Note 274 — Chapter XL

In driving through what seemed to be one of the best streets in Sapporo, I noticed that some exceptionally large houses were the dwellings of the registered prostitutes. Each house had a large ground-floor window. Before it was a barrier about a yard high which cleared the ground, leaving a space of about another yard. Such of the public as were interested were able, therefore, to peer in without being identified from the street, for only their legs and feet were visible. In Tokyo and elsewhere this exhibition of girls to the public has ceased. The place of the girls is taken by enlarged framed photographs. I found on enquiry that the Sapporo houses are so well organised as to have their proprietors' association. At a little town like Obihiro an edifice was pointed out to me containing fifty or more women.