Japanese Girls and Women — Samuari Women, Part 2

One of the tales of old Japan, and a favorite subject of theatrical representation, is the death and revenge of a lady in a daimi[=o]'s palace.

Onoyé, a daughter of the people, child of a merchant, has by chance risen to the position of lady-in-waiting to a daimi[=o]'s wife,--a thing so uncommon that it has roused the jealousy of the other ladies, who are of the samurai class.

Iwafuji, one of the highest and proudest ladies at the court, takes pains on every occasion to insult and torment the poor, unoffending Onoyé, whom she cannot bear to have as an associate.

She constantly reminds her of her inferior birth, and at last challenges her to a trial in fencing, in which accomplishment Onoyé is not proficient, having lacked the proper training in her early life.

At last the hatred and anger of Iwafuji culminate in a frenzy of rage; she forgets herself, and strikes the meek and gentle Onoyé with her sandal,--the worst insult that could be offered to any one.

Onoyé, overcome by this deep disgrace offered her in public, returns from the main palace to her own apartments, and ponders long and deeply, in the bitterness of her soul, how to wipe out the disgrace of an insult by such an enemy.

Her own faithful maid, seeing her disordered hair and anxious looks, perceives some secret trouble, which her mistress will not disclose, and tries, while performing her acts of service, to dispel the gloom by telling gayly all the gossip of the day.

This maid, O Haru, is a type of the clever faithful servant.

She is really of higher birth than her mistress, for, though she has been obliged to go out to service, she was born of a samurai family.

Onoyé, while listening to the talk of her servant, has made up her mind that only one thing can blot out her disgrace, and that is to commit suicide.

She hastily pens a farewell to her family, for the deed must not be delayed, and sends with the letter the token of her disgrace,--Iwafuji's sandal, which she has kept.

O Haru is sent on this errand, and, unconscious of the ill-news she is bearing, she starts out.

On the way, the ominous croak of the ravens, who are making a dismal noise,--a presage of ill-luck,--frightens the observant O Haru.

A little further on, the strap of her clog breaks,--a still more alarming sign.

Thoroughly frightened, O Haru turns back, and reaches her mistress' room in time to find that the fatal deed is done, and her mistress is dying.

O Haru is heart-broken, learns the whole truth, and vows vengeance on the enemy of her loved mistress.

O Haru, unlike Onoyé, is thoroughly trained in fencing.

An occasion arises when she returns to Iwafuji in public the malicious blow, and with the same sandal, which she has kept as a sign of her revenge.

She then challenges Iwafuji, in behalf of the dead, to a trial in fencing.

The haughty Iwafuji is forced to accept, and is thoroughly defeated and shamed before the spectators.

The whole truth is now made known, and the daimi[=o], who admires and appreciates the spirit of O Haru, sends for her, and raises her from her low position to fill the post of her dead mistress.

These stories show the spirit of the samurai women; they can suffer death bravely, even joyfully, at their own hands or the hands of husband or father, to avoid or wipe out any disgrace which they regard as a loss of honor; but they will as bravely and patiently subject themselves to a life of shame and ignominy, worse than death, for the sake of gaining for husband or father the means of carrying out a feudal obligation.

There is a pathetic scene, in one of the most famous of the Japanese historical dramas, in which one seems to get the moral perspective of the ideal Japanese woman, as one cannot get it in any other way.

The play is founded on the story of "The Loyal R[=o]nins," referred to in the beginning of this chapter.

The loyal r[=o]nins are plotting to avenge the death of their master upon the daimi[=o] whose cupidity and injustice have brought it about.

As there is danger of disloyalty even in their own ranks, Oishi, the leader of the dead daimi[=o]'s retainers, displays great caution in the selection of his fellow-conspirators, and practices every artifice to secure absolute secrecy for his plans.

One young man, who was in disgrace with his lord at the time of his death, applies to be admitted within the circle of conspirators; but as it is suspected that he may not be true to the cause, a payment in money is exacted from him as a pledge of his honorable intentions.

It is thus made his first duty to redeem his honor from all suspicion by the payment of the money, in order that he may perform his feudal obligation of avenging the death of his lord.

But the young man is poor; he has married a poor girl, and has agreed to support not only his wife, but her old parents as well, and the payment is impossible for him.

In this emergency, his wife, at the suggestion of her parents, proposes, as the only way, to sell herself, for a term of two years, to the proprietor of a house of pleasure, that she may by this vile servitude enable her husband to escape the dishonor that must come to him if he fails to fulfill his feudal duty.

Negotiations are entered into, the contract is made, and an advance payment is given which will furnish money enough for the pledge required by the conspirators.

All this is done without the knowledge of the husband, lest his love for his wife and his grief for the sacrifice prevent him from accepting the only means left to prove his loyalty.

The noble wife even plans to leave her home while he is away on a hunting expedition, and so spare him the pain of parting.

His emotion upon learning of this venture in business is not of wrath at the disgrace that has overtaken his family, but simply of grief that his wife and her parents must make so great a sacrifice to save his honor.

It is a terrible affliction, but it is not a disgrace in any way parallel to the disgrace of disloyalty to his lord.

And the heroic wife, when the men come to carry her away, is upheld through all the trying farewells by the consciousness that she is making as noble a sacrifice of herself as did the wife of Yamato Daké when she leaped into the sea to avert the wrath of the sea-god from her husband.

The Japanese, both men and women, knowing this story and many others similar in character, can see, as we cannot from our point of view, that, even if the body be defiled, there is no defilement of the soul, for the woman is fulfilling her highest duty in sacrificing all, even her dearest possession, for the honor of her husband.

It is a climax of self-abnegation that brings nothing but honor to the soul of her who reaches it.

Japanese women who read this story feel profound pity for the poor wife, and a horror of a sacrifice that binds her to a life which outwardly, to the Japanese mind even, is the lowest depth a woman ever reaches.

But they do not despise her for the act; nor would they refuse to receive her even were she to appear in living form to-day in any Japanese home, where, thanks to happier fortunes, such sacrifices are not demanded.

Just at this point is the difference of moral perspective that foreigners visiting Japan find so hard to understand, and that leads many, who have lived in the country the longest, to believe that there is no modesty and purity among Japanese women.

It is this that makes it possible for the vilest of stories, and those that have the least foundation in fact, to find easy belief among foreigners, even if they be told about the purest, most high-minded, and most honorable of Japanese women.

Our maidens, as they grow to womanhood, are taught that anything is better than personal dishonor, and their maidenly instincts side with the teaching.

With us, a virtuous woman does not mean a brave, a heroic, an unselfish, or self-sacrificing woman, but means simply one who keeps herself from personal dishonor.

Chastity is the supreme virtue for a woman; all other virtues are secondary compared with it.

This is our point of view, and the whole perspective is arranged with that virtue in the foreground.

Dismiss this for a moment, and consider the moral training of the Japanese maiden.

From earliest youth until she reaches maturity, she is constantly taught that obedience and loyalty are the supreme virtues, which must be preserved even at the sacrifice of all other and lesser virtues.

She is told that for the good of father or husband she must be willing to meet any danger, endure any dishonor, perpetrate any crime, give up any treasure.

She must consider that nothing belonging solely to herself is of any importance compared with the good of her master, her family, or her country.

Place this thought of obedience and loyalty, to the point of absolute self-abnegation, in the foreground, and your perspective is altered, the other virtues occupying places of varying importance.

Because a Japanese woman will sometimes sacrifice her personal virtue for the sake of father or husband, does it follow that all Japanese women are unchaste and impure?

In many cases this sacrifice is the noblest that she believes possible, and she goes to it, as she would go to death in any dreadful form, for those whom she loves, and to whom she owes the duty of obedience.

The Japanese maiden grows to womanhood no less pure and modest than our own girls, but our girls are never called upon to sacrifice their modesty for the sake of those whom they love best; nor is it expected of any woman in this country that she exist solely for the good of some one else, in whatever way he chooses to use her, during all the years of her life.

Let us take this difference into our thought in forming our judgment, and let us rather seek the causes that underlie the actions than pass judgment upon the actions themselves.

From a close study of the characters of many Japanese women and girls, I am quite convinced that few women in any country do their duty, as they see it, more nobly, more single-mindedly, and more satisfactorily to those about them, than the women of Japan.

Many argue that the purity of Japanese women, as compared with the men, the ready obedience which they yield, their sweet characters and unselfish devotion as wives and mothers, are merely the results of the restraint under which they live, and that they are too weak to be allowed to enjoy freedom of thought and action.

Whether this be true or no is a point which we leave for others to take up, as time shall have provided new data for reasoning on the subject.

To me, the sense of duty seems to be strongly developed in the Japanese women, especially in those of the samurai class.

Conscience seems as active, though often in a different manner, as the old-fashioned New England conscience, transmitted through the bluest of Puritan blood.

And when a duty has once been recognized as such, no timidity, or mortification, or fear of ridicule will prevent the performance of it.

A

case comes to my mind now of a young girl of sixteen, who made public confession before her schoolmates of shortcomings of which none of them knew, for the sake of easing her troubled conscience and warning her schoolmates against similar errors.

The circumstances were as follows: The young girl had recently lost her grandmother, a most loving and affectionate old lady, who had taken the place of a mother to the child from her earliest infancy.

In a somewhat unhappy home, the love of the old grandmother was the one bright spot; and when she was taken away, the poor, lonely child's memory recalled all of her own shortcomings to this beloved friend; and, too late to make amendment to the old lady herself, she dwelt on her own undutifulness, and decided that she must by some means do penance, or make atonement for her fault.

She might, if she made a confession before her schoolmates, warn them against similar mistakes; and accordingly she prepared, for the literary society in which the girls took what part they chose, a long confession, written in poetical style, and read it before her schoolmates and teachers.

It was a terrible ordeal, as one could see by the blushing face and breaking voice, often choked with sobs; and when at the conclusion she urged her friends to behave in such a way to their dear ones that they need never suffer what she had had to endure since her grandmother's death, there was not a dry eye in the room, and many of the girls were sobbing aloud.

It was a curious expiation and a touching one, but one not in the least exceptional or uncharacteristic of the spirit of duty that actuates the best women of the samurai class.

Here is another instance which illustrates this sense of duty, and desire of atoning for past mistakes or sins.

At the time of the overthrow of the feudal system, the samurai, bred to loyalty to their own feudal superiors as their highest duty, found themselves ranged on different sides in the struggle, according to the positions in which their lords placed themselves.

At the end of the struggle, those who had followed their daimi[=o]s to the field, in defense of the Sh[=o]gunate, found that they had been fighting against the Emperor, the Son of Heaven himself, who had at last emerged from the seclusion of centuries to govern his own empire.

Thus the supporters of the Sh[=o]gunate, while absolutely loyal to their daimi[=o]s, had been disloyal to the higher power of the Emperor; and had put themselves in the position of traitors to their country.

There was a conflict of principles there somewhat similar to that which took place in our Civil War, when, in the South, he who was true to his State became a traitor to his country, and he who was true to his country became a traitor to his State.

Two ladies of the finest samurai type had, with absolute loyalty to a lost cause, aided by every means in their power in the defense of the city of Wakamatsu against the victorious forces of the Emperor.

They had held on to the bitter end, and had been banished, with others of their family and clan, to a remote province, for some years after the end of the war.

In 1877, eleven years after the close of the War of the Restoration, a rebellion broke out in the south which required a considerable expenditure of blood and money for its suppression.

When the new war began, these two ladies presented a petition to the government, in which they begged that they might be allowed to make amends for their former position of opposition to the Emperor, by going with the army to the field as hospital nurses.

At that time, no lady in Japan had ever gone to the front to nurse the wounded soldiers; but to those two brave women was granted the privilege of making atonement for past disloyalty, by the exercise of the skill and nerve that they had gained in their experience of war against the Emperor, in the nursing of soldiers wounded in his defense.

[*223] In the old days, the women of the samurai class fulfilled most nobly the duties that fell to their lot.

As wives and mothers in time of peace, they performed their work faithfully in the quiet of their homes; and, their time filled with household cares, they busied themselves with the smaller duties of life.

As the wives and mothers of soldiers, they cultivated the heroic spirit befitting their position, fearing no danger save such as involved disgrace.

As the home-guard in time of need, they stood ready to defend their master's possessions with their own lives;

as gentlewomen and ladies-in-waiting at the court of the daimi[=o] or the Sh[=o]gun, they cultivated the arts and accomplishments required for their position, and veiled the martial spirit that dwelt within them under an exterior as feminine, as gracious, as cultivated and charming, as that of any ladies of Europe or America.

To-day in the new Japan, where the samurai have no longer their yearly allowance from their lords and their feudal duties, but, scattered through the whole nation, are engaged in all the arts and trades, and are infusing the old spirit into the new life, what are the women doing?

As the government of the land to-day lies in the hands of the samurai men under the Emperor, so the progress of the women, the new ideas of work for women, are in the hands of the samurai women, led by the Empress.

Wherever there is progress among the women, wherever they are looking about for new opportunities, entering new occupations, elevating the home, opening hospitals, industrial schools, asylums, there you will find the leading spirits always of the samurai class.

In the recent changes, some of this class have risen above their former state and joined the ranks of the nobility; and there the presence of the samurai spirit infuses new life into the aristocracy.

So, too, the changes that have raised some have lowered others, and the samurai is now to be found in the formerly despised occupations of trade and industry, among the merchants, the farmers, the fishermen, the artisans, and the domestic servants.

But wherever his lot is cast, the old training, the old ideals, the old pride of family, still keep him separate from his present rank, and, instead of pulling him down to the level of those about him, tend to raise that level by the example of honor and intelligence that he sets.

The changed fortunes were not met without a murmur.

Most of the outrages, the reactionary movements, the riots and inflammatory speeches and writings, that characterized the long period of disquiet following the Restoration, came from men of this class, who saw their support taken from them, leaving them unable to dig and ashamed to beg.

But the greater part of them went sturdily to work, in government positions if they could get them, in the army, on the police force, on the farm, in the shop, at trades, at service,--even to the humble work of wheeling a _jinrikisha_, if other honest occupation could not be found; and the women shared patiently and bravely the changed fortunes of the men, doing whatever they could toward bettering them.

The samurai women to-day are eagerly working into the positions of teachers, interpreters, trained nurses, and whatever other places there are which may be honorably occupied by women.

The girls' schools, both government and private, find many of their pupils among the samurai class; and their deference and obedience to their teachers and superiors, their ambition and keen sense of honor in the school-room, show the influence of the samurai feeling over new Japan.

To the samurai women belongs the task--and they have already begun to perform it--of establishing upon a broader and surer foundation the position of women in their own country.

They, as the most intelligent, will be the first to perceive the remedy for present evils, and will, if I mistake not, move heaven and earth, at some time in the near future, to have that remedy applied to their own case.

Most of them read the literature of the day, some of them in at least one language beside their own; a few have had the benefit of travel abroad, and have seen what the home and the family are in Christian lands.

There is as much of the unconquerable spirit of the samurai to-day in the women as in the men; and it will not be very long before that spirit will begin to show itself in working for the establishment of their homes and families upon some stronger basis than the will of the husband and father.

CHAPTER IX.