Iam greatly relieved that one of my dreams has beenfulfilled with the publication of this book whichmainly uses pictures to tell the story of an‘ordinary’ Japanese woman who lived at a time ofenormous change in her country and its society andsets the whole in context. I am extremely gratefulto Paul Norbury, proprietor of Renaissance Books,whose reputation is as a publisher of books on Asia,and particularly Japan who, having published two ofmy scholarly books on Isabella Bird, kindly agreedto publish this book too. I shall always treasurethe memory of the one time he was able to meetNobuko, in Kyoto, and will never forget his kindnessin making this happen: it will be an incentive torealise other ambitions of mine. I am also gratefulto Nicholas Pertwee who has kindly taken on the taskof translating this book which presents differentchallenges from the two of mine he has alreadytranslated. My sincere thanks also go to thetwenty-one people who have contributed kindvaledictory messages about Nobuko, to Suzuki Takahowhose hard work laid the groundwork seen here, toMizutani Kazuhiko who drew the finest of maps, toSawasaka Satomi who gave her advice and help withNobuko's calligraphic works, to the publisher inJapan of the Japanese edition of this book'spublisher in Japan, Shibunkaku Publishing, its ChiefEditor Ōchi Akiko, as well as to Inoue Takao,photographer, and Atsumi Hakushō, calligrapher.