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This is the interior of a tea-house where dainty damsels entertain guests. They pour saké for the visitors and assume various other graceful parts of the service, besides furnishing songs and dances and playing games that show off their beauty. All these girls were apprenticed to their trade when children of seven or eight, and every one has been through a course of training as severe in its requirements as that of a musical conservatory and a European school of the ballet. Their repertoire includes songs and dances varied enough to suit every sort of taste and temperament in an audience, but the themes oftenest chosen are vague, poetic pictures of the blossoming of flowers, the blowing of the wind, the dance of fire-flies and butterflies and things of that sort. Their social status is much like that of that sort. Their social status is much like that of popular actresses in European capitals. They sometimes marry earnest admirers of good social positions; if they do not marry, they can play the samisen and other musical instruments even when they are past their dancing days, and there is much instruction they can give to new apprentices.

Notice the flat cushions on which they sit for the meal. Sometimes very low tables only a few inches above the floor might be used in serving a meal but this is the more general custom among well-bred people. Those trays are of lacquered wood. The brass-hooped wooden tub contains boiled rice. The bowls are for soup. The smaller dishes contain boiled fish, various vegetables and rice-cakes. The omnipresent tea-pot waits you see, ready to serve the company; Japanese tea is never allowed to become strong by long infusion. Hot water (by no means always boiling) is poured over the tea-leaves and then poured off at once, with merely a delicate flavor.

(See Davidson's "Present Day Japan," Bacon's "Japanese Girls and Women," Morse's Japanese Homes," Griffis' "The Mikado's Empire." etc.)

From Notes of Travel, No. 9, copyright,1904, by Underwood & Underwood.

Charming geishas at dinner. Tokyo, Japan.
Charmantes Geishas dinant. Tokyo, Japon. 
Reizende Geischas beim Essen, Tokio, Japan.
Encantadoras Geishas comiendo. Tokyo, Japón.
Bedårande geishors middagsmåltid, Tokio, Japan
Очаровательныя Гейши за обѣдомъ, Токіо, Яп.