I have a note of a discussion on the general treatment of domestic animals in Japan in the course of which it was admitted that they were “certainly not treated as well as in most parts of Europe, or as in China.”  One reason given was that “most sects believe in the reincarnation of the wicked in the form of animals.”  The freedom which dogs enjoyed in English houses seemed strange; my friends no doubt forgot that Western houses have no tatami to be preserved.  It was contended, however, that cavalry soldiers “often weep on parting from their horses” and that “people with knowledge of animals are fond of them.”  I have myself seen farmers’ wives in tears at a horse fair when the foals they had reared were to be sold and the animals in their timidity nuzzled them.  Westerners who are familiar with the exquisite and humoursome studies of animal, bird and insect life by Japanese artists of the past and present day,[248] are in no doubt that such work was prompted by real knowledge and love of the “lower creation.”  The Japanese have a keen appreciation of the “song” of an amazing variety of “musical” insects—­there are 20,000 kinds of insects.  It is an appreciation not vouchsafed to the foreigner whose nerves are racked by the insistent bizz of the semi or cicada—­there are 38 kinds of cicada.  Everyone will recall Hearn’s chapter on the trade in “singing insects.”

One of my hosts in Aichi had two tiny cages which each contained one of these creatures.  The cages were hung from the eaves.  In the evening when the stone lantern in the garden was lit, and it was desired to give an illusion of greater coolness after a hot day a servant was sent up to the roof to pour down a tubful of water in order to produce the dripping sound of rain; and this at once set the caged insects chirping.

The sensitive foreigner is distressed by the way in which newly born puppies and kittens are thrown out to die because their Buddhist owners are too scrupulous to kill them.  The stranger’s feelings are also worked on by the unhappy demeanour and uncared-for look of dogs and cats.  On chancing to enter in a Japanese city an English home where there were three dogs I could not but mark how they contrasted in bearing and appearance with the generality of the animals I had seen.  Yet these dogs were all mongrel foundlings which had been abandoned near my friend’s house or dropped into her garden.  No doubt most Japanese dogs suffer from having too much rice—­and polished at that—­and practically no bones.  An excuse for the neglect of cats is that they scratch woodwork and tatami and insist on carrying their food into the best room.

Horses are often overloaded and mercilessly driven on hilly roads.[249] On the other hand, carters lead their horses.  It might be added that the coolies who haul and push handcarts bearing enormous loads never spare themselves.  I was told more than once of people who had been too tenderhearted to make an end of old horses.  I also heard of hens which had been allowed to live on until they died of old age.  In some mountain communities it is the custom, when a chicken must be killed for a visitor’s meal, for an exchange of birds to be made with a neighbour in order that the killing may not be too painful for the owner.[250]