The Japanese Twins   By: Lucy Fitch Perkins (1865-1937)

by Lucy Fitch Perkins

To the Dutch Twins and their friends

Also by Lucy Fitch Perkins

Geographical Series

THE DUTCH TWINS PRIMER. Grade I.

THE ESKIMO TWINS. Grade II.

THE DUTCH TWINS. Grade III.

THE JAPANESE TWINS. Grade IV.

THE SWISS TWINS. Grade IV.

THE FILIPINO TWINS. Grade V.

THE IRISH TWINS. Grade V.

THE ITALIAN TWINS. Grade V.

THE MEXICAN TWINS. Grade V.

THE SCOTCH TWINS. Grade VI.

THE BELGIAN TWINS. Grade VII.

THE FRENCH TWINS. Grade VII.

Historical Series

THE CAVE TWINS. Grade IV.

THE SPARTAN TWINS. Grade V.

THE COLONIAL TWINS OF VIRGINIA. Grade VI.

THE AMERICAN TWINS OF 1812. Grade VI.

THE PIONEER TWINS. Grade VI.

THE AMERICAN TWINS OF THE REVOLUTION. Grade VII.

THE PURITAN TWINS. Grade VII.

Each volume is illustrated by the author

HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY

COPYRIGHT, 1912, BY LUCY FITCH PERKINS

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Riverside Press

CAMBRIDGE. MASSACHUSETTS PRINTED IN THE U.S.A.

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION THE JAPANESE TWINS AND BOT'CHAN.

I. THE DAY THE BABY CAME

II. MORNING IN THE LITTLE HOUSE

III. HOW THEY WENT TO THE TEMPLE.

IV. A RAINY DAY

V. TAKE'S BIRTHDAY.

VI. GOING TO SCHOOL

VII. TARO'S BIRTHDAY.

THE JAPANESE TWINS

THE JAPANESE TWINS AND BOT'CHAN

Away, away, ever so far away, near the western shores of the Ocean of Peace, lie the Happy Islands, the Paradise of Children.

Some people call this ocean the "Pacific" and they call the Happy Islands "Japan," but the meaning is just the same. Those are only their grown up names, that you find them by on the map, in the geography.

They are truly Happy Islands, for the sun shines there so brightly that all the people go about with pleasant, smiling faces, and the children play out of doors the whole year through without ever quarreling. And they are never, never spanked! Of course, the reason for that is that they are so good they never, never need it! Or maybe their fathers and mothers do not believe in spanking.

I have even been told though I don't know whether to think it's true or not that Japanese parents believe more in sugar plums than in punishments to make children good!

Anyway, the children there are very good indeed.

In a little town near a large city on one of the Happy Islands, there is a garden. In the garden stands a house, and in that House there live Taro, who is a boy, and Take (Pronounce Tah' kay), who is a girl.

They are twins. They are Japanese Twins and they are just five years old, both of them.

Of course, Taro and Take do not live alone in the house in the garden. Their Father and Mother live there too, and their Grandmother, who is very old, and the Baby, who is very young.

Taro and Take cannot remember when Grandmother and Father and Mother happened, because they were all there when the Twins came; and the Twins could not possibly imagine the world without Father and Mother and Grandmother.

But with the Baby it was different. One day there wasn't any Baby at all, and the next day after that, there he was, looking very new but quite at home already in the little house in the garden, where Taro and Take lived.

"Taro" means eldest son, and the Baby might have been called "Jiro," because "Jiro " means "second," and he was the second boy in the family; but from the day he came they called him just "Bot'Chan." That is what they call boy babies in Japan.

"Take" means "bamboo," and the Twins' Father and Mother named their little daughter "Take" because they hoped she would grow up to be tall and slender and strong and graceful like the bamboo tree.

Now, can you think of anything nicer in this world than being Twins, and living with a Mother and Father and Grandmother and a Baby Brother, in a dear little house, in a dear little garden, in a dear little, queer little town in the middle of the Happy Islands that lie in the Ocean of Peace?