Page:Sketches of Tokyo Life (1895).djvu/113

Rh standard-bearer’s, one of honour and danger; and many a matoi-bearer has been known to die enveloped in flames sooner than desert the post to which he had been ordered by his captain. The firemen were given their suits and small wages by the street or ward to which they belonged. But since the Restoration, they have all been put under the direct control of the Metropolitan Police Board, which also takes charge of all the fire-alarms in the city.

The fireman to-day is not what he used to be. He has not so much daring and pugnacity as formerly. At the beginning of the year, it is true, all the firemen appear in an open place and make a public display of their acrobatic skill on their ladders; but they fail to convince the beholder that they still retain unimpaired their former high spirit. They have sadly dwindled in number, their present strength being only 1,640, or less than a sixth part of the number a century ago. They are divided into six brigades, or forty companies.

Fire-engines which have recently come into use are now so successful, wherever there is a plentiful supply of water, in preventing fires from spreading, that the average annual ravages of fires are less in extent than a hundredth part of the total area of Tokyo. These engines have impressed the firemen with a sense of their waning importance, for they have no longer absolute control over fires. The fire-engines, useful as they are