WIVES AND DAUGHTERS OF ARTIZANS AND MERCHANTS
In old Japan, among the workers the highest rank was held by farmers,
next by artizans, and last came the merchants, for they were regarded as
resorting to means somewhat degrading for making their living. In fact
they were not producers of positive wealth, but lived by cunning wit on
what others had made.
Artizans, such as carpenters, masons, and professional weavers, as well
as merchants, naturally live in towns and cities. The first work of the
wife is of course in the home, but when the husband's work is of such a
nature that it is possible the wife naturally helps him. Merchants'
wives and daughters, for instance, keep the shops while the husbands
peddle the goods or secure fresh supplies. Weavers' wives and daughters
aid directly, the whole family sharing in the work and acquiring skill.
Carpentry and masonry however are trades in which women take no part, so
women of these classes also seek some suitable domestic industry. In the
smaller towns especially, in recent years, rearing of silkworms is a
common occupation for all classes of moderate means, but in the cities
it is impossible to secure the necessary mulberry leaves, so straw
braiding, the making of fans, embroidery, and similar occupations are
here sought; and there are produced the thousand and one articles used
by the middle and wealthy classes and for export. As a means of
increasing the income the wives of artizans often open their front rooms
as shops and carry on a small retail business.
In times of prosperity these classes flourish and grow luxurious, but
hard times occasionally come, when they are reduced to dire poverty and
even to the verge of starvation; for, living away from the land, they
are more dependent than farmers on the continuous success of their
labors and secondary industries.
The school education of the women of these classes is in general the
same as that of the farming class. But inasmuch as they live, for the
most part, in the larger villages, towns, and cities, they enjoy many
advantages over their farming sisters. Along with their husbands they
have more need of ability to read and write, and, becoming quick-witted
through the stimulus of city life, they learn more easily. In recent
decades, especially the last, many of their children, naturally those of
the more successful families, are pressing up into the higher schools of
learning. As a body, therefore, from the standpoint of mere intellect
and wit, this class surpasses the farming class. From the standpoint
however of moral character, of conjugal fidelity, of industry, and of
trustworthiness in all relations the farming class, along with the
shizoku, surpasses all others, and probably even the peers themselves.
But in these higher classes we must distinguish between the men and the
women; for while the wives are, as a rule, beyond praise in the matter
of conjugal fidelity, the same may not be said of the husbands.
Among the many classes of working women named on a previous page are the
"clerks." This is a new feature of Japanese life worthy of note,
although the class is still small. Under this name we include ticket
sellers in railway stations, assistant barbers, and saleswomen and
shopgirls. Members of this class have of course enjoyed a relatively
large amount of education, and are therefore above the average in
general intelligence and ability. These girls are recruited from the
families of city artizans and merchants.
The descendants of palanquin bearers, day laborers, eta, and hi-nin form
to-day the lowest stratum of society, dwelling on the outskirts of large
cities, in wretchedness, filth, and poverty, getting their living from
day to day and breeding criminals, geisha, and prostitutes. The
stone-breakers, gravel gatherers, coolies, and most irregular of city
day laborers come from this class. Many of these men have illustrious
pedigrees. Some fell to this estate through wanton lust and reckless
expenditure of inherited wealth; some are descendants of disinherited
sons; the ancestors of some have met political reverses and found refuge
and safety only among the "non-humans," where they could live
unrecognized and unknown. Thus all grades of blood course through the
veins of this, the lowest class in Japan. The wives and daughters of
these men share their fate and fortune, living from hand to mouth. Their
life is so low and uncertain that it is absurd to speak of secondary
occupations--they lack even a primary occupation; and their homes, which
constitute the slums of the cities, are no places in which to carry on
any domestic industry.
With the coming to Japan however of modern industrialism and the
building of large factories in or near the cities, the wives and
daughters of this class have opportunity for regular work, earning
enough and more than enough to support themselves while actually at
work. But when attacked by laziness, fickleness, or disease, they easily
slump back into the same economic pit. From this lowest class comes one
of the serious dangers threatening the better life of modern Japan. The
insufficiency of these laborers, their unreliable character, and the
inferior quality of their work, have forced the factories to search
elsewhere for hands. These they have found in the relatively workless,
but industrious and comparatively moral farming class. These farmers'
girls have been brought to the cities and thrown into intimate relations
with the lowest, most dissolute, despised, and really despicable
classes, and the results have naturally been disastrous in many ways, as
we shall see in a later chapter.