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Show GLTMTSj OF A JAPANESE HOME. All Japslese hdnses are built of wood snd appartitly of the lightest kind of v.ood. ThV all look from the outside like mere I temporary. make-bellev houses a simmer day's ' play place. But they live their solidities, a one soon learnsthrough intimate acquaintance. acquain-tance. The! are alrrfost always open on two side at least,- oftentimes on three, and sanetimes on all four. That is, they are built In such a way that the side wala may be taken down entirely, en-tirely, leavini only the interior paper elidlng-walls, br shojl, which can also be slipped fm their grooves and stacked awaylin their own receptacle, built for therl at the corner of each room, thus leaving only the roof and upright supports, with perhaps the little lit-tle exquisitely k rought ornamentations of oddly shapedlapertures and wee side windows of nnt white pine and oiled paper by whlchuhe structure is beautified. beau-tified. The roof U of gray tile usually. !n the better dwellings, and in less pretentious pre-tentious ones oi heavy rice straw thatch out of wjlch grasses and wild flowers grow, to the Intense delight of the humble ownek. No Japanese house Is ever furnished.! To people In thl interior of the country coun-try that which we call furniture would be the r.ot remarkable collection of curiosities. They would not have the remotest Idea what use to make of It. It is all rather difficult to a foreigner ,it first. One murt be trained from labyhood to sit upn one's feet on the floor without discomfort; to eat oft the floor without a single breach of "table manner;" to sleep on the floor without getting: rheumatism or other aches and pains an bad, and all these things one must do in a Japanese home. And learning to "do without" thing is a matter of some difficulty, too. One en-!e en-!e the native who ha never leamA to "do with" things. A knife and a loik.' for instance, seem upon first thought to be a positive necessity. But how quickly one learn to use the dainty little "chop-stlnks,". and how out of place knives and forks soon begin be-gin to look among the txquisite small bits of fine china on th little lacquer tray which No San carries in with such charmlnar grace! In the Japanese kitchen there are elso interesting things. What a kitchen tun be without a stove, without -a chimney, even, without pots and pans and kettles and big knives and chop-plng-boaids and wooden bowlj anl flour-bins and rolling-pins and rattling coal-scuttles and things, that a Japanese Japan-ese kitchen is. All of these "conven-li "conven-li nces"' would be simple pandemonium to a poor little Japanese cook. He knows not ths use of a stove. He ha enly a little hibachl, or earthenware fire-box, in which he puts live charcoals, char-coals, and all his cooking utensils he could put into one of his big kimono sleeves. And yet what winders he can ptrforra! He can prepare a meal for twenty people with less "fuss" than the crdinary cook from County Cork would make over a small lun:heon for ' two; and ha knows how to do everything at a minimum expense. Moreover, he is r.ot always "giving notice," and he Is rot lord of the premises. He is a servant ser-vant in the finest sense of the word, as tie the servants above and below him. There Is no "servant question" in this little empire of Japan, because the distinctions dis-tinctions of caste are too well denned and too rigidly observed to nuke such a thing possible. Almost every servant ser-vant has his servant, aad when the "butler" gets scolded he can go and scold the "boy;" when the cook does something he shouldn't, he has a small helper to blame for it When the gardener gar-dener gets cuffed he can tuff the little chap who keeps the weels out and picks up fallen leaves and feeds the carp In the pond. Eleanor Franklin's Japan Letter in Leslie's Weekly. i |