“Beneath the floor, which is covered with fine, well-stuffed mats, is a square walled hole, which, in the winter season, after having first removed the mats, they fill with ashes and lay coals upon them to keep the room warm. The landladies in their room put a low table upon this fire-hole, and spread a large carpet or tablecloth over it, for people to sit underneath, and to defend themselves against the cold. In rooms where there are no fire-holes they use in the winter brass or earthen pots, very artfully made, and filled with ashes, with two iron sticks, which serve instead of fire-tongs, much after the same manner as they use two other small sticks at table instead of forks. “I come now to the above mentioned _Miseratsie_ (?), as they call them, being curious and amusing ornaments of their rooms. In our journey to court I took notice of the following: 1. A paper neatly bordered with a rich piece of embroidery, instead of a frame, either with the picture of a saint done apparently with a coarse pencil, and in a few, perhaps three or four, strokes, wherein, however, the proportions and resemblance have been so far observed, that scarce anybody can miss finding out whom it was designed to represent, nor help admiring the ingenuity and skill of the master; or else a judicious moral sentence of some noted philosopher or poet, writ with his own hand, or the hand of some noted writing-master, who had a mind to show his skill by a few hasty strokes or characters, indifferent enough at first sight, but nevertheless very ingeniously drawn, and such as will afford sufficient matter of amusement and speculation to a curious and attentive spectator; and, lest anybody should call their being genuine in question, they are commonly signed, not only by the writing-masters themselves, but have the hands and seals of some other witnesses put to them. They are hung up nowhere else but in the toko, as the most honorable place of the room, and this because the Japanese set a great value upon them. 2. “Pictures of Chinese, as also of birds, trees, landskips, and other things, upon white screens, done by some eminent master, or rather scratched with a few hasty, affected strokes, after such a manner that, unless seen at a proper distance, they scarce appear natural.