The age of the bride will probably be twenty years, and the bridegrooms, twenty-one. He, let us say, is the eldest son, and so the first to marry. Pleased are the mother and the aged grandmother to have added to the household a new and willing handmaid.
The family consists of the “obaa-san,” the honorable elderly one, the mother of the lord and master, who may be an honorable judge of the local court; his wife, who really, will not regret the day the aged mother-in-law passes on to the land of the Sun Goddess, that she, at last, may be mistress in her own household instead of chief servant. Then come two younger children -- a boy of seventeen, who attends the modern schools, and is taught strange and incredible things, and a dear little girl of twelve, who is not larger than the American child of eight. A maid servant, of perhaps, thirty, but far older in looks, completes the household. None of these is a stranger to the little bride, who has lived all her life in the neighborhood, but her heart is heavy and filled with foreboding, for fear she may fail in her chief duty, which is to please and serve each member of the household, not excepting even the old family servant, who may prove to be the most fault-finding of them all.
Previous article Next article
From General Nelson A. Miles
Thrilling Stories of The Russian-Japanese War, 1904
