THE SHRINES OF ISE.
Y first meeting with the gods, upon the top of Ontaké, had been strangely unexpected; my last sign from them was destined to be no less so. It took place in an utterly dissimilar yet even more improbable place—the Shrines of Ise.
If, when buds first stir with dreams of blossom amid the forbidding April of our New England year, a man could quietly be spirited away from doubt, delay, and disappointment to a certain province of what is still old Japan, he would find himself in what he would take for fairyland. Over the whole countryside and far up its background of hills glow cloud-like masses of pink-white bloom, while upon all the country roads carnival crowds of men, women, and children journey gayly along, chanting as they go, beneath the canopy of blossom. It is the great Shintō pilgrimage to the Shrines of
