KOTO, MONO, MI, YA. 35
IT 54. Parallel to the abstract nouns in koto, are concrete nouns in mono. While koto denotes "a thing of the mind," "a fact," " an act," mono denotes a tangible, material thing or person, thus :
deki-mono j a bad p i acej " an abscess."
lit. comes-ont thing }
kusai mono, " a smelly thing." shiroi mono, " a white thing." shojiki-monp " an honest fellow."
This distinction between koto, " an abstract thing," and mono, " a material thing," must be clearly kept in mind, if the student would avoid constant misapprehension. Thus onaji mono means "the same thing," "the identi- cal article," whereas onaji koto means "the same sort of thing" (the idea, pattern, etc., being the same, but the actual article a different one).
1< 55. A quality, especially a tinge or soupgon of a quality, is sometimes denoted by nouns ending in mi. Oc- casionally not the quality only, but the object possessing the quality, is thus designated, as :
akami, " a tinge of red."
shiromi, " a tinge of white," " the white of an egg." omoshiromij " [a certain amount of] fun." 1 56. The names of shops are denoted by the termination ya, " house," as :
hon-ya, " a book-store ; " from hon, " a book." nikn-ya, "a butcher's shop;" from niku, "flesh," pan-ya, " a bakery ; " from pan, " bread." Kame-ya, lit. "tortoise house" (or, as we might say,
" To the sign of the Tortoise "), the name of a grocery in
Tokyo well-known to foreign residents.
