On her return to Paris I am convinced
that she promulgated this idea, and gradually gave it effect. Hence
the fashions of the last two years.
Watching the crowd occupied the time in a most interesting manner,
till the firing of guns and the playing of bands announced the arrival
of the imperial train. The Mikado was received on the platform, and
after a very short delay he headed the procession along the covered
way on to the dais.
He is a young, not very good-looking man, with rather a sullen
expression, and legs that look as though they did not belong to
him--I suppose from using them so little, and sitting so much on his
heels; for until the last few years the Mikado has always been
considered far too sacred a being to be allowed to set foot on the
earth. He was followed by his highest Minister, the foreign Ministers,
and a crowd of Japanese dignitaries, all, with one or two exceptions,
in European official dress, glittering with gold lace. I believe it
was the first time that many of them had ever worn it. At any rate,
they certainly had never learned to put it on properly. It would have
driven to distraction the tailor who made them, to see tight-fitting
uniforms either left unbuttoned altogether, or hooked askew from top
to bottom, and to behold the trousers turned up and disfigured by the
projecting tags of immense side-spring boots, generally put on the
wrong feet.
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