OF "DEVIL-GON" AND YOSOGI

The consciousness of a common purpose in mankind, or even the acknowledgment that such a common purpose is possible, would alter the face of world politics at once.—Graham Wallas

There was a bad landlord who was nicknamed "Devil-gon." He was shot. There was another bad landlord who, as he was crossing a narrow bridge over a brook, was "pistolled through the sleeve and tumbled into the water." Although the murderer was well known, his name was never revealed to the police, and the family of the dead man was glad to leave the district. The villagers celebrated their freedom by eating the "red rice" which is prepared on occasions of festivity. In another village, the gunchō who spoke to me of these things said, there were several usurious landlords. "The village headman got angry. He called the landlords to him. He said to them that if they continued to lend at high interest the people would set fire to their houses and he would not proceed against them. So the landlords became affrighted and amended their lives." The rural people of Japan have always three weapons against usury, it was explained to me. First, there may be tried injuring the offending person's house—rural dwellings are mainly bamboo work and mud—by bumping into it with the heavy palanquin which is carried about the roadway at the time of the annual festival. If such a hint should prove ineffective, recourse may be had to arson. Finally, there is the pistol. I remember someone's remark, "A man does not lose a common mind and heart by becoming a landowner."

I could not travel about the rural districts without there being brought under my eyes the conditions which lead country girls to go to the towns as joro (prostitutes). A considerable agricultural authority who had been all over Japan told me that he was in no doubt that most of the girls adopted an immoral life through poverty. I spoke to this man, who had been abroad, of the disgrace to Japan involved in the presence of thousands of Japanese joro at Singapore and so many other ports of the Asiatic mainland. Did these women go there of their free will? My informant was of opinion that "half are deceived." I remember that on the Japanese steamship by which I went out to Japan there were several Japanese girls, degraded in aspect and apparently in ill health, who were returning from Singapore. They were shepherded by an evil-looking fellow. The parting of these unfortunates from their girl friends as the vessel was about to start was a piteous sight. An official who called on me in Aichi—I understood that he was the chief of the prefectural police—told me that there were in the prefecture 2,011 girls in 222 houses, and that there were in a year 725,598 customers, of whom 2,147 were foreigners. Sums of from 200 to 500 yen might be paid to parents for a girl for a three-years term. Food and clothes were also provided, but the girls were almost invariably drawn into debt to the keepers, and not more than 15 per cent. were able to return to their villages. All the girls in the houses had alleged poverty as the reason for their being there.[[47]]

Because I was told that the moral condition of the town of Anjo—population 17,000—where the agricultural school of the prefecture is situated, had improved since its establishment, I asked for some statistics. I found that there were 23 registered geisha, no joro, 50 teahouse girls with dubious characters and 55 sellers of saké. Against these figures were to be counted 19 Buddhist temples of four sects with 19 priests and 20 Shinto shrines with 4 priests.

I met a schoolmaster who had prepared a history of his village in a dozen beautifully written volumes. He had been a vegetarian for fifteen years because, as a Buddhist, he believed that "all living things are in some degree my relatives." I picked up from him a variant on "the early bird catches the worm." It was, "The early riser may find a lost rin" (tenth of a farthing). He gave me another proverb, "The contents of a spitting pot, like riches, become fouler the more they accumulate."

I heard of temples which were promoting rural improvement by means of lanterns. In one village the lanterns were at the service of borrowers at three different places. The inscription on the lanterns says, "Think of the mercy of Buddha who illuminates the darkness of your heart." There is written in smaller characters, "If you live half a ri away you need not return this lantern." Three hundred lanterns are lost or damaged in a year, but paper lanterns are cheap.

One temple has a society composed of those who have family graves in its grounds. These people "study how to get the most abundant crop." There is a prize for the best cultivated tan. Under this temple's auspices there is not only a co-operative credit and purchase association, a poultry society and an annual exhibition of agricultural products, but a school for nurses—they are "taught to be nurses not only physically but morally." The boys and girls of the village are invited to the temple once a month and "told a story." The youngsters are asked to come to a "learning meeting" where they must recite or exhibit something they have written or drawn; "blockheads as well as clever children are encouraged." A fund is being raised so that "a genius who may be suffering from poverty may be able to get proper education." Then there is a Women's Religious Association which aims at "the improvement, necessary from a religious point of view, in the home and of agricultural business." Sermons are given to 500 women monthly. The society sent comfort bags, containing letters, tooth-brushes and sweets, to soldiers at the taking of Tsingtao. A similar organisation for men had for thirteen years listened to a monthly lecture by a well-known priest. It sends occasional subscriptions outside the village. Finally, this praiseworthy temple issues every month 20,000 copies of a 4½-sen magazine.

The Shinto shrines of the prefecture have in all a little more than 40 chō of land. Someone has hit on the plan of getting the agricultural societies of the county and villages to provide the priests with rice seed of superior varieties, the crop of which can be exchanged with farmers for common rice. This is done on a profitable basis, because the shrines exchange unpolished rice for polished. A gō of seed rice makes only about .5 gō when husked.

I walked along the road some little way with a Buddhist priest. In answer to my enquiry he said that as a Buddhist he felt no difficulty about the bag strung across his shoulders being of leather, for the founder of his sect (Shinshu) ate meat. Even a strict Buddhist might nowadays eat animals not intentionally killed, animals which had not been seen alive and animals which were killed painlessly. But my companion abstained as much as possible from meat. As to the reason why some priests were inactive in the work of rural amelioration, he supposed that their poverty, the tradition of devoting themselves to unworldly business and the fact that many of them were hereditary priests accounted for it. He dwelt on the things in common between Shinshu and Christianity and said that, next to the teaching of the head of the agricultural college in the prefecture, the preaching of a missionary had led him to work for the good of his village.

In my host's house in the evening someone happened to quote the proverb, "Richer after the fire." It means, of course, that after the fire the neighbours are so ready with help that the last state of the victim of the fire is better than the first. The view was expressed that hitherto charitable institutions of some Western patterns had not been so much needed in Japan as might be supposed. [[48]] "Those who go to Europe from Japan are indeed much surprised by the number of institutions to help people." Here, however, is the story of an institution coming into existence in a village: "There was a man who was thought to be rich, but he lived like a miser. His shoji were made of waste paper and his guests received tea only. So he was despised. But many years afterwards it was found that for a long time he had been collecting books. Then, to the surprise of everybody, he built a library for his village. He is not at all proud of this and those who ridiculed him are now ashamed."

I was invited to a "Rural Life Exhibition." Some agricultural produce was shown, but three hundred of the exhibits were manuscript books or diagrams. One diagram illustrated the development in a particular county of the use of two bactericides, formalin and carbon bisulphide. The formalin was in use to the value of 2,000 yen. Then there was a wall picture, a sort of Japanese "The Child: What will he Become?" The good boy, aged fifteen, was shown spending his spare time in making straw rope to the value of 3 sen 3 rin nightly, with the result that after thirty years of such industry he became a rural capitalist who possessed 1,000 yen and lived in circumstances of dignity. In contrast with this virtuous career there was shown the rural rake's progress. A youth who was in the habit of laying out 3 sen 3 rin riotously in sweet-shops was proved to have wasted 1,000 yen in thirty years: the prodigal was justly exhibited fleeing from his home in debt.

One of the books on exhibition mentioned the volumes most in demand at some village library. I translate the titles:

Physical and Intellectual Training
About being Ambitious
The Housewife of a Peasant Family
The Management of a Farm
The Days when Statesmen were Boys
Culture and Striving
Essence of Rural Improvement
A Hundred Beautiful Stories
The Art of Composition
The Preparation of the Conscript
A Medical Treatise
A Translation of "Self-Help"
Nature and Human Life
The Glories of Native Places
Anecdotes concerning Culture
Lives of Distinguished Peasants
Mulberry Planting
Chinese Romances
Glories of this Peaceful Reign
Ninomiya Sontoku

I noticed among the exhibits a short autobiography of a farmer, an engaging egoist who wrote:

"As a young man my will was not in study and though I used my wits I did many stupid things and the results were bad. Then I became a little awakened and for two years I studied at night with the primary school teacher. After that I thought to myself in secret, 'Shall I become a wise man in this village, or, by diligently farming, a rich man?' That was my spiritual problem. Then all my family gathered together and consulted and decided[ [49]] that it would suit the family better if I were to become a rich man, and I also agreed. To accomplish that aim I increased my area under cultivation and worked hard day and night. I cut down the cryptomeria at my homestead and planted in their stead mulberries and persimmons. And I slowly changed my dry land into rice fields (making it therefore more valuable). The soil I got I heaped up at the homestead for eighteen years until I had 28,000 cubic feet. I was able then to raise the level of my house which had become damp and covered with mould. The increase of my cultivated area and of the yield per tan and the improvement of my house and the practice of economy were the delight of my life. I felt grateful to my ancestors who gave me such a strong body. Sometimes I kept awake all night talking with my wife about the goodness of my ancestors. Also when in bed I planned a compact homestead. I once read a Japanese poem, 'What a joy to be born in this peaceful reign and to be favoured by ploughs and horses.' (Most Japanese farming is done without either horses or ploughs.) It went deeply into my heart. Also I heard from the school teacher of four loves: love of State, love of Emperor, love of teacher and love of parent. I have been much favoured by those loves. I also heard the doctrines of Ninomiya: sincerity, diligence, moderate living, unselfishness. I felt it a great joy to live remembering those doctrines. I also went to the prefectural experiment station and studied fruit growing and my spirit was much expanded. I returned again to the station and the expert talked to me very earnestly. I asked for a special variety of persimmon. The expert sent to Gifu prefecture for it. I planted the tree and made its top into six grafts. It bore fruit and many passers-by envied it. Two years after that I grafted five hundred trees and sold the grafted stock."

Several villages sent to the exhibition statistics of great interest. One village set forth the changes which had taken place in the social status of its inhabitants[ [50]]. Some communities were represented by statements of their hours of labour [[51]]. One small community's tables showed how many of its inhabitants were "diligent people," how many "average workers" and how many "other people[[52]]." A county agricultural association had painstakingly collected information not only about the work done in a year [[53]] and the financial returns obtained by three typical farmers but about the way in which they spent what they earned.[ [54]]

On my way back from the exhibition I heard the story of a priest. When fourteen years of age he obtained seeds of cryptomeria and planted them in a spot in the hills. He also practised many economies. When still in his teens he asked permission to take two shares in a 50-yen money-sharing club, but was not allowed to do so as no one would believe that he could complete his payments. He persisted, however, that he would be able to pay what was required and he was at length accepted as a member. At twenty he became priest of a small temple which was in bad repair and had a debt of 125 yen. He brought with him his 100 yen from the club and the young cryptomeria. He planted the trees in the temple grounds. He said, "I wish to rebuild the temple when these trees grow up." He cultivated the land adjoining his temple and contrived to employ several labourers. At last the cryptomeria grew large enough for his purpose and he rebuilt the temple, expending on the work not only his trees but 600 yen which he had by this time saved. Then he proceeded to bring waste land into cultivation. At the age of sixty-two he gave his temple to another priest and went to live in a hut on the waste land. There came a tidal wave near the place, so he went to the sufferers and invited five families to his now cultivated waste land. He gave them each a tan of land and the material for building cottages and showed them how to open more land.

"HIBACHI" AND, IN "TOKONOMA," FLOWER ARRANGEMENT AND "KAKEMONO."

SCHOOL SHRINE CONTAINING EMPEROR'S PORTRAIT.

A good judge expressed the opinion that Buddhism was flourishing in 80 per cent. of the villages of Aichi, but this was in a material and ceremonial sense. The prefectures of Aichi and Niigata had been called the "kitchens of Hongwanji" [[55]] (the great temple at Kyoto), such liberal contributions were forthcoming from them. "A belief in progress," this speaker said, "may be a substitute for religion for many of our people; another substitute is a belief in Japan." A village headman from the next prefecture (Shidzuoka) said: "People in my village do not omit to perform their Buddhist ceremonies, but they are not at their hearts religious. In our prefecture the influence of Ninomiya is greater than that of Buddhism. If the villagers are good it is Ninomiyan principles that make them so. Under Ninomiyan influence the spirit of association has been aroused, thriftiness has been encouraged and extravagance reprimanded."

FENCING AT AN AGRICULTURAL SCHOOL.

WAR MEMENTOES AT THE SAME SCHOOL—ALL SCHOOLS HAVE SOME

I told Mr. Yamasaki one day that there was an old Scotswoman who divided good people into "rael Christians and guid moral fowk." What I was curious to know was what proportion of Japanese rural people might be fairly called "real Buddhists" and what proportion "good moral folk." "There are certainly some real Buddhists, not merely good moral folk," he assured me. "If you penetrate deeply into the lives of the people you will be able to find a great number of them. In ordinary daily life, during a period when nothing extraordinary happens, it is not easy to distinguish the two classes; but when any trouble comes then those real religious people are undismayed, while the ordinarily good moral people may sometimes go astray. The proportion of religious people is rather large among the poor compared with the middle and upper classes. These poor people are always weighted with many troubles which would be a calamity to persons of the middle or upper classes. Such humble folk get support for their lives from what is in their hearts. Though they may suffer privation or loss they are glad that they can live on by the mercy of Buddha. There are some religious people even among those who are not poor. They are usually people who have lost some of their riches suddenly, or a dear child, or have been deprived of high position, or have met some kind of misfortune. Sometimes a man may become religious because he feels deeply the misfortunes or miseries of a neighbour or the miseries of war. Or his religion may come by meditation. A man who begins to be religious is not, however, at once noticed. On the contrary, if he is a true believer his daily life will be most ordinary."

One day I passed a primary school playground. The girls had just finished and the boys were beginning Swedish drill. Everyone engaged in the drill, including the master, was barefoot.

I saw that some of the cottages were built in an Essex fashion, of puddled clay and chopped straw faced with tarred boards. Some dwellings, however, were faced with straw instead of boards. They had just had their wall thatch renewed for the winter.

In one spot there was a quarter of a mile of wooden aqueduct for the service of the paddy fields. Much agricultural pumping is done in Aichi. I visited an irrigation installation where pumps (from London) were turning barren hill tops into paddy fields.[[56]] The work was being done by a co-operative society of 550 members who had borrowed the 40,000 yen they needed from a bank on an undertaking to repay in fifteen years.

It was stated that common paddy near Anjo had been bought at 5,000 yen per chō and not for building purposes. When one member of our company said, "The farmers here are rivalling each other in hard work," the weightiest authority among us replied: "What the farmer must do is to work not harder but better. At present he is not working on scientific principles. The hours he is spending on really profitable labour are not many. He must work more rationally. In 26 villages in the south-west of Japan, where farming calls for much labour, it was found that the number of days' work in the year was only 192. Statistics for Eastern Japan give 186 days.[[57]] As to a secondary industry, one or two hours' work a night at straw rope making for a month may bring in a yen because the market for rope is confined to Japan. The same with zori, a coarse sort being purchasable for 2 sen a pair. But supplementary work like silk-worm culture produces an article of luxury for which there is a world market."

When we returned home my host was kind enough to summarise for me—the general reader may skip here—some of the reasons set forth by a professor of agricultural politics for the farmer's position being what it is:

  1. The average area cultivated per family is very small.
  2. The law of diminishing return.
  3. Imperfection of the agricultural system. Mainly crop raising, not a combination of crop and stock raising, as in England. No profitable secondary business but silkworm culture. Therefore the distribution of labour throughout the year is not good and the number of days of effective labour is relatively small.
  4. The commercial side of agriculture has not been sufficiently developed.
  5. There has been a rise in the standard of living. In the old days the farmer did not complain; he thought his lot could not be changed. He was forbidden to adopt a new calling and he was restricted by law to a frugal way of living. Now farmers can be soldiers, merchants or officials and can live as they please. They begin to compare their standard of living with that of other callings. What were once not felt to be miseries are now regarded as such.
  6. Formerly the farmer had not the expense of education and of losing the services of his sons to the army. There is also an increase in taxation. A representative family which incurred a public expenditure, not including education, of 12.86 yen in 1890, paid in 1898 19.68 yen. In 1908 it was faced by a claim for 34.28 yen. [[58]]
  7. Although the area of land does not increase in relation to the increase of population, the size of the peasant family is increasing owing to the decrease of infanticide and abortion and the development of sanitation.
  8. The farmer suffers from debts at high interest.
  9. The character, morality and ability of the farmer are not yet fully developed.
  10. Formerly the farmer lived an economically self-contained existence. He had no great need of money. He must now sell his produce on a market with wider and wider fluctuations.
  11. There are many expensive customs and habits, for instance the two or three days' feasting at weddings and funerals.

During the evening I was told this story. In a village in a far part of the prefecture there lived a farmer called Yosōgi. He was a thrifty and diligent man. When he became old he gave all that he had to his son. But the old man could not stop working. He would go to the farm and help his son. The son did not like this. He wanted his old father to rest. In the end he found that the only way to cope with his industrious parent was to work very hard and leave him nothing to do. But the old man was not to be balked. He took himself off to the hillside and began to make a paddy field where there had never been a paddy field before. To make a paddy field on such a slope is a difficult task. The land must be embanked with stones and then levelled. The building of the strong embankment alone calls for much labour. The old man toiled very hard at his job and sometimes his son in despair sent his labourers to help him. At length the paddy field was finished. But it was only a tenth of a tan in area. When the son saw the small result of so much labour he said to his father, "I grieve for the way you have toiled. You have laboured hard for many days and my labourers have helped you, but all that has been accomplished is the making of a paddy field so small and distant that it is uneconomical."

To this the old man replied: "When you go to Tokyo and see the graveyard at Aoyama you will behold there many monuments of generals and ministers of State. Their merits and their works in this world are described on those monuments. But do you know where the monument of the famous hero Kusunoki Masashige is? It is near Kobe, and it is not more than half as big as those monuments at Tokyo. Do you know where the monument of the great Taiko is? It is in Kyoto, but it is only recently that this monument was put up. Thus the monuments of our greatest heroes are small or have been erected recently. The reason is that it is unnecessary to raise big monuments for them because what they did in their lives was in itself their monument. They built their monument in the hearts of the people. Therefore we can never judge from the size of the monument the kind of work which was accomplished by the man who sleeps under it. Monuments are not only for ministers and warriors. We peasants can also erect monuments in our own way. To open a new paddy field, to plant the bare hillside with trees, these are our monuments. How lonely it would be for me if there were no monument left after my death. However small this paddy field may be, it will not be forgotten so long as it yields for your posterity the blessing of its rice crop." "Happily," the interpreter added, "the old man did not die so soon as he thought he would do. He lived for several years and planted the bare hillside with trees. Now the wood which grows there is worth 10,000 yen."

A peasant proprietor expressed the conviction that goodness in a family was "not the result of its own efforts but of the accumulation of ancestral effort." The "ancestral merits and good spirit remain in the family." On the problem of rich and poor he quoted the proverb, "The very rich cannot remain very rich for more than three generations; a poor family cannot long remain poor." He said that he would be interested to know what I found to be "the causes of our villagers becoming good or bad." "For ourselves," he said, quoting another proverb, "'At the foot of the lighthouse it is dark.'"