In regard to their education it may be said that until the most recent times they have had practically none. In recent decades, however, farmers' children have begun to go to school. Until 1908 the elementary course (compulsory) covered four years, but the results were so poor that the period has now been extended to six. Four years' schooling does not give ability to read easily even a simple daily paper, much less an ordinary book. Our cook, an intelligent and able farming woman, when she came to us twelve years ago, could not read even the simplest Japanese characters, and thinks that at present relatively few farmers' wives have enough education to read papers or write letters. Whether or not six years' schooling will give this ability remains to be seen. It is safe to say that to-day Japanese adult farming women, as a whole, lack book education and have received little, if any, systematic training. They are accordingly largely controlled by tradition, and it goes without saying that their level of mental, moral, and spiritual life is low. The Shinto and Buddhist religions, as they exist among the farmers, are largely lacking in ethical content; they are rituals rather for burying the dead and through the use of charms and magic rites they promise future happiness and present, temporal blessings. Priests, as a rule, do not seek to cultivate the minds of the people, to strengthen their wills for moral life, or to elevate their personalities.
Yet it must not be inferred that farming women are without mental ability or common sense. They are indeed not inferior to the men with whom they share the burdens and toil of life. As a rule they are a sturdy, intelligent, self-respecting folk, having ideals of conduct which include cleanliness, gentleness, and politeness, and in comparison with the peasant classes of Europe are much to be commended. The women not seldom appear to better advantage than their husbands in point of intelligence and common sense, which I have thought might be due to the greater variety of their daily occupation.
In her excellent work on _Japanese Girls and Women_ Miss Bacon writing of this class says: "There seems no doubt at all that among the peasantry of Japan one finds the women who have the most freedom and independence. Among this class, all through the country, the women, though hard-worked and possessing few comforts, lead lives of intelligent, independent labor, and have in the family positions as respected and honored as those held by women in America. Their lives are fuller and happier than those of the women of the higher classes, for they are themselves breadwinners, contributing an important part of the family revenue, and are obeyed and respected accordingly. The Japanese lady, at her marriage, lays aside her independent existence to become the subordinate and servant of her husband and parents-in-law, and her face, as the years go by, shows how much she has given up, how completely she has sacrificed herself to those about her. The Japanese peasant woman, when she marries, works side by side with her husband, finds life full of interest outside of the simple household work, and, as the years go by, her face shows more individuality, more pleasure in life, less suffering and disappointment than that of her wealthier and less hard-working sister."[1]