Brooks's Readers, Third Year Part 22

How strange everything seems. The men, women, and children all wear gowns that look like dresses. They clatter along in wooden shoes, and they carry paper umbrellas. We ride through narrow streets. There are no sidewalks nor green lawns.

And now our carriage stops. We have come to the home of Hana and Tora.

The front of the house is open like a doll's playhouse, and we can see through to the garden beyond.

How clean everything looks! The porch s.h.i.+nes like a mirror. All the floors are covered with matting made of the whitest straw. Even the road in front of the house is swept.

We walk toward the house, and a little girl comes in from the garden.

She has a clear yellow skin, bright black eyes, and smooth black hair.

This is Hana, and she hastens to greet us.

She drops down on her knees, and bows so low that her head touches the matting. Her mother will soon be at home, Hana says, and she begs us to come in.

Does she ask us to take off our hats? Oh, no, she expects us to take off our shoes. The j.a.panese always leave their shoes outside when they go into a house.

Again and again the polite little girl bows her head to the floor as we enter. We sit down on the thick matting, for in the houses of j.a.pan there are no chairs.

II.

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Little Hana looks like a b.u.t.terfly in her loose dress embroidered all over with bright flowers. Her sleeves are very large, and a wide sash of soft red silk is tied around her waist.

And now Hana's mother returns, and Tora comes running in from his play. There are more bows and more greetings.

Tora is dressed in a plain blue gown very much like his sister's. Both the children have large pockets in their sleeves where they carry their playthings.

Our friends invite us to spend the night with them. We are very glad to do so. They take us to the parlor, which is at the back of the house.

It is now time for supper. A small table, about ten inches high, is placed before each person in the room. We sit on the floor as we eat.

A little maidservant brings in cakes and candies shaped like flowers.

She kneels and bows low as she hands them to us.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

Next we have soup, which we drink from small bowls. Then come pickles and strange kinds of food that we have never before seen. Last of all rice is served from a large, round, wooden box, and we drink our tea from tiny cups.

There are no knives and no forks, and so we observe our j.a.panese friends as they eat with two long wooden sticks. Then we take our chop sticks and try to eat the rice as they do. Hana and Tora watch us, but they are too polite to smile.

After the supper is over, the grown people sit on the floor and talk to one another, or watch the children at their games. Hana and Tora play with small cards on which are printed the strange-looking letters of the j.a.panese alphabet.

And so the evening pa.s.ses and bedtime comes. The little maidservant takes us upstairs. We see no beds, and we wonder where we shall sleep.

But screens are soon drawn together, and a room is made for us.

Then the little maid slides back another screen, and there in the wall is a closet. Out of this she takes soft, thick quilts, and spreads them on the matting, one on top of another. For a pillow she brings each of us a small block of wood.

We do not like the wooden pillows, but we sleep soundly all night in our beds on the floor.

HANA AND TORA

THEIR FESTIVAL DAYS

I.

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A beautiful garden lies back of the house where Hana and Tora live.

In j.a.pan the people love the flowering trees and plant them in their gardens. Now it is early springtime and the plum trees are just beginning to burst into bloom.

The children ask us to go with them and look for the first plum blossoms. The pink buds are pus.h.i.+ng out of their brown coverings. "Oh, I am so glad!" Hana says. "Soon the peach trees will bloom, and then it will be time for the Doll Festival.

"How I wish I could show you my dolls! I have more than a hundred, but they are all packed away in the storehouse.

"Some of them are very old. They used to belong to my grandmother and to my great-grandmother. The doll I like best was given to me when I was a baby. It is as large as I am, and it can wear my clothes.

"When the Doll Festival comes I have a merry time. In the morning when I get up I find all my dolls waiting for me in the guest room.

"With them are doll houses, little tables, sets of dishes, and boxes full of pretty gowns and sashes. The first thing I do is to dress all the dolls in their best clothes.

"Of course they must have something to eat, for it is the Feast of Dolls.

"I make tea for them and put dishes of candy and cake and rice on their little tables. It is not polite to leave anything on one's plate, and so Tora and I have all the food that the dolls do not eat.

"For three whole days I can play with my dolls. Then I take off their beautiful clothes and put on their sleeping coats. My mother packs them in their boxes and stores them away for another year, until the Feast of Dolls comes again."

II.

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"Tora does not care for the Feast of Dolls, because that is a girls'

festival. The Feast of Flags is the boys' day."

[Ill.u.s.tration]

"Oh, yes," Tora says, "I think the Flag Festival is the very best day of the whole year. Then everybody flies kites and the boys have their feast.

"What fun it is to see the huge paper fishes flying over all the houses and gardens! Some of the fishes are as large as a man. They open their mouths and swim about in the air as if they were in the water. All day long they flap their fins and tails and rustle in the wind."

"But why are so many of your kites made like fishes?" we ask.

"Because there is one kind of fish in our country so strong and brave that he swims up stream and leaps the waterfalls," Tora answered. "So j.a.panese parents fly kites made like fishes to help their sons remember that they must struggle bravely to win success.