Page:Sketches of Tokyo Life (1895).djvu/68

44 use of the head (butting), the hands (grappling), the loin (twisting) and the feet (tripping). From these were developed all the later methods.

Suppose the great Ekoin matches are on. That fact is soon obtruded upon our notice by the beating of a drum which is carried about town by two young wrestlers with a third acting both as a drummer and reserve-carrier, on the day preceding every day of the matches. At the entrance to the wrestling-booth there is a high tower, from the top of which a drum is also beaten from early morning on the match-days.

The wrestling-booth consists of the ring formed by heaping earth a few feet above the ground, with tiers of seats on all sides. It used formerly to be open to the sky, but is now covered with a canvas roof. The plan is oblong, being about 180 feet by 150, while the ring itself is round, being about twenty feet in diameter, and is surmounted with a square roof supported on four tapering pillars which slightly converge towards the top. Round the pillars are wound alternate strips of red and white cloths, with a