will take her pay and
her bundles, and disappear forever.

Even when servants come on trial for a few days, they often go away
nominally to fetch their belongings, or make arrangements to return, but
the lady of the house does not know whether the woman is satisfied or
not. If she is not, her refusal is always brought by a third person. If
the mistress, on her side, does not wish to hire the girl, she will not
tell her so to her face, but will send word at this time to prevent her
coming. Such is the etiquette in these matters of mistress and
maid.[*317]

Only by a multiplicity of details is it possible to give much idea of
the position of servants in a Japanese house, and even then the result
arrived at is that the positions of what we would call domestic
servants vary so greatly in honor and responsibility that it is almost
impossible to draw any general conclusions upon this subject. We have
seen that there is no distinct servile class in Japan, and that a
person's social status is not altered by the fact that he serves in a
menial capacity, provided that service be of one above him in rank and
not below him. This is largely the result of the grading of society upon
other lines than those on which our social distinctions are founded, and
partly the result of the fact that women, of whatever class, are
servants so far as persons of the opposite sex in their own class are
concerned. The women of Japan to-day form the great servile class, and,
as they are also the wives and mothers of those whom they serve, they
are treated, of course, with a certain consideration and respect never
given to a mere servant; and through them, all domestic service is
elevated.[*318]

There are two employments which I have mentioned among those of domestic
servants because they would be so classed by us, but which in Japan rank
among the trades. The _jinrikisha_ man and the groom belong, as a rule,
to a certain class at the bottom of the social ladder, and no samurai
would think of entering either of these occupations, except under stress
of severest poverty. The _bett[=o]s_, or grooms, are a hereditary class
and a regular guild, and have a reputation, among both Japanese and
foreigners, as a betting, gambling, cheating, good-for-nothing lot. An
honest _bett[=o]_ is a rare phenomenon. The _jinrikisha_ men are, many
of them, sons of peasants, who come to the cities for the sake of
earning more money, or leading a livelier life than can be