Embroideries and Curios
which former etiquette demanded to have laid over the boxes containing gifts or notes, both box and fukusa to be duly admired and returned to the sender. These ceremonial cloths were part of the trousseau of every bride of high degree, and old families possess them by scores. The nicest etiquette ordered the choice of the fukusa, and the season, the gift, the giver, and the receiver were considered in selecting the particular wrapping. The greatest artists have made designs for them, and a few celebrated ones, bearing Hokusai’s signature, are owned by European collectors. The crests of the feudal families become familiar to one from their constant repetition on fukusas. Numberless Japanese legends, and symbols as well, constantly reappear, and no two are ever exactly alike in design or execution, however often one may see the same subject treated. Equally popular are all the symbols of long life—the pine, the plum, the bamboo; the tortoise with the fringed shell that lives for a thousand years; the peach that took a thousand years to ripen; the stork, the old man and woman under the pine-tree hailing the rising sun—and all, when wrapping a gift, equally convey a delicately expressed wish for length of days. The fierce old saints and disciples, who with their dragons and tigers live on old Satsuma surfaces, keep company with the sages who rode through the air on storks, tortoises, or carp, or stand unrolling sacred scrolls beneath bamboo groves. And the Seven Household Gods of Luck, the blessed Shichi Fukujin, are on the fukusa as well. There smile Daikoku, the god of riches, upon his rice-bags, hammer and purse in hand; Ebisu, the god of plenty, with his little red fish; Jurojin, the serene old god of longevity, with his mitred cap, white beard, staff, and deer; high-browed Fukurokujin, lord of popularity and wisdom; Hotei, spirit of goodness and kindness, sack on back, fan in hand, and children climbing and tumbling over him; black-faced Bishamon, god of war
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