^66 IVORY AND THE ELEPHANT 



from the quantity obtainable we might suppose that it was 

 of much less worth.* 



The Japanese ivory carvers rival or even surpass their 

 Hindu brothers in the number and complexity of their 

 tools. In several cases the name of the inventor of a spe- 

 cially adapted tool has been preserved. A recently published 

 Japanese manual of the ivory carver's art figures all of the 

 Japanese tools employed to-day. The manner of using one 

 of the most important of these implements is shown in our 

 illustration, and we have given the Japanese names in full 

 for purposes of identification, although they must be entirely 

 significant only to the few readers who are familiar with the 

 rich and harmonious language of the Land of the Rising Sun. 



This Japanese manual of ivory carving is such a curious 

 and unique publication that it seems to merit a full descrip- 

 tion of its literary contents. At the outset an Imperial 

 Privy Councillor, Count Sasaki Takayuki, has contributed 

 a brief rule from one of the Chinese classics to the following 

 effect:! 



"Keep leveller and string on the left, 

 Keep compass and ruler on the right." 



This is succeeded by a series of brief introductions con- 

 tributed by a number of distinguished Japanese, the first 

 of these being written by Count Sano Tsunetami, also of 

 the Imperial Privy Council, and a former minister of agri- 

 culture and commerce. He says: 



"While there are well-defined methods and perfected 

 technical processes regarding all branches of the arts of 

 painting and carving in our country, yet from ancient 

 times we have had to depend solely for our instruction upon 



♦Cardani. "De subtilitate," Basilese, 1554, pp. 309, 310, Lib. X. 



fThe Japanese translations have been contributed by Mr. Yasuhisa Mogi, formerly 

 of Tokio, Japan, the son of Mitsutoshi Otani, a noted Japanese ivory carver. 



