Paper has a great place in the industries of Japan. It is used everywhere
and for almost everything. A Japanese lives in a house largely built of
paper, drinks from a paper cup, reads by a paper lantern, writes, of
course, on paper, and wraps up his parcels in it, ties up the parcels with
paper string, uses a paper pocket-handkerchief, wears a paper cloak and
paper shoes and paper hat, holds up a paper umbrella against the sun and
the rain, and employs it for a great number of other purposes. He makes
more than sixty kinds of paper, and each kind has its own specified use. He
can make it so tough that it is almost impossible to tear it, and he can
make it waterproof, so that the fiercest rain cannot pass through it.
If your path leads you along the bank of a river you will often see a
fisherman at work. He has many ways of catching his prey. He uses a line
and hook and the net. In a large stream or pool he may be seen at work with
the throwing-net, a clever device.
This net is made in the form of a circle twelve or fourteen feet across,
and round the edge of the net heavy sinkers of lead are fastened. The
fisherman folds this net over his arm, and then tosses into the water a
ball of boiled rice and barley. The fish gather to eat this bait, and then
he throws the net in such a way that it falls quite flat upon the water.
The leads sink at once to the bottom, and the net covers the feeding fish
in the shape of a dome. A strong cord is fastened to the top of the net,
and he begins to haul it up.
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