Page:Brinkley - Japan - Volume 1.djvu/266

 student to find that the frail sister of mediæval Japan was in no sense a social outcast. She had ready access to the houses of ministers of state and other chief officials or prominent noblemen. Her singing and dancing were features at refined entertainments. She delighted aristocratic society with her clever manipulation of puppets, and she composed poems which found a permanent place in literature. Men learned to call her "castle-conqueror" (keisei) rather than fille-de-joie.

The reader of course perceives that these descriptions of the manners and customs of the Japanese have been confined almost entirely to the upper classes. It must be confessed that with regard to the lower orders in the early ages, very little information is available. Independent reference will be made to the development of trade and industry, and in connection with that subject some light will be thrown on the life of the farmer, the mechanic, and the merchant. But in truth these people played a very subordinate part in the history of the nation. Except for the sake of the taxes they paid and the forced labour they performed, they were of small account. The artisan, however, especially the art artisan, became a person of great and growing importance from the time of the Empress Suiko (593—628) onward, since upon him devolved the task of building and decorating the grand temples and spacious mansions which began from that time to be called