The farmer and mechanic. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 18??-19??, 1909-03-30
THE FARMER AND MECHANIC.

are lined WIN lleHl. oo1sIe u IL.
favorite toys are made of dough, ana
there are peddling cooks who go
around selling them. There are men
who carry toy stoves thfougn the
streets and rent them out to the chf-
| dren at so much per hour. They Iur-
nish cakes and other things for the lit
tie ones to cook, 50 that for two or
three cents a party OF girls can nave
a stove for an hour and COOK q Wnole
meal for t~hen1se- YES.
Some of the toys are mace or Iac-
quer and many of paper. One can p,ly
a very nice gun for So and a tin SWORD
for 10 cents.
instructive Games.
Many of the toys II games are
used in teaching the children. Ihefe
sre ~nlaying cards with classical poetry
on them. used much like u game o.
authors. Another pack Of caras
teaches the old Japanese proverbs auu
another the names and forms Oh an
mails. The japanese are experts III
top spinning. They nave Wflstiins
tops and can keep a half dozen OF
them going at one time. They play
battledore and Shuttlecock. eSpec1alfy
stores are filed with bats and balls.
MANY TOYS are used in the kindergar-
tens and there are games which leac1i
history and geography and also cleah-
illness, un~se1fishnesS and mofa1ty. :,
The japanese have fairy tales OF az
kinds. G have stories like Goody-
Two-Shoes and Hop-o-nly-Thum. The
Hop-o-my-Thumb of Japan IS a prlese
one inch long. who does all sorts OF
curious things Another popular
fairy tale is known as the Lucky
Teakettle, another the Battle OF the
Monkey and the Crab. II a th'fd;
the Old Man Who Made n )ead
Trees to Blossom. The story OF Sfl-
shama, a sort of Japanese Rip Van
Wrinkle, is exceedingly popular, as are
also MANY fables about the padsSi,
which might b. called the Bre'r Itab-
bit of Japanese childhood.
In a Japanese Home.
But p we call upon some OF
our little japanese friends. Their
house is situated in a beautiful garden.
It's roof is covered with black tlies
and it has double walls Of wood. The
outer walls Of each side are showed
back during the daytime into little
c~upboards at the orners and the line
inner walls of sash filed With paper
panes may then be seen. There IS a
space TIVE the two walls, and IN
his we sit while awaiting our friends.
They soon ppear. They get down
on their knees and bump their heads
on the floor in bowling to US, and then
ask us in. We AXE off our shoes and
leave them outside. This is h GUS
tom of all Japanese. The houses are
exceedingly clean, and the floors are
covered with thick mats of Woven
white straw which would be hurt by
the nails in our shoes. The mats arc
so soft that our feet sink into them
and we feel like lying down and roll
ing over and over.
In the meantime our little Japan
csc friends have laid cushions On the
mats and beg us to sit. These peo-
pie do not use chairs or sofas. T1ey
have tables for eating which are MOI
more than a foot high, and they ST
and sleep on the floor. The mats are
soft and when they have taken or
! and spread on them some Well pad
; ded comforters they have a Very sof-
bed. In. the daytime these comfort
. ers are rolled up in a bundle and pu-
away in a cupboard or hole in The
, wall which by a sliding door is Sc
: covered that you would not suppose
, it was here. By this means the bod
, room is turned into a DarlOr and Whef
a table is brought in it is a dinins
j room as we'll.
t AS we sit on the mats our littl.
friends tell us about their homes, ex
planning some customs Which are diff
ferent from ours. They say that tn,
e mats are cleaner than our carpets am
: that they are very convenient in de
: scribing a house, as they are Away
? of the same size. They show us tina
;, each mat is three feet wide and 81:
feet long and say that the size Of
house or room is known by the mum
Der OF mats 1t takes to cover the floor
g THE room we are in has eight mats
Larger rooms have twenty or thirt
a mats, and when a carpenter starts t,
build a house he asks the owner hoy
r many mats he wants. and thus fxe
Il the size and price. All land in Japan
is measured by the unit Of the mat
, a tsubo, being six feet square or tW,
. mats IN size. Land here is measure,
! by tsubOs, not acres. It takes NOR
: than a thousand tsubos to make on
. acre of land.
e By and by we go out to look at tn
n bathroom. The Japanese children ar
o very cleanly and they take a redho