Page:Japanese plays and playfellows (1901).djvu/282

246 the spluttering flowers of flame. But gradually they thawed, and losing all their shyness, played battledore and shuttlecock, blindman's buff, and other games. When the babies had gone home with their nurse, the judge and his wife remained to dinner, and a lay preacher, who spoke English perfectly, proved an invaluable medium of conversation. As my guests expressed a desire to conclude the evening with hymns, we sang a great many, from which they derived spiritual pleasure, while my knowledge of their language was much enlarged. The lay-preacher had always two or three hymn-books in his pocket, English and Japanese versions being printed on opposite pages. Suddenly this pious exercise was rudely interrupted. A tipsy geisha, holding a saké-cup in her hand, staggered into the room and addressed some bacchanalian words to the lay preacher, who chanced to be near the door. She had escaped from a rather noisy wedding-party, which was feasting and clapping hands in the room below, while the bridal couple had retired and the shimadai, an emblematic group of pine and bamboo, crane and tortoise, remained for a symbolic centre of festal joy. We took this intrusion for a hint to separate, and it certainly jarred on a devotional mood. To my friends this apparition must have suggested the "scarlet woman," whose cup is full of abominations, but I could not regard it in any other light than the opportune assertion of la joie de vivre, protesting against the gloomy gospel of Puritan restraint.