New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1860-08-20

what the japanese officials viii say 10 this short
hand diplomacy. hope it may read them a. well
as some others good Lesson. a
II il the opening of the first Japanese Summer
month and the appearance OF the country Is delight
full. Fields and bilsdes are clothed with the och
est verdure. Horseback rides through the shaded
country lanes are our principal recreation. We
have good horses and these rural paths interiaee
the surface of the island that we seldom repeat the
same route. AS we ride along the scenery yaries
with every stage Of progress Now our ride in
s,n mi neds Of wheat and barley, or along the
aines oil The paddy fields. Now it is up the wooded
nil slopes, through openings of oak chestnut, and
t N innged leaf Of Japanese maple. Now uniec
,De DARK shade OF forests Of fir and cedar recalling
her iook ana pleasant balssmy smell the scenery
OF the temperate zone, OF hating on HILTON wa
look down terraced valley little aIlnyial expanse
lying between two hill ridges, with breadth of
shade in either side, so tropical in jts character
and in the density and richness Of its foliage. that
the sweet wales of beautiful Java seem again TO be
before us. There are the palms, and in a moment
more the red Malay boys will spring with shout
from behind the hedge-rows, bearing delicious
bananas and pines. The wind drives a shower Of
dog-wood blossoms in our faces, recalling rs from
our tropical dream, "a sprinked water brings back
10 the cheels the fainting life. We pass on through
never-endng panorama Of landscape beauty.
Warm days ard wet days succeed each other
n the proportion Of one of the latter 10 two
of the former, weather which stimulates vegetation
to rapid growth. While our nights are warmer
than the nights of May at home, our middays VIII
average but little higher range of the thernOme-
ter. IT is the New-York June without any extremes
Of heat at midday.
We had our lamb and green peas fortnight ago.
Radishes have gone 10 seed; lettuce is fbrous;
Strawberries, "snakeberries," as the Japanese cali
them are plenty in the felds-strawberries in size
and color only for they dry and tasteless tho
apples Of SOdom. The apricots have more than
half their growth; the good fOr-naugbt cherries are
turning red. Cucumbers of little more than q
fingers size, brought 10 market in little shallow
straw baskets that hold two of them, are sold for
penny basket. l.f
have seen no curiosity Of vegetable growth great
er than that of a Wistaria came upon few days
ago. II grew at tie foot Of high bank oyerhung
with CRY ptOmeria, where stood an old ways:de
shrine. Like the oak of Sumner Chace, 1t was
g hidden to the knees in fern.'
while its creeping vines ran riot over plantation
of palma, stunted by this green serpents embrace
and the branches of large tree that had been
felled by it's side Two feet above the ground this
Wistara had grth of FIVE feet About fifteen feet
from the ground it divided off into multitude OF
snaky vines that extended fifty feet horizontally
over the tops of the stunted palms, or twined
fallen tree, curious mass of tangled growth. Its
lilac-cOlOred flowers swayed with the wind in peu-
dulous racemes a foot and half long. The Japan
ese dwarf this vine extremely, training it also over
arbors where its long pendants have an effective
display The lilac colOred variety grows wild in the
hills about Kanagawa. The pure white variety
have only seen cultivated as dwarfs; it probably
comes from some other part Of the island.
| have Def IRE spoken of the Azaleas. Nowhere
in fho do thayh fhai
have seen the hill-tOps all aglOw with their crinl-
son petals, as though cOnfagratOn was sweeping
across. ! have seen the bushes or small trees, as
in Japan they might be called bordering the wood
land paths with a prOdigal display of purple, and
scarlet, and crimson, and orange, and yellow load
ing the air far and near with perfume in that inex-
baustible prousiOn which nature sometimes loves to
exhibit. ! have picked the blossoms, and, throw
ing them down on the earth, have measured them
as they rested on their petals foot in circumfer-
ence A MODtan peOny lies before me whose broad
disk, not an exceptionally large one, measures two
feet around. The PawlOwnia (PaioLocnia Impert-
ais of SiebOld) is now in bloom. 1t is Indigenous
TO Japan. and might be easily mistaken for the ca
tapa, which it closely resembles.
Two features in the Flora of Japan cannot fail TO
strike every Observer-the beauty and great variety
of its evergreen trees and shrubs the same extent
and variety Of Towering trees and shrubs. Of these
last from the opening Of Spring until now there has
been constant succession. 1 hope yet to see many
of them growing on American soil. There IL
rubus now in bloom whose flowers are as large and
nearly perfect, and quite beautiful as our OWE
double white roses. have seen the vine growing
in country farmyards 10 the hight of ten feet white
with its scented bOss0miDg.
Our latest dates from NewYork are TO the 18th
of February, received a week since. A letter from
hence to the Atlantic States and its reply takes
round six months to go and come by the English
overland mail. You will receive this via California
in sixty days or So Oh for that much talked-oflme
of Pacific steamers and the California railroad when
Japan will no longer seem at the worlds end from
you