File:JapanHomes012 FRAMING OF AN ORDINARY TWO-STORIED HOUSE. (FROM A JAPANESE DRAWING).jpg

English: From the original book: "Fig. 12 represents the frame-work of an ordinary two-storied house. It is copied from a Japanese carpenter's drawing, kindly furnished the writer by Mr. Fukuzawa, of Tokio, proper corrections in perspective having been made. The various parts have been lettered, and the dimensions given in Japanese feet and inches. The Japanese foot is, within the fraction of an inch, the same as ours, and is divided into ten parts, called sun. The wood employed in the frame is usually cedar or pine. The corner posts, as well as the other large upright posts, called hashira (H), are square, and five sun in thickness these are tenoned into the plate upon which they rest. This plate is called do-dai (D); it is made of cedar, and sometimes of chestnut. The do-dai is six sun square, and rests directly on a number of stones, which are called do-dai-ishi (D, 1). Between the hashira come smaller uprights, called ma-bashira (M) (hashira changed to bashira for euphony); these are two sun square. Through these pass the cross-pieces called nuki; these are four sun wide and one sun thick. To these are attached the bamboo slats as substitutes for laths. The horizontal beam to support the second story floor is called the nikaibari (Ns); this is of pine, with a vertical thickness of one foot two sun, and a width of six tenths of a sun. The rafters of the roof, called yane-shita (Ya), in this frame are nine feet long, three sun wide, and eight tenths of a sun in thickness. Cross-beams (T), from the upper plate from which spring posts to support the ridge-pole, are called taruki. The first floor is sustained by posts that rest on stones embedded in the ground, as well as by a beam called yuka-shita (Yu); this is secured to the upright beams at the height of one and one-half or two feet above the do-dai. The upper floor-joists are of pine, two inches square; the flooring boards are six tenths of a sun in thickness, and one foot wide. The lower floor-joists, called neda-maruta (Ne), are rough round sticks, three sun in diameter, hewn on opposite sides. On top of these rest pine boards six tenths of a sun in thickness... As the rooms are made in sizes corresponding to the number of mats they are to contain, the beams, uprights, rafters, flooring-boards, boards for the ceiling, and all strips are got out in sizes to accommodate these various dimensions. The dimensions of the mats from one end of the Empire to the other are approximately three feet wide and six feet long; and these are fitted compactly on the floor. The architect marks on his plan the number of mats each room is to contain, — this number defining the size of the room; hence the lumber used must be of definite lengths, and the carpenter is sure to find these lengths at the lumber-yard. It follows from this that but little waste occurs in the construction of a Japanese house. Far different is it with us in our extravagant and senseless methods of house-building. In our country, a man after building a wooden house finds his cellar and shed choked to repletion with the waste of his new house, and for a year or more at least has the grim comfort of feeding his fireplaces and kitchen stove with rough and finished woods which have cost him at the rate of four to eight cents per square foot!"