350 ART INDUSTRY AND RELATED OCCUPATIONS. 



garde, en couvrant et decouvrant les vases qui contiennent le vernis, 

 de s'exposer a sa vapeur ; on tourne la tete pour I'eviter ; sans cette 

 attention Ton courroit risque de gagner les clous de vernis." 



Preparation of the Raw Lac for the Lacquerer. 



Ki-sh6-mi, the raw lac (Ki-urushi) purified from foreign sub- 

 stances, is ground for some time in a shallow wooden tub, to crush 

 its grain and give it a more uniform liquidity. It is then pressed 

 through cotton cloth (wata-goshi) or hemp-linen (nuno-goshi). 

 In this way the several varieties of Se-shime^ which appear in the 

 price list are obtained, and are much used not only for ground- 

 work, but also in the final (polishing) work upon the lacquer 

 wares. Thus Se-shime is nothing else but a purified, filtered and 

 evenly flowing raw lac. 



In order to describe the remaining varieties of lacquer, it will 

 be necessary to follow the mechanical purification in its removal 

 of a considerable part of the water admixture. This is done by 

 evaporation in the sun, or by mild heat over a coal fire. The 

 Ki-sho-mi, or Se-shime, is poured into shallow pans, which have an 

 average diameter of 0"5 to i meter, and walls 2 to 4 centimeters 

 thick, and is stirred constantly with a flat paddle. In the northern 

 cities specially engaged in the lacquer industry (Niigata, Waka- 

 matsu, Yonezawa, Hojiri, etc.), these pans are made of cross 

 sections of Tochi {/Escidiis tinbinata, BL), and in Tokio and other 

 southern cities, out of such cuttings from the trunks of the Keaki 

 {Zelkoiva Keaki, Sieb.). The lac is heated in the former over a 

 moderate coal fire, in the latter in the sun, the pan being inclined 

 against a wall, so that the contents, as they are stirred may have 

 the full benefit of the sun's rays. The work takes usually a 

 few hours, the quantity of water is noticeably reduced, and the so- 

 treated Kurome-urushi becomes a syrupy, greyish brown liquid 

 like Se-shime. In the three principal cities of the country (Tokio, 

 Kioto and Osaka) this preparation and that of the hereinafter 

 named varieties is made by a particular guild of lacquer dealers, 

 which ten years ago numbered sixteen members. These dealers, 

 or Urushi-ya, recognise in their price list 16 to 20 varieties of 

 lacquer. The workmen of other cities informed me that this was 

 an unnecessary division, and maintained that for all practical 

 necessities, 5 to 6 varieties would suffice. The Urushi-ya is evi- 

 dently a medium which furnishes a better though higher-priced 

 material to the lacquerer than that which he gets by preparing it 

 for himself, as is done in the cities where a more limited lacquer 

 industry is carried on. 



^ The word Se-shime 1:5 not to be taken here in the narrow sense of lac ob- 

 tained from the branches of the tree, but is derived from seshimeru (to make 

 firm and durable), and refers to its use in groundwork. Only a small part 

 of this Se-shime-urushi is branch lac. 



