CHAPTER XX.

PUBLIC AMUSEMENTS.

Pleasures—_No_-performance—Playgoing—The theatre—Japanese dramas—_Gidayu_-plays—Actors—A new school of actors—Actresses—Wrestling—Wrestlers—The wrestling booth—The wrestler’s apparel—The Ekoin matches—The umpire—The rules of the ring—The match-days—The story-tellers’ hall—Entertainment at the hall.

We Japanese do not take our pleasures sadly; for when upon pleasure bent, we give ourselves to it heart and soul and forget for the nonce the cares and troubles that may at other times weigh upon our minds. And foreign observers, from seeing us in our hours of relaxation, taunted us, at least until our war with Russia showed us in another light, with frivolity and pronounced us a nation incapable of taking things seriously. Nothing could have been further from the truth than to suppose that we lead a butterfly existence, for we are as a nation serious, indeed, if anything, too serious. The _abandon_ with which we throw ourselves into the gaieties of the moment is attributable rather to the rarity of our opportunities. Our women, in particular, have very little leisure, and if they wander with childish delight in avenues of cherry-blossoms or sit with quiet content on the verandah under the harvest-moon, it is because they are glad to snatch a few hours of innocent enjoyment from their round of almost ceaseless household work. The simplicity of our pleasures is but the natural outcome of the simplicity of our lives; and if we have not the comforts and conveniences of European homes, neither do we suffer from the feverish stress and strain of European social life.

Of the various forms of public entertainment in Japan, the oldest and peculiarly Japanese is the _no_-dance. It is a posture-dance performed to the accompaniment of flutes and drums, while a ballad is sung at the same time to explain the movements. It was developed from the ancient religious dances and first came into vogue in the sixteenth century. The ballad, which is known as _utai_, is written in a mixture of the Chinese and old Japanese styles and cannot be readily comprehended by those who are not versed in these styles. The dance is slow and stately, though sometimes there are quick movements in it; it is performed by men with masks and in robes which were worn in ancient times; the actors on the stage at a time are few; and the stage itself has, except in rare cases, little setting. It is not, therefore, everybody that can appreciate a _no_-performance; indeed, the fact that it is caviare to the general and its superiority in point of refinement to the common dances of the people have won for it great popularity among the upper and middle classes; and the performances are largely attended. Many people also practise singing the _utai_; it has the advantage over other ballads, when it is unaccompanied by a dance, of being sung without any musical instrument. The _utai_ ballads are comparatively short, and in a single performance several of them are sung and danced.

The same _no_-dance is seldom repeated in a run. The programme is changed every day, because popular as the _no_ is in a sense, its patrons are yet too few to justify a run of the same dance. For a larger public we must turn to the drama. The play is in Japan as in other countries the most popular public amusement; but in few other lands is playgoing such an elaborate diversion as it is with us. In the old days the theatre opened early in the morning and did not close until nearly midnight; but some twenty years ago the police authorities limited the length of a performance to eight hours, and now it lasts from six to nine hours. In some theatres the doors open at four in the afternoon and close at ten or eleven; this allows a professional man to hurry to the theatre as soon as his office-hours are over and witness a performance in half an hour or so from its commencement; but other houses open at twelve or one and close at nine or ten. Playgoing was in the old times a whole day’s work, and women would prepare for it days beforehand and often lie awake the preceding night so as not to be late for the opening hour. They took their meals at the tea-houses, which are even now attached to the theatres, especially the larger ones. Through these tea-houses people book their seats in the theatre; and they go there first to divest themselves of unnecessary paraphernalia before entering the play-house and are thence provided with meals and refreshments which they take while looking at the performance. It is therefore to the interest of these tea-houses that the performance should be going on at meal-time. Those who cannot afford to visit a tea-house go direct to the theatre and are similarly looked after, except in the case of those in the cheapest seats, by attendants detailed for the purpose. In fact, eating and drinking is inseparable from playgoing in Japan. People eat and drink while looking at a performance; some even cannot enjoy it unless they are regaled at the same time with _sake_. Playgoing is, in short, an expensive pastime in Japan.

The theatre is a large oblong building. Over the great entrance hangs a row of wooden-framed pictures representing the scenes played; the side-entrances lead to the gallery. In front of the stage as one enters the theatre is the pit, which is partitioned into small compartments capable of holding four or five persons squatting. On either side are two stories of boxes and facing the stage across the pit is the gallery on the second or third story, which is mostly patronised by playgoers who, being unable to pay for the whole performance, come to see one or two of the best acts. From the sides of the stage two entrance-passages run through the pit towards the entrance. Actors walk under the passages to the entrance end and coming out into a box, make their appearance on the entrance-passage. These passages are very convenient as they give a larger room to the stage and impart a sense of distance when it is not expedient to crowd too suddenly on the stage. The stage is screened off from the auditorium by a drawn curtain in the larger theatres and by a drop-curtain in some of the smaller. When a popular actor is playing or some special piece is performing, curtains are presented by the patrons of the actor or the theatre; and in such a case several curtains are drawn one after another between the acts across the stage for the admiration of the audience. Another peculiarity of the Japanese stage is the revolving-stage. A scene is set upon the front half of a turn-table which is flush with the rest of the stage floor; and while that scene is being acted, the carpenters are putting up the next in the rear half; and when the first scene is over, the table revolves and brings the second to view, and so the play is continued without interruption. Yet another peculiarity is the presence on the stage of black-veiled men in clothes of the same colour. They are known as “blackamoors” and supposed to be invisible. At the commencement of a run; they stand or sit behind the actors and prompt them; they remove from the stage any article that has ceased to be of use or pull away the dead in a fight if they are found to be in the way, or push a cushion to an actor when he is about to sit down. They are of great use, though it is hard to acquiesce in the fiction of their invisibility. The stage music is played usually on one side of the stage; but when a _gidayu_ is required, its performers are seated on a high perch to the left of the stage.

Only in rare cases is the day’s performance taken up by a single play. The usual course is to have two plays, the first being of an historical character or concerned with disturbances in a daimyo’s family, and the second being a domestic play. For the Japanese drama is divided into three classes, the first being the historical drama, which deals with the times of war, most frequently in the twelfth, fourteenth, and sixteenth centuries, that is, the periods of the feuds which led to the establishment of the Shogunate, of the insurrections which resulted in the temporary rule of the country by two lines of Emperors, and of the ascendancy of the Taiko and Tokugawa Iyeyasu; the second treats of what are known as disturbances in noble families, the most common cause of which was the struggle for succession between the rightful heir and an illegitimate child of a daimyo; and lastly, the domestic drama depicts scenes in the lives of the common people, the favourite heroes and heroines of which were in the old days chivalrous gamblers, magnanimous robbers, and self-sacrificing courtesans. Of late, however, the domestic drama has greatly extended its scope, for now it presents pictures of modern life in reputable society. Then, two plays are acted in a performance, and there is not unfrequently a middle piece or an after-piece, or both, and such a piece presents a bright and gay scene with dancing in it. Thus, a performance is made to suit all tastes. This rule of two plays is not always adhered to; it is frequently disregarded by the new school of actors, who give only one play with an after-piece. We give a gay after-piece to relieve the strain of witnessing a serious and often tragic play, a curious contrast to the European _lever de rideau_ which allows the playgoer to dine without hurry.

Plays are again divided into two classes according to their form. One is the ordinary prose drama; and the other is the _gidayu_, a kind of musical or ballad drama. The latter was brought into vogue two centuries ago by Gidayu, a singer, who gave his name to this form of drama. It was originally sung at puppet-shows; but as the librettos were written by Chikamatsu Monzaemon, the greatest of Japanese dramatists, they are highly valued as literature. The standard set by Chikamatsu was kept up by his immediate successors; but no _gidayu_ of note has appeared since the third quarter of the eighteenth century. In Osaka, where Gidayu lived and sang, puppet-shows still draw large houses; and no _gidayu_-singer of the present day is considered a regular professional unless he has gone through the mill at the Bunrakuza, the great puppet-theatre of Osaka. In Tokyo _gidayu_ puppet-shows do not enjoy much favour; _gidayu_ are in the capital sung at the story-tellers’ hall or performed on the stage. The _gidayu_ contains the ordinary prose dialogue; the singing part describes the feelings and movements of the puppets. But these explanations which do very well in a puppet-show, are too lengthy on the stage; while the singing is going on, the acting is apt to become wooden, and the interest in the play is saved from flagging only by the beauty of the language and the skill of the singer.

There has of late been a great change in the histrionic art in Japan. Until about twenty years ago, the theatrical profession was mostly hereditary, and such as did not come of a theatrical family entered the stage as pupils of some well-known actor. None could practically become an actor without the countenance of the whole profession; and if a pupil showed extraordinary talent, he was not unfrequently made his master’s successor. For great histrionic names are handed down from generation to generation; thus, the late Ichikawa Danjuro, the greatest actor of Japan since the Restoration, was the ninth of his name, and his rival, Onoye Kikugoro, was the fifth. The third great actor at the time was Sadanji, a pupil of the fourth Kodanji; the present head of the Actors’ Guild is Shikan the Sixth; and the most promising actor of the day is Uzaemon the Thirteenth. Not one of these names has been invariably handed down from father to son; but it is vested in the family, whose consent is necessary for its assumption by a pupil.

Some twenty years ago, a new school of actors sprang into being; they were called student-actors as they came mostly from the student class. They formed companies and gave performances by themselves. At first they were looked upon with disdain by the professionals; but they soon became popular and, not being fettered like the latter by the traditions of their profession, they were more natural in their acting and had freer scope. It was during the war with China and immediately after that their strong points came into prominence; for when they acted scenes from that war, their representations were absolutely free from the conventionalities of the old school, and it was acknowledged that in the modern realistic drama the new school was decidedly superior to the old. In course of time the former began to learn the tricks of the trade as practised by the other, while the younger actors of the old school threw off the trammels of tradition in plays of contemporary life, so that there is now far less difference between the two schools. And in some theatres actors of both schools play together.

In most theatres actors take female parts as well as male. Many actors have made their mark in female roles, and such characters are often specialised, some actors excelling in depiction of ladies of rank and others in representing women of the people and of the _demi-monde_. There are also actresses in Tokyo, but they seldom perform with actors; for the instances which have hitherto occurred of such performances were not very successful. One theatre in Tokyo is occupied entirely by women, who play male parts as well as those of their own sex. The best actress of the day is Kumehachi, who has few peers in her line even among actors; but it cannot be said that actresses as a whole enjoy high favour in Japan.

Another public amusement which vies with the stage in popularity is wrestling. Though there are often wrestling bouts in different parts of the city, the great matches to which all lovers of the art look forward every year are those which take place in January and May in the temple-grounds of Ekoin on the south side of the River Sumida; for as they decide the combatants’ position in the profession, they are fought in grim earnest.

There are some five hundred wrestlers in the Tokyo Wrestlers’ Guild, which comprises all the professionals of the city. In the wrestlers’ list they are divided into two sets, east and west. In each set there are some score of wrestlers of the first grade, and there are corresponding grades in both sets down to the lowest. When wrestlers of the first grade retire through age or disease from the active list, so to speak, they become, unless they leave the guild altogether and take up other callings, elders of the guild. The elders are partners in the getting up of the Ekoin matches; they also take in pupils, for no one can become a professional wrestler except under the aegis of an elder. For the young wrestler this is convenient, because he is always under the protection of his elder and naturally profits if, when he goes touring in the provinces, he is in the company of a wrestler of a higher grade from the same elder. When a wrestler is without a peer, he becomes what may be called the invincible champion. There have been less than a score of such champions since the first of them took that title two and a half centuries ago; but at present there are two invincible champions at the same time.

Wrestling takes place in an arena of sand bounded by a ring, some twenty feet in diameter, formed of empty rice-bags and covered by a four-pillared wooden roof. It is surrounded by tiers of seats for the spectators. At the foot of each of these pillars sits an elder watching the match and acting as referee in case of dispute. At two opposite pillars are a bucket of water, a basket of salt, and a bundle of paper-slips, the salt to purify the body for the contest which may end fatally and the slips for wiping the hands.

The wrestler appears in the arena without clothing. He has over his loin-cloth a wide, wadded cotton-belt adorned with twine tassels when he wrestles; but if he is a first-grade wrestler, he makes a formal appearance in the arena with others of the same grade before they commence their bouts, when he wears in addition an apron of heavy material richly embroidered with his professional name or some other distinguishing mark stitched in gold.

The Ekoin matches last for ten days, or rather for ten fine days. Until lately, the booth was merely covered with matting or canvas, and as the rain leaked in, the matches could not be held on wet days. As, moreover, men are sent round the city with drums to announce the matches, the day preceding the match-day had also to be fine or at least to give reasonable hopes of fine weather on the following day, so that one fair day during a spell of rain was of no use. A run of matches might therefore last for twenty days or more. And all the time the elders had to feed the wrestlers to keep them together, and so, long-continued rainy weather might swallow up the profits of the run, especially as the Japanese wrestlers with their huge paunches are hearty eaters. A permanent building for wrestling matches has, however, been erected at Ekoin; it was opened in June, 1909. It is the largest building of the kind in Japan and holds more than ten thousand spectators. The great hall will, in spite of the heavy initial cost, pay in the long run as there will be no need to put up a booth each time and matches can be held irrespectively of the weather.

The matches commence with those of the lowest grade, and the best bouts take place late in the afternoon. Before each bout a summoner appears in the arena and calls out the names of the two combatants, who, as they are already waiting outside the ring, immediately make their appearance, and the umpire formally announces their names. They drink a cup of water and purify themselves with a pinch of salt. They crouch opposite each other and, at a word from the umpire, grapple with each other. It often happens that one of them is not ready for the grip, and they separate; once more they rise and drink water and return to their former positions. Some wrestlers repeat this until the spectators are tired out. But when they do tussle, the struggle does not take long; and if they remain long in each other’s grip without coming to a conclusion, the umpire separates them and lets them refresh themselves with water before they resume the bout. The umpire then puts them exactly in the same position as they were before. It is remarkable with what accuracy he makes them resume their former position; he can tell at a glance their exact posture at each moment of the bout; and he does not make the least error in the bend of their bodies or the touch of their hands. Such an eye naturally requires long training; and the umpire has, like the wrestler, to rise from the lowest rung of his profession. At first he presides over the bouts of the wrestlers of the lowest grade; and as he acquires skill and experience, he rises to a higher grade until finally he umpires the matches of the foremost wrestlers. His decision is seldom disputed; and in the rare cases when it is called in question, he appeals to the elders sitting at the four pillars.

The rules of the ring are very strict. If a wrestler falls, touches the ground with a knee, a hand, or any part of the body other than the soles of his feet, or steps on the rice-bags of the ring, he is declared defeated. The ways in which, he can cope with his adversary were originally put at forty-eight; but they were subsequently increased to twice, and later still to four times, that number. These original forty-eight throws were divided into four classes of twelve each, namely, the butting with the head, grappling with the hands, twisting with the hips, and tripping with the feet. From these were developed all the later methods.

During the first days of the matches the wrestlers of the first grade are paired with those whose positions on the other side do not correspond to their own; and then the matches become gradually more equal until on the ninth day those of the same position on both sides are pitted against each other. It is the most exciting day of the whole series; but on the tenth and last day those of the highest grade seldom appear and the interest in the matches flags as a matter of course.

These great matches, occurring as they do only twice a year, throw the whole city into a fever of excitement, and while they are on, one hears of nothing else. In the booth the enthusiasm is very great, and it rises to such a pitch when a clever throw takes place or a favourite distinguishes himself, that the spectators throw into the arena their overcoats, tobacco-pouches, or whatever else come handy as marks of their approval to the victor. They afterwards send presents in money and recover their property.

Thus, playgoing is expensive and takes up the best part of a day, while the wrestling matches which arouse universal interest occur but twice a year, other matches being mostly of local interest only. Neither of these amusements can serve to while away a few hours of idleness or relaxation; to those who wish to spend an evening pleasantly and at little expense, the story-tellers’ hall is always open. It stands conspicuously in a street; for over a wide entrance, the walls of which are studded with numerous pegs for suspending the clogs and sandals of its patrons, hangs a large square lantern announcing on its face the names of the principal performers, while the name of the hall is inscribed at a side-end. The hall itself is a great matted room with a platform at the furthest end. The spectators squat promiscuously on the mats and watch the performances or listen to the tales of the story-teller on the platform which is about four feet high and can be seen from all parts of the room. The hall opens at six or half-past; but it only begins to fill an hour later and closes at about ten o’clock.

Entertainments of various kinds are given at the story-tellers’ halls. In some the story-tellers proper appear; half a dozen or more come upon the platform in succession, winding up with the chief story-teller of the evening. Those of the better grade tell serious stories, complete at a sitting or continued through the whole run of the company which is fifteen evenings, for they change twice a month. Most of the others, however, tell short stories, humorous and ending often in a word-play; their object is merely to raise a laugh among their audience. There are also story-tellers of a different kind, whose speciality is tales of war and stories of men famed in Japanese history; but as they talk seriously and not in the light vein of their more humorous _confrères_. they are not so popular as the latter. It is not, however, always the story-teller who occupy the platform. In the course of the evening there may be music and singing by professionals or conjuring tricks. There are also several halls opened exclusively for the singing of _gidayu_; and though for their proper singing a deep, strong voice is really requisite, female singers are far more numerous than male in Tokyo. In the capital it is not as in Osaka, the home of _gidayu_-singing, for a young and pretty girl-singer finds greater favour than a male singer of skill and experience. In one evening half a dozen such singers perform, the last being the head of the troupe.

In these halls some of the stories told are far from edifying; but from others the lower classes become acquainted with the lives of the noted men of their country. The proletariat in Japan are probably more intimate with the history of their country than those of other lands. Such history may not always be authentic; but of the famous names in that history, warriors, statesmen, priests, and scholars, they hear from the more serious entertainers at the halls; and the _gidayu_ has also an educative influence, for it inculcates unceasingly the duty of loyalty and filial piety and never tires of dwelling upon the nobleness of self-sacrifice.