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Japanese Girls and Women Revised and Enlarged Edition

Page 264.

Each year that passes sees a few more stores adopting the habit of fixed prices, not to be altered by haggling.

Page 282.

On another occasion the good offices of the fortune-teller were sought concerning a marriage, and the powerful arranger of human destinies discovered that though everything else was favorable, the bride contracted for was to come from a quarter quite opposed to the luck of the bridegroom. This was no laughing matter, as the bride was of a noble family and the breaking of the engagement would be attended with much talk and trouble on both sides; but, on the other hand, the family of the bridegroom dared not face the danger so mysteriously prophesied by the fortune-teller. In this predicament, there was nothing to do but to pull the wool over the eyes of the gods as best they might. For this purpose the bride with all her belongings was sent the day before the wedding from her father's house to that of an uncle living in another part of the city, and on the morning of the wedding-day she came to her husband from a quarter quite favorable to his fortunes. It seems quite probable that the gods were taken in by this somewhat transparent subterfuge, for no serious evil has befallen the young couple in three years of married life.

Page 317.

To the American mind this method of terminating relations is always irritating and frequently embarrassing, but in Japan any discomfort is to be endured rather than the slightest suspicion of bad manners. If the foreign visitor is trying to learn to be a good Japanese, she must submit patiently when the servant solemnly engaged fails to appear at the appointed hour, sending a letter instead to say that she is ill; or when the woman upon whom she is depending to travel with her the next day to the country receives a telegram calling her to the bedside of a mythical son, and departs, bag and baggage, at a moment's notice, leaving her quondam mistress to shift for herself as best she may.

Page 318.

Among the many changes that have come over Japan in the transition from feudalism to the conditions of modern life, there is none that Japanese ladies regard with greater regret than the change in the servant question. As the years go by and new employments open to women, it becomes increasingly difficult to engage and keep servants of the old-time, faithful, intelligent sort. Notwithstanding increased pay, and the still existing conditions of considerate treatment, comfortable homes, and light work, it is hard to fill places vacated, even in noble households: and there is almost as much shaking of heads and despondent talk over the servant question in Japan to-day as there is in America.

Page 322.

It is interesting to note that it is to the quickness and courage of a jinrikisha man who interposed between him and his would-be assassin that the present Czar of Russia owes his escape from death at Otsu, near Kyōtō, in 1891.

Footnotes:

[45] Gohei, a piece of white paper, cut and folded in a peculiar manner, one of the sacred symbols of the Shintō faith.

[46] Tengu, a winged, long-nosed or beak-mouthed monster, supposed to inhabit the mountain regions of Japan. It was from a tengu that Yoshitsune, one of the greatest of Japanese heroes, learned to fence, and so became a swordsman of almost miraculous expertness. Oni, a demon or goblin.

EPILOGUE.

My task is ended. One half of Japan, with its virtues and its frailties, its privileges and its wrongs, has been brought, so far as my pen can bring it, within the knowledge of the American public. If, through this work, one person setting forth for the Land of the Rising Sun goes better prepared to comprehend the thoughts, the needs, and the virtues of the noble, gentle, self-sacrificing women who make up one half the population of the Island Empire, my labor will not have been in vain.

INDEX.

  • Adoption, 103, 112, 187.
  • Agility of Japanese, 13.
  • Ai, love, 415.
  • Amado, sliding wooden shutters used to inclose a Japanese house at night, 23.
  • Amulets, 329.
  • Andon, a standing lamp inclosed in a paper case, 89.
  • Ané San, or Né San, elder sister (San the honorific), a title used by the younger children in a family in speaking to their eldest sister, 20.
  • Aoyama, 131.
  • Apprentices, 309, 310.
  • Art in common things, 237-239, 462, 463.
  • Artisans, 235-239, 270.
  • Babies, 1-17;
    • bathing, 10;
    • conditions of life, 6, 7;
    • dress, 6, 15;
    • food, 10, 11;
    • imperial babies, 8, 9;
    • learning to talk, 16;
    • learning to walk, 13, 14;
    • of lower classes, 7;
    • of middle classes, 8;
    • of nobility, 8;
    • skin troubles, 11;
    • teething, 12;
    • tied to the back, 7, 8, 12.
  • Baby carriages, 424.
  • Baths, public, 10.
  • Beauty, Japanese standard of, 58;
    • early loss of, 122.
  • Bé bé, a child's word for dress, 16.
  • Bed, the Empress's, 446.
  • Betrothal, 60.
  • Bettō, a groom or footman who cares for the horse in the stable and runs ahead of it on the road, 62, 71, 311, 316, 319.
  • Bible, circulation of, in Japan, 412-414.
  • Birth, 1.
  • Boys, amusements of, 362-370.
  • Breakfast, 89.
  • Brothels. See Jōroya.
  • Buddha's birthday, 365.
  • Buddhism, 168, 240;
  • Buddhist funerals, 131, 132, 347.
  • Buddhist nuns, 155.
  • Buddhist priest, story of a, 418-421.
  • Building, 333-335.
  • Butsudan, the household shrine used by Buddhists, 323.
  • Games, battledore and shuttlecock, 31, 32;
  • Géisha, a professional dancing and singing girl, 286-289.
  • Géisha ya, an establishment where géishas may be hired, 286.
  • Géta, a wooden clog, 13, 14.
  • Ginza, 265.
  • Girlhood, 17-34.
  • Gohei, a piece of white paper folded and cut in a peculiar manner, one of the sacred symbols of the Shintō faith, 464.
  • Hakama, the kilt-pleated trousers that formed a part of the dress of every Japanese gentleman, also the skirt worn by school-girls over the kimono, 433, 456.
  • Haori, a coat of cotton, silk, or crêpe, worn over the kimono, 8.
  • Hara-kiri, suicide by stabbing in the abdomen, 201, 202.
  • Haru, Prince, 113, 152, 442-444, 446-452.
  • Haru, Empress, 155-168.
  • Héimin, the class of farmers, artisans, and merchants, 203, 228, 229;
  • Hibachi, a brazier for burning charcoal, 30, 72, 136, 307.
  • Hidéyoshi. See Toyotomi.
  • Hinin, a class of paupers, 228.
  • Hiyéi Zan, 243.
  • Holidays, 269.
  • Hotel-keepers, 280, 281.
  • Hotels, 247-250.
  • Household duties, training for, 21.
  • Household worship, 328.
  • Hyaku nin isshu, "Poems of a Hundred Poets," the name of a game, 26.
  • Inkyo, a place of retirement, the home of a person who has retired from active life, 136.
  • Instruction, in etiquette, 46;
    • in flower arranging, 42;
    • in music, 41, 431;
    • in painting, 47, 432;
    • in reading and writing, 38;
    • in tea ceremony, 44.
  • Inu, a dog, 250.
  • Isé, 231.
  • Iwafuji, 210-213.
  • Iwakura, Prince, 157.
  • Iya, a child's word, denoting dislike or negation, 16.
  • Iyémitsŭ, 171, 172.
  • Iyéyasŭ, 169.
  • Kaibara's "Great Learning of Women," 387, 389, 391.
  • Kakémono, a hanging scroll, 44, 147, 238.
  • Kaméido, 296.
  • Kami-dana, "god-shelf," the household shrine used by Shintō worshippers, 328.
  • Kana, Japanese phonetic characters, 40 note, 430.
  • Katsuobushi, a kind of dried fish, 5.
  • Kimono, a long gown with wide sleeves and open in front, worn by Japanese of all classes, 7, 94, 188, 192, 287.
  • Kisses, 36.
  • Knees, flexibility of, 9.
  • Kotatsu, a charcoal fire in a brazier or small fireplace in the floor, over which a wooden frame is set, and the whole covered by a quilt, 33.
  • Koto, a musical instrument, 42.
  • Kugé, the court nobility, 155, 170.
  • Kura, a fire-proof storehouse, 147, 171, 173.
  • Kuruma, a wheeled vehicle of any kind, used as synonymous with jinrikisha.
  • Kurumaya, one who pulls a kuruma. See Jinrikisha man.
  • Kurushima, 203.
  • Kyōtō, 156, 171, 240, 241.
  • Mam ma, a baby's word for rice or food, 16.
  • Mamushi, a poisonous snake, 467, 468.
  • Manners of children, 18.
  • Manzai, exorcists who drive devils out of the houses at New Year's time, 357.
  • Marriage, 57-83;
  • Marumagé, a style of arranging the hair of married ladies, 119.
  • Matsuri, a festival, usually in honor of some god, 274-278, 366-370.
  • Matsuri, Shobu, feast of flags, 363, 364.
  • Méiji (Enlightened Rule), the name of the era that began with the accession of the present Emperor in 1868, 149.
  • Mékaké, a concubine, 111-114.
  • Men, old, dependence of, 133;
    • amusements of, 136.
  • Merchants, 262-269, 469.
  • Military service of women, 188-190, 208, 223.
  • Missionary schools, 56.
  • Miya mairi, the presentation of the child at the temple when it is a month old. The term is also used to describe the visits to the temple at the ages of three, five, and seven, 3-6, 425-427.
  • Mochi, a kind of rice dumpling, 4, 24, 25, 65, 352, 353.
  • Momotaro, 33.
  • Mon, a family crest, 366.
  • Montsuki, a kimono bearing the crest of the wearer, 457.
  • Morality, standards of, 76.
  • Mother, her relation to her children, 99-102.
  • Mother-in-law, 84, 87;
    • O Kiku's, 74.
  • Moving, 335-337.
  • Mukōjima, 191, 295.
  • Music, 41, 42, 430-432.
  • Names, 3, 423.
  • Nara, 247.
  • Né San. See Ané San.
  • New Year, preparation for, 349-356;
  • Nikkō, 231, 245.
  • No, a pantomimic dance, 292, 293.
  • Norimono, a palanquin, 30.
  • Noshi, a bit of dried fish, usually folded in colored paper, given with a present for good luck, 2.
  • Nurses, trained, 398.
  • Nursing the sick, 101.
  • Reading of women, 385-387.
  • Red Cross Society, 398, 416.
  • Religion of peasantry, 464-466.
  • Retirement from business, 133.
  • Retirement of Emperors, 134.
  • Revenge, 198, 210-214.
  • Revolution of 1868, 76, 221.
  • Rice, red bean, 3, 5, 65.
  • Rin, one tenth of a sen, or about one half mill, 240.
  • Rōnin, a samurai who had lost his master and owed no allegiance to any daimiō, 198, 213.
  • Utsunomiya, 70, 71.
  • Uyéno Park, 296.
  • Virtue, Japanese and Western ideas of, 215-219.
  • Visits, after marriage, 63;
    • in honor of a birth, 1, 2;
    • New Year's, 25;
    • to a house of mourning, 340;
    • to parents, 98;
    • to tombs, 98, 359.
  • Voice in singing, 430-432.
  • Yamato Daké, 215.
  • Yasaku, 324;
    • marriage and divorce of, 69-73.
  • Yasé, 243, 244.
  • Yashiki, a daimiō's mansion and grounds, 169, 171, 173, 311, 313.
  • Yedo. See Tōkyō.
  • Yōshi, an adopted son, 104.
  • Yoshiwara, a district in Tōkyō given over to disreputable houses, 409.
  • Zodiac, Chinese signs of the, 331.
  • Zori, a straw sandal, 13.