f a virtuous woman was that she be faithful to her husband
or lover; no such faithfulness was expected of him. And neither in
the case of man nor woman did the conventions of the period depend at
all on the nature of the relationship between the two. Wives no
longer lived in their fathers' homes after marriage, but the
newly-wedded husband built new rooms for his wife's especial use, so
that, by a fiction such as the Oriental delights in and Occidental
law is not entirely ignorant of, her home was still not his. Before
betrothal, girls were not allowed to call themselves by a family
name. At the betrothal her affianced first bound up in a fillet the
hair that she had formerly worn loose around her face. Even more
symbolical was the custom upon lovers' parting of tying to the
woman's undergarment a string from the man's; this knot was to be
unloosed only when they met again.

THE SHOSO-IN

At Nara, in Yamato province, near the temple of Todai-ji, a store
house built of wood and called the Shoso-in was constructed in the
Nara epoch, and it still stands housing a remarkable collection of
furniture and ornaments from the Imperial palace. There is some
question whether this collection is truly typical of the period, or
even of the palace of the period; but the presence of many utensils
from China, some from India (often with traces of Greek influence),
and a few from Persia certainly shows the degree of cosmopolitan
culture and elegance there was in the palace at Nara. At the present
day, strangers may visit the collection only by special permission
and only on two days each year; and the museum has always had a
mingled imperial and sacred character. When the power of the
shogunate was at its height, the Shoso-in was never opened except by
orders of the Emperor. Among the contents of this museum are:
polished mirrors with repousse backs, kept in cases lined with
brocaded silk; bronze vases; bronze censers; hicense-boxes made of
Paulownia wood or of Chinese ware; two-edged swords, which were tied
to the girdle, instead of being thrust through it; narrow leather
belts with silver or jade decoration; bamboo flutes; lacquer
writing-cases, etc.

ENGRAVING: OUTLINE SKETCH OF THE SHOSO-IN AT NARA

REFORM OF LOCAL ADMINISTRATIONS

To the Emperor Konin belongs the credit of correcting some flagrant
abuses in provincial administration. There was an inconvenient
outcome of the religious mania which pervaded the upper classes
du