Because of his enormous productiveness, Shunsho's work in _hoso-ye_ form is common, frequently in fine condition. Most of the _hoso-ye_ prints were originally issued in joined groups of three; the groups are seldom found intact now. The grace of his women has made them more generally popular than his impressive men, and they are consequently harder to obtain. It must be noted that Shunsho's work is uneven, and that the majority of the pieces offered are either tame and uninteresting examples of pot-boiling or caricatures that lack the intensity which lifts certain of the artist's most grotesque figures to tragic heights. The matchless Shunsho collection of Mr. Frederick W. Gookin is full of such prints as rarely come into the market to-day. Occasionally the more distinguished ones are met with; and they are treasures which the practised collector eagerly seizes. Fortunately print dealers are not, as a rule, conscious of the greatness of the difference, and they will frequently offer side by side a print that is merely one of Shunsho's commonest pieces of hack-work and a print that is one of the glories of the Ukioye School. On such occasions the collector has the pleasure of profiting by his own discrimination. Shunsho's large square prints and pillar-prints are of extreme rarity. BUNCHO. Connected by association with the school of Shunsho, yet lifted by his originality to a place quite apart from it, is the artist Ippitsusai Buncho. His master, a certain Ishikawa Kogen (or Yukimoto) of the classical Kano School, seems to have meant little to him; from the beginning of his production, about 1765, Shunsho's and Harunobu's influence chiefly guided him. He and Shunsho jointly published in 1770 three volumes of actor-portraits enclosed in fans. Little is known of his life except that he was originally a Samurai; he is said to have turned from his original master to the Ukioye School and to have led a life of dissipation until eventually his friends persuaded him to abandon such things and procured for him the honorary title of Hokyo. After this, we hear nothing of him. He died in 1796. [Illustration: IPPITSUSAI BUNCHO.]