med Homuda while he sat on the throne is now
designated Ojin, and the Emperor who ruled as Osazaki is remembered
as Nintoku. In the Imperial family, and doubtless in the households
of the nobility, wet-nurses were employed, if necessary, as also were
bathing-women, washing-women, and rice-chewers.**

*B.H. Chamberlain.

**"Rice, which is mainly carbohydrate, is transformed into grape-sugar
by the action of the saliva. This practice is still common in China
and used to be so in Japan where it is now rarely met with. It was
employed only until dentition was complete." (Munro.)

"To what we should call education, whether mental or physical, there
is absolutely no reference made in the histories. All that can be
inferred is that, when old enough to do so; the boys began to follow
one of the callings of hunter or fisherman, while the girls stayed at
home weaving the garments of the family. There was a great deal of
fighting, generally of a treacherous kind, in the intervals of which
the warriors occupied themselves in cultivating patches of ground."*

*B.H. Chamberlain.

BURIAL OF THE DEAD

Burial rites were important ceremonials. The house hitherto tenanted
by the deceased was abandoned--a custom exemplified in the removal of
the capital to a new site at the commencement of each reign--and the
body was transferred to a specially erected mourning-hut draped
inside with fine, white cloth. The relatives and friends then
assembled, and for several days performed a ceremony which resembled
an Irish wake, food and sake being offered to the spirit of the dead,
prayers put up, and the intervals devoted to weird singing and solemn
dancing. Wooden coffins appear to have been used until the beginning
of the Christian era, when stone is said to have come into vogue.

At the obsequies of nobles there was considerable organization. Men
(mike-hito) were duly told off to take charge of the offerings of
food and liquor; others (kisari-mochi) were appointed to carry the
viands; others (hahaki-mochi) carried brooms to sweep the cemetery;
there were females (usu-me) who pounded rice, and females (naki-me)
who sung dirges interspersed with eulogies of the deceased. The
Records mention that at the burial of Prince Waka a number of birds
were used instead of these female threnodists. It appears, further,
that those following a funeral walked round the coffin waving
blue-and-red banners, carrying lighted torches, and playing music.

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