Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1891-04-14
A PEEP AT YOKOHAMA
Breezy Pen Pictures of Life in the
Great Seaport Of Japan.
THE SHOPPING QUARTER QUAINT.
A Whole Days Theatricals for the Small
Sum of Yankee Dime.
WHERE LUXURIOUS LIVING is CHEAP

Pretty nearly every American who goes
to Japan lands at Yokohama, the seaport OF
Japan, chiefly, perhaps, from its vicinity to
Tokyo, the Capital of the country, writes
Douglas Sladen. 1t is very good place to
land, for it is the principal foreign colony,
and one can get excellent accommodation to
recruit after the voyage. and a good many
wrinkles about travelling in the interior.
How novel and strange it was to sit down to
q regular French lunch OF many courses,
served by crowd of spindle-legged
japanese, in their picturesque dark blue
tunics and hose, who (most of them), could
not speak word of English, and took
their orders by the numbers on the menu:
"Boy, bring me some No. g." How funny
we thought the shu fling noise they made as
they ran about the floor, dragging their
straw sandals by the big toes.
Landing in Japan is most entertaining.
The moment a ship drops anchor she is sur
rounded by q fotilla of sampans-queer
little native boats, propelled with one oar
by half-naked "Japs," who swarm up on the
ships deck, sucking in their breath and
bowling to the ground as soon as they are on
board. Nobody patronizes Them but the
Asiatic passengers. Saloon passengers 60
off in the hotel launches. and in few min
utes, threading their way through the
swarming native craft, land you close by
the Custom House. Your luggage is car
ried I'D bv swarm of coolies. How funny
these coolies looked the first time one saw
theml Just like the servants in Perugino's s
pictures, or the varlets Of the shakespearian
stage, in their tight hose and tunics, which
IL of 40 l. ntpn
in the back with some brilliant device in
white or red.
Odd Things in the Shop Quarter.
Close to the Hatoba is the division be-
tween the native and European cities. We
made our escape from the ''lie European
town." as the Cinnamon would call it, and
struck the genuine japanese town in the
Ben-ten dori (Venus street). The houses
there were thoroughly Japanese-lIttle one
story affairs, built of wood, with their fronts
removed ali day, replaced, unless it was
sunny enough, with dark blue or chocolate
colored curtains, like the door of a tent,
orpamented with the owners name or de-
vice in huge white Chinese characters. Most
of them in the street were shops for the
benefit of foreigners-photograp shops,
porcelain shops, casket shops, silk mer-
chants, haberdashers, or curio shops of the
third order. The second order are in
the Honcho dori-the next street-which
EN- mblematizes its superiority by having
the shop fronts glazed instead of open. The
first order are in shape like Deakins or the
fiue art gallery in the foreign settlement
Even some of the Ben-ten dori shops were
un-J apanese enough to have counters: The
true japanese store has floor, raised about
a foot above the street, covered with fine
white straw mats an inch thick. On this
the proprietor squats, the customer never
upon it without removing his
boots. The stock is partly spread out on the
floor, partly on shelves AMI partly hung
from the ceiling. At the rear is a wooden
ladder, like a ships COMPANION, leading to
the attic, if there is one, and there is gener-
ally passage on one side.
In the first shop little boy was finishing
off, with hammer and agate burnisher, the
gilt on one of the great "Satsuma jars"
which they make in Yokohama. E.
The Theater Street.
In about the third shop we bought some
note paper, ornamented with storks, temples,
tori and Fujiyama, which we fondly be-
lieved to be what the Japanese used, until
little lower down We came to a genuine jap
anese stationer's, Tomoya's, where we saw
the 100-ieet rolls OF porous wrapping paper,
their "billets-doux, and saw them making
the great white-covered account books with
knotted rope backs, SO familiar to us after
ward. But even the Beh-ten dori was not
quite Japanesy enough, though we did see a
human water cart, carrying two great
buckets of unpainted wood, which he set
"a-showering" by pulling up a spigot tied
to a cord, held against q linchet handle
The Japanese are wonderfully dexterous
with their fingers; they can do different
thing with every finger on their hand at the
same tim.. A little lower down we found
ourselves in the 'theater street," genuine
bit of japan.
AT the very entrance was theater, where
you could sit all day for ten cents, and
smoke your pipe and eat your dinner; orna-
mented outside with huge sign-boards, COW
cred with the most blood-curdling pictures
of dragons as big as ships, breathing the
traditional fire, of women being cut up, like
beefsteaks, of bood-Splashing murders, and
split hair breadth escapes, painted in all the
colors of the rainbow, the line of blood show
ing up nobly. Most Japanese plays are
very much in Ercles' vein; they are really
exceedingly clever in Stimulating wounds;
the murderer makes savage cut and blood
spurts from his victim. A 'tum tumming"
noise is kept up all the time the perform
ance goes on, possibly to draw the attention
OF folks outside to the fact that the perform
ance is going on. And a hoarse-voiced man
invites you to enter, like the keeper of the
"iat woman" and the "dog-faced man" at
an English fair.
Matron-Like Little Children.
Outside the theater were row of little
girls seemingly about years old, carving
the next baby but one in the haori, on their
backs. and discussing affIirs with the grav-
ity of matrons, or skipping about 10 get out
OF the way OF the kodak. Whether they
were standing still, or he was having his
head shaken off. seemed q matter of pure
Indifference to the baby. Close by stood the
pipe mender, with a rack full of second
hand pipes, ranging down to cent in price;
but most of the customers wished to econo-
mize. and have their own dilapidated pipes
mended. Then we drove on, and passed a
peripatetic keysmith, carrying on his
shoulder q box like bootblack's, but hand.
somely bound with brass, and hung with
festoons OF keys, and close by him an
'tameya," or maker of dough toys, with one
of the little street stoves, where, by paying
fraction of cent children can have a little
dough and sauce, and spend the whole
afternoon in cooking.
1t is a wonderful street, this Theater street,
with its theaters and bath houses, and ba-
zaars, where they sell semi-European trash,
and the inevitable pipe cases and hairpins.
1t has one most fascinating by-street lead
ing off it, where the cabinet makers and
curio sellers congregate.
have spent days and days in this street.
picking up queer little articles of daily
domestic use among the humbler japanese
as artistic as a Greek temple in their OBJ
servance of the science of shape and orna-
ment, and each with its little bit of allegory
or famous legend hinted at. Brass bowls