THREE:"The baking serves to fix the colors firmly in their cells, as the fire is hot enough to melt the glass slightly and fuse it to a perfect union with the body of the bowl. For common work, a single coating of enamel and a single baking are sufficient, but for the finer grades this will not answer. Another coating of colors is laid on, and perhaps a third or a fourth, and after each application the bowl is baked again. When this process is finished, the surface is rough, and the bowl is not anything like what we see it now. It must be polished smooth, and, with this object, it is ground and rubbed, first with coarse stones, then with finer ones, then with emery, and finally with powdered charcoal. In this way the bowl was brought to the condition in which you will find it, if it comes all right and uninjured from the box. A good many pieces of this ware are broken in the handling, and consequently they add to the price of those that come out unharmed.About ten miles out from Yokohama the party turned from the Tokaido, and took a route through the fields. They found the track rather narrow in places; and on one occasion, when they met a party in jin-riki-shas, it became necessary to step to the ground to allow the vehicles to be lifted around. Then, too, there had been a heavy rainthe storm that cut short their visit to Tokio; and in some places the road had been[Pg 164] washed out so that they were obliged to walk around the breaks. Their journey was consequently somewhat retarded; but they did not mind the detention, and had taken such an early start that they had plenty of time to reach Enoshima before dark. They met groups of Japanese peasants returning home from their work; and in every instance the latter made way for the strangers, and stood politely by the roadside as the man-power carriages went rolling by. Frank wanted to make sketches of some of the groups, and was particularly attracted by a woman who was carrying a teapot in one hand and a small roll or bundle under her other arm. By her side walked a man carrying a couple of buckets slung from a pole, after the fashion so prevalent in Japan and China. He steadied the pole with his hands, and seemed quite indifferent to the presence of the foreigners. Both were dressed in loosely fitting garments, and their feet were shod with sandals of straw. The Japanese sandal is held in place by two thongs that start from near the heel on each side and come together in front. The wearer inserts the thong between the great toe and its neighbor. When he is barefooted this operation is easily performed; and, in order to accommodate his stockinged feet to the sandal, the Japanese stocking has a separate place for the "thumb-toe," as one of them called the largest of his "foot-fingers." The foot of the Japanese stocking closely resembles the mitten of America, which young women in certain localities are said to present to discarded admirers.
