Yoshiwara “Pot-pourri.”

The following items are given in the “Yoshiwara Ō-kaga-mi” (吉原大鑑 = The Great Mirror of the Yoshiwara) under the heading of “Sho-yaku Hyaku-monogatari” (諸譯百もの語 One Hundred Miscellaneous Tales).

In former days the present “Dai-ya” (cook-houses) were called “Ki-no-ji-ya” owing to the fact that a man named Oda-wara-ya Ki-ue first established such houses. Originally only the smaller brothels were supplied with food from these dai-ya, but now-a-days all the brothels, irrespective of size or grade, draw their foodsupply from the cook-houses. These dai-ya supply every conceivable kind of food, be it sushi (a fish and rice roll), kwashi (cakes), soba (buck-wheat macaroni), midzu-gwashi (fruit), or what not; and according to the quantity of food, dishes are divided into three classes, viz:—Nami-dai (ordinary dish), Dai-shō (medium-sized dish), and Ō-dai (a large-sized dish). These sizes are charged out at 25 sen, 37-1⁄2 sen, and 50 sen respectively, but the dai-ya are said to supply brothels at one third of the above prices, and if that be so then the latter earn a profit of two-thirds of the selling price to guests! The rule is to make a prompt cash payment on delivery of food, but as a matter of fact a wooden ticket, bearing the sign of each brothel, is given in exchange for dai-no-mono (food brought in) every time it is brought in, and payment is made the following day. It is stated by “those who know” that there are some brothels which have a debt of several hundred Yen to the dai-ya. There are a great many dai-ya in the Yoshiwara, but those which usually supply first-class brothels are “Koi-matsu” of Ageya-chō Ni-chō-me; “Yao-kyū” of the same street; and “Matsu-no” of Sumi-chō. In counting the number of dai-no-mono, the auxiliary numeral “mai” is used: thus “nami-sammai” (ordinary three flat things) means three ordinary dishes of food. This is generally abbreviated to simply—“nami san” (ordinary three) etc., and the auxiliary numeral eliminated. An ordinary dish, with a bottle of saké thrown in, is known as “ichi-mai ippon” [one (dish) and one bottle.] Sometimes a guest orders food merely for the good of the house, and under these circumstances will be asked:—“What will you take?” He will no doubt reply:—“Nan demo ii yo” (“Anything will do”) and so the cook-house is instructed to send in a demo-dai (a dish of “anything”: demo is a contraction of nan demo = “anything”) which means that there is no particular choice on the part of the customer.

By the way, there is, in the “Shōbai Ōrai” (倡賣往來) by Ikku, an item which shows a bill of fare in a dai-ya a hundred years ago. It is as follows:—“The bill of fare of the “Ki-no-ji-ya” consisted of:—

etc., all of which foods are suitable for those persons who stop in brothels for several consecutive days.

Famous Things of the Yoshiwara
ALSO
Peddlers, Hawkers, and Beggars.

These things were very popular (even outside the Yoshiwara) from the An-ei (1772–1780) to Bunsei (1818–1829) eras, and the “Dote no kin-tsuba” (a cake made in the shape of the guard on a sword-hilt), was well known even after the Restoration. There is still one store which deals in this time-honoured cake, and it is as popular as ever.

The meibutsu (famous things) at present are the following:—The cuisine of the Kaneko restaurant; the kama-meshi (iron-pot-rice) of Horikawa; the tempura (fried fish) of Hamada; the kabayaki (roasted eels) of Ōtsune; Matsumo-zushi; shiruko (rice-cakes with a sauce of red beans and sugar) of Takaoka; Ki-no-ine-meshi (rice boiled with soy); kwashi (cakes and confectionery) of Futaba-ya; the saké of Okuda; the photographs of Katō; the bath-houses of Ageya-chō and Kyōmachi; the patent medicines of Nakane and Konishi; the ezōshi (coloured pictures) of Sanuki-ya; the komamono (fancy goods) of Nori-ya; the zōri (sandals) of Hishi-ya; etc.

Above all, the cooking of Kaneko is well known, and greatly esteemed, not only in the Yoshiwara but even outside the quarter as well. The construction and decoration of every room has been carried out in exquisite taste, and the furniture of the house is at once rare and costly: moreover, there is a fine bath-room in the restaurant, and, as everything is thus arranged comfortably for guests, many visitors to the Yoshiwara patronize the “Kaneko,” and go there accompanied by the yūjo they have chosen as their companions.

In the streets are to be found vendors of rice-dumplings (dango), boiled red-beans (ude-adzuki), fruit (midzu-gashi), oden (a kind of dumpling), saké (rice-wine); sushi (rice-cakes plastered over with fish or sea-weed on which vinegar has been sprinkled) etc., and crowds of miscellaneous hawkers and quacks, including tsuji-ura sellers (tsuji-ura are small pieces of paper on which are printed poems or mottoes: these are wrapped in cracknels made of rice (sembei) or put among parched-peas as a pastime), newspaper sellers, fortune-tellers (uranai-sha), nattō-sellers (nattō is a kind of food made from boiled beans), sellers of the tōfu (bean curd) of Komatsu-bashi, sellers of fūki-mame (cooked and sweetened beans), blind shampooers (amma) female hairdressers (onna kami-yui), washermen (sentaku-ya) messengers, etc. Then there are shinnai-bushi singers (shinnai-bushi is a style of popular song originated by a man named Tsuruga Shinnai), Kapporé-dancers, singers of hayari-uta (popular songs), ahodara-kyō (reciters of comic imitation of Buddhist sacred writings and prayers), and flute-players (shaku-hachi). Beggars swarm in front of the smaller brothels early in the morning and ransack the remnants of food left over by guests from the previous evening: the sight of these hordes of dirty unkempt beings, clawing at and hungrily devouring the broken victuals, is a sight at once sad and disgusting.

In September 1867, a hospital for the treatment of venereal diseases of prostitutes was established in Yokohama for the first time in the history of Japan, and subsequently similar institutions were established at Kōbe and Nagasaki. This measure was adopted by the Bakufu Government owing to the representations made by an Englishman—Dr. Newton, R. N.—who, in spite of much opposition from prejudice and ignorance, succeeded in converting the authorities to his views after a long struggle. At first the physical examination of prostitutes was limited to the three ports of Yokohama, Kōbe, and Nagasaki, but in September 1871 the measure was applied to the women at Senju. The vital importance and value of such inspection not being understood by the public at large, the courtesans regarded the system with strong aversion, and they accordingly began to remove away from Senju to other quarters which were as yet free from the objectionable measure. This anti-inspection movement so seriously interfered with their business that the brothel-keepers were eventually forced to apply to the authorities to suspend the system, with the result that it was abolished in April 1872. In June 1873, however, the Tōkyō Municipal authorities again established physical examination offices, one being opened in each of the following six places:—Yoshiwara, Nedzu, Senju, Shinjiku, Shinagawa, and Itabashi. Examinations were made several times a month, and women who were found suffering from venereal diseases were sent to the hospital at Atagoshita for treatment. This was the first instance of a Lock hospital in Tōkyō, but since then similar institutions have sprung into existence in different parts of the country.

In October 1888, physical examination places were established in the Yoshiwara and five other yūkwaku by the authorities, but in July 1889 these were abolished, and the brothel-keepers were ordered to fit up a hospital at their own expense: since that time the Lock hospital in every prostitute quarter has been maintained by the parties locally interested.

In the “Regulations of the Lock hospital of the Shin-Yoshiwara,” which obtained official sanction in June 1889, we find the following:—

[The rules relative to various details such as govern admissions, wards, etc., are omitted.]

The above extract will furnish some idea of the working of a Lock hospital, and as to the question of maintenance the following particulars may be interesting.

Generally speaking, the hospital is maintained in this manner, but when there is a deficit in its revenue this is made good by an appropriation from the reserve fund of the brothels (kashi-zashiki no tsumi-tatekin.)

As the number of prostitutes in the Yoshiwara is about three thousand women their physical examination cannot be effected in a single day; the quarter therefore is divided into districts to facilitate the process of inspection.

The regular examination days, and the inspection districts, are as follows:—

Of course special examinations are made when necessity arises.

According to the latest investigations, the result of examinations showed the average rate of infected persons to be over 6 per cent. The annexed figures for 1897 may prove interesting, but it must be borne in mind that they can only be considered as comparatively reliable. The results of examinations of course depend very much upon the strictness of the doctors in attendance, consequently every prostitute quarter varies in its stated percentage of infected cases. In 1898 the percentage of disease rose to as high as 5.58 average as against 4.73 average in 1897. This difference has been caused by the more thorough inspection instituted by the present surgeon in charge—Mr. Doi.35

Results of Medical Inspection.

Results of Medical Inspection.
1897.

Mu-sen yū-kyō, or going on a gay frolic without being possessed of the necessary means, is locally known in the Yoshiwara as “Ebisu-kō” or Hōritsu (“Law”). The former term has been brought into use because the majority of those who intentionally go “on the spree” without money attire themselves in the garb of wealthy people and so resemble the God of Wealth (Ebisu), who is much en evidence at the festival of “Ebisukō” (in honor of the God of Wealth), although in reality they haven’t a “red cent” (bita-ichi-mon) with which to bless themselves when the time for squaring up accounts comes. The latter term has been coined owing to the fact that a large number of law (hōritsu) students have been guilty of swindling, but they generally contrive to evade their liabilities by means of ingenious arguments and managing to force their victims into committing technically illegal acts of which they take mean advantage and which they use as a weapon against creditors. As a matter of fact, the brothel-keepers sometimes find it impossible to appeal to the police, and are often forced to “grin and bear” their losses in silence owing to the “cuteness” and sophistry of the “hōritsu.” It is not uncommon for men belonging to the shokunin (artisan) class to enter a brothel under the influence of liquor without consulting the state of their purses, and consequently to find themselves confronted next morning with a long bill which they cannot settle. These fellows are taken in hand by professional “fixers” (shimatsuya = one who “fixes up” and settles matters) called “uma-ya” (horse-houses) who undertake to collect the bill on commission. The “fixers,” or “uma-ya,” send a messenger, known as an “uma” (horse), home with such defaulting guest, and this “uma” will dog the footsteps of the debtor until the latter pays his bill. Cases have however been known where the guest conducted a “horse” (uma) to a certain house, which he pretended was his own, entered on the pretext of obtaining some money, and walking through quietly, slid out of the back-door and escaped. But even when a guest temporarily escapes in this way, he is generally detected, and then, if he can’t pay, the “uma” levy a squeeze of 50 sen per day on their victims.

The “Ebisu-kō” plan of having a “good time” gratuitously is made a kind of profession of by some rascals, and it is said that in Tōkyō there are several societies or bands (kumi or gumi) of expert swindlers in this line. Thus there are the Hongo-gumi, Kanda-gumi, Shitaya-gumi, Shiba-gumi, Fukagawa-gumi, etc., each kumi taking its name from the district to which it belongs. There is also a special kumi called “Daruma-gumi,” because its members have the figure of Daruma tatooed on their forearms, and carry on their fraudulent operations in a delightfully free and easy manner. The figure of Daruma is supposed to represent the celebrated prince and priest of Southern India—Dahma. This holy patriarch sat for nine years in profound abstraction till his legs fell off, therefore he is described in Japanese as “o ashi no nai” (“being without any august legs”) but this, by a pun on the words, can be understood as “being without any august cash.” Considering that the members of this “Daruma-gumi” never pay for anything, the “trade-mark” they have adopted is certainly very appropriate! Among the members of these beautiful societies, the act of evading payment of bills is known as “Kipparai” (Kipparau = to cut right through an obstruction) or “Nakaseru” (“to cause to weep”).

The use of tsuji-kago (palanquin) by the general public was permitted from the Genroku era (1688–1703), but the number of these conveyances in Yedo was limited to one hundred only! People, therefore, were in the habit of visiting the Yoshiwara on horseback. [The name of a street in the Yoshiwara—Uma-michi (Horse-street)—testifies to the fact that horses used to pass to and from the quarter.] Later on the palanquin traffic increased, but with the appearance of the Meiji (present) period, kago dropped out of fashion.

The jinrikisha-men who ply between the Yoshiwara and Uma-michi are called among themselves “yonashi” (an abbreviation of yonabe-shi = night-workers), owing to the fact that they sleep during the day-time and go to work at night. The best known jinrikisha houses (“Ban” 番) in the neighbourhood of the Yoshiwara are called:—“Tatsu-shin,” “Hage-gumi,” “Honchō-ban,” “Dote-gumi,” “Misawa,” etc. The men belonging to these houses come out to pick up fares about dusk, and fortified with a “helmet of saké” chase after any likely pedestrian, accosting him with the words:—“Danna, naka madé ikaga desu?” (“Master, how would you like to go as far as the Yoshiwara?”). At first these knights of the jinrikisha demand an exorbitant fare, but reduce the same, after some haggling on the part of the would-be riders, to about 15 sen per ri. As soon as the man has settled terms, he will probably exclaim “oi kita! hora yo!” (almost untranslatable) and picking up the shafts of the vehicle start off as fast as his legs can carry him, brandishing his lantern (they call it a “kamban” among the jinrikisha fraternity) as he speeds along. A coolie who aims to secure a tip will probably ask his customer “Danna, dochira ye tsukemasu?” (“Master, to which house shall I take you?”) and if the reply is “Nani, ō-mon de yoroshii” (“Oh, just put me down at the great gate”) the rider is probably only bent on a stroll through the Yoshiwara for the purpose of sight-seeing. If, on the contrary, a fare replies “Emon-zaka de orosé” (“Put me down at Emon-zaka”), he is generally a cowardly fellow who is desirous of protecting himself from the jinrikisha-puller’s demand for additional payment by means of the close vicinity of the police-box on the hill.

When two kuruma-ya are employed—one as an atōshi (pusher) or tsunappiki (extra puller in front)—three times the single fare is usually demanded because one of the men must return without a vehicle, and cannot therefore pick up a fare on his way back. The atōshi or tsunappiki has to waste his time in going home, whereas the man who has his jinrikisha with him can generally earn something by picking up a fare on his return journey.

When a jinrikisha-man has brought a guest to a brothel or tea-house he is usually given a tip of from 20 to 30 sen, which is paid by the house and afterwards charged to the guest. There is also a body of jinrikisha-coolies known as “mōrō-shafu” (“shady” jinrikisha-men) who are invariably very bad characters. Sometimes these rascals have an arrangement with certain of the lower-class brothels (bori-ya=greedy and covetous houses) to inveigle country-folk into their dens and thus make improper gains. Among the mōrō-shafu there have been desperate scoundrels who even dared to go the length of taking fares to lonely places and there robbing them of valuables and money after the fashion of highwaymen, but, owing to the stringent police system, as well as the control exercised by the jinrikisha-men’s guild, these evils have been greatly diminished. As regards the slang used by the Yoshiwara jinrikisha coolies, there seems to be but little difference between it and that employed by outside jinrikisha-men.

Their method of counting is as follows:—

Other slang words abound, but we have not space enough to give more than a few examples:—

There is a funny story told relative to the introduction of jinrikishas, and the consequent falling into desuetude of palanquins. A certain guest asked his “lady friend” in a brothel if she could tell him what sign was most used on the lanterns of jinrikisha-men: she promptly replied “Yamagata ni ka no ji ga ō gozaimasu” (“Mostly the shape of a mountain Ʌ with the katakana syllable “ka”—カ—”). She was thinking of the signs used to denote the different classes of prostitutes (vide page 123) and mistook the characters 人力 (jinriki) for the sign Inverted V and the syllable カ. It appears that in those early days the names of districts or guilds were not painted on the lanterns, but merely the two characters 人力 (jinriki), and hence the comical error!

Sanya-uma da-chin-dzuké.
(The cost of hiring horses to and from the Yoshiwara.)

The “Kinsei Kisekikō” (新世奇跡考) says that in the olden days young bloods who frequented the Yoshiwara used to travel to and fro on horse-back. It was also a fashion of the period to consider everything white to be tasteful. Thus the craze went so far that people fancied white horses, white sword-hilts, white leather hakama (loose pantaloons), white sleeves, and white everything else. In a book called the “Ko-uta Sō-makuri” (小唄總まくり)—published in the second year of the Kwambun (1661–1372) era—the following scale of charges for horse-hire is given:—

The above proves the taste of the period for white horses, and besides this there was a song in vogue in the Meireki era (1655–1657) which described the graceful appearance of a man of rank visiting the Yoshiwara on the back of a white steed.

Byō-chū oyobi In-shoku no koto.
(Of the sickness of prostitutes and of their meals.)

Generally speaking, every yūjo possesses a room in which she lives irrespective of the fact of whether she has visits from guests or otherwise; but, in some houses, when a prostitute falls sick, she is not allowed to remain in her room, and is sent down to the ō-beya (large apartment) for treatment: this room is known among the inmates of the brothel as “yosé-ba” (place of gathering).

In a courtesan’s apartment is to be found every cooking utensil necessary in the preparation of a meal, and therefore many of the girls take their meal in their own room, merely getting boiled rice up from the kitchen and preparing other articles themselves.

In some houses however, all the inmates have dinner together in the kitchen, and so there is an old saying—“Yūjo wo nabe-kama nashi no shotai-mochi” (“Yūjo are like house-holders who are possessed of neither pots nor pans.”) In the Kajita-rō the yūjo used to make their servants boil rice for them in their own rooms over charcoal fires.

Hiké no koto.
(Closing hours in the Yoshiwara.)

Mention is made in the “Yoshiwara Ōkagami” (吉原大鑑) that the hiké was fixed at 10 o’clock, but afterwards this was considered too early, and no clapping of hyōshigi (a pair of wooden blocks which are struck together as a signal) was made at that hour. The great gate (Ō-mon) was shut at 10 o’clock, but the kuguri-do (a small low door cut in a gate) was left open so as to permit ingress and egress. When the hour of midnight struck, (then called kokonotsu-doki), the hyōshigi were clapped together four times, and the place was finally closed up.

Kōchō no koto.
(The next morning.)

In the “Yoshiwara Ōkagami” (吉原大鑑)—referred to in the preceding chapter—it says that “the parting and return home in the morning is called “Kōchō” (後朝), but in ordinary Japanese the parting of two lovers in the morning is idiomatically termed “Kinu-ginu no wakare.”

Hiru-jimai Yo-jimai no koto.
(The day and night engagements of courtesans.)

The “Yoshiwara Ōkagami” (吉原大鑑) also says that there were formerly two kinds of shimai (仕舞 here the word means “engagement”) viz:—Hiru-jimai (day engagement) and Yo-jimai (night engagement.)36

Raku-seki no koto.
(The removal of names from the register of the Yoshiwara.)

The “Yoshiwara Ōkagami” (吉原大鑑) says:—