Part 22 (1/2)

Those enlisted in the army shall render their service at the cost of their lives.

Those who stay at home shall do their best, complying with the principles laid down by the Minister of Agriculture.

Relatives of soldiers at the front shall be helped and sympathised with.

All shall subscribe to war bonds as much as possible.

All shall practise thrift and economy in accordance with their social standing.

Musical entertainments shall be given up for two years.

Methods proved to be effective in cultivation shall be reported.

In the warm, cloudy days insects multiply rapidly. Think of your brothers at the front, struggling against one of the mighty military powers of the world, and be ashamed to be vanquished by hordes of insects or ma.s.ses of vegetable growth in your fields. For the purpose of destroying insects an ample supply of oil is to be had at the experimental farm, as during last year; and payment therefor may be deferred until after harvest.

A communication to agents and managers says: ”Comport yourselves in a way suitable to the dignity of an agent of the clan. Bear in mind the privileges and favours you enjoy, and exert yourselves to requite these favours. Respect the name and the coat-of-arms of the clan.” In the neighbourhood there are about a hundred families bearing the name of Homma.

FOOTNOTES:

[158] In the three years 1916-18 the percentage of conscripts suffering from trachoma was 15.8.

[159] For farmers' budgets, see Appendix XIII (end).

BACK AGAIN BY THE EAST COAST

CHAPTER XXII

”BON” SONGS AND THE SILENT PRIEST

(YAMAGATA, AKITA,[160] AOMORI, IWATE, MIYAGI, f.u.kUs.h.i.+MA AND IBARAKI)

The worst of our education is that it looks askance, looks over its shoulder at s.e.x.--R.L.S.

A village headman, encountered in the train just as we were leaving Yamagata prefecture, gave me some insight into the life of his little community. The fathers of two-score families were shopkeepers and tradesmen--- that is, tradesmen in the old meaning of the word. There were also a few labourers. About two hundred and fifty families owned land and some of them rented additional tracts. Another sixty were simply tenants. The poorer farmers were also labourers or artisans.

Most of them were ”comfortable enough.” There were, however, half a dozen people in the village who were helped from village funds. Of the middle-grade farmers ”it might be said that they do not become richer or poorer.”

The headman had formed a society which sent its members to visit prefectures more developed agriculturally. This society had engaged an instructor from without the prefecture and he had taught horse tillage and the management of upland fields and had made model paddies. Five stallions had been obtained and a simple adjustment of paddy-land had been brought about. As a result the rice yield had risen.

This headman had also had addresses delivered in the village for the first time. Further, after buying a number of books, he had visited all the villagers in turn and shown them the books and had said to each of them, ”I wish you to buy a book and, after reading it, to give it to the library.” ”And,” he told me, ”none of them objected.” Soon a valuable library came into existence.

This admirable functionary felt some satisfaction at having been able to abate the custom according to which the young men, with the tacit permission of their parents, had gone into the neighbouring town after harvest ”to visit the immoral women.” ”They used to spend as much as 5 yen,” said our headman. He had started worthier forms of after-harvest relaxation, and ”the cost of the amus.e.m.e.nt days is now only 50 or 60 sen.”

When we got on the main line again and pursued our way farther north, it was through even stouter snow shelters and through many tunnels.

Not a few miserable dwellings were to be seen as we pa.s.sed into Akita prefecture. We broke our journey after some hours' travelling to stay the night at a rather primitive hot spring inn four or five miles up in the hills. A slight rain was falling. Four pa.s.sengers at a time made the ascent to the hotel, squatting on a mat in an old contractor's wagon, pushed along roughly laid rails by two perspiring youths in rain-cloaks of bark strips. At the inn, on going to the bath, I found therein a miscellaneous collection of people of both s.e.xes from grandparents to grandchildren. One bather enlivened us by performances on the flute, which, if a musical instrument must be played in a bath, seems as suitable as any. In this rambling inn there were many farmers who, by preparing their own food and doing for themselves generally, were holiday-making at bedrock prices.

As it was the _Bon_ season, when the spirits of the dead are supposed to return, I was a witness of the method adopted to help the ghosts to find their old homes. At the top of a 30 or 40 ft. pole a lantern is fixed with a pulley. Fastened up beside the lantern is a bunch of green stuff, cryptomeria in many cases. The lantern is lighted each evening for a week. Having heard a good deal about the suppression of _Bon_ dances and songs I was interested when a fellow-guest began talking about them. He had seen many _Bon_ dances and had heard many _Bon_ songs. There can be no doubt that there has been some unenlightened interference with the _Bon_ gathering. The country people seem to be suffering from the determination of officialdom to make an end of everything in country as well as town that may be considered ”uncivilised” by any foreigner, however ill instructed. In towns the s.e.xes are not accustomed to meet, but country people must work together; therefore they find it natural to dance and sing together. As to the _Bon_ songs, it is common sense that expressions which may be regarded as outrageous and indecent in a drawing-room may not be so terrible on a hilltop among rustics used to very plain speech and to easy recognition of natural facts that are veiled from townspeople. My chance acquaintance at the inn recited a number of _Bon_ songs and next morning brought me some more that he had remembered and had been kind enough to write down. They merely established the fact that bucolic wit is as elemental in j.a.pan as in other lands. Most of the songs had a Rabelaisian touch, some were nasty, but nearly all had wit. The following is an entirely harmless example:

Mr. Potato of the Countryside Got his new European suit.

But a potato is still a potato.

He took one and a half _rin_[161] out of his bag And bought _ame_[162] and licked at it.