In 1897, when we were in Japan, foreign clothes and top-hats were very popular, and to-day queer combinations of clothes are still noticeable. The foreign cap is much worn by the men, and a sort of loose-sleeved overcoat of English cloth, like an opera coat, is used in winter, worn over the kimono. But the tabis, or linen socks made like a mitten, and the clogs, are worn as before, while often an unmounted fur skin is wrapped about the neck. People well dressed in European clothes are called "high-collared"—in fact, this expression is applied to almost anything that is Western and modern. Many of the men who have been abroad are very correctly and smartly clad, but they usually put on a Japanese costume in the evening, for they call the European dress an "uncomfortable bag."
Some of the "high-collared" Japanese have at least one meal a day in European style, and part of the house is usually devoted to foreign furniture. They also believe that milk and meat should be eaten in order to make the race grow larger. Most of the men are anxious to learn Western ideas, and take great pride in showing inventions that have been introduced. They consider themselves quite up to date, and so they are in many ways.
When my husband was first in Japan, in 1889, a woman's highest desire was to wear European clothes, and if she could hire a costume and be photographed in it, she was perfectly happy. But I do not think they feel like that to-day. The novelty has worn off. Besides, Japanese dressmaking is a very simple matter; a kimono is made of straight breadths of cloth basted together. Compared with that, the plainest Western frock must offer many problems.
It is certainly better for us not to attempt to talk Japanese, for if one cannot speak it well it is safer not to try at all. One is very liable to address a nobleman in the language of a coolie, or to mystify a servant by speaking to him in the tongue of the higher classes—there are three ways of making a remark, according to the rank of the person addressed! No one can believe the difficulties of the language till he has tried it. To master it in any degree requires years of study.
To illustrate this I will quote from Dr. Gordon, the missionary, who gives a bit of dialogue between teacher and pupil during a lesson. "The pupil says,'The child likes meshi.' 'No,' says his mentor, 'in speaking of a child's rice it is better to use the word mama—the child likes mama.' Undiscouraged, the student tries again: 'Do you eat meshi?' But his teacher stops him and tells him that it is polite, in speaking to another of his having or eating rice, to call it gozen. Having taken this in, the student goes on with his sentence-building: 'The merchant sells gozen.' Again the teacher calls a halt, and tells him that meshi and gozen are used for cooked rice only, and that for unboiled rice kome is the proper word. Feeling that now he is getting into the secrets of the language, he says, 'Kome grows in the fields,' but he is again stopped with the information that growing rice is called ine."
More than one scholar in European tongues has declared Japanese to be the most difficult language in the world. One has said that a man "can learn to understand as much of Spanish in six months as he can of Japanese in six years." Chinese ideographs are said to outnumber the Japanese characters to-day, and in numerous instances have actually displaced them, even among the common people. Many characters have two meanings and only in combination can you know which is intended. There are no pronouns in the language, nor are there any "swear-words" or imperatives, the people are so polite.
Family names are also very confusing—to the Japanese themselves, I should think, as well as to us—because of the frequency of adoption. Each family feels that it must have an heir to take care of the aged members while they live and to pray for them when they die, so a child is adopted and given the patronymic. Blood doesn't seem to count at all, for even if a son is born later, it is the adopted child who inherits. Sometimes children brought up in foreign countries take foreign names. A naval officer told me of a charming Japanese girl whom he knew, named Bessie. One day she confided to him that she was going to marry Charlie. "Marry your brother!" exclaimed the astounded officer. "Yes," replied Bessie sweetly, "you not know—I not father's real child, and Charlie not father's real child. Charlie and I, we no relation—both adopted!"
Adoption is not always necessary, however, for if a man has no children he can easily divorce his wife, simply by telling her to return to her father's house, and he may then marry another woman. The modern law also gives this privilege of divorce to the wife, but custom is so strong that she never leaves her husband of her own accord.
Marriages are generally arranged by the parents, with the assistance of a mutual friend. The man and girl are allowed to see each other, but although they are not actually forced into marriage, few would dare to disobey their parents' wishes in the matter. They have a wedding feast, at which the bride and groom sit on the floor facing each other. The ceremony sometimes consists of their both drinking from a two-spouted tea-pot. The bride is clad in a white kimono and veil, which she keeps all her life, and wears once more when she is dead. Many presents are received, but the gifts of the groom, which are as costly as he can afford, are offered by the bride to her parents in gratitude for all that they have done for her in the past.
After the wedding the husband takes his bride to his home, no doubt to live with his father and mother. The wife must not only obey her husband, but is also much under the rule of her mother-in-law. A man sometimes brings his concubine into the house, and often her children as well, and these his wife is obliged to adopt. If husband and wife disagree, the go-between is usually consulted, and occasionally succeeds in arranging matters.