The Foundations of Japan Part 21

Near the experiment station was a crematorium of ugly brick and galvanised iron belonging to the city of Yamagata at which 1,000 bodies were burnt in a year in furnaces heated with pine blocks. A selection might be made from four rates ranging from 35 sen to 5 yen.

The most expensive rate was for folk who arrived in Western-style coffins.

The experiment station had another inst.i.tution at its doors. This had to do not with the dead but with the living. Its name was "The Garden where Virtues are Cultivated." The director of it was the father of the agricultural expert of the prefecture. The garden, which was not a garden, was a home for bad boys, or rather for thirty bad boys and one bad girl. The bad girl--the director, being a man of humanity, common sense and courage, thought it most necessary that there should be at least one bad girl--acted as maidservant to the director. The bad boys "maided" themselves and the school. The lads were such as had fallen into the hands of the police. They were being reformed in a somewhat original way by a somewhat original director.

Early in the day they had their cold bath, which was itself a break with j.a.panese custom, for, though most j.a.panese have a nightly hot bath, they are content with a basin wash in the morning. Then the boys "cleaned school." Next they were marched up one by one to a mirror and required to take a good look at themselves, in order, no doubt, to see just how bad they were. After this they were called on to "give thanks to the Emperor and their ancestors." Finally came a half-hour lecture on "morality." It was considered that by this time the boys were ent.i.tled to their breakfast. For open-air labour they were sent to the experiment station, but they had manual work also in their own school, where, among other things, they "made useful things out of waste," the income from which went to their families. On Sundays the master, though he must be nearer sixty than fifty, fenced with every one of the thirty boys in turn--no ordinary task, for j.a.panese fencing calls not only for an eye and a hand, but for a muscular back. Some wholesome-looking young fellows, members of a young men's a.s.sociation, served as volunteer masters and lived in the bare fashion that was so good for the boys.

The director did not believe that bad boys were hopeless. He said that not only the boys but their parents were better for the work done in "The Garden where Virtues are Cultivated." He seemed to have become a sort of consulting expert to primary school-masters who were at a loss to know how to manage bad boys. Chastis.e.m.e.nt, as is well known, is unusual in j.a.panese schools. The director of the human _hortus inclusus_ confessed to me that though two of his boys whom he had caught fighting might not have been separated without, in the Western phrase, "feeling the weight of his hand," his heaviest punishment on other difficult occasions was the moxa.

The moxa brings us back to real horticulture. Moxa is _mogusa_ or mugwort. _Mogusa_ means "burning herb." The moxa is a great therapeutic agent in the Far East. A bit of the dried herb is laid on the skin and set fire to as a sort of blister. From the application of the moxa as a cure for physical ills to its application for the cure of bad boys is a natural step. One sees by the scars on the backs of not a few j.a.panese that in their youth either their health or their characters left something to be desired. The moxa, then, is the rod in pickle in "The Garden where Virtues are Cultivated." But I think it is not brought out often. A wrestling ring in a ma.s.s of sand thrown down in a yard, a harmonium, a blackboard for the boys to work their will on, doors labelled "The Room of Patience," "The Room of Honesty," "The Room of Cleanliness" and "The Room of Good Arrangement," not to speak of a rabbit loping about the school premises--these and some other touches in the management of the school spoke of an even stronger influence toward well-doing than the moxa. But even if the moxa should fail, the attention of the boys could always be drawn to the crematorium.

One who knew the rural districts discoursed to me in this wise: "The best men are not numerous, but neither are the worst. I doubt whether the desire to enjoy life is as strong in the j.a.panese as in the people of the West. Most farmers would no doubt be happy with material comfort. Pressed as they have been by material needs, they have no time to think. When they are easier, they may get something beyond the physical. At present we must regard their material welfare as the most urgent thing." But a man standing by, who was also a countryman, strongly dissented. "Religion," he said, "is not only important but fundamental."

I have been received by more than one prefectural governor at eight in the morning. His Excellency of Yamagata sets a good example by rising at five and by going to bed at nine. He told me that he thought the farmer's chief lack was cheap money. Low interest and a long term might convert into arable 25,000 acres of barren land in his prefecture. In the old days, as I knew, the farmers drove tunnels considerable distances for irrigation, but with modern engineering better results would be possible if money were available. As to the misdeeds of the rivers, it might almost be said that every village was feeling the need of embanking and of going to the source of loss by planting trees in the hills. Beautiful forests of feudal period had been wasted in the early days of Meiji and the result was now plain.

But attention had to be given to the minds as well as the pockets of the villagers. Families that were once reasonably content were now discontented. A livelihood was harder to get, taxation was heavier and there was an increase in needs. Country people imagined townspeople to be comfortably off, "not realising how they were tormented." Villagers envied townsmen their amus.e.m.e.nts. Some prefectures had forbidden the _Bon_ dance and had supplied nothing in its place. It was easy to see why farmers no longer applied themselves so closely to their calling and were wavering in their allegiance to country life. Healthful amus.e.m.e.nts were necessary for those whose minds were not much developed. Also, country people should be taught the true character of town life, and that agriculture, though it might not yield the profit of commerce and industry, ensured a reasonably happy life in healthful places where physical strength could be enjoyed. The right kind of village libraries should be encouraged. Music might perhaps be forced into compet.i.tion with _sake_.

A mental awakening by education was the final solution of the rural problem, the Governor thought. Religion was also important for the development of the village. Believers not under the eyes of others would avoid wrong-doing because watched by heaven. Lectures on agriculture and sanitation had a good influence when delivered by priests. Temples were often schools before the era of Meiji and so priests were socially active. Under the new dispensation the work was taken out of their hands. So they had come to care little for the affairs of the world. But they were influential and the prefecture had asked for their help. The merits of many priests might not be conspicuous, but the number of them who were active was increasing and the villagers deferred to them if they took any step.

The most hopeful thing in the villages was the awakening of the young men: they were becoming "sincere," a favourite j.a.panese word. For the most part the credit societies were not efficient, but in one county credit societies had lessened the business of the banks. The best way to furnish capital to farmers was out of the capital of their fellow farmers.

Possibly the girls of the villages were not making the same advance as the boys. They did not go to their field labour willingly. Sometimes when a woman was asked by a neighbour on the road, "Have you been working on the farm?" she would answer, "No, I have been to the temple." The host of women's papers had a bad effect. With regard to the _habutae_ (silk goods) factories, there was a bright side, for they gave work to the girls in winter, when they were idle "and therefore poor and sometimes immoral." On the other hand, factory girls tended to become vain and thriftless and the stay-at-home girls were inclined to imitate them.

FOOTNOTES:

[157] See Appendix XLV.

CHAPTER XXI

THE "TANOMOSHI"

(YAMAGATA)

Society is kept in animation by the customary and by sentiment.--MEREDITH

Six feet of snow is common on the line on which we travelled in Yamagata prefecture, and washouts are not infrequent. A train has been stopped for a week by snow. It was difficult to think of snow when one saw groups of pilgrims with their flopping sun-mats on their backs.

The shrines on three local mountain tops are visited by 20,000 people yearly.

We bought at railway stations different sorts of gelatinous fruit preparations. Most places in j.a.pan have a speciality in the form of a food or a curiosity that can be bought by travellers.

In the great Shonai plain, which extends through three counties, there are no fewer than 82,500 acres of rice and the unending crops were a sight to see. A great deal of the paddy land has been adjusted. In one county there is the largest adjusted area in j.a.pan, 20,000 acres. When one raises one's eyes from the waving fields of illimitable rice, the dominating feature of the landscape is Mount Chokai with his August snow cap.

The three-storey hotel at which we stayed had been taken to pieces and transported twenty miles. Such removal of houses to a more convenient or, in the case of an hotel, a more profitable site, is not uncommon.

I sometimes patronised at Omori a large hotel on a little hill halfway between Yokohama and Tokyo, which had formerly been the prefectural building at Kanagawa. In the hotel in which I was now staying I was interested in the "Notice" in my room:

1. A spitting-pot is provided. [Usually of bamboo or porcelain.]

2. No towels are lent for fear of _trachoma_.[158] [The traveller in j.a.pan carries his own towels, but a towel is a common gift on a guest's departure in acknowledgment of his tea money.]

3. There is a table of rates. Guests are requested to say in which they desire to be reckoned. [To the hotel proprietor, landlord or manager when the visit of courtesy is paid on the guest's arrival.

Otherwise a judgment is formed from the guest's clothes, demeanour and baggage.]

4. Please lock up your valuables or let us keep them. [There are no locks on j.a.panese doors.]

5. Railroad, _kuruma_, box-sledge or automobile charges on application. [The box-sledge shows what the country is like in winter.]

In conversations about local conditions I was told that "landowners of the middle grade" were suffering from "trying to keep up their position." I remembered the song which may be rendered:

Would that my daughter Were married to a middle farmer.

With two _cho_ of farm And a _tan_ in the wood.

No borrowing; no lending; Both ends meeting.

Visiting the temple by turns-- Someone must stay at home.

Going to Heaven sooner or later.

What a happy life!

What a happy life!

Tenants were rather well off because their standard of living was lower than that of owners. Economic conditions were improving in Yamagata, but in the adjoining prefecture of Miyagi on the eastern coast of j.a.pan "whole villages" had gone to Hokkaido. Some poor farmers were spending only 5 sen a day on food, the rest of what they ate coming entirely from their own holdings. Some farmers said, "If you calculate our income, we are certainly unable to make a living, but in some way or other we are able," which is what some small holders in many countries would say.

I was told that a labourer's 5 _tan_ could be cultivated by working half days. Generally more was earned by labouring than could be gained from a small patch of land. But for half the year labourer's work was not obtainable. My informant found small tenant labourers "well off"

if both husband and wife had wages: "they are able to buy a bottle of _sake_ in the evening." Their position was better than that of a small peasant proprietor.

One in a thousand of the families in a specified county slept in straw. I heard of the payment of 20 to 25 per cent. to p.a.w.nbroker lenders.

But there is another way of borrowing. The plan of the _ko_ may be adopted. A _ko_--it is odd that it should so closely resemble our abbreviation "Co."--is simple and effective. If a man is badly off or wants to undertake something beyond his financial resources, and his friends decide to help him, they may proceed by forming a _ko_. A _ko_ is composed of a number of people who agree to subscribe a certain sum monthly and to divide the proceeds monthly by ballot, beginning by giving the first month's receipts to the person to succour whom the _ko_ was formed. Suppose that the subscription be fixed at a yen a month and that there are fifty subscribers. Then the beneficiary--who pays in his yen with the rest--gets 50 yen on the occasion of the first ingathering. Every month afterwards a member who is lucky in the ballot gets 50 yen. The monthly paying in and paying out continue for fifty months and all the subscribers duly get their money back, with the advantage of having had a little excitement and having done a neighbourly action.

But the _ko_, or _tanomoshi_, as I ought to call it, is not always the innocent organisation I have described. There is a _tanomoshi_ system under which, after member A, the beneficiary, has received the first month's subscriptions, the other members are open to receive bids for their shares. That is to say that, when the time comes round for the second paying out of 50 yen, member F, who happens to have become as much in need of ready money as A was, offers, if the month's moneys be handed over to him, to distribute among the members sums up to 20 yen.

July and December, when most people need ready money, are months in which a hard-up member of a _tanomoshi_ may sometimes offer to distribute as much as 50 per cent. of what he receives. The result of such bidding for shares is that well-to-do members of a _tanomoshi_, who are the last to draw their 50 yen, receive in addition to it all the extra payments made by impoverished members who took their shares earlier. Benevolence in a _tanomoshi_ is not seldom a mask for avarice that the law against usury cannot touch. In truth, the only virtuous part of a _tanomoshi_ may be the first sharing out to the person in whose interest it was supposed to be started. It should be added, however, that there is a sort of _tanomoshi_ which has no particular beneficiary and is merely a kind of co-operative credit society. In one place I heard of a _tanomoshi_ that maintained a large fund for the relief of orphans and the sick.

In many villages there were private or co-operative G.o.downs for the storage of rice against fire, rats and damp. Though the farmer who sends rice to such a store receives a receipt, it is not legally a marketable doc.u.ment. Hence an improvement on this simple storage plan.

I visited the premises of a company that could store more than 500,000 bushels of rice, and I found purification by carbon bisulphide going on. The receipts given by this company--"certificated" for large quant.i.ties and "tickets" for small--certify not only the quant.i.ty but the quality of the rice, and are readily cashed. The storehouse owners work under a licence, and they have the advantage that the buyer of the receipts of non-licensed stores is not protected by the courts.

In the office of the company were samples of eleven market qualities of rice, and before them, by way of showing respect to the great food staple, was set the _gohei_ of cut white paper seen in Shinto shrines. Outside the office, girl porters carried the bales of rice to and fro. Close to the store was a river in which some of the dusty, perspiring porters were washing and cooling themselves with a simplicity to which Western civilisation is not yet equal. Opposite them men were fishing by casting in draw nets from the sh.o.r.e just as in biblical pictures the apostles are represented as doing.

The company has a rice market where farmers were putting their business in the dealers' hands. Each dealer has to deposit 5,000 yen with the State. The dealer who buys rice from a farmer has better polishing machinery than the farmer possesses. Therefore he can give the rice a more uniform appearance. By decreasing the weight of the rice during the polishing he gives it he is also able to lessen the sum payable for carriage and he has the value of the offal.

In order to visit farmers I rode some distance into the country.[159]

The village, which was of the Zen sect, was at work cleaning out and straightening the stream which, as is usual in many villages, ran through the middle of it. I was impressed during my visit not only by the readiness and intelligence with which my questions were answered but by the good humour with which a stranger's inquiries concerning personal matters was received. I had another thought, that I might not have found a group of Western farmers so well informed about their financial position as these simple, primitively clad men.

Our _kuruma_ route to and from the village had been through one great tract of well-adjusted rice fields. Adjustment was not difficult in this region because half the land belongs to the Homma family, which has given much study to the art of land-holding. For two centuries the clan by charging moderate rents and studying the interests of its tenants has maintained happy relations with them.

For many years a plan has been in operation by which 200 one-_tan_ paddy-fields are cultivated by the agents or managers of the estate, by tenants selected by their fellow tenants for merit, by tenants chosen by the landlord for diligence and by others picked out because of their interest in agriculture. In order to increase the zest of compet.i.tion the cultivators are divided into a black and a white company. The names of those who raise the most and best rice are published in the order of their success, farm implements are distributed as prizes, the clever cultivators are invited to the landlord's New Year entertainment to the agents and managers, and at that feast "places of distinction are given."

There is also a system of rewarding the best five-years averages. A compet.i.tion takes place between what are called "dress fields" because those who get the best results from them receive a ceremonial dress bearing the inscription, "Prosperity and Welfare." The honour of wearing these robes in the presence of their landlord at his annual feast is valued by these simple countrymen.

Through the introduction by the landlord of horse labour and ploughs--implements with which the farmers were formerly unacquainted--second cropping of part of the paddies has become possible. There is an elaborate system of "progressive reduction" and "average reduction" of rents in a bad season, by which, it was explained, "the industrious tenant enjoys a larger reduction than an idle one." "Tenants are grouped in fives, which help one another in their work and in cases of misfortune." In their agreement with their landlord, tenants promise that "wrong-doing shall be mutually reprimanded and counsel shall be given one to another." "Again, if a tenant falls ill, has his house burnt or meets with misfortune, a.s.sistance shall be given by his fellows." During the war with Russia the following instructions were issued: