3-071-261 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

A Japanese archery house in Jeddo, 1881. 'Mr. Joseph Bell, our Special Artist...has visited one of the accustomed places of recreation for natives of the leisurely and elegant class. It is a tea-house, built of thin wood and paper in the midst of a grove or garden, and simply furnished, with a few mats and stools, and with a small charcoal-fire box to keep the tea-kettle always boiling: just the nicest place that can be devised for lounging through a warm summer afternoon. The special kind of diversion that is offered to ladies and gentlemen...is a little mild archery practice...Here are two Japanese visitors - nay, we perceive that he is a real Englishman, and not a Japanese wearing the polite European dress - here is our Special Artist himself, accompanied by an amiable Japanese young lady, to whom he is paying courteous attentions, both now innocently proving their comparative dexterity in the use of the harmless bow and arrow, at an indoor range of six or seven yards. It seems a very pretty sort of occupation for such idle minutes as most people sometimes contrive to while away, in something or other which is called "pastime," because it helps them to pass the time'. From "Illustrated London News", 1881.