Glimpses of Japan and Formosa

Persons in a position to know something about the subject tell us that Japanese husbands are "almost all" unfaithful. I take it that they refer to those who can afford to be; certainly the great mass of haulers and carriers, of mud-wading rice-growers, would scarcely have the time or the means to indulge in extramarital relations. The facts seem to be that rather a large number of men of means maintain two and even three households, usually in at least a pretense of ignorance of each other; and that the almost government-owned _yoshiwaras_ in every city of size are prosperous, while questionable hotels abound from end to end of the empire. Part-Japanese women we met asserted that they would under no circumstances marry Japanese men, not even to gain high rank, alleging that the average native husband is not only maritally untrustworthy but treats his wife brutally-whatever that may mean. As some of these ladies had already stuck it out bravely to the beginning of middle age, we are forced to give their testimony due weight. Yet there is certainly little active outward evidence of all this, but the appearance of model propriety everywhere-except in one notorious respect.

Even the cynical traveler comes to the conclusion that, for all the striking differences between their ways and our ways, the Japanese are really civilized-until he sees a man in faultless European attire, carrying a portfolio that suggests he may be a cabinet minister, calmly take off everything except his scanty underwear and change to a kimono in a first-class car occupied by ladies. Among men somewhat lower in the social scale, yet far enough above the brute to know better, personal exposure often reaches the incredible. It may be pleasant in summer to wander across town or the length of an empire in bath-robe and slippers, but there are times and places that the unconcealed human form is out of place. I am no prude, and I realize that in some matters we English-speaking people are secretive to the point of silliness; but certainly in this respect the Japanese are as much at fault in the other direction.