JAPAN’S GEISHA GIRLS.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 16928, 30 December 1922, Page 5

JAPAN’S GEISHA GIRLS.

FREED BY COURT DECISION.

The spcoia] correspondent in Japan of the 1 Chicago Tribune ” pays : The Appellate Court of the district of Osaka has given a decision affecting hundreds of thousands of girls in Japan, now held in moro or less involuntary servitude. The Court’s Opinion compares with t,ho famous Jlred Scott decision in the. United States, which helped largely in the abolition of negvo slavery.

The decision seta free of obligations contracted for them by their parents or guardians the girls of tho Geisha profession—the dainty little entertainers of Japan, the butterflies wbo make gay the niglit life of cities, but who flutter always with the light silken cord of thoir contract limiting thoir flights, and held firmly in. tho hands of their unseen masters behind tho gold screens, and with pockets wide open to receive nil the Geisha earnings. Tho Geisha system, as old as tho history of Japan, is roughly as follows:—-

Parents of girls whom they feel unable to maintain present them when children of from 7 to 12 to tho masters of Geisha training houses, l’hese masters select the comeliest and brightest, and thoso having a, natural musical talent, and practically adopt them. The parents enter into contracts that the girls shall remain with their master, and be subject to all his commands until such time as they have repaid from their earnings as enter tamers all the cost of their education in music, dancing, flower arrangements, colour matching, deportment, table etiquette, and conversation.

There is nothing necessarily vicious about a. Geisha girl’s life. She is not necessarily immoral, and many are not. r J he aristocracy of Japan numbers inanv wives who met their titled husbands first as Geisha girls. In their comings and goings they must meet many men. They must live within districts prescribed hv the police. Until they have earned their way out they are virtual slaves. Such was tho rule until a few da vs ago, when the High Court at Osaka rendered a decision that no girl may he bound by a contract' fhade without her consent and knowledge, and enforced against her will. ”