Japan: Its History, Arts, and Literature/Volume 6/Chapter 2
Chapter II
OBSERVANCES AND PASTIMES
Every family has rules and methods of its own which it follows with regularity directly proportionate to their age. The members of a household newly franked with the stamp of gentility, look abroad for models of fashion and deportment, but the members of a household that has enjoyed pride of place through immemorial generations, enact their own canons, and obey them with scrupulosity that grows with obedience. For two thousand years, more or less, the Japanese nation lived the life of an independent and virtually secluded family, borrowing largely, indeed, from the conventions and precedents of its over-sea neighbours, but impressing upon everything foreign the mark of home genius, so that, though the metal remained alien, the coins struck from it bore domestic images and superscriptions. Little by little, the doings of the day, the etiquette of the season, the observances of the month, and the celebrations of the year were coded by custom
and promulgated by practice, until the people 
Boys Playing Kotoro.
The sports of Japanese children include kite-flying, top-spinning, snow-balling, battledoor and shuttlecock, etc.,—in fact, most of our old nursery friends modified by the genius loci.
conventionalities, pleasant, graceful, and refined, but inflexible. Nowhere else can be seen grooves of routine beaten so deeply by the tread of centuries; nowhere else does the light of old times, the veteris vestigia flammœ, shine so steadily on the paths of usage. These customs may be examined one by one, and taken thus independently, they present generally very pretty and often very quaint studies. But to appreciate their relation to the life of the nation, one must follow the nation in its observance of them from New Year's day to New Year's eve.
According to the calendar of old Japan, the commencement of the year varied from what Western folks call the 16th of January to the 19th of February, but, on the average, it may be said to have fallen a full month later than the day fixed by the Gregorian method of reckoning. It was thus associated with an idea of spring foreign to the corresponding season in Europe and America. In fact, the first fortnight of the first month was called "spring-advent" (ris-shun) ; the second fortnight, the "rains" (u-sui). That old idea still clings to the time, even under the altered conditions of the new calendar, and people still persuade themselves that spring has dawned when the first January sun rises, though neither the plum nor the snow-parting plant (yuki-wari-so)—each a harbinger of spring in Japan—is within a month of opening its buds. To see the New Year in is considered a wholesome custom, but it involves something more than it does in the West, for, after greeting the stranger, folks remain up to welcome him. Let a man's enthusiasm be ever so defective, he is expected to rise at the hour of the tiger (4 A. M.), wash his feet and hands and don new clothes to meet the auspicious morn. Then, with his gala garments in due order, he worships the celestial and terrestrial deities, performs obeisance to the spirits of his ancestors, offers congratulations to parents and elders, and finally sits down to breakfast. No ordinary viands are consumed. The tea must be made with "young water" (waka-mizu), drawn from the well as the first ray of the new year's sun strikes it. The pièce de résistance (zōni) is a species of potpourri,[1] made from six components, invariably present though in varying proportions, and it is absolutely essential that every one desiring to be hale and hearty throughout the opening twelve months should quaff a measure of special saké[2] from a red-lacquer cup. Each householder, from the highest to the humblest, is careful to prepare and set out an "elysian stand," or red-lacquer tray, covered with leaves of the evergreen yuzuriha, and supporting a rice dumpling, a lobster, oranges, persimmons, chestnuts, dried sardines, and herring roe. This stand and its contents have allegorical signification. Ancient Chinese legends speak of three islands in some remote ocean where youth is everlasting, where birds and animals are all pure white, and where the mountains and palaces are built of gold and silver. The "elysian stand" (hōrai-dai) represents the principal of these three islands (hōrai-jima), and the viands piled upon it are either homonymous with words expressing perpetuity and longevity, or present some feature suggesting long life and prosperity. Thus the leaves spread upon the stand are from the shrub yuzuriha, and on them repose bitter oranges called daidai. But in ordinary colloquial, daidai yuzuri signifies to "bequeath from generation to generation." The kernels of chestnuts, dried and crushed, are called kachi-guri, and kachi also signifies "victory." The lobster (ebi), with its curved back and long tentacles, is typical of life so prolonged that the back becomes bent and the beard grows to the waist. The sea-weed (kombu) is a rebus for yoro-kobu, or yoro kombu, to "rejoice." Sardines are set out because the little fish swim never singly but always in pairs, suggesting conjugal fidelity; herring roe, because of all the sea's inhabitants the herring is supposed to be the most prolific; dried persimmons, because of the fruit's medicinal qualities; and rice-cake, otherwise called "mirror-dumpling" (kagami-mochi), because, in the first place, its shape and name refer to the "sacred mirror" of the Shintō paraphernalia, and, in the second, when cut up for consumption it is known as hagatame, or "teeth-strengthener," a word having the same sound as "debility restorer." Thus this assemblage of edibles constitutes a feast of fortune. Originally the elysian stand was set before guests coming to pay New Year's calls, and the comestibles placed upon it were partaken of. But it subsequently became a mere article of furniture, a part of the decorations of the season. These decorations, spoken of collectively as kado-matsu, or "pine of the doorway," consist primarily of pine and bamboo saplings planted at either side of the vestibule and having a rope of rice-straw (shime-nawa) suspended across the boughs or festooned from them. History says that the fashion of the pines dates from the beginning of the tenth century; that the bamboo was added five hundred years later, and that the straw rope preceded both by an unknown interval. No religious significance attaches to the pine or the bamboo; they simply typify ever-green longevity. But the rope recalls the central event in the Japanese cosmogony, when, the Sun Goddess having been enticed from her cavern, a barrier was stretched across the entrance to prevent her from retreating thither again. Wherever the rope hangs the sweet fresh breath of spring is supposed to penetrate. This, then, is the most prominent element of the decorations: it is suspended not only at the entrance of the house, but also beside the well, before the bathroom, across the sacred shelf, and in the inner court. At the central point of the rope a lobster, some fern fronds, and some yuzuriha leaves are usually tied, the fronds and leaves serving, in this instance, to suggest hardy verdure. A piece of charcoal is added to the assembly, tradition assigning to it the power of warding off evil influences. Theoretically no work of any kind should be done on New Year's day. Even the usual business of sweeping the house is forbidden, lest some element of the "male principle" should be inadvertently removed with the rubbish. But this idleness is merely nominal, for there devolves upon every one the inevitable duty of paying congratulatory visits to friends and relatives,—a duty which is gradually losing many of its old-time graces and assuming the character of a corvée. From the tiniest child to the most ancient grand-father, each dons the best and newest garments that the family wardrobe can furnish, and while the grown-up folk make their round of calls, lads, lassies, and children devote themselves to appropriate pastimes. The visits paid by the small fry of society to the great fish involve nothing more than inscription of one's name in a book or the deposit of one's card in a basket. It is impossible to conceive anything colder and more conventional. Often even the formality of a servant to receive the names of the callers is dispensed with: the visitor finds an untenanted vestibule, a receptacle for cards, and a name-book. But where friendship is concerned, and among the middle and lower classes generally, the call assumes a more genuine and genial character. The visitor carries with him, or is preceded by, a present of some kind, a "year jewel" (toshi-dama); usually trifling in value—as a basket of oranges, a fan, a bundle of dried sea-weed (hoshi-nori), a towel, a parcel of paper, a salted salmon, or a box of sweetmeats—but always wrapped up with scrupulous neatness, and encircled by a cord with strands of red and gold or red and white, the ends joined in a "butterfly knot," under which is thrust a bit of haliotis looking out from a quiver-shaped envelope. Black is the ill-omened hue among colours in Japan; red stands at the opposite end of the category, and red and gold constitute the richest combination, red and white being next in order of auspiciousness. The bit of dried haliotis has a double meaning: it suggests not only singleness of affection, supposed to be typified by the mollusc's single shell, but also durability of love and longevity, since the dried haliotis is capable of being stretched[3] to an extraordinary length. This elaboration of detail extends to the formulæ of greeting. The curt phrases current in the Occident are replaced by sentences that centuries of use have polished and crystallised: "I respectfully tender rejoicings at the opening season;" "I thank you for the many acts of kindness shown to me in the old year, and trust that there will be no change in the new;" "On the contrary, it is I that have to be grateful for your services and to beg for their continuance;" "I am ashamed to offer such an exceedingly insignificant object, but I entreat that you will do me the honour of accepting it as a mere token;" " I am overwhelmed to find that you have come to me when I should have hastened to wait upon you;" and so forth and so on, each sentence punctuated with profound bows and polite inspirations. Meanwhile the streets are converted into playgrounds. Business is entirely limited to the sale or purchase of "treasure-ships" (takara-bune),—a favourite toy typical of good fortune,—sweet saké and bean-jelly (yokau), carried about by hucksters whose musical cries enhance the general festivity. The shops are not shut, but ingress is denied by means of bamboo blinds hanging underneath tablets which bear the name of the householder and are fastened in place with cords of red and white. There is a sound of laughter everywhere, for all the young people turn out, in bright costumes, and play battle-board (hago-ita) and shuttlecock, the penalty for dropping the shuttlecock being to receive, on a tender part of the body, a whack from the battle-boards of all the other players, or a smudge of ink on the face, each of which visitations evokes peals of mirth. The shuttlecock is a diminutive affair, flying swiftly and requiring to be struck true and full. Tradition ascribes to it originally the shape of a dragonfly, and alleges that the game acts as a charm against the attacks of mosquitoes during the ensuing summer, the dragon-fly being a devourer of those insect pests. But that phantasy has passed out of mind. The game of shuttlecock came to Japan from China. In the latter country it is a pastime for men: the heels of their shoes, soled with paper to a thickness of one or two inches, serve for battledoors, and they kick with marvellous dexterity. Japan added a battle-board and thus adapted the amusement to both sexes, while at the same time, bringing its paraphernalia within the range of decorative art. For the battle-board gradually became an object of beauty. The idea of furnishing it with a cat-gut face or parchment back did not occur to its makers: it remained essentially a thin, flat board of white pine. But its reverse, lacquered at first in gold and colours, was finally covered with applied pictures (oshie) showing all the elaboration of detail that distinguishes a Parisian poupée of the most costly kind. The Japanese maiden loves and cherishes dolls at least as much as does her little sister of the West, but her battle-boards hold nearly the same rank in her affections, and if she is fortunate in the possession of rich parents and fond friends, the pillars of her play-room support galleries of battle-boards where may be seen all the great personages of her country's history moulded in white habutœ[4] and tricked out in the resplendent robes of the Palace or the glittering armour of the campaign. The game of battle-board and shuttlecock, though it engages the attention of girls of all ages, finds comparatively little favour with lads until they have reached the age when love of muscular sports begins to be supplemented by a sense of feminine graces. Kite-flying is the amusement of the boy proper. It is a curious fact, apparently inconsistent with experience in other directions, that while the kite occupies at least as large a space in the vista of Japanese as of Chinese childhood, and attracts a much greater share of adult attention in Japan than in China, the ingenious and fantastic shapes that the toy takes in the Middle Kingdom are not emulated in the island empire. The dragon, two or three fathoms long, that may be seen writhing over a Chinese village, each section of its body an independent aeroplane, becomes in Japan a single rectangular surface, generally lacking even the picturesque adjunct of a tail, and unornamented save that the figure of some renowned warrior is rudely caricatured on its face. This difference indicates simply that the Japanese boy prefers the practical to the fanciful. What he wants is, not a quaint monster undulating at a low elevation, but an object that shall soar as loftily and as perpendicularly as possible, and shall hang humming from the blue right overhead.
A digression may be made here from the routine of annual observances in order to speak more fully of kites, for while they hold among Japanese pastimes a rank so prominent as to call for special description, the season for flying them varies in different localities, and it is consequently impossible to assign to them a set place in any calendar of sports. Little lads in every town and village make New Year's day the great epoch for this business, but adult kite-flyers choose other times. In Nagasaki, for example, which enjoys a high reputation for skill in such matters, the third month of the old almanack—that is to say, the balmy time of April or early May—is the season for the shi-en-kai (paper-flying assembly), and on three days in that month—the 10th, 15th, and 20th—all the world and his wife or light-o'-love flock out to one of three spots traditionally appropriated for the game. The kites vary in size from one to thirty-six square feet, but are uniformly rectangular in shape, their ribs made of seasoned bamboo slightly convex to the wind, their paper coverings joined and spread so deftly that perfect equipoise is obtained, and their connection with the flying cord effected by a skein of filaments converging from innumerable points of their surface. The string, through a length of ten to a hundred yards, is covered with powdered glass, for the object of each kite company is to cut down all competitors. Its cord once severed, a kite becomes the property of any one save its original owner, and that inviolable law leads to the organisation of bands of kitecatchers, who mount into high trees, stand at points of vantage, or roam about, armed with long poles, lassoes, and other catching contrivances. It is understood that whenever several catchers lay hands simultaneously on a kite cut adrift, the person nearest to the severed end of the string shall be regarded as the possessor, and that, where distinction is difficult, the kite must be torn into fragments then and there. But despite these precautions against dispute, fierce fights sometimes occur, and Nagasaki was once divided into two factions that threatened for a moment to destroy the town and each other in the sequel of a kite-flying picnic. Generally, however, the merriest good-humour prevails, and the vanquished return as serene as the victors, all equally undisturbed by the thought that the cost of the shi-en-kai makes a large inroad into the yearly economies of the richest as well as the poorest. Tosa, the southern province of the island of Shikoku, is scarcely less celebrated than Nagasaki for the kite-flying propensities of its inhabitants. But there is no set season in Tosa. The birth of a boy, whether it occur in spring, summer, or winter, is counted the appropriate time for a sport that typifies the soaring of ambition and the flight of genius. Humble households send up little kites to signalise these domestic events, but great families have recourse to the furoshiki-dako, a monster from twenty-four to thirty feet square with a tail from a thousand to twelve hundred yards long. The tail, made of red and blue paper, or red and white, in alternate rolls, is coiled in a great open chest, from which the ascending kite draws it, and it is at this huge appendage that rival kites aim their flight. As the kite is pulled down from the clouds, the spectators struggle to possess themselves of the tail, which is generally torn into fragments in the scramble. A feast for all that have assisted to fly the kite terminates the ceremony. Vast, however, as are the dimensions of the furoshiki-dako of Tosa, the pride of place, so far as size is concerned, belongs to the "two- thousand-sheet kites" of Suruga and Tottomi provinces. A "sheet"[5] refers to the form in which paper is ordinarily manufactured, namely, a rectangular measuring a foot by seven inches, approximately. Thus the superficies of a two-thousand-sheet kite, allowing for the joinings of the sheets, is from a thousand to eleven hundred square feet, or about the size of a carpet that would cover a room thirty-three feet square. Such a kite requires a cable to fly it, a sum of from five hundred to six hundred yen to construct it, a special building[6] to store it, and a score of strong men to control it. At the opposite extreme of the scale of kite-flying districts stand the provinces of Owari and Mikawa. There the smaller the kite, the more highly it is esteemed. Tiny representations of dragon-flies, cicadas, and bees are flown with gossamer silk wound on spindles of ivory or tortoise-shell.
It might be supposed that a visit to the temples to pray for good fortune during the new year would be considered an essential part of the day's duties by the pious section of the population; but although a few aged or particularly superstitious folk may be seen offering up a brief orison to the tutelary deity, they are the exception, not the rule. It is considered more fitting to assemble on some highland and join hands of reverence as the first sun of the year rises above the horizon.
Another feature of New Year's day is a dance performed in the streets by strolling mummers who go about in pairs, manzai saizo, fantastically apparelled. One carries a small hand drum, the other a fan, and they dance from door to door with a degree of vigour not usually displayed by saltatory artists in Japan. Girls of the Eta[7] class also go about wearing immense hats that almost completely hide their faces, and playing samisen. These are the tori-oi or bird-chasers. A Chinese superstition transplanted to Japan says that birds of ill omen hover in the air on New Year's day, and seek an opportunity to enter men's abodes. It is the duty of the Eta damsels to avert this calamity, and little paper parcels of cash handed out to them from house after house as they pass along, striking a few notes on the samisen here and a few notes there, show how conservatively respectful is the demeanour even of the modern Japanese towards these ancient beliefs.
As the first day of the month is one of complete abstention from all ordinary business, so the second marks the conventional resumption of trades, industries, and occupations. The student looks into his books; the calligraphist uses his brush; the merchant opens his store; the mechanic takes out his tools; the sailor handles his ship; the painter mixes a colour; and the wholesale dealer sends goods to the retailer. But all these doings are only pretty make-believes. No one thinks of working seriously. Even the hatsuni, the first distribution of merchandise, takes the form of a picturesque procession of hand-wagons gaily decorated and drawn by men in bright costumes. At the Palace and in the residences of noblemen special dances are performed, and wherever a shrine stands in honour of the god of prosperity (Daikoku), cakes of rice flour moistened with warm water are offered.[8]
The 3d is regarded as the fête of the "three Daishi." Piously disposed people in Tōkyō visit the Uyeno temples, and in Kyōtō repair to Hieizan; but it must be confessed that the "mirror-dumpling" ceremony on the following day is observed with far more punctilio. The "mirror-dumplings" (kagami-mochi), which have hitherto stood on the "elysian table," and those that have been offered at the family altar (kami-dana), at the well, and at the hearth, are cut up, fried with soy, and eaten by every member of the household, though, in truth, the dish derives its relish rather from the season than from its own savour.
At dusk on the 6th and at dawn on the 7th a curious combination of cooking and incantation takes place. It is called "the chopping of the seven herbs." From the Nara epoch—that is to say, from the eighth century—it became customary that the Emperor, attended by the Court nobles, should make an expedition to the hills on the "first day of the rat," in the first month, for the purpose of rooting up pine saplings and carrying them back to plant in the Palace park. His Majesty thus brought home longevity, of which the pine had always been symbolical. At the same time the leaves of spring plants were plucked, so that green youth might accompany length of years. It would be futile to attempt any description of the stately graces and elaborate ceremonial with which the Japanese can invest these acts in themselves so primitive. The transplanting of a baby pine, the gathering of a few tender leaves, are purposes so essentially paltry that to prelude them by sumptuous preparations and accompany them by solemn rites seems a grotesque solecism. But the most trivial aim derives dignity from the earnestness with which it is pursued, and the Japanese can be just as much in earnest about the lightest fancy as about the weightiest fact. They know how to be picturesquely great in small things, and if the faculty is crushed hereafter by collision with the hard realities of Western civilisation, the artistic world will be so much the poorer. During the first century of this pine-transplanting observance, its leaf-plucking adjunct was simply symbolical, but from the time of the Emperor Saga (813 A. D.) the practical precepts of Chinese traditions were adopted, and the leaves came to serve as seasoning for soup. Seven kinds had to be selected by those that aimed at strict orthodoxy, but common folks contented themselves with two. These they placed on a block, and with a large knife in each hand chopped rythmically to the seven-syllabled refrain:—
Never here from China fly;
Flit and hop, flitting hopping;
Chip and chop, chipping chopping."[9]
Here once more appear the birds of ill omen which the ample-hatted Eta maiden has already been seen driving away with samisen strains on New Year's day. Their connection with the preparation of the "seven-herb" soup is an affair of sound, not sense. The Chinese were wont to rap on the doors of their houses for the purpose of scaring away these invisible visitors, and the Japanese have converted that profoundly sensible custom into a chorus which they chaunt to the accompaniment of the chopping-knives, making a merry pastime out of even this primevally simple performance.
From the eighth day of the month business is resumed, and on the 11th men of war make offerings of mirror-dumplings to their armour, and practise archery, using a target big enough to avert the misfortune of opening the year with a bad record. On the 14th the decorations of pine, bamboo, and rope are removed and burned together, but in their place willow wands finely split into flower-like forms (kezurihana) are fixed to the eaves.[10] The cremation of the pine saplings and their companions is intended to drive away the mountain demons, who hate the crackle and sputter of fire, and to invite the cheerful principle while expelling the sad.[11] The 15th is distinguished as the "chief-origin" day, and tradition requires that bean (azuki) broth should be eaten in every household, the bean being fatal to evil spirits. This day, too, and the 16th are servants' holidays. Men-servants and women-servants are allowed to visit their homes, a proceeding politely designated "the return of the rustics" (yabuiri). The New Year's ceremonials are now nominally at an end. Indeed, they may be said to have terminated with the burning of the decorations. But there remains one observance never forgotten or curtailed. It belongs to the 20th, is called "the first face," and consists in offerings of rice dumplings (mochi) by the fair sex to their toilet mirrors, just as on the 11th the samurai makes a similar offering to his armour. While maids and matrons pay this vicarious homage to their own charms, merchants worship the deities of prosperity, Ebisu and Daikoku, the main feature of their worship being a display of profuse hospitality to friends and relatives,—a veritable housewarming.
It will be observed that the gods do not play a very prominent part in Japan's New-Year observances. People do not turn their feet to the temples, nor do the priests deliver sermons to large audiences. At the close of the month (24th and 25th), however, there is a faint revival of religious sentiment. The shrines of Emma, the deity of Hades, are visited, and the more superstitious carry with them little wooden carvings of a bullfinch, which they have carefully kept during the old year and which they now exchange at the shrines for new effigies; thus divesting themselves of the burden of their sins of deceit during the past twelvemonth and receiving a token of renewed sincerity and renewed expiation throughout the opening year. This is another example of those quaint plays upon words probably inevitable among people speaking a language like that of the Japanese. The name of the bullfinch (uso) is homonymous with the term "falsehood." Thus the idea of the worshipper is to hide in his sleeve—for the effigy of the bullfinch is thus carried—all the fibs and falsehoods of which he has been guilty throughout the old year, and to avert their evil results. But the singular fact is that he carries home from the shrine a new symbol of deception. He makes naïve admission that life cannot be lived without lying, whereby he thus avoids at least the lie of pretending to think that it can.[12] It must not be supposed, however, that his fresh bullfinch confers prospective absolution from the guilt of guile. No such idea is acknowledged, though it is easy to perceive that a mechanical device for periodically evading the consequences of deceit cannot fail to create a false conscience towards the fault.
Every year of the "ten-stem cycle" on which the almanack of old Japan was based, has a special point of the compass from which fortunate influences are supposed to emanate. The god controlling these influences is called the "Year-luck Deity" (Toshi-toku jin), and throughout the first month sacred saké (miki) and rice dumplings are offered to this mysterious being at the domestic altar. There is, in truth, no more mysterious divinity in the Japanese pantheon,—a divinity of doubtful sex, said by some to be the youngest daughter of the Dragon king whose palace is at the bottom of the sea, and described by others as a sort of steersman spirit who guides the sequence of the years through the changes of the compass points. The average Japanese wastes no more brain fibre over the enlightenment of these arcana than the average Christian does over the orthodoxy of the Logos. It is a traditional part of the New Year's observances to fill with votive wine the sacred bottles (on-miki-dokuri) reserved for that purpose, and to flank them with plump dumplings of rice-flour, just as it is a duty of joy to build up at the threshold pillars of longevity and an arch of sweet atmosphere.
There is little in the way of fête or pastime to distinguish the first half of the second month. The innumerable shrines of Inari throughout the country are thronged with worshippers on the first "day of the horse" (hatsu-uma), generally about the 2d of the month; lights are placed in the pillar-lamps; flags are hoisted, and after praying for agricultural prosperity, the people feast on "red rice" (seki-han), the invariable dish at seasons of congratulation. This day, also, used to be counted specially auspicious for the commencement of children's studies, but modern civilisation has severed the old-fashioned connection between education and the cycles of stems and signs. Still, however, there are housewives so conservative of tradition that only on the second day of the second month will they consent to engage a new woman-servant, such having been the ancient rule.[13]
The first fifteen days of the second month are known as the time of the "insects' tremor" (ketchitsu); the second fifteen as the "spring equinox" (shumbun). It is supposed that the insects which have lain dormant throughout the winter feel the touch of spring and start in their sleep, preluding the bursting of the plum blossoms, which takes place from the 15th. Visits to the plum forests marks the beginning of the year's open-air fêtes. Appreciation of natural beauties is a sense that has attained great development in Japan. It is independent of social refinement or philosophical education. The blacksmith's apprentice and the scullery maid welcome the advent of the flower time as rapturously as do the dilettante and the noble dame. In the case of the plum there are features that appeal with special force to the æsthetic instincts of the people. The gnarled, age-worn aspect of the gloomy tree contrasts so powerfully with the fresh softness of its pearl-like blossoms, and the absence of leaves so enhances the sanguine temerity of the fragile flowers, that the Japanese discover in this effort of nature a hundred allegories pointing the victory of hope over despair, the renewal of vigour among decay, the triumph of fortune over the blight of adversity. A library might be filled with the verselets that have been composed in honour of plum flowers, and suspended from the branches of favourite trees in the groves to which all classes of the people flock at this season.
Battle-board and shuttlecock, kite-flying and archery, have been spoken of here as sports con- sidered specially appropriate to the New Year; but there are other games which, though not limited to any particular period, are naturally played with exceptional zest at that time. Football used to be one of them; but the old-fashioned ke-mari, imported from China a dozen centuries ago, has now been completely ousted by its Occidental representative. The essence of the sport, as practised in China and Japan, was to kick the ball as high as possible and to keep it always in flight. There were no goals, no organised systems of assault and defence, and the pastime was essentially aristocratic. Hand-ball (te-mari) is the corresponding amusement of the gentle sex. The reader must not imagine anything in the nature of English "fives." Hand-ball, as the Japanese girl plays it, is a combination of refined dexterity and graceful movement. The ball is struck perpendicularly on the ground, and the player performs a complete pirouette in time to strike it again as it rebounds. Sometimes she meets it at the summit of its bound and arrests it for a second on the back of her fingers before reversing her hand and striking the ball downward again preparatory to a new pirouette; sometimes she makes it leap so high that she can pirouette twice before it springs again from the ground, and, all the while, she and her companions chaunt a song in unison with these lithe movements. Victory depends upon not letting the ball escape beyond the range of circle and stroke, but victors and vanquished alike have the satisfaction of displaying to the full that "eloquence of form" which constitutes the speech of the coquette. There are other methods of playing the game, but they need not occupy attention here; unless, indeed, exception be made in favour of o-te-dama, which has for its paraphernalia three, five, or seven tiny rectangular bags filled with small beans, and which demands only a fraction of the exertion required by te-mari proper. To tell how these miniature bags are manipulated would call for two or three pages of text and two or three score of illustrations. But if any lady has a beautiful hand and arm, a supple wrist, a quick eye, and muscles capable of nice adjustment, the Japanese accomplishment of o-te-dama deserves her serious attention.
To this context, also, belongs sugo-roku, or the "ranging of sixes," which, though it includes the demoralising element of dice, is, of all indoor pastimes, the most generally affected in Japan. The "race game," familiar in Europe and America, is so closely akin to Japanese sugo-roku that it is difficult to doubt their common parentage. There is a broad sheet divided into lettered or pictorial sections, from one to another of which the player progresses according to the number thrown by him with a single die. The game is said to have had its origin in India,[14] whence it found its way to Japan in the eighth century. At first it was prohibited on account of its gambling character, but eventually Buddhist priests took it up, and converted it into an instrument for inculcating virtue. An illustrated ladder of moral tenets, varied by immoral laches, led to heaven or precipitated into hell, and young people were expected to derive a vicarious respect for the ethical precepts that marked the path to victory. The game thenceforth became a vehicle of instruction as well as amusement, its pictures representing sometimes official grades or religious terms.
A cognate amusement, without the use of dice, is the "poem card" game (uta-garuta). This, as its name karuta—a Japanese rendering of the Spanish word carta—suggests, is partly of foreign origin. Before their contact with the West, the Japanese had a pastime called "poem shells,"—uta-kai, or kai-awase,—the precursor of "poem cards." In its earliest day, this amusement consisted simply in joining the shells of a bivalve. A number of shells—twenty, thirty, or more—constituted the pack, from which one was taken by each player, the remainder being spread on the mats to form a "deck." The player's object was to find the mate of the shell dealt to him. By and by, as the game received aristocratic patronage, shells of special beauty were selected, carefully polished, and placed in circular boxes of rich gold lacquer, which figured among the furniture of every refined lady's boudoir. Then a new feature was added: the affinity of two shells was indicated by inscribing on one the first half of some celebrated couplet and on the other the second half. The writing of poetry—or, to speak more accurately, the knack of expressing some pretty fancy in metrical form—had a place among the essential accomplishments of an educated lady or gentleman in Japan, and involved intimate acquaintance with all the classical gems in that field of literature. It is easy to see, therefore, that these "poem shells" became at once a source of pleasure and of instruction. The Portuguese, coming in the sixteenth century, brought with them playing-cards as well as Christianity and firearms. Strange to say, however, though the Japanese welcomed the cards, they rejected the foreign manner of using them, and devised a game of their own, which may be compared to whist, but is, on the whole, more complicated and difficult. It is called "flower-joining" (hana-awase). The essentially Japanese feature of the game is that every card bears a representation of some flower, with the name and appearance of which the player must be familiar. Cards are also substituted for shells in the "poem-shell" pastime described above, and these uta-garuta (poem cards) occupy in the repertoire of feminine and youthful pastimes the same place that the difficult game of hana-awase holds among the amusements of men. In Japanese estimation, however, no game supports comparison for a moment with that of go, to which foreign translators give the misleading name "checkers," though it bears about the same relation to checkers as vingt-et-un does to whist. There is probably no other game in the world that demands such analytical insight and genius for combination. Every educated man plays go, but very few develop sufficient skill to be classed in one of the nine grades of experts, and not once in a century does a player succeed in obtaining the diploma of the ninth, or highest, grade. The board and men—small round counters of shell, ivory, or stone—used for playing go serve also for a pastime called gomoku-narabe, or "five in a row;" a simple amusement, affected by girls and children, and mistaken by many foreigners for go itself, with which it has no manner of connection. Chess (shogi), too, is very popular. It is cognate with the "royal game" of the Occident, but there are thirty-six pieces instead of thirty-two, and the board has eighty-one squares instead of sixty-four. On the other hand, though the movements and names of the pieces resemble those of their Western representatives, their powers are not so large, and it has consequently been inferred that the Japanese game is simpler than the Occidental. The inference is probably erroneous, for any element of simplicity due to the reduced power of the pieces is compensated by their greater number, and by the fact that at a certain stage pieces previously won or lost reappear in a combination. A form of chess to which the term applies only by courtesy—namely, tsume-shogi, or the imprisonment of one freely moving piece by several others of very restricted power—is much played by the lower orders.
Gambling has never been practised in Japan on a scale commensurate with European records. Such an incident as the ruin of an educated man by cards and dice is comparatively rare. The game of hana-awase, spoken of above, might be expected to attain the rank held by whist or piquet in Europe and America, and thus to become a recognised amusement in refined circles. But a certain measure of discredit has always attached to it. Cards are not among the recognised pastimes of polite society, and the card-player is counted a mauvais sujet in a serious sense. "Poem cards" and sugo-roku are, of course, considered perfectly innocent: no betting is connected with them. But players of hana-awase sometimes put up large stakes, and repair to tea-houses and restaurants to carry on the game in secret. These, however, are invariably young folks who have not yet concluded the sowing of their wild oats. A man of mature years who devotes his evenings to such doings recognises himself as a vicious person. Certain sections of the lower orders, on the other hand, are not restrained by any sentiment of self-respect in this matter. Grooms, drawers of jinrikisha, and carriers of kago often while away the intervals of their toil with a game of cards, and stake their hardly earned coins on the result. One may occasionally see a group of these men, huddled together in some out-of-the-way corner and rapt in their illicit pursuit, while one of their number stands sentinel to watch for the coming of a constable. The law is very strict. Whenever and wherever he is observed, the card-player for money may be arrested.[15] There must be distinct evidence, however, that money changes hands. Gambling-houses do not exist and never have existed. The three-card man, the hunt-the-pea artist, and the roulette board are not seen at public fêtes. They would be promptly "run in." But the professional gambler does exist. So far as his art is concerned, he is generally a poor species of ruffian. Loaded dice and sufficient sleight of hand to substitute them for the legitimate ivories are his stock in trade. There is no scope for skill, nor any redeeming doctrine of chances and probabilities. Youths with money or expectations are enticed into the society of these professionals, and robbed until they are no longer worth robbing. Still the field for exercising talent so rudimentary is very limited. The gambler, therefore, moulds himself on finer lines. He is an accomplished man of the world, a charming companion, fatally versed in all the intricacies of hana-awase, and competent to supplement skill by art. He frequents fashionable tea-houses, and inveigles pleasure-seekers into little games with costly results.
Numerical symmetry has always possessed a charm for the Japanese, and may perhaps be chiefly responsible for the fact that during many centuries they have specially feted the third day of the third month, the fifth of the fifth, the seventh of the seventh, and the ninth of the ninth. These four days, together with the seventh day of the first month, constitute the go-sekku, or "five festivals of the seasons." There is a weird and fanciful legend which connects the five celebrations with the story of an ox-headed incanation of Buddha, who married the youngest daughter of the dragon king, and subsequently carved into five pieces the body of a prince who had opposed his quest for a wife; but the fabrication of this gruesome tale evidently succeeded the birth of the custom for which it professes to account.[16] The celebration on the third day of the third month is commonly called the hina-matsuriy or dolls' festival. It is the fête of little maidens, and their manner of celebrating it is to marshal a multitude of dolls representing historical characters, with their vassals, servitors, soldiers, equipages, and paraphernalia. Incredible care and sometimes great expense are lavished on the preparation of these toys. Every detail is studiously exact, whether of costume, of armour, of arms, of head-dress and foot-gear, of camp or palace furniture, of utensils for cooking and for feasting, of arrangements for wedding ceremonies and state progresses. Sometimes the figures and their accessories number as many as from five hundred to a thousand articles, and the work of setting them out is a delight of days' duration, no less than a liberal education in the customs and etiquette of refined life. In every house offerings are made of white saké and herb-cake (kusa-mochi), that is to say, cake made of rice-flour mixed with leaves of the artemisia (yomogi), or of "mother-and-child " shrub (haha-ko-gusa). Of course costly collections of o-hina-sama, or "honourable effigies," as the little maidens call them, are preserved from generation to generation, descending from mother to daughter. But the demand for new ones gives employment to a considerable body of artists, and during the week that precedes the fête day, a busy market is held in such quarters of the capital cities as from time immemorial have been counted the chief emporia of these elaborate toys,—for example, Nakabashi, Owari-cho, and Jikkendama in Tōkyō; Shijo and Gojo in Kyōtō, and Mido-maye and Junkei-cho in Ōsaka. So soon as the fête is over, the o-hina-sama are packed away in silk and wadding, not to see the light again until the third month of the following year. There is no doubt that the idea of this dolls' festival came from China, but the development that it received after its adoption by the Japanese amounts to complete metamorphosis. The Chinese conception was that the first "serpent-day"[17] in the third month should be devoted to exorcising the evil influences to which each person is individually exposed. For that purpose an exorcist supplied a paper puppet, with which the recipient rubbed his body. This nade-mono (literally, rubbing thing) was then returned to the exorcist, who performed certain rites over it. By and by it became customary to range the nade-mono of a household on a shelf with offerings of wine and food, and out of that habit grew the o-hina-sama. It is a record fairly illustrating the changes undergone by the customs of the East-Asian continent after transplantation to Japanese soil.
Tradition says that when Sakyamuni was born a dragon appeared and poured water over the babe. The incident is commemorated in Japan on the fourth day of the fourth month, when the "washing of Buddha" (kwan-butsu or yoku-butsu) takes place. An image of the god — a birthday Buddha (tanjo-butsu)—is set up in a hall decorated with flowers, and each worshipper pours water or amacha (a decoction of hydrangea leaves) over the effigy from a tiny ladle. This, being a temple rite, does not evoke much enthusiasm, but evidences of its popular observance may be seen in decorations of azalea sprays, shikimi boughs, and u (Deutzia scabra) blossoms set up at the gates of houses. As usual, the idea of averting evil dictates the procedure of the time. Worms are the special object of exorcism. A leaf of shepherd's purse (nazuna) is tied inside the lantern of the sleeping-chamber, and over the lintel is pasted an amulet[18] written with ink which has been moistened with the liquid of lustration (amacha). Again the rice-flour cake is offered at the domestic altar. It now takes the form of a lotus petal with capsule of bean-paste (an). In the cities hucksters go about selling ducks' eggs, which, eaten on this day, are supposed to be efficacious against palsy; and occasionally itinerant priests, with close-cropped hair and a peculiar costume, pass from street to street calling out, O-shaka! o-shaka! or "Buddhas to sell, Buddhas to buy," and performing buffoon tricks to gaping crowds. The stock in trade of these gwannin-bo (depraved priests) consists of little images of Sakyamuni and five-coloured flags of the u flower, the whole carried ignominiously in common water-pails.
The fourth month of the old calendar, the May of modern times, is distinguished above all other months as the season of flowers. It is then that the cherry blooms, and in Japanese eyes the 
A "No" Dancer in Costume.
refined, beautiful, and vigorous. The blossom itself has no special excellence ; it is as cherry blossoms are everywhere. But by massing the trees in positions that lend themselves to a coup-d'œil, by arching them over long avenues beside broad rivers, and by setting them in a framework of exquisite scenery, there are produced glowing effects and harmonious contrasts which, enhanced by the opalescent atmosphere of a Japanese spring, are worthy of the passionate enthusiasm they arouse. It has been sometimes asserted, sometimes denied, that a keener love of flowers and a more subtle sense of their beauties exist, either by instinct or by education, among these Far-Eastern people than can be found anywhere else. Those that take the affirmative view point to the vast crowds of men, women, and children that throng the cherry groves during the short season of bloom; to the universality of this affectionate admiration, as potent to draw the grey-headed statesman or the philosopher from his studio as to attract lads and lasses on the threshold of life and love; to the familiar acquaintance with flowers and their habits that is possessed even by artisans and scavengers, and to the fact that the Japanese manage to derive much wider gratification from flowers and to utilise them more effectively as factors of public pleasure than any other nation does. In the science of horticulture they rank far below Europeans and Americans. They had practically no knowledge of botany until they acquired it from the West. Their gardens have never included conservatories of rare exotics. It has not occurred to them to organise competitive flower-shows in the Occidental fashion, and nature has bequeathed to them only a small portion of the floral wealth with which England, France, and the United States are dowered. Yet they have made so much of her comparatively scanty gifts that the blossoms of each season are a feature in their lives, a prime element in their happiness. If they possessed the laburnum, the lilac, the hawthorn, the gorse, the bluebell, the snow-drop, the honeysuckle, the jessamine, the primrose, and all the other "letters of the angel tongue" written on the fair faces of some Western countries, it is possible, indeed, that the keenness of their appreciation might have been dulled by satiety; but, judging by the facts as actually existing, the strong probability is that they would have taught the world new ways of profiting by these gifts of nature. Certainly they stand alone among nations in the public organisation of their taste for flowers and in the universal fidelity with which they gratify it. The cherry fêtes of Tōkyō, Kyōtō and other Japanese cities need not be described here. In former times, when the patrician stood above the law, and when the disguise of an eye-mask—an "eye-wig," as it was jocosely called—sufficed to justify almost any licence, these motley crowds were sometimes unwilling witnesses of rude practical jokes. But the policemen's baton is now more potent than the samurai's sword, and beyond the discord of a vinous refrain, or, perhaps, entanglement in a group of erratic roisterers, the peaceful citizen has nothing to apprehend. Boat-races on the Sumida River in Tōkyō and athletic sports in the parks are features of this month, but such things are modern innovations and do not yet rank higher than second-rate imitations of their Occidental models. Reference may be made en passant to a pretty but now almost obsolete pastime associated with this season, the game of "water windings" (kyoku-sui). It had its origin in China, and obtained great vogue at one time among the aristocrats of Japanese society, but the age has passed it by. A cup of wine launched upon a stream was suffered to float at the caprice of the current, and verselets were composed before it came within reach of the convives posted along the banks. A trivial pastime, in truth, but it is in the genius of the Japanese to make much of slender resources.
There is another kind of picnic which survives all changes of fashion, and attracts pleasure-seekers in as great numbers now as it did a hundred years ago. It may be seen at its best in Tōkyō. On certain days in May and early June, when the spring tides recede from the shallow reaches along the southern suburb of the city, large spaces of weed-covered sand emerge from the water, and adjacent to them the sea spreads a covering only a few inches deep over wide areas where shell-fish congregate. The days when nature behaves in that manner are marked with a red letter in the citizen's calendar. Engagements that must wait weeks or even months for fulfilment, engagements to gather shells in company, are formed between persons of all ages,—green lads and lasses, men and women in middle life, and old folks to whom the spring airs no longer bring more than a fitful suggestion of "light fancies." These pleasure-seekers launch themselves in the favourite vehicle of Tōkyō picnics, the yane-bune,—a kind of gondola,—and float seaward with the ebbing tide, singing snatches of song the while, to the accompaniment of tinkling samisen, or of that graceful game ken,[19] so well devised to display the charms of a pretty hand and arm. Such outings differ in one important respect from the more orthodox picnics of Tōkyō folks,—the visits to plum-blooms, cherry-blossoms, peony beds, chrysanthemum puppets, iris ponds, and river-openings. They differ in the fact that there is no display of fine apparel. Bright and skilfully blended colours there are, indeed; but the embroidered girdle, the elaborately woven robe of silk crepe, the dainty armlet, and the costly hair-pin are absent. Camlets and cottons constitute the proper costume of the day, and a pretty air of business resolution replaces the leisurely archness generally characteristic of the budding damsel in Japan. To two articles of apparel only do the ladies give special heed. Of these, the more important is the petticoat, if such a misleading and commonplace term may be applied to the closely fitting underskirt of Japanese habiliments,—the yumoji, a broad band of silk, folded round the body and reaching from the waist to a little below the knee. In the vast majority of cases the colour of this item of clothing is crimson. Its glowing uniformity may, however, be varied by sundry devices, from an almost imperceptible sprig pattern of darker hue, to wonders of deft weaving and happy caprice, and a quick-eyed ethnologist may look to see much exercise of tasteful coquetry in the yumoji that grace the suburban shell-beds of Tōkyō at spring-tide picnics. The second article demanding and receiving unusual care is nothing more or less than a towel. Here, again, the paucity of our Anglo-Saxon language becomes perplexing. "Petticoat" may pass for yumoji, faute de mieux, but to speak of the tenugui (literally, "hand-wiper") as a towel is to convey a very false impression of the little blue-and-white linen kerchief which these shell-seeking ladies twist into the daintiest coiffures conceivable, not so much to shade their complexions as to preserve the gloss and symmetry of the achievements that their hair-dressers have turned out for the occasion. The water, as has been said, is only a few inches deep, but a few inches mean much when skirts have to be kept from dabbling in the brine, and arms must be free for a plunge above the elbow. It will be understood, therefore, that the shell-beds gleam with such a display of white ankles as would shock a prude. But prudery is not among the paraphernalia taken to sea on these occasions. The Japanese are nothing if not natural, and when the business of the moment demands certain concessions, no one is supposed to look beyond the necessity. But in truth it may be safely said that delicacy and modesty are less outraged at the shio-ki in Tōkyō than in many an Occidental salon. The wide sleeves of the upper garment are restrained by a cord (tasuki) crossed over the breast and back; the skirts are tucked under the inner girdle, and in that guise merry girls and women paddle about, groping in the soft sand that closes over their white feet, and picking up shell-fish of many kinds in considerable quantities. Grown men, middle-aged men, and even old men do not disdain to join the fun, and seem to find genuine pleasure and excitement in delving after hidden crustacea, while the sea-breeze whispers of luncheon and toys with the crimson yumoji of the gentle gleaners. Luncheon, of course, is a special feature of these outings; for in each boat there is a little furnace piled with glowing charcoal, and on this the captured shell-fish crack and sputter, until, sweetened by a drop of soy at the proper moment, they become a delicacy fit for any palate. Then there is leisurely drifting homeward on the bosom of the rising tide, with faces that have imbibed the sun's glow and limbs that retain a pleasantly languid sense of recent exertion.
The boys' fête (tango) on the fifth day of the fifth month is a particularly conspicuous event, owing to the fact that at every house where a male child has been born during the preceding twelvemonth a carp, made of paper or silk, is raised, banner-wise. The carp is attached by its mouth to the end of a flag-staff, and being inflated by the breeze, undulates overhead, so that, through-out the days of this observance, thousands of big fish seem to be writhing and gyrating above the roofs of the cities. In Japanese eyes the carp typifies indomitable resolution. As it sturdily faces the stream and leaps up the waterfall, so fond parents hope that their little lads will rise in the world and overcome all obstacles. The sweet-flag and the iris, now in full bloom, play a conspicuous part in this fête. Bunches of the former, together with sprays of mugwort (yomogi), are raised at the eaves of houses,[20] and saké seasoned with petals of the iris is the beverage of the season. In the alcoves, warriors, battle-steeds, armour, and weapons of war—often beautiful and brilliant examples of skilled workmanship and decoration—are ranged, but these relics of bygone days are fast losing their interest for the youth of the nation; and since it is impossible to combine picturesqueness with accuracy in any representation of the military uniforms and accoutrements of modern times, alcoves that used once to be crowded with gallant puppets in gorgeous panoply now make no contribution to the gaiety of the tango. Tradition tells nothing certain about the origin of this celebration. Some of its details—as, for example, the fact that the rice-cakes peculiar to the time are wrapped in bamboo leaves, and the bean-confections in oak leaves, or that, at the hour of the hare, all lights are extinguished for a brief interval in temples and houses—have their own special legends to explain them, but the festival as a whole is a mystery. There are many minutiæ, but they scarcely merit description in detail. Neither does the series of flower-fêtes that mark the various seasons, the picnics to the wistaria, the azalea, the iris, the lotus, the peonies, the chrysanthemums, the orchids, and the autumnal tints. The ideal of the Japanese is to have a festival of flower or foliage for every month, but their manner of enjoying themselves on these occasions is uniformly simple. They do not carry with them stores of provisions and hampers of wine, but are content with the fare that the local tea-house offers, and to have indited a felicitous couplet and suspended it from the branch of some notable tree, or from the stem of some luxuriantly blooming plant, is to have attained the summit of enjoyment. Were it possible to banish the spasm-shouts that men mistake for songs, and the twanging of the unmusical samisen, the out-door fêtes of Japan would be the acme of refined pleasure-seeking.
Among the ceremonies of the sixth month the principal takes place at twilight by river-banks, when Shintō priests set up cross-shaped periapts (gohei) and pray for the dispersal of evil influences, or into the stream thus purified cast miniature paper surcoats, shaped by the hands of worshippers and bearing the legend, "Peace be on this household" (kanai anzen). The growth of modern ideas tends to weaken the people's fidelity to these purely religious rites, which, indeed, might well be spared from the nation's customs. The same remark partially applies to the case of the sekku, on the seventh of the seventh month, for few persons now place faith in the cakes (sakuhei) which, eaten upon that day, were formerly supposed to avert ague; nor is the "marriage of the stars" regarded any longer with even traditional curiosity. Yet the latter legend once inspired a pretty ceremony. Four tables used to be placed in the garden,—especially in the park of the "Palace of Pure Freshness," for the custom was always favoured by the imperial family,—and thereon, flanked by smoking sticks of incense, vessels of water were set, to reflect the passage of the heavenly-river (ama-no-kawa, i. e. the Milky Way) by the Herdboy Prince (Tanabata) on his way to meet the Weaver Princess (Ori-hime). Connected with this ceremonial—purely Chinese in its origin—was the writing of verselets upon thin sheets of bamboo or fine-grained woods; and these tanzaku, as they are called, ultimately took the form of dainty tablets, decorated with devices in golden and silvern lacquer, and tasselled with silk cords, many of which have found a place in Western collections merely for the sake of their prettiness. To this seventh month, however,—it must not be forgotten that the terminology of the old calendar is here used throughout, and that the so-called seventh month corresponds, approximately, with August,—to this seventh month belongs a celebration which retains much of its old vigour, and can never be entirely neglected so long as ancestral worship is the national cult. It is a fête known as Urabon, or more commonly Bon, intended for the welcome and entertainment of the spirits of the dead which are supposed to visit their loved survivors at this season. The nature of the occasion will at once suggest the profound sentiment connected with its observance. Five days, from the 13th to the 16th, are devoted to the rites, though it is not to be supposed that these are of an elaborate or complicated character. The chief duty is to prepare the shoryo-dana, or spirit-altar. It is a small mat of straw, having at the four corners bamboo pillars, between which is suspended the inevitable "sweet-air rope" (shime-nawa) with pendent decoration of wave-shaped vermicelli, sprays of chestnut, dried persimmons, yew berries, ears of millet, white egg-fruits, gourds, and winter cherries. Over the straw floor are strewn bulrushes and leaves of the cockscomb and lespedeza; within the enclosure stand rods thrust into melons or egg-fruits which are cut into shapes of oxen or horses—spirit vehicles—and around the whole is erected a low belt of cedar leaves. The details are inviolable. Viands are, of course, provided for the use of the ghostly visitors. There are the cakes of welcome (omukae-dango) and the cakes of farewell (okuri-dango); there are rice-balls wrapped in lotus leaves; there is a humble dish called imono-zuki, which consists of potato-stems boiled and seasoned with soy, and there are fruits varying in kind and quantity according to the means of the household. Lanterns are suspended before each house, and at eventide on the 13th tiny fires of hemp are lit to greet the coming spirits, and a vessel of water is placed outside, that they may wash their feet. Again, on the night of the 16th, these feebly flickering lights shed their rays on the path of the departing visitors, and so the fête ends. The preparations are elaborate; the rites and observances of the simplest. It might be supposed that since the aerial visitors are regarded as guardians and assistants of their kinsfolk on earth, this, their one annual visit, would be converted into an occasion for propitiating their favour and enlisting their aid. But hospitality does not suggest that a guest should be importuned with petitions. There is some sprinkling of powdered incense over the embers of the hempen bonfire in order that the fumes, mingling with the ghostly essences that permeate the air, may smother evil influences; sometimes, too, men light their pipes in the flame, thinking thus to inhale good fortune; sometimes they step over the fire to avert or heal certain maladies, and sometimes they preserve the cinders as a charm against disease. But the spirits come and go unworried by petitions. Neither their advent nor their presence inspires feelings of awe or horror. The average Japanese is not without a dread of ghosts, and may easily be persuaded into a quiet but firm conviction in the reality of a haunted house, but the spirits that come to visit him in his home at Bon time are friends whom he loves and trusts. His disposition is to receive them with dance and song rather than with shrinking and aversion, and it thus fell out that among the multitude of Japanese fêtes none was so conspicuously marked by dancing performances. The past tense is here used, for these Bon dances have fallen under the ban of the law in modern Japan, and though still practised in the provinces, are no longer to be seen in the great cities. It is on record that, some two thousand years ago, men and women of all classes, princes and princesses of the blood not excepted, were wont to assemble upon hill-tops or in the streets, and to engage in dances, one object of which was identical with the motive of the modern ball, namely, to promote the interests of love. This custom was subsequently modified—like so many other Japanese customs—by Chinese influences, but much of its ancient character was certainly preserved in the Bon dances which the civilisation of new Japan taboos.
- ↑ See Appendix, note 5.
Note 5.—Rice cake (mochi), Japanese turnip (daikon), potatoes (imo), a species of sea-weed (kombu), haliotis (awabi), a burdock (gobo).
- ↑ See Appendix, note 6.
Note 6.—This saké is called toso, though the term is properly limited to the spices themselves. The custom came from China, where it existed certainly as far back as the third century before Christ. It is said to have originated with an old hermit who distributed among the villagers packets of physic, directing that the packet be let down by a string into the well, taken up again on New Year's day, and placed in a tub of saké, a draught of which would prove a preservative against every kind of disease. The practice was introduced into Japan at the beginning of the ninth century, and etiquette soon elaborated the ceremonial by prescribing a special kind of saké for each of the first three days of the year,—toso, biyakusan, and toshosan. It is de rigueur that the youngest of a party should be the first to drink the spiced saké. As for the spices, they are chiefly carminatives.
- ↑ See Appendix, note 7
Note 7.—The bit of haliotis is called noshi, which signifies "stretched out."
- ↑ See Appendix, note 8.
Note 8.—A kind of silk.
- ↑ See Appendix, note 9.
Note 9.—The popularity of kite-flying in Japan is indirectly attested by the ordinary manner of estimating the strength of twine. "One-sheet twine" (ichi-mai ito) means twine capable of holding a one-sheet kite; "two-sheet twine" (ni-mai ito), twine capable of holding a two-sheet kite, and so on. There is, consequently, no three-sheet twine, or five-sheet twine, etc., because kites, being square or rectangular, cannot be constructed with three, five, seven, eleven, etc. sheets of paper.
- ↑ See Appendix, note 10.
Note 10.—The great hall in a temple is often utilised for the purpose.
- ↑ See Appendix, note 11.
Note 11.—The Eta no longer form a separate class in the eye of the law.
- ↑ See Appendix, note 12.
Note 12.—It is not easy to trace the origin of this custom. In the Imperial Palace, on the 4th of the first month, it used to assume a much more elaborate form, the dancers being four, with costumes suggesting Manchurian affinities,—head-gear like a helmet, boat-shaped sandals, and long trains. The manzai who perform in the streets of towns and villages come from Mikawa, which province enjoys the special privilege of supplying these artists.
- ↑ See Appendix, note 13. Note 13.—Toto no tori no
Nikon no tochi ni.
Wataranu mae ni.
Suto suto ton ton ton. - ↑ See Appendix, note 14.
Note 14.—Sometimes a bamboo basket is fixed on the roof to drive away demons.
- ↑ See Appendix, note 15.
Note 15.—In some parts of Japan there still survives a custom once common everywhere on the 15th of the first month. A pine branch is painted in five colours (black, red, white, yellow, and blue), and if a woman is struck with this kayutsuye, as it is called, she becomes destined to be the mother of a boy.
- ↑ See Appendix, note 16.
Note 16.—The festival of Uso-kai had its origin in Chikuzen Province. There, beginning at a date no longer ascertainable, pious people inaugurated the custom of visiting the temple of Temman at the hour of the bird on the night of the 7th of January, and offering effigies of the uso. The priests distributed new effigies in exchange, and among the latter was one covered with gold-foil. The devotee to whose lot this gilded bullfinch happened to fall counted himself secure for a year against all dangers or consequences of deception. In the beginning of the present century the custom was extended to Tōkyō, where it is widely observed up to the present time. The wooden uso is carved from the sacred sakaki (Cleyera japonica).
- ↑ See Appendix, note 17.
Note 17.—Agents (keiwan) for the hire of domestic servants constitute a numerous and, for the most part, an unscrupulous class. Their occupation includes also letting and selling of houses and lands, but recourse to their services is avoided as much as possible by respectable folks. They depend for their fees on the success of the business entrusted to them, and it is well understood that female servants may be "procured" from a keiwan for purposes other than domestic employment.
- ↑ See Appendix, note 18.
Note 18.—Japanese tradition says that it was invented by an Indian prince during a period of imprisonment. The hybrid nature of the name sugoroku indicates a foreign origin.
- ↑ See Appendix, note 19.
- ↑ See Appendix, note 20.
- ↑ See Appendix, note 21.
- ↑ See Appendix, note 22.
- ↑ See Appendix, note 23.
- ↑ See Appendix, note 24.
Note 24.—Sprays of the sweet flag that have thus been exposed are believed to imbibe the medicinal dew of heaven, and are consequently placed in family baths for the invigoration of bathers.
Note 19.—There existed among the foreign residents at the Treaty Ports an apprehension that when they passed under Japanese jurisdiction, they would be liable to have their houses entered by the police, and the players of an innocent game of whist hauled to prison. There was no basis for such a forecast. The Japanese police cannot enter any private house without a warrant, and the possibilities of playing cards at social réunions without interruption are quite as large in Japan as in Europe or America.
Note 23.—This game, probably more widely played than any other in Japan, depends upon the principle that certain objects, animate or inanimate, correspond to certain combinations of the fingers, and that the objects thus represented have relative values. The players clap and wave their hands in unison with some rhythmic chaunt, and mark the pauses of the rhythm by these digital combinations. There is an almost endless variety of methods, and the graceful dexterity displayed by experts is most charming.
Note 22.—The formula inscribed on this paper is curiously simple: "The 4th of the fourth month is an auspicious day for killing kamisage-mushi" (larvæ of the meat fly).
Note 21.—The day is called jo-nichi, or "expulsion day."
Note 20.—The ox-headed monarch (Gozu) is often represented in Japanese pictorial and decorative art. He had passed through three cycles of existence, and ruled the stars before he descended to govern India, but perhaps because he was such a great personage, perhaps because he had the aspect of a demon and horns of a bull, he found difficulty in procuring a wife. At last, obeying the directions of a little bird with a dove-like voice, he set off for the dragon god's palace in the southern seas. He had ridden ten thousand miles when, at sunset, he sought shelter from Kotan, the King of Southern India. But Kotan closed the gates in the face of his uncanny visitor, and when Gozu's honeymoon was over, he slaughtered the whole tribe of the inhospitable king, and divided his body into five sacrifices, to be offered up at the five seasons (go-sekku). According to this legend, the pine decorations at the New Year symbolise Kotan's gate; the charcoal attached to the rice-straw rope indicates his funeral censer; the red and white mirror-cake means his flesh and bones; the seven-leafed congee typifies his seven locks of hair; the cake eaten on the third day of the month represents his ear and tongue; the cake eaten on the 5th of the fifth month, his hair; the vermicelli partaken of on the 7th of the seventh month, his arteries, and the chrysanthemum-saké drunk on the 9th of the ninth month, the blood of his liver. No Japanese concerns himself about this revolting tradition.