182 SINGING-BIEDS AND FLO WEES, ETC. 



over the sterner sex. Like the women, the men are 

 always courteous and kind amongst themselves, and 

 also towards foreigners. In speaking thus generally of 

 the Japanese, I refer more particularly to the poorer 

 classes, the farmers and fishermen, and those who live 

 by the sweat of their brow. 



As a race the Japanese are certainly short. The 

 men are well made, muscular, active, and strong, and 

 their average height is, I should think, about five feet 

 five inches. The women are diminutive, and I have 

 often wondered that such small creatures should pro- 

 duce such a strong muscular race. The fair sex are 

 womanlike in their figure from their waist upwards, 

 but from there downwards they are more like badly 

 made men, being narrow across the hips and thick 

 about the joints. It is curious, also, that they have 

 such ugly, flat, dumpy little feet, without any arch, 

 whereas their first cousins the Chinese have the most 

 perfect feet and hands of any race I ever saw. Like 

 the men, the women are very muscular and strong, 

 and capable of carrying enormous weights for great 

 distances, and undergoing every degree of exposure to 

 all kinds of weather. It may be said of them truly, 

 "There is a great deal of good contained in a small 

 parcel." 



