Page:Eliza Scidmore--Jinrikisha days in Japan.djvu/221

 kimonos, to put on after the bath and wear at night. These gowns are marked with the crest or name of the house, painted in some ingenious or artistic design; and guests may wander round the town, even, clad in these garments, that so ingeniously advertise the Maple-leaf, the Chrysanthemum, or Dragon tea-house. All guides, and servants particularly, enjoy wearing these hotel robes, and travellers who dislike to splash their own clothing march to the bath ungarmented, assuming the house gowns in the corridor after their dip. These ukatas at the Shiurokindo were the most startling fabrics of Arimatsu. and we looked in them as if we had been throwing ink-bottles at each other.

Until the long jinrikisha ride was over we had not felt weary, as each day beguiled us with some new interest and excitement; but when we stepped from those baby-carriages at the door of the Shiurokindo we were dazed with fatigue, although the coolies who ran all the way did not appear to be tired in the least. Their headman, who marshalled the team of ten, was a powerful young fellow, a very Hercules for muscle, and for speed and endurance hardly to be matched by that ancient deity. At the end of each day he seemed fresher and stronger than at the start, and he has often run sixty and sixty-five miles a day, for three and four days together. He led the procession and set the pace, shouting back warning of ruts, stones, or bad places in the road, and giving the signals for slowing, stopping, and changing the order of the teams. On level ground the coolies trotted tandem—one in the shafts, and one running ahead with a line from the shafts held over his shoulder. Going down-hill, the leader fell back and helped to hold the shafts; going uphill, he pushed the jinrikisha from the back.

The jinrikisha coolies make better wages than farm laborers or most mechanics. Our men were paid by the distance, and for days of detention each man received 205