Only by the graciousness and charity, in a sense, of the upper classes were the household servants saved from institutions. When the Baroness, for example, had married, some of them—cooks, maids, and nurses—had stayed with her parents, some had gone to another sister, some had come to her and been set to training the new ones. With her they had a home for life. This system accounted in part, at least, for the fact there were no beggars or mendicants in Japan.
Essentially conservative, essentially the product of a strange and scarcely understood past, the Japanese woman in my opinion did not possess in her typical psychology any strong leanings towards rebellion. This was true even among the many women writers on papers and magazines. Those who interviewed me were intelligent, but I was constantly amazed at their ancient and domesticated outlook.
I did not believe the woman of Japan would discard her beautiful costume or sacrifice her esthetic sense upon the altar of Occidental progress and materialism. The kimono was her chrysalis. Outwardly it was often of some thick serviceable goods, dull brown or black, shot through with threads of purple or blue. Yet underneath were silks of the brightest and most flaming hues, formalized for each particular occasion. Only a fleeting glimpse was caught of these as she walked. They were symbolic of her present position in society.
From the lowest serving maid to the finest aristocrat, certain indelible traits immediately impressed themselves. First of all was the low, soft, fluttering voice, like art and music combined. They were too modestly shy to talk out loud; you could scarcely hear them in a small room. Perhaps one reason men did not take their opinions seriously was because they did not speak up. I heard on every side of the New Woman—but I never saw her. Only those who had turned Christian showed any signs of thinking independently. To be a Christian seemed to imply being a rebel or radical of some kind. They told me it with great secret pride.
This was the single place where I had found men rather than women responding to the potentialities of birth control. The former wanted to learn and thereby make of themselves something better. They were more and more in touch with the ideas of the Western world, and were broadening themselves through travel. I was confident a shifting environment was going to extend the masculine point of view and, if birth control could be proved of benefit to them, they would practice it. At that time I did not agree that East and West could never meet.
Japan was undoubtedly a man’s country. Wherever we went, Grant was Exhibit A. He was a tall, dark, rather gawky youth, with adolescent manners but always cheerful. In private houses butlers and maids paid him much attention, and, in hotels, as soon as we entered the dining room everybody, because he was a man child, rushed to anticipate his wishes, to see that he was made comfortable. I straggled on behind. At our first appearance in one of these, the little girls who were being trained as waitresses and whose duty it was to bow the guests in and out were obviously confused. When we were seated at the table the proprietor apologized, “You must excuse them because they are so young, and they have their minds too much on this young gentleman.”
The Yoshiwara, to which some missionaries escorted me, was certainly an integral part of this man’s world. First we visited the unlicensed quarter, winding in our rickshas among alley-like streets lined with small houses. The dark eyes of the girls peered out through slits in the screen walls. Working men were standing in the muddy roadways, chattering, scrutinizing the prices which were posted in front like restaurant menus—so much per hour, so much per night. A door opened to admit a visitor. The light in the lower story vanished and soon another twinkled upstairs; or a light went out above and reappeared below, the door opened again and a figure emerged. Hundreds of lights behind paper windows seemed to flicker on and off constantly, low to high, high to low. The sordidness, the innumerable, shining eyes made me shiver involuntarily.
After we crossed a bridge to the licensed quarter the scene changed immediately. The wide thoroughfare, with a row of trees down the center festooned with electric globes like a midway, was clean and inviting. The amply-built houses had an air of spaciousness and luxury, their lanterns sent out a soft, alluring gleam, and carefully cultivated gardens produced a profusion of flowers in the courtyards. This part of the Yoshiwara appeared a delightful place. Its attraction for the girls was obvious; they would rather seek a livelihood in this fashion than in the dismal factories. Nor was it odd that they should find more romance here with many men than drudging for one all their days as the “incompetents” they became after marriage under the domination of their mothers-in-law.
Through portals as broad as driveways the patrons, much better dressed than those in the unlicensed quarter, strolled up to view the photographs of the inmates, posted like those in the lobby of a Broadway theater. In some frames was only the announcement, “—— just arrived, straight from ——. No time for picture.” The clients did a great deal of “window shopping.” Newcomers from the country might have eight or nine visitors an evening, an older one but two or three. Many of the girls came from good families, frequently to lift their fathers or brothers out of debt. They sent their earnings back and, as soon as they had accumulated a sufficiency, often went home, married, and became reputable members of society.
But in spite of the Yoshiwara’s artificial glamour, the crowd of men swarming like insects, automatically reacting to the stimulus of instinct, was unutterably depressing.