So cleverly are the attacking tops thrown that the
first top is often knocked to a distance of several feet. Other games are
playing at war with toy weapons, hunting grasshoppers, which are kept in
tiny cages of bamboo, and hunting fireflies. The last pastime is followed
by Japanese of all ages, and the glittering flies are pursued by night, and
struck down by a light fan.
Wherever there is a stream of water, the boys set up toy water-wheels, and
these water-wheels drive little mills and machines, which the boys have
made for themselves in the cleverest fashion.
Here is a group whose heads are very close together. Let us peep over their
shoulders, and see what it is they watch so quietly and earnestly. Ah! this
is a favourite trick. A small boy is setting a team of half a dozen beetles
to draw a load of rice up a smooth, sloping board. He has made a tiny cart
of paper, and filled it with rice. The traces of the cart are made of fine
threads of silk, and he fastens the threads of silk to the backs of the
beetles with gum.
Now he has his strange team in motion, and the beetles are marching up the
board, dragging their load. The tiny faces in the ring of watchers are
filled with deep but motionless interest. Not one dreams of stretching
out a finger. There is no need to say, "Don't touch!" No one would dream
of touching--that would be very rude. Japanese children manage their own
games, without any appeal to their elders. It is not often that a dispute
arises, but, should that happen, the question is settled at once by the
word of an elder child.
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