Page:Things Japanese (1905).djvu/313

Rh district complained of getting no promotion after long and faithful service. Their claim was found just and was acceded to, each man being granted one step upwards. At the same time, however, the salary of each grade was reduced to what that of the grade next below it had hitherto been, so that in reality the men gained nothing. In such circumstances, Europeans would have protested that insult had been added to injury; but it is not recorded that the Japanese concerned evinced any discontent. About the same time, an old-established hotel in one of the largest cities of the empire was burnt down. With us, permission to rebuild would have been granted at once (supposing any permission to be necessary):—the fact that the proprietor had carried on business successfully during a long term of years, would have been deemed the best of all reasons for encouraging him to continue. Not so in Japan. The municipality held that he had made plenty of money already, and that the other hotels in the place, which had found in him a dangerous competitor, should be given a chance. Permission was, therefore, refused for more than a twelvemonth, and when at last granted, it was accompanied with vexatious conditions. Here again we see the action of reason of a certain kind, and also a jealous regard of a certain kind for the rights of others; but the eye with which this regard and this reason view the matter appears to a European to squint. What would he say to the report published in 1899 by the directors of a certain brewery company in the neighbourhood of Yokohama, wherein an item of 5,000 yen for advertising was entered as an asset?(!) These clever folks were but looking ahead; their prophetic soul viewed as an already accomplished fact the increase to their business which such advertising would produce, and they passed the 5,000 yen to the credit side accordingly. On another occasion, the manager of a Japanese insurance company applied to an English expert for advice on the state of the firm, which seemed to be not wholly satisfactory. When the expert looked into the accounts, he discovered a deficit of 700,000 yen, which of course he advised the company to publish, adding that the