Artistic Japan

It is but a few years ago that Japanese engraving was unknown to It was the last of a series of revelations. It has taken no less than two centuries for the country of the rising sun to disclose the last secrets of an antique civilisation which had grown in silence and isolation.

When, in the seventeenth century Portuguese navigators landed in the mysterious archipelago, in search of new territory for the exercise of their commercial activity, they were not in a position to judge of the artistic side of the country. Besides that these commercial men were little fitted to appreciate an art which docs not catch the eye by a staring exterior, the astute inhabitants of Nippon were too wide awake to seek to undertake the education of their new visitors.