teacups and pots, the great iron kettles in use over the fire in the farmhouse kitchen,--all these are things as pretty and tasteful in their way as the rich crêpes, the silver incense burners, the delicate porcelain, and the elegant lacquer that fill the storehouse of the daimiō; and they show, much more conclusively than these costlier things, the universal sense of beauty among the people. The artisan works at his home, helped less often by hired laborers than by his own children, who learn the trade of their father; and his house, though small, is clean and tasteful, with its soft mats, its dainty tea service, its little hanging scroll upon the walls, and its vase of gracefully arranged flowers in the corner; for flowers, even in winter and in the great city of Tōkyō, are so cheap that they are never beyond the reach of the poorest. In homes that seem to the foreign mind utterly lacking in the comforts and even the necessities of life, one finds the few furnishings and utensils beautiful in shape and decoration; and the money that in this country must be spent in beds, tables, and chairs can be used for the purchase of _kakémonos_, flowers, and vases, and for various gratifications of the æsthetic taste. Hence it is that the Japanese laborer, who lives on a daily wage which would reduce an American or European to the verge of starvation, finds both time and money for the cultivation of that sense of beauty which is too often crushed completely out of the lower classes by the burdens of this nineteenth century civilization which they bear upon their shoulders. To the Japanese, the "life is more than meat," it is beauty as well; and this love of beauty has upon him a civilizing and refining effect, and makes him in many ways the superior of the American day-laborer.[*239] The peasants and farmers of Japan, thrifty and hard-working as they are, are not by any means a prosperous class. As one passes into the country districts from the large cities, there seems to be a conspicuous dearth of neat, pleasant homes,--a lack of the comforts and necessities of life such as are enjoyed by city people. The rich farmers are scarce, and the laborers in the rice-fields hardly earn, from days of hardest toil with the rudest implements, the little that will provide for their families. In the face of heavy taxes, the incessant toil, the frequent floods of late years, and the threatening famine, one would expect the poor peasants to be a most discouraged and unhappy class. That all this toil and anxiety does wear on them is no doubt true, but the laborers are always ready to bear submissively whatever comes, and are always hopeful and prepared to enjoy life again in happier times. The charms of the city tempt them sometimes to exchange their daily labor for the excitement of life as _jinrikisha_ men; but in any case they will be perfectly independent, and ask no man for their daily rations.