Page:Occult Japan - Lovell.djvu/346

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324
OCCULT JAPAN.

to be taken. Indeed, this seems so self-evident a preliminary to driving you anywhere at all, that it sounds supererogatory to chronicle it. But attempt the same thing in Japan. At any of the treaty ports jump into a jinrikisha as if in a hurry, and say nothing. Five to two off goes your man at a dog-trot for a couple of hundred yards; then he suddenly slackens, stops, turns, and to his surprise, though not yours, inquires where you wish to be taken. Not till then did the idea strike him that he did not know his destination. He had at first acted on the impulse your jumping into the jinrikisha had given him, to go; the afterthought of whither had not occurred to him. His first idea had instantly translated itself into action before it could wake a second thought.

Instances of this in more complicated form are to be met with, of course, the world over. Witness the adventure of the shop-girl to whom darts in through the door an urchin with the announcement: "Marm! your little boy has just been run over in the street!" The poor shop-girl drops everything, rushes from behind the counter, bolts out of the door, and gets a couple of steps