My last day in Ōsaka was given to shopping,--chiefly in the districts
of the toy-makers and of the silk merchants. A Japanese acquaintance,
himself a shopkeeper, took me about, and showed me extraordinary things
until my eyes ached. We went to a famous silk-house,--a tumultuous
place, so crowded that we had some trouble to squeeze our way to the
floor-platform, which, in every Japanese shop, serves at once for
chairs and counter. Scores of barefooted light-limbed boys were running
over it, bearing bundles of merchandise to customers;--for in such
shops there is no shelving of stock. The Japanese salesman never leaves
his squatting-place on the mats; but, on learning what you want, he
shouts an order, and boys presently run to you with armfuls of samples.
After you have made your choice, the goods are rolled up again by the
boys, and carried back into the fire-proof storehouses behind the shop.
At the time of our visit, the greater part of the matted floor-space
was one splendid shimmering confusion of tossed silks and velvets of a
hundred colors and a hundred prices. Near the main entrance an elderly
superintendent, plump and jovial of aspect like the God of Wealth,
looked after arriving customers. Two keen-eyed men, standing upon an
elevation in the middle of the shop, and slowly turning round and round
in opposite directions, kept watch for thieves; and other watchers were
posted at the side--doors. (Japanese shop-thieves, by the way, are very
clever; and I am told that nearly every large store loses considerably
by them in the course of the year.) In a side-wing of the building,
under a low skylight, I saw busy ranks of bookkeepers, cashiers, and
correspondents squatting before little desks less than two feet high.
Each of the numerous salesmen was attending to many customers at
once. The rush of business was big; and the rapidity with which the
work was being done testified to the excellence of the organization
established. I asked how many persons the firm employed, and my friend
replied:--
"Probably about two hundred here; there are several branch houses. In
this shop the work is very hard; but the working-hours are shorter than
in most of the silk-houses,--not more than twelve hours a day."
"What about salaries?" I inquired.
"No salaries."
"Is all the work of this firm done without pay?"
"Perhaps one or two of the very cleverest salesmen may get
something,--not exactly a salary, but a little special remuneration
every month; and the old superintendent--(he has been forty years in
the house)--gets a salary. The rest get nothing but their food."
"Good food?"
"No, very cheap, coarse food. After a man has served his time
here,--fourteen or fifteen years,--he may be helped to open a small
store of his own."
"Are the conditions the same in all the shops of Osaka?"
"Yes,--everywhere the same. But now many of the detchi are graduates
of commercial schools. Those sent to a commercial school begin their
apprenticeship much later; and they are said not to make such good
detchi as those taught from childhood."
"A Japanese clerk in a foreign store is much better off."
"We do not think so," answered my friend very positively. "Some who
speak English well, and have learned the foreign way of doing business,
may get fifty or sixty dollars a month for seven or eight hours' work
a day. But they are not treated the same way as they are treated in
a Japanese house. Clever men do not like to work under foreigners.
Foreigners used to be very cruel to their Japanese clerks and servants."
"But not now?" I queried.
"Perhaps not often. They have found that it is dangerous. But they
used to beat and kick them. Japanese think it shameful to even speak
unkindly to detchi or servants. In a house like this there is no
unkindness. The owners and the superintendents never speak roughly. You
see how very hard all these men and boys are working without pay. No
foreigner could get Japanese to work like that, even for big wages. I
have worked in foreign houses, and I know."
*
It is not exaggeration to say that most of the intelligent service
rendered in Japanese trade and skilled industry is unsalaried. Perhaps
one third of the business work of the country is done without wages;
the relation between master and servant being one of perfect trust on
both sides, and absolute obedience being assured by the simplest of
moral conditions. This fact was the fact most deeply impressed upon me
during my stay in Osaka.
I found myself wondering about it while the evening train to Nara was
bearing me away from the cheery turmoil of the great metropolis. I
continued to think of it while watching the deepening of the dusk over
the leagues of roofs,--over the mustering of factory chimneys forever
sending up their offering of smoke to the shrine of good Nintoku.
Suddenly above the out-twinkling of countless lamps,--above the white
star-points of electric lights,--above the growing dusk itself,--I
saw, rising glorified into the last red splendor of sunset, the
marvelous old pagoda of Tennōji. And I asked myself whether the faith
it symbolized had not helped to create that spirit of patience and love
and trust upon which have been founded all the wealth and energy and
power of the mightiest city of Japan.