560 Mr. F. T. Piggoit [March 11, 



it is in this, as I think you will have seen, that Japanesque with its 

 astonishing angles, true neither to nature nor to art, so terribly 

 misses the mark : it is in this that the Japanese so entirely excel. 



I cannot but digress to dwell for a short space upon the Jaj)anese 

 art of beautiful arrangement, out of which composition in design 

 Bprings. You are all probably familiar with one of the commonest 

 forms of Japanese oruament, that in which the surface is sprinkled 

 with heraldic devices, or with fragments or patches of ornament ; 

 often in the case of a continuous design it is broken in upon here and 

 there by imaginary, or slightly indicated, cloud-masses. The prin- 

 ciple is the same in both cases. The devices or patches may be 

 few, or many, but they are set upon the surface irregularly, with 

 apparent hap-hazard, or, as the Japanese say, "jiggi-jiggi." The 

 etfect is invariably charming; in spite of the very small material 

 used to produce it, there is a sense of completeness which is the 

 more surprising as it seems to conflict with every principle known 

 to our o\\Ti symmetrical art. And yet there is nothing hap-hazard 

 about it, it is the result of a most finished study, guided by a most 

 refined taste ; the taste which enters into the minutise of every day 

 life in Japan ; whether it be the coolie setting-out minute maple 

 trees on the slopes of a miniature Fujiyama, the maiden settling gew- 

 gews in her raven tresses, your " boy " arranging flowers for your 

 table, the journeyman painter daubing colour on the commonest ian, 

 all alike know the mysterious secret, and act upon it. You cannot 

 live a week in Japan without noticing that it is deeply-rooted in 

 the people's instincts. I verily believe that, with some inclinings of 

 the head, and not a few soft interjaculatory reflections, a Japanese 

 could put a postage-stamp on an envelope artistically. 



I pray you to forgive the banality of this word "artistically," 

 but I use it deliberately. When the Japanese are said to be " so 

 artistic " the speaker usually refers to this skill of theirs in beautiful 

 arrangement. And those aesthetic souls who pose as the high priests 

 of something they call " high art," they too have their little fantasies 

 of arrangement ; they love to set things all askew, thinking thereby 

 to redeem themselves from the curse of commonplace, which indeed, 

 they do; they are certainly dimly conscious of one fact, that it is 

 possible not to be commonplace. Beyond this they do not go, 

 deeming " all anyhow " to be the perfect rule of art. " Culture " with 

 its inept niaiseries, its tawdry and fade conceits, struggles still in 

 the primers of a science of which the Japanese have long ago formu- 

 lated every rule, and daily practise the examples. If they put one 

 little flower-vase on a table, or paste on a screen a dozen differently 

 shaped poetry papers, the result is always effective, always charming ; 

 in their subtle arrangements there is a most admired disorder, they 

 geem indeed " to snatch a grace beyond the reach of art." 



Though I travel somewhat " beyond the reach of art," let me 

 indicate, in the lightest and most Jaimnese method of suggestion, 

 how wrapped up are the subtleties of this charm with intellectual 



