None Of These
Treasures Are Kept In The House, But In The Kura, Or Fireproof
Storehouse, Close By.
The rooms are not encumbered by ornaments; a
single kakemono, or fine piece of lacquer or china, appears for a
few days and then makes way for something else; so they have
variety as well as simplicity, and each object is enjoyed in its
turn without distraction.
Kanaya and his sister often pay me an evening visit, and, with
Brunton's map on the floor, we project astonishing routes to
Niigata, which are usually abruptly abandoned on finding a
mountain-chain in the way with never a road over it. The life of
these people seems to pass easily enough, but Kanaya deplores the
want of money; he would like to be rich, and intends to build a
hotel for foreigners.
The only vestige of religion in his house is the kamidana, or god-
shelf, on which stands a wooden shrine like a Shinto temple, which
contains the memorial tablets to deceased relations. Each morning
a sprig of evergreen and a little rice and sake are placed before
it, and every evening a lighted lamp.
LETTER X - (Continued)
Darkness visible - Nikko Shops - Girls and Matrons - Night and Sleep -
Parental Love - Childish Docility - Hair-dressing - Skin Diseases.
I don't wonder that the Japanese rise early, for their evenings are
cheerless, owing to the dismal illumination. In this and other
houses the lamp consists of a square or circular lacquer stand,
with four uprights, 2.5 feet high, and panes of white paper. A
flatted iron dish is suspended in this full of oil, with the pith
of a rush with a weight in the centre laid across it, and one of
the projecting ends is lighted. This wretched apparatus is called
an andon, and round its wretched "darkness visible" the family
huddles - the children to play games and learn lessons, and the
women to sew; for the Japanese daylight is short and the houses are
dark. Almost more deplorable is a candlestick of the same height
as the andon, with a spike at the top which fits into a hole at the
bottom of a "farthing candle" of vegetable wax, with a thick wick
made of rolled paper, which requires constant snuffing, and, after
giving for a short time a dim and jerky light, expires with a bad
smell. Lamps, burning mineral oils, native and imported, are being
manufactured on a large scale, but, apart from the peril connected
with them, the carriage of oil into country districts is very
expensive. No Japanese would think of sleeping without having an
andon burning all night in his room.
These villages are full of shops. There is scarcely a house which
does not sell something. Where the buyers come from, and how a
profit can be made, is a mystery. Many of the things are eatables,
such as dried fishes, 1.5 inch long, impaled on sticks; cakes,
sweetmeats composed of rice, flour, and very little sugar; circular
lumps of rice dough, called mochi; roots boiled in brine; a white
jelly made from beans; and ropes, straw shoes for men and horses,
straw cloaks, paper umbrellas, paper waterproofs, hair-pins, tooth-
picks, tobacco pipes, paper mouchoirs, and numbers of other trifles
made of bamboo, straw, grass, and wood.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 49 of 219
Words from 25205 to 25756
of 115002
