The Birmingham age-herald., 1912-10-14
19l2-1914 First Ave.


 engagement of screens. This is a totally misleading statement. Screens" in our sense of the word, have nothing to do with the matter. They exist. no doubt. in most Japanese houses, and are often very beautiful; but they are used, just as we use them, either for pure ornament or to shut out draught.
 House construction becomes very much clearer when we think of the partitions as consisting not of screens, but of slid- ing panels. Nor is it true that the Japan ese house is not divided into rooms The line of demarkaton between room and room is definitely fixed by the grooves in which the panels slide. There is even solid and permanent boundary; for the panels are only some five feet nine in height, whereas the height of the room is generally about eight feet; so that from 2G to 90 inches of fixed partition fill the space between the panels and the ceiling. It is true that when all the panels are drawn back a whole floor of house becomes practically one large room. but this is almost as true of some English and many American houses when all tho folding or sliding doors are open.
 So much by way of removing the mis- conception created in my mind at any rate, by the use of the word screen" Looking now at the Japanese house at large, one can easily define It's dominant characteristic. It is house, without walls it is a roof raised on wooden up- rights over a wooden platform some l8 inches above the ground, which forms the main, and in one story houses the only floor The roof and the upper floor or floors are supported entirely by tho beams which form the skeleton of the whole erection. The space wkich in Eu- ropean houses is occupied by walls and windows is here given over to sliding panels of a different sort than which form the partitions between rooms. Each house has an outer and an inner easing. The outer casing of wooden shutters called ''amado," slides away every morning into cupboard boxes disposed that . dozen "amado' slip into them with perfect ease. and can be slipped out again at night with an minimum Of exertion. It is in these simple yet ingenious adjustment that the Japanese excel. Thus the outer wall Gas we should call it) of the house is unbuit every morning, to be rebuilt at night The process of unbuilding. I may add, is eminently favorable to early ris- ing, for the showing away of the amado'' at daybreak is conducted with . chatter suggestive of railway shunting yard in Full operation.
 And what of the inner casing? It like. wise consists of sliding panels placed some two or three feet behind the outer casing; which space of two or three feet forms a sort of veranda for lower stor4 or balcony for an upper story But the. inner panels called "shojf are entfreN different from the "amado.''. and are the peculiar characteristic of Japanese arch- lecture. They consist of light wooden frames, over the rectangular panels of which, so to speak. white paper Is pasted in lieu of glass. Translucent, but not transparent. the paper admits light while it secures privacy; though secure is y,erhaps scarcely the word. for privacy which an inquisitive baby's finger can de- story. +-
 Tn. reader may now understand per- haps, something of the toy-like fragility of the Japanese house. Save it's roof and it's floors. there is scarcely anything solid CT inmovable about 1t. When tho ..amado'' are slowed away for the day the walls are literally of white paper. and though these paper walls are seldom quite removed one panel is generally slippod behind another, so that oall in- tents and purposes the building is as wall less as bandstand, or as dolls house with the front unlocked. Add to this that everything is on a diminutive scaie. suited to the low average stature of th0 ooople. At least 10 times a day I nearly brain myself in passing from room to room Chairs there are none-oh, the lux ury of a common Windsor chair after a few hours of squatting on Japanese mats and the tables are about foot high, suited to the needs of kneeling jewellers. Everywhere and in everything, moreover. the workmanship is of toy-like neatnesg, q finicking nicety of adjustment Tn liter al fact there are many portions of Jap anese house that you could smash at blow. like child's plaything. If, after an hours squatting. you are moved to lean your aching hack against the karakam'' tthe partition panels). you are as likely sU not to fall into the next room