In 1890, Hearn went to Japan with a commission as a newspaper correspondent, which was quickly terminated. It was in Japan, however, that he found a home and his greatest inspiration. Through the good will of Basil Hall Chamberlain, Hearn gained a teaching position during the summer of 1890 at the Shimane Prefectural Common Middle School and Normal School in Matsue, a town in western Japan on the coast of the Sea of Japan. During his fifteen-month stay in Matsue, Hearn married Koizumi Setsuko, the daughter of a local samurai family, with whom he had four children: Kazuo, Iwao, Kiyoshi, and Suzuko. The date of the marriage of Setsuko and Lafcadio is uncertain. According to Setsuko herself, she married Lafcadio around December 1890. Another story says that since the Koizumi family was also impoverished, around February 1891 Setsuko started her work as a live-in housekeeper in Lafcadio's house, where he lived by himself as an English teacher. Nishida Sentaro, Lafcadio's colleague and English teacher, volunteered as an interpreter between Setsuko and Lafcadio. Lafcadio Hearn was known as "Herun-san" by local people in Matsu. On 11 August 1891, Lafcadio sent a letter to a friend of his to announce his marriage with Setsuko. Interracial marriage was frowned upon in Japan around the time when Lafcadio and Setsuko married. In November 1891, Lafcadio moved to Kumamoto with Setsuko. Setsuko unsuccessfully studied English to talk to Lafcadio. Setsuko, however, correctly understood Lafcadio's broken Japanese, called "Herun-san Kotoba" (Hearn-speak) in their family, and the couple communicated with each other. In 1893, their first son Kazuo was born. In 1894, the couple moved to Kobe, Hyōgo Prefecture. He became a full-time writer after Glimpses of Unfamiliar Japan, a book which he wrote during his stay in Kumamoto, gained popularity. After that, Setsuko provided much of the material for Lafcadio's major works.[ In 1896, during their stay in Kobe, his application for naturalisation was granted by the governor of Shimane Prefecture and he became a member of the Koizumi family, officially changing his name to Koizumi Yakumo. In 1896, the couple moved to Ichigaya, Ushigome-ku, Tokyo. Setsuko not only told Japanese folk legends but also explained what she read in published books to Lafcadio to help him in writing. Lafcadio asked Setsuko to be a "storyteller" who did not just read books aloud but told the stories in her own words, and Setsuko followed his requests. The couple had two sons and one daughter in Tokyo, but after they moved to Nishiokubo in 1902, Lafcadio's health began to deteriorate. On 26 September 1904, Laficadio died. Lafcadio left all assets to his wife in a will. In 1914, Reminiscences of Lafcadio Hearn, her memoir about Lafcadio, was included in Koizumi Yakumo, edited by Tanabe Ryuji-