Page:Brinkley - Japan - Volume 2.djvu/85

 products of the lacquerer's art for the panels of its cupboards. It became, too, a species of cabinet for the display of objects of virtu. Celebrated paintings, or autographic scrolls by renowned men, were suspended on its wall, and choice specimens of porcelain, jade, or bronze were ranged on its shelves. That use of the alcove belongs, however, to a late period of the epoch, and is to be associated with the architecture of the "illustrious houses" in the cities rather than with that of the military residences in the provinces. The original and long-obeyed conception was that the objects appropriate to an alcove were limited to a religious picture or image, a bell (shō) for ringing during prayer, a "worldly-dust-brush" (hossu) such as priests carried, and the "three armour-pieces" of Buddha, namely, a pricket candlestick, a censer, and a flower-vase. The use of the tatami—that is to say, the thick mat of plaited straw and invariable dimensions, which has already been described in speaking of the Heian epoch—was greatly extended during the times now under consideration. Instead of being laid on the dais of state and in sleeping and women's chambers only, these essentially Japanese objects covered the floors of all the rooms, even military men not considering them too comfortable. It has to be observed, however, that men of very high rank, social or official, did not sit in direct contact with the mats: they used cushions, round or square,