I was told that a labourer's 5 _tan_ could be cultivated by working
half days. Generally more was earned by labouring than could be gained
from a small patch of land. But for half the year labourer's work was
not obtainable. My informant found small tenant labourers "well off"
if both husband and wife had wages: "they are able to buy a bottle of
_saké_ in the evening." Their position was better than that of a small
peasant proprietor.

One in a thousand of the families in a specified county slept in
straw. I heard of the payment of 20 to 25 per cent. to pawnbroker
lenders.

But there is another way of borrowing. The plan of the _kō_ may be
adopted. A _kō_--it is odd that it should so closely resemble our
abbreviation "Co."--is simple and effective. If a man is badly off or
wants to undertake something beyond his financial resources, and his
friends decide to help him, they may proceed by forming a _kō_. A _kō_
is composed of a number of people who agree to subscribe a certain sum
monthly and to divide the proceeds monthly by ballot, beginning by
giving the first month's receipts to the person to succour whom the
_kō_ was formed. Suppose that the subscription be fixed at a yen a
month and that there are fifty subscribers. Then the beneficiary--who
pays in his yen with the rest--gets 50 yen on the occasion of the
first ingathering. Every month afterwards a member who is lucky in the
ballot gets 50 yen. The monthly paying in and paying out continue for
fifty months and all the subscribers duly get their money back, with
the advantage of having had a little excitement and having done a
neighbourly action.

But the _kō_, or _tanomoshi_, as I ought to call it, is not always the