Thunberg had an opportunity of seeing Japanese plays, both at Ōsaka, on his return from Miyako, and at Nagasaki, during the annual Matsuri in honor of Suwa, which he attended. “The spectators,” he says, “sit in houses of different dimensions, on benches. Facing them, upon an elevated but small and narrow place, stands the theatre itself, upon which seldom more than one or two actors perform at a time. These are always dressed in a very singular manner, according as their own taste and fancy suggest, insomuch that a stranger would be apt to believe that they exhibited themselves not to entertain, but to frighten, the audience. Their gestures as well as their dress are strangely uncouth and extravagant, and consist in artificial contortions of the body, which it must have cost them much trouble to learn and perform. In general they represent some heroic exploit, or love story, of their idols and heroes, which are frequently composed in verse, and are sometimes accompanied with music. A curtain may, it is true, be let fall between the actors and the spectators, and some necessary pieces be brought forward upon the theatre; but in other respects these small theatres have no machinery nor decorations which can entitle them to be put in comparison with those of Europe. [Illustration: INTERIOR VIEW OF A TYPICAL JAPANESE HOUSE] “When the Japanese wish at any time to entertain the Dutch, either in the town of Nagasaki, or more particularly during their journey to the imperial court, they generally provide a band of female dancers, for the amusement of their guests. These are generally young damsels, very superbly dressed, whom they fetch from the inns; sometimes young boys likewise are mixed among them. Such a dance requires always a number of persons, who turn and twine, and put themselves into a variety of artificial postures, in order to represent an amorous or heroic deed, without either speaking or singing. Their steps are, however, regulated by the music which plays to them. These girls are provided with a number of very fine and light gowns, made of silk, which they slip off one after another, during the dance, from the upper part of their body, so as frequently to leave them, to the number of a dozen together, suspended from the girdle which encircles their loins.”