File:The mikado's empire (1894) (14597793337).jpg

Identifier: mikadosempire05grif (find matches)
Title: The mikado's empire
Year: 1894 (1890s)
Authors: Griffis, William Elliot, 1843-1928
Subjects:
Publisher: New York, Harper & brothers
Contributing Library: The Library of Congress
Digitizing Sponsor: The Library of Congress

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e flowers, caught theirfirst butterflies, began their first stratagem by decoying the unwary fishwith the hook, and picked off the lotus petals for banners, the leavesfor sun-shades, and the round seeds to eat, or roll like marbles. Then,as the boys grew up, they put on the swords, shaved off their fore-hair,and progressed in the lore of Chinese sages and native historians, andwere fired with the narratives of the exploits of Taiko and Yoritomoand lyeyasu; while the girls grew in womanly grace and beauty, and 438 THE MIKADOS EMPIRE. perfected themselv^es in household etiquette and studied the WomansGreat Learning. Then had come the marriage ceremonial, with nospoken vows, and made without priest or official, followed by festalcheer, wine, music, dance, and exchange of presents. Here the bridebecame mother. Hence, after one hundred days, she went with herchild to the temple, where the robed and shaven bonze wrote a name-charm, and put it in the childs prayer-bag. In this house had been
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The Weddiug Party. (From a Japanese painting on silk.) celebrated many a household festival. These rooms had echoed withmerry laughter, or resounded with the groans and sobs of grief. Hencehad gone out the funeral procession, when the bodies of loved parentswere borne to the grave or the cremarium. The funeral cortege, withlanterns, and hearse of pure white wood borne on four mens shoulders,with robed bonzes and men in ceremonial dress and muffled swords,and women in pure white robes and half-moon-like caps of floss silk, LIFE IN A JAPANESE HOUSE. 439 had passed out this gate. Prayers ha(^heen read, candles lighted, bellstinkled, the corpse laid on the pyre, and the fire lighted by the broth-er of the deceased, and the ashes deposited in the vase in the familymonument in that cemetery beside the mountain yonder. In this fam-ily oratory a new black tablet, gilt-lettered, was set among the ances-tral names, to be honored through coming generations. Every day some new discovery showed me

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