The long and narrow islands of Japan, which have furnished
European gardeners with so many beautiful and fairly hardy flowers, also maintain a very large and interesting popula- tion both of beasts and birds. The indigenous animals are far more varied in species than are those of England ; and the contrast between them and the two islands of New Zealand, for example, with their few native birds and total absence of native mammals, is very striking. On the other hand, the domestic animals of the islands are by no means remarkable either for number or excellence. Sheep seem to have been almost unknown until recently, and mutton was imported from China by European residents. Horses are employed for farm work in parts, But their improvement never was an object of much solicitude to the country magnates under the old system, though they used them for sporting purposes, and especially to ride when engaged in their favourite sport of hawking. A daimio would be carried in his palanquin, surrounded by his retainers, to the meeting- place. But then his horses would be brought, and the greatest swells of the party would put on overalls of spotted deerskin, mount their horses, and ride through the damp and dripping reed-beds, hawk on fist, with plenty of beaters, these often dragging a weighted rope to aid in flushing the birds. These horses were cobs of a good hardy breed.
A rough kind of greyhound, and some carefully bred spaniels, were originally the only sporting dogs of Japan. The pretty little Japanese toy spaniels are well known. It is an interesting question as to how a breed like the spaniel became established there; but the parallel between the position of the same class of dog there and in England is close. In each country there is a " toy " breed, represented here by the King Charles spaniel and the Blenheims, and also a larger spaniel for field use. As the Dutch brought the pug-dog to Europe from China, it seems just possible that they may have taken out toy spaniels in exchange. But the Chinese and Japanese toy spaniels have every appearance of having been established in the Far East for a very long period, and the latter resemble the " silky " bantams of the same country, the fineness of the hair of the one being matched by the hair-like quality of the feathers in the other.
Many of the fur-bearing animals of Manchuria are also found in Japan. Among these are the marten (sometimes called Japanese sable), ermine (in the northern districts), and several squirrels, red foxes, and otters. The last-named are not trained by the Japanese to catch fish, but are very numerous in places on the coast. Otters chasing fish below water are not unfrequently a subject chosen by Japanese artists for their graceful studies of natural history. The furs obtained on the islands are, as a rule, smaller in size than those from the continent, and less rich in colour.
In Japan, equally with Northern China, the quadramana are found further north than in other parts of the globe. The sight of humming-birds in the more or less temperate regions of the Pacific coast of North America is not so surprising as the presence of an active and prolific race of monkeys among the pine groves of Japan. They are rather large apes, with speckled red faces and a most unpleasant cast of countenance, and, to judge from the behaviour of those kept in captivity, have considerably more than the average degree of monkey intelligence. They seem quite indifferent to cold, though the forests which they inhabit are frequently visited by deep falls of snow. They are largely herbivorous creatures, devouring tree shoots, leaves, and other vegetables, and do not appear to invade the cultivated ground, as do the baboons of South Africa. They are adepts at throwing sticks and stones in self-defence, a trick which is well known to the natives in the forests which they frequent.
The red-deer and its varieties, such as the splendid stag known as the " maral " in Manchuria and Siberia, are not found beyond the limits of the continent. But in the Japanese or sika deer our Far Eastern allies possess an animal so handsome, hardy, and excellent as venison that its highly successful introduction into English parks is matter foi congratulation. It is a short, sturdy, strong-looking deer, and the stags carry handsome horns, though by no means so large in proportion as are those of the Indian axis stag. In winter the fur is thick and of a dark brown, in summer it is of a bright fawn colour, dappled with white spots. The race is prolific, and the stags are so courageous that they have been known to fight and kill red-deer of far greater size when con-
fined in the same park with our native stags. The fur seals still come to their old " rookeries" on one or more of the small islands belonging to Japan in the Behring Sea, but their number is rapidly dwindling there as elsewhere.
But it is in bird life that the natural history of the islands is most remarkable, and the list of interesting species is by no means confined to the wild ducks and cranes which are such a favourite subject in the national art. Among what may be called the " popular " birds of the country aro the cuckoo and the " jenny wren," and it is somewhat curious that public fancy has always preferred to delineate the storks, cranes, ducks, and geese of the rice marshes and rivers rather than the birds of the garden and the field. If the cranes have a religious association, the same cannot be said of the other waterfowl. But every Japanese seems to be a florist and ornithologist by nature, and the ease of observing the water birds, and the decorative character of their plumage, probably determined the popular preference for their presence, not only on their pools and ponds, but also in almost every form of picture and decorative design. Birds of prey are very numerous. Among these is a fine sea-eagle, not greatly differing from the splendid Korean sea-eagle, one of the largest of its race. The goshawk also breeds there in numbers, nesting chiefly in the pine trees. It was the favourite bird of the sporting daimios in the old days, and the young were regularly taken from the nests and brought up "at hack," much on the same principles as the goshawk is or was in Europe. They were flown at pheasants mainly, and also at cranes and geese, which were approached by the aid of a stalking-horse when feeding on the rice•fields and the stubblea in harvest-time. A very interesting bird, not exactly a " raptor," but allied in habits, is a large butcher bird. It preys on frogs, among other creatures, and lives mainly by the side of the reed-beds and water channels. The most striking of the Japanese game birds is one of the "copper pheasants," a brilliantly coloured but rather scarce creature. But the Japanese variety of the common pheasant is also a remarkable bird. In it the splendid, green which decorates the neck only of the "English" pheasant, or the ring-necked Chinese species, is carried down over the whole breast. It is also larger than either the common or Chinese pheasant, and when crossed with these greatly improves the size of its progeny.
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