The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1904-03-03
JAPAN OF TO-DAY
phones and Acknowledgements Numerous-prosress
in Literature Six Ways to Kill Man Bare. Handed

oeo~e@e~es.e-s e sea -e-o .s.e -s.0 90 o.
Japan and the japanese are the coun
try and people upon whom the world
eyes are today fixed. and it may. there
fore, be interesting to select from sew
eraI brand-new books on Japan some O
the more striking facts about the Land
of the Rising sun
One of the most useful of these book.
is e. w. Clements thoroughly up-to-
date Handbook of Modern Japan CA
c. McClurg). One gets good idea OF
the size of Japan from the statement
that it is only a little larger than Cali
fornia. 1t lies between the same paral-
IeIs of latitude as the States Of the
Mississippi Valley, and presents even
more varieties and extreme climates
than may be found from Minnesota TO
Louisiana. How densely the country is
populated may be seen from the state
ment that, while the area of Japan is
only one-twentieth of that of the
United States, the population is more
than one-half as great. 1t was Al, $40, so
in 1900, and the females exceeded the
males by 10000. The foreigners then
resident in Japan numbered, however,
only II, 900, of whom one-half were Chi
nese. OF Japanese, 123,791 were then
living abroad, of whom 90,146 were in
the United States. So mountainous is
Japan that only twelve per cent. of the
land is level ground, and a farm of five
acres-worked without cattle-is consid
cred large. Tobacco, which is largely
smoked by both sexes, is not a native
plant, but was introduced by the Por-
tuguese.
In his chapter on Industrial Japan,
Mr.. Clement speaks of the fact that at
the Uraga Dockyard large American
men-of-war have been satisfactorily re-
paired; and on October Is, 1902, a small
United States gunboat was launched.
the first instance in which Japan has
got an order of shipbuilding from
Western country. The new civilization
of the West has carried into Japan the
itch for gold and the desire for more
numerous and more expensive luxuries.
A troublesome Importation from the
West is the labor union. Some of the
trades are well organized, and there are
frequent strikes. Japan has already
1000 miles of railway, most of which
the government owns. In Toxic, there
are in use 1854 telephones. Bicycles
are very popular, and are cheaply man
ufactured. To show the extent of
Japan's shipping interests, we may
mention that the Nippon Yusen Kaisha
alone has seventy-six ships totalling
242,00 tons. The foreign commerce of
Japan has increased from $13,e00,000 in
1868 to 1855. 100000 in 19C2-twenty fold
in a third of century.
The typical Japanese house, wooden,
straw matched, without furniture, and
with its floors covered with mating, is
said to be giving way, in measure, to
houses in the Occidental style. II is
now common to find in houses of we'll
to-do people foreign room with carpet,
table, chairs, beds, stoves, CRATES, pic
lures, etc. Schools, churches, stores,
and other such places are also being
with doors on hinges glass
windows, etc. The japanese eat little
meat, and it is sold in small quantities.
Beef is cut UP into nlouthfuls and sold
by the ounce; chickens are carefully
and infinitely dissected and sold by
parts, as the wing, the leg, or an ounce
or two of the breast.
The Occidental games of cards have
become quite popular in Japan, as also
tennis and baseball. In the latter great
American game they have become so
proficient that they frequently win
against the Americans and British who
make up the baseball club of the Yoko-
hama Athletic Association. They have
also taken to Western plays, Shake
speare's "Othello" being put on the
stage in 1903 with marked success.
Under the head of Manners and Gus
TOMS" Mr. Clement tells of some
japanese superstitions which exist side
by side with things most modern. Fort
example:
On the seventh day of the first
month if a male swallows seven, and a
female fourteen, red beans, they will
De free from sickness all their lives;
f one bathes at the hour of the dog
IN the tenth day, his teeth will become
hard. A child begotten in the fathers
orty-third year is supposed to be pos
;essed of the devil When such a
'hild is about one month old it is,
therefore, exposed for about three
hours in some sacred place. Some
member OF the family then goes to
get it, and bringing it to the parents,
says: This is a child whom I haze
ound and whom you had better take
md bring up Thus having fooled The
levil, the parents receive their own
hid back.
Here is a paragraph regarding arse
lals, etc. from Mr.. Clements book:
The guns for the artillery service
lsed to be purchased abroad, but are
low chiefly manufactured in Osaka. !
There is an excellent arsenal in the ,
<oishikawa District of Toxic. where
he once famous Murata rifle was for
nerly manufactured, but that has been
upper seeded by the ''thirtieth year" (of
IeijD rifle; and both of these are jap ;
-nese inventions. The arsenal is also
urning out ammunition at the ordi-
larry rate of a million rounds day.
The development of the newspaper :
5 one of the interesting features of I
life. Thirty years ago there
we're none Today there are more ,
han thousand newspapers and mag ?
zines. indulging in woodcuts, even {
artoons. The newspapers are almost !
Ill morning journals, but go to press {