Page:Brinkley - Japan - Volume 4.djvu/165

 and write, first, an essay containing a thousand of the ideographs in commonest use, and secondly an anthology of Chinese poems. Girls also began with a syllabary—the hiragana only—and then, having learned to write the numerals, they studied a manual of simple ethics and received lessons in domestic management. Reading, the use of the abacus, the rules of etiquette and music were also taught to girls of the better class, and they learned sewing from the wife of their teacher. An excellent spirit pervaded these schools. A teacher was regarded with such reverence that even to "tread within four feet of his shadow " seemed a sacrilege, and, on the other hand, he treated the pupils as though they were his own children, while they reciprocated by regarding him in the light of a father and evincing gratitude to him throughout his life. There were no such things as examinations in these elementary schools. Their place was taken by monthly "repetitions" (saraye) and by one great repetition and two caligraphical tests annually; namely, on the second of the first month and the first of the seventh. Learning, in fact, consisted mainly of caligraphy. All the religious observances in the schools illustrated that fact; as when flags having the name of the deity inscribed on them by pupils were offered at the shrine of Inari; or ideographs of unusual size were indited at the festival of Tenjin; or, on the eighth of the fourth month, ink made from tea