hions of the city, and
rejoice that they are not themselves the slaves of novelty, and
especially of the foreign innovations that play so prominent a part in
Japanese city life to-day. "The frog in the well knows not the great
ocean," is the snub with which the Japanese cockney sets down Farmer
Rice-Field's expressions of opinion; while the conservative countryman
laughs at the foreign affectations of the T[=o]ky[=o] man, and returns
to his village with tales of the cookery of the capital: so extravagant
is it that sugar is used in everything; it is even rumored that the
T[=o]ky[=o]ites put sugar in their tea.

But while the country laughs and wonders at the city, nevertheless, in
Japan as elsewhere, there is a constant crowding of the young life of
the country into the livelier and more entertaining city. T[=o]ky[=o]
especially is the goal of every young countryman's ambition, and thither
he goes to seek his fortune, finding, alas! too often, only the hard lot
of the _jinrikisha_ man, instead of the wealth and power that his
country dreams had shown him.

The lower class women of the cities are in many respects like their
sisters of the rural districts, except that they have less freedom than
the country women in what the economists call "direct production." The
wells and water tanks that stand at convenient distances along the
streets of T[=o]ky[=o] are frequently surrounded by crowds of women,
drawing water, washing rice, and chattering merrily over their
occupations. They meet and exchange ideas freely with each other and
with the men, but they have not the diversity of labor that country life
affords, confining themselves more closely to indoor and domestic work,
and leaving the bread-winning more entirely to the men.

There are, however, occupations in the city for women, by which they may
support themselves or their families. A good hair-dresser may make a
handsome living; indeed, she does so well that it is proverbial among
the Japanese that a hair-dresser's husband has nothing to do. Though
professional tailors are mostly men, many women earn a small pittance in
taking in sewing and in giving sewing lessons; and as instructors in the
ceremonial tea, etiquette, music, painting, and flower arrangement, many
women of the old school are able to earn an independence, though none of
these occupations are confined to the women alone.

The business of hotel-keeping we have referred to in a previous chapter,
and it