REFORM IN JAPAN

Wairarapa Standard, Volume 2, Issue 74, 14 May 1873, Page 2

REFORM IN JAPAN

(Fr'm the “Pall Mall Gazette.”) Not the least noticeable feature in the recent reforms which have been effected in Japan is the ease and ap- J parent enjoyment with which the non- ’ official classes have accommodated themselves to the changes which their rulers have declared to he necessary for the good of the State. In some cases they seem even to have led their leaders. For instance, it is stated in the Japan Gazette that many of the Yeddo story tellers whose habit it was to amuse the people with mythological and other native tales now attract crowds of listeners by recounting to them the latest scraps of English and American news. An order also which has been issued at Yokohama to the effect that the practice of shading the top of the head is henceforward to bo discontinued, and that the hair is to be allowed to grow in tho foreign fashion, would appear to be an outgrowth of the popular taste to which the presence of professors of foreign hair-dressing in tho large native cities is due. To show how generally acceptable was the disestablishment of all religious bodies 1 we may point to the fact that at SMo where up to the time of the downfall of tho Tycon’s Government there flourished no fewer than GOO temples, 139 onlv now remain ; and probably the formation of a general elective Parliament for which GOO members are to bo chosen during the present month, is strictly in accordance with the will of tho people. The taste for everything foreign which is thus so universally displayed will doubtless help forward the study of English and other European languages at least among the official classes, but at present tho professors colleges, and schools, of which we have beard so much, do not seem quite to have completed their task, that is to say, if wo may judge

from the wording of the following notice, in English, which, according to the Japan Gazette, was recently posted up at Yokohatn : —“ At a night of two weeks ago, ajin-riki-sha drawer in a street of Teddo, was fired on bis loins by a rogue. It is yet uncertain who was the rogue.”