Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1891-12-27

built of bamboo, paper and thin tiles These
are exqisitely beautiful, but to an Amerl-
can eve thew are so unsubstantlal as TO
seem more like dolls houses than genuine
homes
The ordinary home of the working people
is small wooden building of three or four
rooms The main room serves as dining,
sitting and sleeping room One closet is
used as kitchen and another as a bath
room. The other rooms are used for sleep
ing The floors are matted and kept e1-
1uuisitely neat and clean. The inmates and
all callers leave their shoes, slippers or clogs
at the entrance and enter in bare or stock
inged-feet.
Habits Of Life Indoors.
The meals are served on low tables, never
higher than two feet The conyives sit or
squat upon mats When the meal is fn-
ishcd, the table and tableware are removed
and the place is sitting room. At night
fall. cotton comforters are brought from the
family-press, two to person, and spread upon
the mats, and little wooden benches, like
the footrests in churches, are used as pillows.
y house like this can be built or bought
for $50, upward. 1t rents from s. year
upward and its furniture costs from SO to
$50. The people eat three or four times
day, employing a diet almost vegetarian in
character. In cold weather they bathe once
and in hot twice a day.
Health under these conditions is excellent
Skin diseases and the other ills that arise
from personal uucleanliness are almost I'M
known. There is none of that crowding
found in the great cities of Europe and
America The ratio of inmates to houses
in the Empire is less than to l, being
about 35 to according to the last census.
Odd to relate there is less crowding in the
cities than in the poorer rural districts.
Thus in Osaka CITY the ratio is 81 and in
Toxic, the capital, 4; while in the farming
districts of Awamori it is 5.S. This is the
very opposite OF things at home.
Relations OF Capital and Labor.
The relations of employer and e1nploye
are more than friendly. The former,
whether agriculturist, artisan or manufact-
urer treats the latter as if he were a rela-
tive rather than hireling. In the country
the general usage is for them to eat at the
same table. In many vocations, such as fishing,
fshcuring, mining, carving and metalwork,
there is rude prodt-sharing or co-opera-
ton rather than a strict hiring between
master and man. There are numberless
labor organizations in Japan, but they are
more in the nature of the medieval English
guilds than the modern trades unions.
the Government, for purposes of revenue,
farmed out the exclusive privileges of trade
in certain districts to men able to paw for
the same. These joined forces to protect
their own interests and formed unions or
syndicates. In the course of time the orig
inal owners admitted faithful employees to
their organization, until finally the better
members Of each craft were enrolled as one
body. From protecting the interests of the
one they grew by degrees into protecting the
interests of all engaged in their particular
trade. By acting as q unit they eXcrted
great influence with the governing classes.
Introduction OF New Industries.
In this manner the Government was IN
duced to bring to Japan regardless of eX-
pense from Corea, North China and Guam
tung the greatest experts in porcelain
baking, cloissonee making, lacquering and
Through this governmental
aid these arts arose TO their present su-
premacy, and afford employment 10 hum
dreds of thousands of artisans of the highest
skill. The guilds are as active to-day as
at any time in the past. They teach ap-
prentices and oversee their work, instruct
in branches of their art with which
they are unfamiliar, secure markets for fin
ished goods. situations for unemployed
members and take up and fight for the
cause Of any member to whom injustice has
been done.
Since the extension of suffrage in Japan,
they have begun to take an interest in politi-
cal matters, and NAV ere long, following in the
of their Western brethren, bios
som cut as a regular party in themselves.
Stranger things have happened in this EN-
pire of the Rising Sun. There are no |
strikes nor lockouts. The employer is sat- |
sfed with reasonable profit and the work. |
man with a just remuneration. In what |
other country can the like be found?
W. S. FALES.