LIFE'S SAMENESS.

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1447, 23 May 1912, Page 11

LIFE'S SAMENESS.

A popular geisha in Japan occupies an important position in the public imagination, and a sensation was therefore created in Tokio by tho recent attempt at suicide of ono oi tho mo?t famous of the Shimbashi geishas, who are in their turn (says Heuter s correspondent) the most famous of all the thousands of geishas in Tokio. The first report stated that the lady had been driven to, her deed by mountains of debt contracted as the result of a passionate attachment to a certain popular actor. The "Tokio Asahi," indeed, considered the matter of such importance that after the recovery of tho would-be suicide tho editor induced her to write the history of the incident. Here it is:—

"T'ne mere idea of u debt of one or two thousand yen could never drive me to suicide. I am subject to fits of melancholy, and when in the grip of one of these I want to get out of the world. Wliy'r Simply and solely because I am tired of life. A geisha's life contains no excitement. It is always the same, day in and day out. Publican* sell drink, cats catch mice, dogs watch burglars, and nion have their constant varying selfish pastimes and occupations, But the geisha has nothing to do but to continue always in the same tiresome groove, dancing and singing, singini? and dancing. J thought if I died that I might one day be reborn in the shape of one of those creatures— men, cots, or dogs/ Therefore 1 resolved to die, and I drank sulphuric acid. Then tho naiu began in my chest, and at once the litter stupidity and madness of my wish to die came upon me. All wish of dvinjr vanished. I coughed and coughed, and 'here I am quite well again." Incidentally the affair is not unnaturally declared 'to be the best advertisement this geisha has over had.