutsu—it’s not an ordinary event. It is verily the first event in our family history that I could trace back for six centuries. My to-day’s dream of America—dream of a butterfly sipping on golden dews—was rudely broken by the artless chirrup of a hundred sparrows in my garden. “Chui, chui! Chui, chui, chui!” Bad sparrows! My dream was silly but splendid. Dream is no dream without silliness which is akin to poetry. If my dream ever comes true! 24th—The song of gay children scattered over the street had subsided. The harvest moon shone like a yellow halo of “Nono Sama.” All things in blessed Mitsuho No Kuni—the smallest ant also—bathed in sweet inspiring beams of beauty. The soft song that is not to be heard but to be felt, was in the air.