New-York tribune., 1921-11-06

something human ABOUT us heathenS III
- Japan. For we have laughed for nearly
twenty-six centuries and do still laugh
at the miseries and predicaments of others.
And that is perhaps the broadest foundation
stone underneath the old and scantily fur
nished structure which might be called
Japanese Humor In all our long weary his
tory our august ancestors have never achieved
lemon meringue pie. Therefore that re-
fined masterpiece Of humor so familiar to the
movie fans Of this enlightened land-Charlie
Chaplin with his noble features soidly and
squarely opposing the flight of a piece of the
aforementioned pie--had never delighted our
people over there before the invasion of
American films.
Even with this painfully glaring hand-
cap Japan may be able to hold her own
against the United States or any other coun-
try in the variety and extravaganza of her
slapstick comedy. There is a humorous i'm
preston in America that the Japanese are a
race suffering from superintendent and that
they are stiff as the starch in their cere-
monial costumes of ancient days. Evidently
our American friends got the idea of our
people from the fans, lacquer wares and Sat
of our official class.
Refinement we may have in some things, but
not so abundantly in the realm of humor
Some years ago there lived in Toxic scholar
named Professor Basil H. Chamberlain. He
knew us much better than we did ourselves,
because it was his erudite delight to read us
in the light Of what the other peoples beyond
the four seas thought and did He wrote a
small book which, in the judgment of many
of US natives, has remained for generations
and will remain for many more generations
one of the biggest books on Japan. In his
"Things Japanese" he defines Japanese hu-
NOR as the mixture of ''the broad Jest the
outrageous pun, the practical joke the loud
guffaw. Quips, cranks and wanton wies,
snatches of half meaningless song buffoonery,
tomfoolery, high jinks of every sort--the very
carnival of uproarious merriment''
There is book which has enjoyed for CEN
turies the reputation of being the one big fun
book Of the people of Japan. "Hizakurigc" is
its name, which cannot be Englished either
correctly or gracefully (for it is not correct
or graceful word in any language), but
which might be rendered as "Shanks' Mare
ing IT. 1t is the record Of two heroic souls,
Yajirobei and Kidahachi by name, the Japa-
Mutt and jeff absolutely penniless-
that Is, without funds of their own but rather
rich in the money in other mems pockets)
shaking it from the storied Yedo of the Shotgun
down that historic highway, Tokaido, to the
ancient flower capital of the Mikado, the
present Kyoto.
The classic was written by the Japanese
Rabelais, who wrote under the pen name of
Jippensha Ikkyu. Poor in worldly wealth. his
two heroes were rich in that superb Gift of
the gods we sometimes call wit And the
featuring Of these two things, the utter alb
sense of money and the persistent presence of
sharpest sort Of wit, naturally mothered many
laugh. But from beginning to end and at
all times it is that brand of fun so luminously
severed by the definition of Professor Cham
berlain quoted above. Here is sample
Zone day, long, long after the sun had gone
behind the western hills in his night robe of
crimson and gold, our travellers two, YAH and
Kida (for short), found themselves at the
entrance of village inn. They were pale
with hunger and gray with the dust of travel.
Above all the wealth of the world they longed
for the steaming hot consultations of a regu-
lar Japanese bath. When the maid announced
that the bath was ready neither YAH nor Kida
cared very much for the first prize in polite
ness. YAH just naturally beat Kda to it,
simply because he happened to be the nimber