1900] Village Children 



associates. Her little white jacket and decent skirt 

 she wore as though they were fine garments, yet at 

 the same time did her work with no sign of aloofness. 

 A shy little thing, she ran away when I looked at her, 

 seeming in every respect strangely out of place 

 among the children of the beach, though she too was 

 semi-aquatic, and swam like a duck. 



Boys swarmed there, many of them paddling about 

 in wooden tubs just big enough to squat in, with 

 bamboo sticks for oars. Thus humbly equipped, 

 they would fish happily for hours, even in deep water. 

 Nevertheless, these joyous children suffered from Physical 

 certain serious handicaps mouth breathing, mainly handlca P s 

 caused by adenoids, and .sore eyes, two maladies 

 common among the poor, especially in the southern 

 districts of Japan. The first naturally results from 

 lack of proper heat during the damp and chilly win- 

 ter, to be further aggravated by the prevalent ciga- 

 rette habit. But both difficulties are associated with 

 the custom by which young children are carried 

 around with drooping heads on the backs of their 

 older sisters, often facing the sun and always exposed 

 to dust and infection. Eczema of the scalp, also pain- 

 fully common among the smaller youngsters, is 

 thought to be made worse by shaving their heads. 

 This custom, already passing away in 1900, was a 

 semi-religious rite, it being superstitiously thought 

 essential to success in life. One Buddhist demigod, 

 when properly propitiated, was supposed to keep 

 children from crying during the process. 



Abe, much distressed at the sight of so many sore 

 eyes in villages without a physician, inquired of me in 

 some detail as to the remedial uses of borax and zinc 

 oxide; and, having the ear of the press in Tokyo, 



