To the Board of Trustees of the Peabody Academy of Science, who, recognizing the ethnological value of the work I had in hand, granted me a release from my duties as Director until I could complete it; and to Professor John Robinson, Treasurer of the Academy, and Mr. T. F. Hunt, for friendly suggestions and helpful interest, as also to Mr. Percival Lowell for numerous courtesies,--my thanks are due. I must not forget to record here my indebtedness to Mr. A. W. Stevens, chief proof-reader of the University Press, for his invaluable assistance in the literary part of my labors, and for his faithful scrutiny of the proof-sheets. At the same time I desire to thank Miss Margarette W. Brooks for much aid given to me in my work; my daughter, Miss Edith O. Morse, for the preliminary tracings of the drawings from my journals; Mr. L. S. Ipsen, who drew the unique and beautiful design for the cover of this book; Mr. A. V. S. Anthony for judicious supervision of the process-work in the illustrations; the University Press for its excellent workmanship in the printing of the book; and the Publishers for the generous manner in which they have supported the undertaking. I will only add, that the excellent Index to be found at the end of this book was prepared by Mr. Charles H. Stevens.
EDWARD S. MORSE. Salem, Mass., U. S. A. November, 1885.
Within twenty years there has gradually appeared in our country a variety of Japanese objects conspicuous for their novelty and beauty,--lacquers, pottery and porcelain, forms in wood and metal, curious shaped boxes, quaint ivory carvings, fabrics in cloth and paper, and a number of other objects as perplexing in their purpose as the inscriptions which they often bore. Most of these presented technicalities in their work as enigmatical as were their designs, strange caprices in their ornamentation which, though violating our hitherto recognized proprieties of decoration, surprised and yet delighted us. The utility of many of the objects we were at loss to understand; yet somehow they gradually found lodgment in our rooms, even displacing certain other objects which we had been wont to regard as decorative, and our rooms looked all the prettier for their substitution. We found it difficult to formulate the principles upon which such art was based, and yet were compelled to recognize its merit. Violations of perspective, and colors in juxtaposition or coalescing that before we had regarded as inharmonious, were continually reminding us of Japan and her curious people. Slowly our methods of decoration became imbued with these ways so new to us, and yet so many centuries old to the people among whom these arts had originated. Gradually yet surely, these arts, at first so little understood, modified our own methods of ornamentation, until frescos wall-papers, wood-work and carpets, dishes and table-cloth metal work and book-covers, Christmas cards and even railroad advertisements were decorated, modelled, and designed after Japanese style.