LACQUER WORK. 369 



tarnish after a little while, lose their metallic lustre, and become a 

 dull yellowish brown. Plate VI., fig. a, represents such an imitation. 

 This costly decoration, Kin-ji, which looks like a thin covering 

 of gold leaf, is found very often in old lacquer wares of great value, 

 e.g.. on boxes, medicine chests, India-ink boxes, and other articles. 

 Gin-ji, or silver-ground, is used much less often on larger surfaces, 

 but is prepared with silver dust in much the same manner. In Plate 

 VII. the moon and one chrysanthemum are imitations of Gin-ji. 



3. Mokume, spotted texture (moku = veined or curled wood, 

 kime = texture), or curled form (Plate VI., fig. c). The veins and 

 speckling of the wood is sketched with white lead or colcothar, 

 but the working out is done by degrees, perhaps beginning at the 

 middle of the surface to be decorated, or from the centre of one 

 of the spots. The Maklye-shi presses through Yoshino paper the 

 brownish red colour, which is made by mixing red oxide of iron 

 and Se-shime-urushi together, when necessary thinning it with 

 camphor ; he then puts his little horn palette (Tsune-ban, see Plate 

 III., fig. 8) over the thumb of his left hand, lays some of the colour 

 upon it, and begins his work at the centre of one of the spots, going 

 over the faint outlines with red on the point of a fine rat-hair brush, 

 and then covering also the surface so outlined with the same colour. 

 He next takes his little sieve (Plate IV., fig. i, or one similar), with 

 a small amount of gold dust, and if, as in this case, an even, gold, 

 mirror-like surface is desired, strews the little bit of surface freshly 

 coated with Shita-makiye ; or, if the reflection is to decrease, grow- 

 ing feebler towards the centre, the dry outer side lying next to the 

 edge, in which case the powder is brushed on the moist figure, 

 these girdling outlines, e.g., and then toward the centre of the 

 spots. Deep yellow is obtained from a fine powder of Yaki-gane, 

 yellowish green and light yellow from Koban. When the centre 

 or eye of the spot is covered, the painter proceeds next to the first 

 girdle, the second, and so on. VVhen the whole ground has been 

 treated in this way, and left in the damp drying-room for a day, 

 superfluous particles of gold dust are brushed off, and the surface 

 of the Mokume receives a thin coat of Nashi-ji-urushi, for which 

 Se-shime can also be used. Then follows longer drying, rubbing 

 with magnolia charcoal, another varnish of the same lacquer, 

 another drying and rubbing with charcoal, and finally the work to 

 produce the proper lustre. 



The effect of Mokume work is heightened by alternation of the 

 so-called yellow, red, and green gold dust by other tints, and by 

 strewing mother-of-pearl powder over it. This surpasses Nashi-ji 

 and Kin-ji, and wherever it appears is a mark of costly lacquer- 

 work. 



4. Kara-kusa = arabesques, and kumo = clouds.^ Besides the 



1 The name Kara-kusa, China-weed, used for arabesques, indicates the 

 Chinese origin of this manner of decoration, as it is there much more exten- 

 sively employed, especially in ornamenting bronze vases, than in Japan. 

 II. B B 



