A FARTHING'S WORTH OF FUN
How would you like to go to a fair with a farthing, a whole farthing, to
spend as you pleased? I think I can see some of you turning your noses up,
and looking very scornful. "A farthing, indeed!" you say. "Pray, of what
use is a farthing? I wouldn't mind going to a fair with a shilling, or even
sixpence, but what could anyone do with a farthing?" Well, in Japan you
could do a great deal. We must remember that Japan is a country of tiny
wages; many of its workers do not receive more than sixpence a day, and a
man who gets a shilling is well off. Tiny earnings mean tiny spendings, and
things are arranged on a scale to meet very slender purses.
We will now see what sort of time O Hara San, Miss Blossom, and her
brother, Taro San, Master Eldest Son, had at the fair one fine day in
Nagasaki. In the morning they sprang up from their quilts full of excited
pleasure, for they had been looking forward to this fair for some time. But
they did not romp and chatter and show their excitement as English children
would do. Their black eyes shone a little more brightly than usual, and
that was all.
When they had whipped their rice into their mouths with their little
chopsticks, they started for the fair, which was to be held in the grounds
of a great temple. Of course, they were dressed in their best clothes. Both
had new kimonos, and O Hara San had a very fine obi, which her parents had
bought for her by denying themselves many little luxuries. Their father and
grandmother went with them, but their mother stayed at home with the baby.
Their father wore a newly-washed kimono, but his chief glory was an old
bowler hat which a European gentleman had given to him. It had been much
too large for him, but he had neatly taken it in, and now wore it with
great pride. When they reached the fair they gave themselves up to its
delights with all their hearts. There was so much to do and so much to see.
Almost at once O Hara San and Taro were beguiled by a sweetmeat stall.
Each had five rin, and five rin make one farthing, or rather less, but we
will call it a farthing for the sake of round figures. One rin apiece was
spent here. The stall was in two divisions: one stocked with delicious
little bottles of sugar-water, the other with pieces of candy, tinted
bright blue and red and green. Miss Blossom went in for a bottle of
sugar-water, and her brother for candies. But first he demanded of the
candy-seller that he should be allowed to try his luck at the disc. This
was a disc having an arrow which could be whirled round, and if the arrow
paused opposite a lucky spot an extra piece of candy was added to the
purchase. To Taro's great joy, he made a lucky hit, and won the extra piece
of candy; he felt that the fair had begun very well for him.
While they drank sugar-water and munched candy, they wandered along looking
at the booths, where all sorts of wonders were to be seen--booths full of
conjurers, acrobats, dancers, of women who could stretch their necks to
the length of their arms, or thrust their lips up to cover their eyebrows,
and a hundred other curious tricks. The price of admission was one rin
each to children, and finally they chose the conjurer's booth, and saw him
spout fire from his mouth, swallow a long sword, and finally exhibit a
sea-serpent, which appeared to be made of seal-skins tacked together.
When they left the show they came all at once on one of the great delights
of a Japanese fair. It was the man with the cooking-stove, round whom
children always throng as flies gather about honey. For the fifth part of
a farthing you may have the use of his cooking-stove, you may have a piece
of dough, or you may have batter with a cup, a spoon, and a dash of soy
sauce. You may then abandon yourself to the delights of making a cake for
yourself, baking it for yourself, and then eating it yourself, and if you
spend a couple of hours over the operation the man will not grumble. As
this arrangement combines both the pleasure of making a cake and playing
with fire, it is very popular, and we cannot wonder that Taro took a turn,
though Miss Blossom did not. She felt herself rather too big to join the
swarm of happy urchins round the stove.
While Taro was baking his cake she spent her third rin on a peep-show,
where a juggler made little figures of paper and pasteboard dance and
perform all kinds of antics. Then they went on again. Each bought one rin's
worth of sugared beans, a very favourite sweet-meat; and these they ate
while they waited for their father and grandmother to join them at the
door of a certain theatre where they had agreed to meet. Into this theatre
was pouring a stream of people, old and young, men, women, children, and
babies, for a great historical play was to be performed, and it would
shortly begin. Soon their elders turned up, and their father took their
last rin to make up the payment which would admit them.
In they went, and took possession of their place. The floor of the theatre
was divided by little partitions, about a foot or so high, into a vast
number of tiny squares, like open egg-boxes. In one of these little boxes
our friends squatted down on the floor, and the grandmother began to unpack
the bundle which she had been carrying. This bundle contained a number of
cooking-vessels and an ample supply of rice, for here they meant to stay
for some hours to see the play, to eat and drink, and enjoy themselves
generally.
The father filled his pipe, lighted it at the hibachi, and began to smoke,
as hundreds more were doing all round them. Each box contained a family,
and each family had brought its cooking-pots, its food, and its drink; and
hawkers of food, of pipes, of tobacco, of saké, and of a score of other
things, rambled up and down selling their wares.
[Illustration: THE TOY SHOP]
When the play began every one paid close attention, for it was a great
historical play, and the Japanese go to the theatre and take their children
there in order to learn history. There are represented the old wars, the
old feuds, the struggle of Daimio against Daimio--in short, the history of
old Japan. When an actor gave pleasure, the audience flung their hats on
the stage. These were collected by an attendant, and kept until the owners
redeemed them by giving a present. For six hours O Hara San and Taro sat
in their little box, laughing, shouting, eating, and drinking, while the
play went on. Then it was over, for it was only a short play, at a cheap
theatre. "Ah!" said their father, "when I was a boy we had real plays. We
used to rise early and be in the theatre by six o'clock in the morning.
There we would stay enjoying ourselves until eleven at night. But now the
decree of the Government is that no play shall last more than nine hours.
It is too little!"
The children quite agreed with him as they helped their grandmother to
gather the pots and pans and dishes which were scattered about their box.
Then each took the wooden ticket which would secure the shoes which they
had left outside with the attendants, and went slowly from the theatre.
When they had obtained their shoes and put them on, Miss Blossom and Master
Eldest Son strolled slowly homewards through the fair. They had not another
rin to spend--their farthing's worth of fun was over.