The return to Tokyo of Sylvia Elliott at this very time seemed an especially kind dispensation of Providence². Kent had seen practically nothing of her since his arrival in Japan. In his eagerness to immerse himself in the Japanese life, to steep himself therein, he had felt as if he had no time for intermingling with the foreign element, had almost resented its intrusion where he had not been able to avoid it. The whites, Americans, British, French and the rest were, after all, commonplace, incapable⁴ of affording the stimulus⁵ of the new, the attraction of the unknown, the piquancy⁶ of the constant zest⁷ to peek⁸ and penetrate⁹ beyond the mysteries behind the shoji. He had known people like that all his life; now, in Japan, he wanted to be with the Japanese; in that way only was it possible to attain¹⁰ to the full the charm of living in a foreign country, strange, picturesque¹¹, exotic, to taste with the critical appreciation¹² with which a connoisseur¹³ sips¹⁴ a rare vintage, in slow sips, the impressions and sensations derivable¹⁶ from the colorful life stirring all about him.