w comforts, lead lives of intelligent, independent labor, and have in
the family positions as respected and honored as those held by women in
America. Their lives are fuller and happier than those of the women of
the higher classes, for they are themselves bread-winners, contributing
an important part of the family revenue, and they are obeyed and
respected accordingly. The Japanese lady, at her marriage, lays aside
her independent existence to become the subordinate and servant of her
husband and parents-in-law, and her face, as the years go by, shows how
much she has given up, how completely she has sacrificed herself to
those about her. The Japanese peasant woman, when she marries, works
side by side with her husband, finds life full of interest outside of
the simple household work, and, as the years go by, her face shows more
individuality, more pleasure in life, less suffering and disappointment,
than that of her wealthier and less hard-working sister.

CHAPTER X.

LIFE IN THE CITIES.

The great cities of Japan afford remarkable opportunities for seeing the
life of the common people, for the little houses and shops, with their
open fronts, reveal the _penetralia_ in a way not known in our more
secluded homes. The employment of the merchant being formerly the lowest
of respectable callings, one does not find even yet in Japan many great
stores or a very high standard of business morality, for the business of
the country was left in the hands of those who were too stupid or too
unambitious to raise themselves above that social class. Hence English
and American merchants, who only see Japan from the business side,
continually speak of the Japanese as dishonest, tricky, and altogether
unreliable, and greatly prefer to deal with the Chinese, who have much
of the business virtue that is characteristic of the English as a
nation. Only within a few years have the samurai, or indeed any one who
was capable of figuring in any higher occupation in life, been willing
to adopt the calling of the merchant; but many of the abler Japanese of
to-day have begun to see that trade is one of the most important factors
of a nation's well-being, and that the business of buying and selling,
if wisely and honestly done, is an employment that nobody need be
ashamed to enter. There are in Japan a few great merchants whose word
may be trusted, and whose obligations will be fulfilled with absolute
honesty; but a large part of the buy