Transient guests are often received on the verandah; which place the hibachi, tabako-bon, and tea and cake are [pg 247] brought. In summer evenings it is much cooler here than on the matted floor within, and with the garden in view forms a pleasant place for recreation. Flower-pots are sometimes placed along its edge; children play upon it; and in a long suite of rooms it forms a convenient thoroughfare from one apartment to another. It is often the only means of reaching a room at one end of the house, unless by passing through other rooms, as in many cases there are no interior passage-ways, or corridors, as with us. It is needless to say that the verandah is kept scrupulously clean, and its wooden floor is often polished.[20]
Fig. 232.—Balcony rail.
The amado, or rain-doors, by which the verandah is closed at night and during stormy weather, are in the form of light wooden screens about the size of the shōji. These are made [pg 248] of thin boards held together by a light frame-work having a few transverse bars. The amado run in a single groove on the outer edge of the verandah; at night the house is effectually closed by these shutters, and during hot summer nights the apartments become almost stifling. In many houses, however, provision is made for ventilation in the shape of long, narrow opening just above the amado. Panels are made to fit into these openings, so that in winter the cold to some extent may be kept out. On unusually stormy days and during the prevalence a typhoon, the house closed in this way is dark and gloomy enough.
These shutters are the noisy features of a Japanese house. Within are no slamming doors or rattling latches; one admires the quiet and noiseless way in which the fusuma are gently pushed back and forth; and the soft mats yielding to the pressure of still softer feet, as the inmates like cats step lightly about, are soothing conditions to overstrained nerves and one cannot help contrasting them with the clatter of heavy boots on our wood floors, or the clouds of filthy dust kicked out of our carpets in any rough play of children. All these miseries are happily avoided in a Japanese house. Truth compels me to say, however, that in the morning you are roughly awakened by the servants pushing back into their appropriate recesses these outer wooden screens; and this act is usually noisy enough. In public houses this performance takes the place of clanging bell or tympanum-bursting gong (a Chinese instrument of torture which our people seem to take peculiar delight in); for not only the rattling bang of these resonant shutters, but the bright glare of daylight where before you had been immersed in darkness, assails you with a sudden and painful shock.
Fig. 233.—Rain-door lock unbolted.