130 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1959 
In all, 454 scholars and students other than the Gallery staff read 
and studied in the library. Twenty interested persons saw the Wash- 
ington Manuscripts from the vault and studied the facsimiles. 
In the reshelving of the library a rare book division was estab- 
lished. This includes these books which are outstanding examples of 
Japanese rare books: Sanjitrok-kasen (The thirty-six immortals of 
Japanese poetry), [n.p., Suminokura Soan, n.d.]. Each page con- 
tains a portrait with the name of the poet and his or her poem. These 
poets were selected by the poet Fujiwara no Kinto, with illustrations 
considered to be by Tosa Mitsushige. This is a perfect copy, prob- 
ably in its original condition. Its slightly tinted papers of yellowish 
and brownish shades are interleaved with white papers. ‘The sheets 
are not numbered and there is no other inscription except the names 
of the poets and their poems. The writings are judged to be in the 
style of K6éetsu’s calligraphy. The second book is a collection: Utai- 
bon (one hundred utai for the No plays of Kanze school), first 
edition. Calligraphy by Honami Koetsu with the 36 designs said to 
be by Sotatsu, brother-in-law of Koetsu. These are Saga-bon (books 
printed in Saga) under the patronage of Suminokura Soan, a very 
wealthy businessman and an ardent pupil of Kéetsu in calligraphy. 
The paper was probably prepared by “paper maker Ky6ji,” who lived 
with K6etsu at his villa Takagamine. The papermill was situated by 
the river Kamiyagawa, which flows near Koetsu’s own villa at Takaga- 
mine. The books are printed from movable type on both sides of 
the paper. The sheets are folded once in the center, sewed with red 
silk, and bound two quires to a volume. The paper is white and 
colored, heavy, coated with clay, and printed with floral designs in 
mica. The covers are various-colored papers of the same quality, 
with dark-tan labels. 100 volumes in 6 lacquer boxes after IKGetsu’s 
designs. Dr. Yukio Yashiro of Japan, an authority on these books, 
says the calligraphy on the boxes is not Koetsu’s. These volumes are 
extremely rare in Japan. 
The year’s record of cataloging included a total of 1,422 entries of 
which 666 analytics were made, 425 titles of books and pamphlets were 
cataloged, and 53 titles were recataloged and reclassified. Of the total 
of 4,970 cards necessary for the above work, only 610 were available 
as printed cards from the Library of Congress. 
PUBLICATIONS 
Two publications were issued by the Gallery as follows: 
The Freer Gallery of Art. 16 pp., 8 pls., 2 floor plans, 1 plan of court planting. 
Rey. ed. 1958. (Smithsonian Inst. Publ. 4185.) 
Fong, Wén. The lohans and a bridge to heaven. Occas. Pap., vol. 3, No. 1, 64 
pp., 18 pls., 1 fig., 1958. (Smithsonian Inst. Publ. 4805.) 
