Part 16

--'Well, to describe it in full would require at least a pamphlet, but I will give you an outline of the game. The proper number of players engaged at one time is three; the game can be played by two, but it is as slow as playing dummy whist. The advantage of our game lies in that a party could consist of up to six players. The limits of the players engaged at a time, as I have just said, is three, and therefore the number exceeding three is obliged to stand out for one game, namely, for the play of one deal. But no particular person is obliged to stand out, so that one must either be bought off or allowed to play by the resignation of any other player, unless he himself prefers to stand out. This takes place after the cards have been dealt. Here, therefore, comes in much consideration and often "bluff." Naturally, each one plays for himself and for his own advantage, therefore there is no partnership as in whist; and yet in the course of playing one has often to form a sort of alliance for a moment with a second player in order to prevent the common calamity against the probable stratagem of the third player. I may also add, that as each one plays on his own account, he has the option of standing out for one game, as I have already indicated, in which case, however, he has to pay a certain penalty. Should all players but two thus stand out, those remaining two would play the game. One deal sometimes finishes without any play at all, when all the players but one throw up their hands and pay penalty rather than play with bad cards, in which case, of course, the penalties go to the one who remains. The penalty paid varies according to the relative positions of the payers to the dealer, as well as the kinds of the six cards which are thrown out on the table at the beginning of the game, and therefore paying penalty and standing out from the play for one game requires much consideration. The prices for buying up the surplus number of the players also differ according to the six cards on the table and to the cards the seller holds. Similar to bridge, certain rewards are given to the player who holds certain sets of cards and also to the player who gets in certain sets of cards. It is the latter point which requires, as is natural, the greatest skill, inasmuch as one who aims at getting in one such set loses much when he fails, and it often happens that while he is striving to get in a certain set, another player gets in a far better set; therefore one has often to sacrifice his own chance in order to hinder an opponent. Twelve games make a rubber. The method of counting the issue is as follows: Each player must have in his hand in the case of quit one hundred and twenty points at the end of the rubber, and therefore it would seem that each receives one hundred and twenty points in counters at the beginning, but, as a matter of fact, he only receives seventy-two points or sixty, as the players agree upon. The counting in this game generally goes by dozens, though odd numbers also come in. Thus counters are made of two kinds, one is a dozen points and the other single points. The balance between the points which one actually receives when starting and ten dozens which he has to make good in his hand at the end of the rubber goes to the person who is the greatest winner of the rubber, and therefore the more players, the greater the rewards for the winner of the rubber. Of course it is most difficult to play in such a way as just to quit oneself, because there are so many tricks, and one often has to float a loan in the course of the game, or in other words, to borrow a requisite number of counters from the banker, which must be repaid at the end of the rubber.

'The "rain" cards are another source of fluctuation in the game, because every one of them, whatever value it possess, may be counted as a single point card somewhat similar to what you sometimes do with your aces. I almost think the invention of your bridge is in some way based upon our flower cards.'

--'It is dreadful: one could never get a clear idea only by hearing the explanation. You have, after all, wasted your time in trying to make us understand, though I asked you for the explanation,' said one cunningly.

'Thank you very much,' I said.

--'You say your social atmosphere in respect of such matters was far better in times gone by,' said another.

--'I do,' I answered.

'But I hope it will not get worse.'

--'I hope so too,' I said, 'but the influence of Western civilisation is so overwhelming.'

--'Pierre Loti's description of some of the features of Japanese society is very fine from a literary point of view, but I understand it is not a true representation. Is that your opinion too?' interposed another.

--'I have not read it, but from what I have heard, I can decidedly answer in the affirmative. The main facts therein contained are nothing else than exaggerated stories of exceptional incidents often practised by foreigners themselves. Do you think we Japanese could not have the same experience in the West if we liked? Nay, more: can you say that similar incidents do not happen in some parts of the West? I don't expect an answer. I shall be doing greater service to the West by letting such a delicate subject drop.'

--'Perhaps you may think me a little abrupt,' remarked a gentleman; 'but may I ask you rather a delicate question? People say that in Japan men and women bathe together, and talk about it as a sign of immorality. Is it a fact?'

--'Not exactly,' I answered; 'in public baths, in times gone by, both sexes bathed together, but you must remember, even in those times, those who went to public baths were people of the lower classes, for the better classes always managed to have their own bathroom, and in Japan houses having such bathrooms are very common. Moreover, even in those days, there was nothing more indelicate in the matter of public baths than a sea-bath by both sexes in occidental countries. I should like to remind those who write about such matters of many customs in their own countries to which they may be too much accustomed to perceive any impropriety, but which appear very indelicate to the eyes of strangers. I may go a step further: we are sometimes even astonished to notice that the most indelicate performances--such that, if it were in Japan, would not be permitted by the police to go on two minutes--are given, under the name of dances or suchlike, and men and women of respectability go and see them without showing the slightest embarrassment. I confess I have personally seen some of these performances while visiting out of curiosity different places of interest. But, in reality, there is no necessity for me to set up such matters against our former customs of public baths, because, for several decades, such bathing has been forbidden, and every public bath has long since had one division for men and another for women. Those who think that the former custom still exists are mistaken, and are labouring under a false impression given by travellers of former days.

'_Apropos_ of a bath, I prefer in a way our system, be it public or private, to the ordinary Western method. With our system, a large space of the floor of the bathroom is made either of wood or concrete, in such a way that water may be poured on to it. There is, besides the main bath, also a small tank containing fresh cold and warm water in separate sections, so that one who bathes can make free use of the water, warm or cold, both before getting into the bath and before dressing.'

--'I think, on the whole, I like your country,' said another. 'It seems very different from what many people have represented it hitherto, but you have not yet given us a comprehensive survey of your people, in respect to social and moral organisation.'

--'I think I have done so often,' said I; 'but if you do not object, I will do so once more by repeating to you the exact words of an interview which I gave to a representative of the London press:

'"You remember the story of George Washington and the cherry tree?" said Baron Suyematsu, with a smile, to our representative. "Well, that is very often told to the children in the Japanese schools."

'The distinguished Japanese statesman, who is at present in London, was explaining how the moral virtues, and especially patriotism and bravery in battle, are not merely considered desirable things in Japan, but are actively propagated in the schools and in the army. For, as Mr. Lyttelton, the Colonial Secretary, remarked to an audience last week, they teach patriotism in Japan.

'"You see, there is no religious teaching in the public schools in Japan," said Baron Suyematsu; "but the teaching of morality occupies an important place in the curriculum. From the Western point of view it may seem difficult to teach morality without connecting it with religion, but we do it!"

'This patriotic bravery, as one of the virtues, comes into the code. The teaching is based upon the Confucian ethics, and the "cleanness of conscience" which is the essence of Shintoism, the national religion of Japan.

'THE CODE OF HONOUR.

'"Then there is Bushido," said the baron, "which may be called the code of honour of Japanese knighthood. This Bushido had a tight grasp of the military class, which consisted of the retainers of feudal lords, who had not to work for their daily bread. These retainers were not rich, but they had something to live upon, and frugality was one of their virtues. Their only business was to do their duty to their lords, which meant in time of war to fight for them. But as for more than two centuries and a half the country had been at peace, and as the military class had no fields of ordinary occupation, they naturally gave their energies to intellectual pursuits side by side with military training. In a word, their business was to make themselves as much gentlemen as possible. Thus grew up a code of honour which was primarily founded upon military duty alone, but which later on was extended to the acquirement of gentlemanly conduct, and then to be a true gentleman, and loyal to their lords.

'"After the opening of our country to other nations, there was a time when we seemed to lose the guiding influence of our old morals, for Confucianism lost its influence to some extent, and intercourse with strangers gave some shock to our old morality, and led our people to imagine that freedom from restraint and obligation was the characteristic of European ideals.

'"It was at this juncture that the emperor issued an edict defining our ideal of morality. In accordance with his edict, the curriculum of the schools includes the teaching of morality, and the moral virtues are explained and expatiated upon in lectures and discourses. The teachers introduce sayings and maxims of great men of all nations.

'WASHINGTON AND _SELF-HELP_.

'"As I have told you, the story of George Washington is often quoted. Smiles's _Self-Help_ is often used, and I have no doubt Nelson's signal at Trafalgar. The principal examples are naturally the great heroes of our own country who served the emperor and Japan. In that way both boys and girls are imbued with the moral virtues, among which loyalty and patriotism are prominent.

'"But this teaching is not limited to the schools. It is carried on in the barracks in the form of what we call 'spiritual education.' The aim is to make men capable of appreciating their duties as soldiers. This barrack teaching is in accordance with an edict issued by the emperor when universal military service was introduced, and it is based upon the moral virtues. We have no chaplains. The teaching is undertaken by the officers themselves as part of their regular duty, and they deliver exhortations in the barrack-rooms.

'"But you must know that, man for man, Europeans recognise that Japanese are superior to Russians, and I am not surprised that that is said. In Japan education is universal, and there is scarcely a soldier who cannot read and write, or who has not had some kind of education. For that reason they ought to be intellectually superior to the Russians. And as we have universal service, all sorts of people are found in the ranks, without distinction of social position or vocation. In the barracks you find the son of a nobleman and the son of a coolie, and there is no aloofness between them. That makes the company so efficient.

'MILITARY TRAINING FOR BOYS.

'"In the schools we not only have the national flag, but the boys are drilled in military manner. If the municipality can afford it, real arms are used in the higher grade schools. In the peers' school and many others they have regular firing manœuvres.

'"It is not generally known, I suppose, that I was once an English volunteer?" said Baron Suyematsu, with a laugh at the recollection. "That was when I was at Cambridge. I joined the University Rifles."

'As to Chinese soldiers, the baron said that the moral teaching of the Japanese army constituted one of the great differences between them. Then he pointed out that in China soldiers are rightly looked down upon, for they are recruited only from the worst classes, and respectable men will not enter the ranks.

'Baron Suyematsu does not approve of the efforts of the Christian missionaries to discourage the national custom of committing suicide rather than be captured in battle, for he thinks the effect would be to lower the soldiers' high ideal of patriotism and courage.

'"There is all the difference," he said, "between wanton suicide and voluntarily sacrificing one's life for the honour of the nation. Our ideal is to die for one's country rather than bring upon her the disgrace of being taken by the enemy. What can be nobler than that? It is the same as being killed by the enemy. And the missionaries are trying to teach our soldiers that it is wrong. It is a great pity."'

--'But that only covers one phase, the method of your education,' said one.

--'True, but it covers a good deal!' I said. 'Do you think I can write a big book on Japan at a moment's notice?'

--'Well, I will leave you alone then,' said he.

--'Every one of the Russian soldiers who returned wounded from the battlefield, when asked the cause of their defeat, said that the Russians were defeated because the Japanese soldiers were great scholars compared to themselves. I have it on good authority,' interposed another.

--'Perhaps it looked like that to them,' I answered.

VII

Some talk on superstition--A remark on earrings--Japanese troops after the war; no fear of Chauvinism--Generals and officers--How the system of the hereditary military service was abolished and the new system was introduced--Its history--Japan after the war--Views given to the American press--Mr. Seppings-Wright and his views on the Japanese character--The Japanese navy and its history--Origin of the shipbuilding yards--The difficulty of a thorough reform in China and Russia--How Japan managed to bring about the consummation of the great reform--The feudal system was a great help--Explanation of the Japanese feudal system and the clans--The re-shuffling of the feudatories under the Tokugawa régime--Difference of grandeur of the feudatories--Exceptional formation of the Satsuma clan--Financial system of the Shogunate --Finance of the Imperial Government at the beginning of the Great Change--How the affairs of the governments of the feudatories were wound up--The old system of taxation--Thorough reform--The old notion of land tenure

I found myself once more in a very incongruous group of people whom I had met on various occasions. I noticed a number of them engaged in a lively conversation.

--'Ah! Monsieur A.,' said a lady, 'you are acquainted with many Japanese, and have been in contact with them for many years, so that you will be able to explain to me. Some say the Japanese are superstitious, others again say they are not. Which do you think true?'

--'I have known,' said Monsieur A., 'some hundreds of the Japanese, mostly young men, of course. They are extremely free from any sort of bias or superstition. I have never known people so unbiassed and so little superstitious.'

--'But,' said the lady, 'I have heard from a gentleman who was resident in Japan for some years that there existed in that country some sort of superstition. He told me, for example, that "some people disliked the number "four," because _shi_, which is four in Japanese, means also death, as far as the pronunciation is concerned. Consequently when, for instance, one gives a tip, he would give either threepence or fivepence, and not fourpence, even in the case where fourpence may be more appropriate; in other words, either less or more, to avoid the number four. And the same is generally the case when one makes a present of a number of articles which are identical, unless they are two pairs; is not that funny? In the whole world there can be nothing more natural than numbers. No one can make the four cardinal points of the compass less or more because he dislikes the number "four." The same reasoning holds good with everything.'

--'I do not think,' answered Monsieur A., 'the superstition of four is very widely believed in. But what do you say to our dislike for the number thirteen.'

--'But,' said she, 'that is a different matter. That originated with religion.'

--'Is it so?' said Monsieur A. 'I wouldn't dispute it. But let me tell you an incident I met with some time ago. I was present at a meeting of a literary association. There was a good deal of conversation on the subject of the superstition of less civilised peoples. At the refreshment-table I had to sit next an elderly lady. I placed, accidentally or not I don't remember, my knife and fork crosswise. The lady immediately noticed this, and told me quickly to alter them. I remarked that the dislike of that position of knife and fork was perhaps also a sort of superstition, whereupon the lady told me that it was not a superstition, but a tradition, and therefore it differed very much from the superstitions practised by less civilised peoples.'

--'She was right, of course,' said the lady.

--'Well, I can scarcely see any difference,' observed Monsieur A.

--'I can tell you another incident,' remarked a different gentleman. 'When an occidental missionary was once telling some women of savage tribes that their wearing rings in their noses was barbarous and unhealthy, he was asked by them how it was that his wife and daughters were wearing rings in their ears, and he had great difficulty in explaining to them that the method adopted by the civilised races for wearing rings in their ears was very different from their wearing rings in the nose.'

--'Oh!' exclaimed some ladies.

--'But stay,' said another, 'let us have some more serious talk. I wish to ask Baron Suyematsu his opinion on a few important points of which I am anxious to be informed.'

Turning to me, he said:

--'I do not entertain any wild notion of the "Yellow Peril" cry. One thing is certain, however, that your country has been winning all this time brilliant victories unprecedented in history, and there is no doubt that your success will continue to the end of the war. Don't you think after the fighting is over your army will become chauvinistic, or, in plain language, unruly, and constantly ready to pick quarrels with foreign countries.'

--'I do not think so,' I answered. 'In the first place, the discipline of our men is very good, and they are most orderly and obedient to the emperor and his government. Then, too, the very nature of the organisation of our troops makes such matters differ greatly from hereditary troops or volunteers of long service. You see by the universal system, which we have adopted, men serve in the ranks only for a limited time, and therefore in the course of a few years the old soldiers retire, and go back to their original avocations in the country or the town, as the case may be, and the new ones fill their places. While the newcomers would be inspired by the traditions of their regiments, they could not, at the same time, be personally bombastic on account of the deeds of their predecessors.'

--'But what of the generals and officers?'

--'Of them I entertain no fear of their becoming jingoes. After having undergone all the hard work, and having achieved many brilliant victories, it is only natural that generals and other officers, indeed the army itself, should win greater popularity and higher estimation in the people's minds, and it is possible that their weight may be felt indirectly in internal politics. But it would never go so far as to make any difference in our external relations with foreign countries. As a matter of fact, our generals and officers are as little inclined to meddle with general politics as they are intent on fulfilling their professional duties. Above all, as I have so often said, it is a great misconception on the part of some Occidentals to suppose the Japanese at large to be an aggressive and bellicose nation.'

--'Your army is now organised under the universal service system,' said another. 'Before the present Imperial régime came into existence you had, as I understand, a very deep-rooted hereditary system of military service. It must have been very difficult to abolish the old and substitute the new. Your Bushi were regarded as the flower of the land, and surely it was a most bold conception to substitute sons of peasants and tradesmen in their place, and to believe they would do service equally well, or better. Your statesmen must have had strong convictions to induce them to make such a radical change as the new régime. Please let us have some explanation on that point.'