ing too severe and cruel. Boys were often injured in
it.

There are many other games which we simply mention without describing.
There are three games played by the hands, which every observant
foreigner long resident in Japan must have seen played, as men and women
seem to enjoy them as much as children. In the Stone game, a stone, a
pair of scissors, and a wrapping-cloth are represented. The stone
signifies the clenched fist, the parted fore and middle fingers the
scissors, and the curved forefinger and thumb the cloth. The scissors
can cut the cloth, but not the stone, but the cloth can wrap the stone.
The two players sit opposite each other at play, throwing out their
hands so as to represent either of the three things, and win, lose, or
draw, as the case may be.

In the Fox game, the fox, man, and gun are the figures. The gun kills
the fox, but the fox deceives the man, and the gun is useless without
the man. In the third game, five or six boys represent the various
grades of rank, from the peasant up to the great daimios or shogun. By
superior address and skill in the game the peasant rises to the highest
rank, or the man of highest rank is degraded.

From the nature of the Japanese language, in which a single word or
sound may have a great many significations, riddles and puns are of
extraordinary frequency. I do not know of any published collection of
riddles, but every Japanese boy has a good stock of them on hand. There
are few Japanese works of light, and perhaps of serious, literature, in
which puns do not continually recur. The popular songs and poems are
largely plays on words. There are also several puzzles played with
sticks, founded upon the shape of certain Chinese characters. As for
the short and simple story-books, song-books, nursery rhymes, lullabys,
and what for want of a better name may be styled Mother Goose
Literature, they are as plentiful as with us, but they have a very
strongly characteristic Japanese flavor, both in style and matter.

It is curious that the game of foot-ball seems to have been confined to
the courtiers of the Mikado's court, where there were regular
instructors of the game. In the games of Pussy wants a Corner and
Prisoner's Base, the Oni, or devil, takes the place of Puss or the
officer.

I have not mentioned all the games and sports of Japanese children, but
enough has been said to show their general character. In general they
seem to be natural, sensible, and in e