READING HALL

THE DOORS OF WISDOM

THE MIKADO'S EMPIRE

BY

WILLIAM ELLIOT GRIFFIS

THE TEMPORARY MIKADOATE.

The first step taken after the overthrow of the military usurpation at Kamakura was to recall the mikado Go-Daigo from exile. With the sovereign again in full power, it seemed as though the ancient and rightful government was to be permanently restored. The military or dual system had lasted about one hundred and fifty years, and patriots now hoped to see the country rightly governed, without intervention between the throne and the people. The rewarding of the victors who had fought for him was the first duty awaiting the restored exile. The methods and procedure of feudalism were now so fixed in the general policy of the Government, that Go-Daigo, falling into the ways of the Minamoto and Hojo, apportioned military fiefs as guerdons to his vassals. Among them was Ashikaga Takauji, to whom was awarded the greatest prize, consisting of the rich provinces of Hitachi, Musashi, and Shimosa. To Kusunoki Masashige were given Settsu and Kawachi; and to Nitta, Kodzuke and Harima, besides smaller fiefs to many others.

This unfair distribution of spoils astounded the patriots, who expected to see high rank and power conferred upon Nitta and Kusunoki, the chief leaders in the war for the restoration, and both very able men. It would have been well had the emperor seen the importance of disregarding the claims and privileges of caste, and exalted to highest rank the faithful men who were desirous of maintainino; the dignity of the throne, and whose chief fear was that the duarchy would again arise. Such a fear was by no means groundless, for Ashikaga, elated at such unexpected favor, became inflamed with a still higher ambition, and already meditated refounding the shogunate at Kamakura, and placing his own family upon the military throne. Being of Minamoto stock, he knew that he had prestige and popularity in his favor, should he attempt the re-erection of the shogunate. Most of the common soldiers had fought rather against Hojo than against duarchy. The emperor was warned against this man by his ministers; but in this case a woman's smiles and caresses and importunate words were more powerful than the advice of sages. Ashikaga had bribed the mikado's concubine Kadoko, and had so won her favor that she persuaded her imperial lord to bestow excessive and undeserved honor on the traitor.

The distribution of spoils excited discontent among the soldiers, who now began to lose all interest in the cause for which they had fought, and to murmur privately among themselves. "Should such an unjust government continue," said they, "then are we all servants of concubines and dancing-girls and singing-boys. Rather than be the puppets of the mikado's amusers, we would prefer a shogun again, and become his vassals." Many of the captains and smaller clan-leaders were also in bad humor over their own small shares. Ashikaga Takauji took advantage of this feeling to make himself popular among the disaffected, especially those who clung to arms as a profession and wished to remain soldiers, preferring war to peace.

Of such inflammable material the latent traitor was not slow to avail himself when it suited him to light the flames of war. Had the mikado listened to his wise counselor, and also placed Kusunoki in an office commensurate with his commanding abilities, and rewarded Nitta as he deserved, the century of anarchy and bloodshed which followed might have been spared to Japan.

Go-Daigo, who in the early years of his former reign had been a man of indomitable courage and energy, seems to have lost the best traits of his character in his exile, retaining only his imperious will and susceptibility to flattery. To this degenerate Samson a Delilah was not wanting. He fell an easy victim to the wiles of one man, though the shears by which his strength was shorn were held by a woman. Ashikaga was a consummate master of the arts of adulation and political craft. He was now to further prove his skill, and to verify the warnings of Nitta and the ministers. The emperor made Moriyoshi, his own son, shogun. Ashikaga, jealous of the appointment, and having too ready access to the infatuated father's ear, told him that his son was plotting to get possession of the throne. Moriyoshi, hating the flatterer, and stung to rage by the base slander, marched against him. Ashikaga now succeeded by means of his ally in the imperial bed in making himself, in the eyes of the mikado, the first victim to the conspiracies of the prince. So great was his power over the emperor that he obtained from the imperial hand a decree to punish his enemy Moriyoshi as a choteki, or rebel, against the mikado.

Here we have a striking instance of what, in the game of Japanese state-craft, may be called the checkmate move, or, in the native idiom, Ote, "king's hand." It is difficult for a foreigner to fully appreciate the prestige attaching to the mikado's person—a prestige never diminishing. No matter how low his actual measure of power, the meanness of his character, or the insignificance of his personal abilities, he was the Son of Heaven, his word was law, his command omnipotent. He was the fountain of all rank and authority. No military leader, however great his resources or ability, could win the popular heart or hope for ultimate success unless appointed by the emperor. He who held the Son of Heaven in his power was master. Hence it was the constant aim of all the military leaders, even down to 1868, to obtain control of the imperial person. However wicked or villainous the keeper of the mikado, he was master of the situation. His enemies were choteki, or rebels against the Son of Heaven ; his own soldiers were the huan-gun, or loyal army. Even might could not make right. Possession of the divine person was more than nine-tenths—it was the whole—of the law.

Moriyoshi, then, being choteki, was doomed. Ashikaga, having the imperial order, had the kuan-gun, and was destined to win. The sad fate of the emperor's son awakens the saddest feelings, and brings tears to the eyes of the Japanese reader even at the present day. He was seized, deposed, sent to Kamakura, and murdered in a subterranean dungeon in the Seventh month of the year 1335.

His child in exile, the heart of the emperor relented. The scales fell from his eyes. He saw that he had wrongly suspected his son, and that the real traitor was Ashikaga. The latter, noticing the change that had come over his master, left Kioto secretly, followed by thousands of the disaffected soldiery, and fled to Kamakura, which he had rebuilt, and began to consolidate his forces with a view of again erecting the Eastern capital, and seizing the power formerly held by the Hojo. Nitta had also been accused by Ashikaga, but, having cleared himself in a petition to the mikado, he received the imperial commission to chastise his rival. In the campaign which followed, the imperial forces were so hopelessly defeated that the quondam imperial exile now became a fugitive. With his loyal followers he left Kioto, carrying with him the sacred emblems of authority.

Ashikaga, though a triumphant victor, occupied a critical position. He was a choteki. As such he could never win final success. He had power and resources, but, unlike others equally usurpers, was not clothed with authority. He was, in popular estimation, a rebel of the deepest dye. In such a predicament he could not safely remain a day. The people would take the side of the emperor. What should he do? His vigor, acuteness, and villainy were equal. The Hojo had deposed and set up emperors. It was Ashikaga who divided the allegiance of the people, gave Japan a War of the Roses (or Chrysanthemums), tilled the soil for feudalism, and lighted the flames of war that made Kioto a cock-pit, abandoned the land for nearly two centuries and a half to slaughter, ignorance, and paralysis of national progress. To clothe his acts with right, he made a new Son of Heaven. He declared Kogen, who was of the royal family, emperor. In 1336, this new Son of Heaven gave Ashikaga the title of Sei-i Tai Shogun, Kamakura again became the military capital. The duarchy was restored, and the War of the Northern and the Southern Dynasties began, which lasted fifty-six years.

The period 1333-1336, though including little more than two years of time, is of great significance as marking the existence of a temporary mikadoate. The fact that it lasted so short a time, and that the duarchy was again set up on its ruins, has furnished both natives and foreigners with the absurd and specious, but strongly urged, argument that the Government of Japan, by a single ruler from a single centre, is an impossibility, and that the creation of a dual system with a "spiritual" or nominal sovereign in one part of the empire, and a military or "secular " ruler in another, is a necessity.

During the agitation of the question concerning the abolition of the dual system, and the restoration of the mikado in 1860-1868, one of the chief arguments of the adherents of the shogunate against the scheme of the agitators, was the assertion that the events of the period 1333-1336 proved that the mikado could not alone govern the country, and that it must have duarchy. Even after the overthrow of the "Tycoon" in 1868, foreigners, as well as natives, who had studied Japanese history, fully believed and expected that in a year or two the present mikado's Government would be overthrown, and the "Tycoon " return to power, basing their belief on the fact that the mikadoate of 1333-1336 did not last. Whatever force such an argu- ment might have had when Japan had no foreign relations, and no aliens on her soil to disturb the balance between Kioto and Kamakura, it is certain that it counts for naught when, under altered conditions, more than the united front of the whole empire is now required to cope with the political pressure from without.

THE WAR OF THE CHRYSANTHEMUMS.

The dynasty of the imperial rulers of Japan is the oldest in the world. No other family line extends so far back into the remote ages as the nameless family of mikados. Disdaining to have a family name, claiming descent, not from mortals, but from the heavenly gods, the imperial house of the Kingdom of the Rising Sun occupies a throne which no plebeian has ever attempted to usurp. Throughout all the vicissitudes of the imperial line, in plenitude of power or abasement of poverty, its members deposed or set up at the pleasure of the upstart or the political robber, the throne itself has remained unshaken. Unclean hands have not been laid upon the ark itself. As in the procession of life on the globe the individual perishes, the species lives on, so, though individual mikados have been dethroned, insulted, or exiled, the prestige of the line has never suffered. The loyalty or allegiance of the people has never swerved. The soldier who would begin revolution, or who lusted for power, would make the mikado his tool; but, however transcendent his genius and abilities, he never attempted to write himself mikado. No Japanese Cesar ever had his Brutus, nor Charles his Cromwell, nor George his Washington, Not even, as in China, did one dynasty of alien blood overthrow another, and reign in the stead of a destroyed family. Such events are unknown in Japanese annals. The student of this people and their unique history can never understand them or their national life unless he measures the mightiness of the force, and recognizes the place of the throne and the mikado in the minds and hearts of its people.

There are on record instances in which the true heirship was declared only after bitter intrigue, quarrels, or even bloodshed. In the tenth century, Taira no Masakado, disappointed in not being appointed Dai Jo Dai Jin, left Kioto, went to Shimosa in the Kuanto, and set himself up as Shinno, or cadet of the imperial line, and temporarily ruled the eight provinces of the East as a pseudo-mikado.

Taira no Masakado, or, as we should say, Masakado Taira, was a man of great energy and of unscrupulous character. He was at first governor of Shimosa, but aspired to rule over all the East. He built a palace on the same model as that of the mikado, at Sajima, in Shimotsuke, and appointed officers similar to those at the imperial court. He killed his uncle, who stood in the way of his ambition. To revenge his father's death, Sadamori, cousin to Masakado, headed two thou-sand men, attacked the false mikado, and shot him to death with an arrow, carrying his head as trophy and evidence to Kioto, where it was exposed on the pillory. Shortly after his decease, the people of Musashi, living on the site of modern Tokio, being greatly afflicted by the troubled and angry spirit of their late ruler, erected a temple on the site within the second castle enceinte near Kanda Bridge, and in that part of the city district of Kanda (God's Field) now occupied by the Imperial Treasury Department. This had the effect of soothing the unquiet ghost, and the land had rest; and later generations, mindful of the power of a spirit that in life ruled all the Kuanto, and in death could afflict or give peace to millions at will, worshiped Masakado under the posthumous name of Kanda Mio Jin (Illustrious Deity of Kanda), his history having been forgotten, or transfigured into the form of a narrative, which to doubt was sin. When lyeyasu, in the latter end of the sixteenth century, made Yedo his capital, he removed the shrine to a more eligible location on the hill in the rear of the Kanda River and the Suido, where, later, the university stood, and erected an edifice of great splendor, surrounded by groves and grounds of surjiassing loveliness. This was per-haps only policy, to gain the popular favor by honoring the local gods; but it stirred up some jealousy among the "mikado-reverencers" and students of history who knew the facts. Some accused him of treasonable designs like those of Masakado. In 1868, when the mikado's troops arrived in Yedo, they rushed to the temple of Kanda Mio Jin, and, pulling out the idol or image of the deified Masakado, hacked it to pieces with their swords, wishing the same fate to all traitors. Thus, after nine centuries, the traitor received a traitor's reward, a clear instance of historic justice in the eyes of native patriots

In 1139, the military families of Taira and Minamoto came to blows in Kioto over the question of succession between the rival heirs, Shutoku and Go-Shirakawa. The Taira being victors, their candidate became mikado. During the decay of the Taira, they fled from Kioto, carrying with them, as true emperor, with his suite and the sacred insignia, Antoku, the child, five years old, who was drowned in the sea when the Taira were destroyed. The Minamoto at the same time recognized Gotoba.

It may be more analogical to call the wars of the Gen and Hei, with their white and red flags, the Japanese Wars of the Roses, Theirs was the struggle of rival houses. Now, we are to speak of rival dynasties, each with the imperial crysanthemum.

In the time of the early Ashikagas (1336-1390) there were two mikados ruling, or attempting to rule, in Japan. The Emperor Go-Daigo had chosen his son Kuniyoshi as his heir, but the latter died in 1326. Kogen, son of the mikado Go-Fushimi (1299-1301), was then made heir. Go-Daigo's third son Moriyoshi, however, as he grew up, showed great talent, and his father regretted that he had consented to the choice of Kogen, and wished his own son to succeed him. He referred the matter to Hojo at Kamakura, who disapproved of the plan. Those who hated Hojo called Kogen the "false emperor," refusing to acknowledge him. When Nitta destroyed Kamakura, and Go-Daigo was restored, Kogen retired to obscurity. No one for a moment thought of or acknowledged any one but Go-Daigo as true and only mikado. When, however, Ashikaga by his treachery had alienated the emperor from him, and was without imperial favor, and liable to punishment as a rebel, he found out and set up Kogen as mikado, and proclaimed him sovereign. Civil war then broke out.

Into the details of the war between the adherents of the Northern emperor, Ashikaga, with his followers, on the one side, and Go-Daigo, who held the insignia of authority, backed by a brilliant array of names famous among the Japanese, on the other, I do not propose to enter. It is a confused and sickening story of loyalty and treachery, battle, murder, pillage, fire, famine, poverty, and misery, such as make up the picture of civil wars in every country. Occasionally in this period a noble deed or typical character shines forth for the admiration or example of succeeding generations. Among these none have exhibited more nobly man's possible greatness in the hour of death than Nitta Yoshisada and Kusunoki Masashige.

On one occasion the army of Nitta, who was fighting under the flag of Go-Daigo, the true emperor, was encamped before that of Ashikaga. To save further slaughter, Nitta sallied out alone, and, approaching his enemy's camp, cried out : "The war in the country continues long. Although this has arisen from the rivalry of two emperors, yet its issue depends solely upon you and me. Rather than millions of the people should be involved in distress, let us determine the question by single combat." The retainers of Ashikaga prevailed on their commander not to accept the challenge. In 1338, on the second day of the Seventh month, while marching with about fifty followers to assist in investing a fortress in Echizen, he was suddenly attacked in a narrow path in a rice-field near Fukui by about three thousand of the enemy, and exposed without shields to a shower of arrows. Some one begged Nitta, as he was mounted, to escape. "It is not my desire to survive my companions slain," was his response. Whipping up his horse, he rode forward to engage with his sword, making himself the target for a hundred archers. His horse, struck when at full speed by an arrow, fell. Nitta, on clearing timself and rising, was hit between the eyes with a white-feathered shaft, and mortally wounded. Drawing his sword, he cut off his own head—a feat which the warriors of that time were trained to perform—so that his enemies might not recognize him. He was thirty-eight years old. His brave little band were slain by arrows, or killed themselves with their own hand, that they might die with their master. The enemy could not recognize Nitta, until they found, beneath a pile of corpses of men who had committed hara-kiri, a body on which, inclosed in a damask bag, was a letter containing the imperial commission in Go-Daigo's hand-writing, "I invest you with all power to subjugate the rebels." Then they knew the corpse to be that of Nitta. His head was carried to Kioto, then in possession of Ashikaga, and exposed in public on a pillory. The tomb of this brave man, stands, carefully watched and tended, near Fukui, in Echizen, hard by the very spot where he fell. I often passed it in my walks, when living in Fukui in 1871, and noticed that fresh blooming flowers were almost daily laid upon it—the tribute of an admiring people. A shrine and monument in memoriam were erected in his native place during the year 1875.

The brave Kusunoki, after a lost battle at Minatogawa, near Hiogo, having suffered continual defeat, his counsels having been set at naught, and his advice rejected, felt that life was no longer honorable, and solemnly resolved to die in unsullied reputation and with a sol-dier's honor. Sorrowfully bidding his wife and infant children good-bye, he calmly committed hara-kiri, an example which his comrades, numbering one hundred and fifty, bravely followed.

Kusunoki Masashige was one of an honorable family who dwelt in Kawachi, and traced their descent to the great-grandson of the thirty-second mikado, Bidatsu (a.d. 572-585). The family name, Kusunoki ("Camphor"), was given his people from the fact that a grove of camphor-trees adorned the ancestral gardens of the mansion. The twelfth in descent was the Vice-governor of lyo. The father of Masashige held land assessed at two thousand koku. His mother, desiring a child, prayed to the god Bishamon for one hundred days, and Masashige was bom after a pregnancy of fourteen months. The mother, in devout gratitude, named the boy Tamon (the Sanskrit name of Bishamon), after the god who had heard her prayers. The man-child was very strong, and at seven could throw boys of fifteen at wrestling. He received his education in the Chinese classics from the priests in the temple, and exercised himself in all manly and warlike arts. In his twelfth year lie cut off the head of an enemy, and at fifteen studied the Chinese military art, and made it the solemn purpose of his life to overthrow the Karaakura usurpation, and restore the mikado to power. In 1330, he took up arms for Go-Daigo. He was several times besieged by the Hojo armies, but was finally victorious with Nitta and Ashikaga. When the latter became a rebel, defeated Nitta, and entered Kioto in force, Kusunoki joined Nitta, and thrice drove out the troops of Ashikaga from the capital. The latter then fled to the West, and Kusunoki advised the imperialist generals to follow them up and annihilate the rebellion. His superiors, with criminal levity, neglecting to do this, the rebels collected together, and again advanced, with increased strength by land and water, against Kioto, having, it is said, two hundred thousand men. Kusunoki's plan of operations was rejected, and his advice ignored. With Nitta he was compelled to bear the brunt of battle against overwhelming forces at Minato gawa, near Hiogo, and was there hopelessly defeated. Kusunoki, now feeling that he had done all that was possible to a subordinate, and that life was no longer honorable, retired to a farmer's house at the village of Sakurai, and there, giving him the sword bestowed on himself by the mikado, admonished his son Masatsura to follow the soldier's calling, cherish his father's memory, and avenge his father's death. Sixteen of his relatives, with unquailing courage, likewise followed their master in death.

Of all the characters in Japanese history, that of Kusunoki Masashige stands pre-eminent for pureness of patriotism, unselfishness of devotion to duty, and calmness of courage. The people speak of him in tones of reverential tenderness, and, with an admiration that lacks fitting words, behold in him the mirror of stainless loyalty. I have more than once asked my Japanese students and friends whom they considered the noblest character in their history. Their unanimous answer was "Kusunoki Masashigé." Every relic of this brave man is treasured up with religious care; and fans inscribed with poems written by him, in facsimile of his handwriting, are sold in the shops and used by those who burn to imitate his exalted patriotism. His son Masatsura lived to become a gallant soldier.

The war, which at first was waged with the clearly defined object of settling the question of the supremacy of the rival mikados, gradually lost its true character, and finally degenerated into a melee and free fight on a national scale. Before peace was finally declared, all the original leaders had died, and the prime object had been, in a great measure, forgotten in the lust for land and war. Even the rival emperors lost much of their interest, as they had no concern in brawls by which petty chieftains sought to exalt their own name, and increase their territory by robbing their neighbors. In 1392, an envoy from Ashikaga persuaded Go-Kameyama to come to Kioto and hand over the regalia to Go-Komatsu, the Northern emperor. The basis of peace was that Go-Kameyama should receive the title of Dai Jo Tenno (ex-emperor), Go-Komatsu be declared emperor, and the throne be occupied alternately by the rival branches of the imperial family. The ceremony of abdication and surrender of regalia, on the one hand, and of investiture, on the other, were celebrated with due pomp and solemnity in one of the great temples in the capital, and the war of fifty-six years' duration ceased. All this redounded to the glory and power of the Ashikaga.

The period 1336-1392 is of great interest in the eyes of all native students of Japanese history. In the Dai Nihon Shi, the Southern dynasty are defended as the legitimate sovereigns, and the true descendants of Ten Sho Dai Jin, the sun-goddess; and the Northern dynasty are condemned as mere usurpers. The same view was taken by Kitabatake Chikafusa, who was the author of the Japanese Red-book, who warned the emperor Go-Daigo against Ashikaga, and in 1339 wote a book to prove that Go-Daigo was mikado, and the Ashikaga's nominee a usurper. This is the view now held in modern Japan, and only those historians of the period who award legitimacy to the Southern dynasty are considered authoritative. The Northern branch of the imperial family after a few generations became extinct.* thinkers, and even soldiers admit. Fukuzawa, the learned reformer and peda-gogue, and a chaste and eloquent writer, in one of his works condemns the act of Kusunoki, not mentioning him by name, however, as lacking the element of true courage, according to the enlightened view. He explains and defends the Christian ideas on the subject of suicide. His book created great excitement and intense indignation in the minds of the samurai at first; but now he carries with him the approbation of the leading minds in Japan, especially of the students.

The names of the "Northern," or "False," emperors are Kogen, Komio, Shinko, Go-Kogon, Go-Enyiu, and Go-Komatsu.

THE ASHIKAGA PERIOD.

The internal history of Japan during the period of time covered by the actual or nominal rule of the thirteen shoguns of the Ashikaga family, from 1336 until 1573, except that portion after the year 1542, is not very attractive to a foreign reader. It is a confused picture of intestine war.

Ashikaga Takauji, the founder of the line, was a descendant of the Minamoto Yoshikuni, who had settled at Ashikaga, a village in Shimotsuke, in the eleventh century. He died in 1356. His grandson Yoshimitsu, called the Great Ashikaga, was made shogun when ten years old, and became a famous warrior in the South and West. After the union of the two dynasties, he built a luxurious palace at Kioto, and was made Dai Jo Dai Jin. He enjoyed his honors for one year. He then retired from the world to become a shaven monk in a Buddhist monastery.

Under the Hojo, the office of shogun was filled by appointment of the imperial court; but under the Ashikaga the office became hereditary in this family. As usual, the man with the title was, in nearly every case, but a mere figure-head, wielding little more personal power than that of the painted and gilded simulacrum of the admiral that formerly adorned the prow of our old seventy-four-gun ships. During this period the term Kubo sama, applied to the shoguns, and used so frequently by the Jesuit fathers, came into use. The actual work of government was done by able men of inferior rank. The most noted of these was Hosokawa Yoriyuki, who was a fine scholar as well as a warrior. It was through his ordering that the young shogun Yoshi- mitsu was well trained, and had for his companions noble youths who excelled in literary and military skill. This was vastly different from Hojo Tokimasa's treatment of the sons of Yoritomo. He attempted the reform of manners and administration. He issued five mottoes for the conduct of the military and civil officers. They were : 1. Thou shalt not be partial in amity or enmity. 2. Thou shalt return neither favor nor vengeance. 3. Thou shalt not deceive, either with a right or a wrong [motive]. 4, Thou shalt not hope dishonestly [for a bribe]. 5. Thou shalt not deceive thyself.

The pendulum of power during this period oscillated between Kioto and Kamakura; a tai (or "great") shogun ruling at the former, and a shogun at the latter place. An officer called the shikken was the real ruler of the capital and the central provinces; and another called the kuan-rei (Governor of the Kuanto), of Kamakura and the East. War was the rule, peace the exception. Feudal fights; border brawls; the seizure of lands; the rise of great clans; the building, the siege, and the destruction of castles, were the staple events. Every monastery was now a stronghold, an arsenal, or a camp. The issue of a combat or a campaign was often decided by the support wliich the bonzes gave to one or the other party. The most horrible excesses were committed, the ground about Kioto and Kamakura, both of which were captured and recaptured many times, became like the chitama (blood-pits) of the execution-ground. Villages, cities, temples, monasteries, and libraries were burned. The fertile fields lay waste, blackened by fire, or covered from sight, as with a cloth, by dense thickets of tall weeds, which, even in one summer's time, spring with astonishing fecundity from the plethoric soil of Japan. The people driven from their homes by war returned to find a new wilderness, resounding with the din of devouring insects. The people of gentle birth fled to mountain caves. Education was neglected. The com- mon herd grew up in ignorance and misery. Reading and writing, except among the priests and nobles, were unknown arts which the warriors scorned. War was the only lucrative trade, except that of the armorers or sword-makers. Famine followed on the footsteps of war, and with pestilence slew her tens of thousands. Pirates on the seas ravaged not only the coasts of Japan, but those of China and Corea, adding pillage and rapine to the destruction of commerce. The Chinese mothers at Ningpo even now are heard to frighten their children by mentioning the names of the Japanese pirates. On land the peasantry were impressed in military service to build castles or in- trenched camps; or, the most daring, becoming robbers, made their nests in the mountains and plundered the traveler, or descended upon the merchant's store-house. Japan was then the paradise of thieves. To all these local terrors were added those gendered in the mind of man by the convulsions of nature. Earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, floods, tidal waves, typhoons, and storms seem to have been abnormally frequent during this period. The public morals became frightfully corrupted, religion debased. All kinds of strange and uncouth doctrines came into vogue. Prostitution was never more rampant. It was the Golden Age of crime and anarchy.

The condition of the emperors was deplorable. With no revenues, and dwelling in a capital alternately in the possession of one or the other hostile arm ; in frequent danger from thieves, fire, or starvation; exposed to the weather or the dangers of war, the narrative of their sufferings excites pity in the mind of even a foreign reader, and from the native draws the tribute of tears. One was so poor that he depended upon the bounty of a noble for his food and clothing; another died in such poverty that his body lay unburied for several days, for lack of money to have him interred. The remembrance of the wrongs and sufferings of these poor emperors fired the hearts and nerved the arms of the men who in 1868 fought to sweep away for- ever the hated system by which such treatment of their sovereign became possible.

So utterly demoralized is the national, political, and social life of this period believed to have been, that the Japanese people make it the limbo of all vanities. Dramatists and romancers use it as the convenient ground whereon to locate every novel or play, the plot of which violates all present probability. The chosen time of the bulk of Japanese dramas and novels written during the last century or two is that of the late Ashikagas. The satirist or writer aiming at contemporary folly, or at blunders and oppression of the Government, yet wishing to avoid punishment and elude the censor, clothes his characters in the garb and manners of this period. It is the potter's field where all the outcasts and Judases of moralists are buried. By com-mon consent, it has become the limbo of playwright and romancer, and the scape-goat of chronology.

The act by which, more than any other, the Ashikagas have earned the curses of posterity was the sending of an embassy to China in 1401, bearing presents acknowledging, in a measure, the authority of China, and accepting in return the title of Nippon O, or King of Japan. This, which was done by Ashikaga Yoshimitsu, the third of the line, was an insult to the national dignity for which he has never been forgiven. It was a needless humiliation of Japan to her arro- gant neighbor, and done only to exalt the vanity and glory of the usurper Ashikaga, who, not content with adopting the style and equipage of the mikado, wished to be made or called a king, and yet dared not usurp the imperial throne. The punishment of Ashikaga is the curse of posterity. In 1853, when the treaty with the United States was made, a similar insult to the sovereign and the nation, as well as a contemptible deception of the American envoy and foreigners, was practiced by the shogun calling himself "Tycoon" (Great King, or Sovereign of Japan). In this latter instance, as we know, came not the distant anathema of future generations, but the swift vengeance of war, the permanent humiliation, the exile to obscurity, of the Tokugawa family, and the abolition of the shogunate and the dual system forever.

It was during the first of the last three decades of the Ashikaoti period that Japan became known to the nations of Europe; while fire-arms, gunpowder, and a new and mighty faith were made known to the Japanese nation.

The Ashikaga line of shoguns comprised the following

1. Takanji 1335-1357

2. Yoshinori 135S-1367

3. Yoshmitsu 1368-1393

4. Yoshimochi 1394-1422

5. Yoshikadzu 1423-1425

6. Yoshinori 142S-1440

7. Yoshikatsu 1441-1448

8. Yoshimasa 1449-1471

9. Yoshihisa 1472-1489

10. Yoshitaue 1490-1493

11. Yoshizumi 1494-1507

12. Yoshitane (same as the 1oth) 1508-1520

13. Yoshihara 1521-1545

14. Yoshiteru 1546-1567

15. Yoshiaki 1568-1573

The term Kubo sama, so often used by the Jesuit and Dutch writers, was not an official title of the shogun, but was applied to him by the common people. When at first anciently used, it referred to the mikado, or, rather, the mikado who had abdicated, or preceded the ruling sovereign; but later, when the people saw in the Kamakura court and its master so close an imitation of the imperial style and capital, they began gradually to speak of the shogun as the Kubo, with, however, only the general meaning of "the governing power," or the nobleman who enjoyed the right of riding to the court in a car, and entering the imperial palace. The term was in use until 1868, but was never inherent in any office, being rather the exponent of certain forms of etiquette, privilege, and display, than of official duties. The Jesuit fathers nearly always speak of the mikado as the Dairi, and at first erroneously termed the daimios "kings." Later on, they seemed to have gained a clear understanding of the various titles and official relations. In some works the Kuambaku (with dono, lord, attached) is spoken of as "emperor." Nobunaga, who became Nai Dai Jin, is also called "emperor." During the supremacy of the military rulers at Kamakura and Yedo, the offices and titles, though purely civil, once exclusively given to nobles at the mikado's court, were held by the officials of the shogunate. In later chapters, the writer of this work has fallen into the careless and erroneous practice of calling daimios "princes." The term "prince" should be employed only in speaking of the sons of the mikado, or members of the imperial family. "Collectively, the daimios were lords or barons, and all ranks of the peerage were represented among them, from the kokushi, or dukes, down to the hatamoto, or knights."

LIFE IN THE MIDDLE AGES.

History, as usually written, gives the impression that the normal condition of mankind is that of war. Japanese students who take up the history of England to read, lay it down convinced that the English people are a blood-loving race that are perpetually fighting. They contrast their own peaceful country with the countries of Eu-rope, to the detriment of the latter. They turn most gladly from the monotonous story of battle, murder, and sieges, to Buckle, Guizot, or Lecky, that they may learn of the victories no less renowned than those of war which mark as mile-stones the progress of the race. I greatly fear that from lack of literary skill my readers will say that my story of Japan thus far is a story of bloody war ; but such, indeed, it is as told in their own histories. Permanent, universal peace was unknown in Japan until, by the genius of lyeyasii in the sixteenth century, two centuries and a half of this blessing were secured. Nevertheless, in the eight centuries included between the eighth and the sixteenth of our era were many, and often lengthened, intervals of peace. In many sequestered places the sandal of the warrior and the hoof of the war-horse never printed the soil. Peace in the palace, in the city, in the village, allowed the development of manners, arts, manufactures, and agriculture. In this period were developed the characteristic growths of the Japanese intellect, imagination, social economy, and manual skill that have made the hermit nation unique in the earth and Japanese art productions the wonder of the world.

In this chapter, I shall simply glance at some of the salient features of life in Japan during the Middle Ages.

The introduction of continental or Chinese civilization into Japan was not a simple act of adoption. It was rather a work of selection and assimilation. As in this nineteenth century, the Japanese is no blind copyist, he improves on what he borrows. Although the traveler from China entering Japan can see in a moment whence the Japanese have borrowed their civilization, and though he may believe the Japanese to be an inferior type to that of the Chinese, he will acknowledge that the Japanese have improved upon their borrowed elements fully as much as the French have improved upon those of Roman civilization. Many reflecting foreigners in Japan have asked the question why the Japanese are so unlike the Chinese, and why their art, literature, laws, customs, dress, workmanship, all bear a stamp peculiar to themselves, though they received so much from them? The reason is to be found in the strength and persistence of the primal Japanese type of character, as influenced by nature, enabling it to resist serious alteration and radical change. The greatest conquests made by any of the imparted elements of continental civilization was that of Buddhism, which became within ten centuries the universally popular religion. Yet even its conquests were but partial. Its triumph was secured only by its adulteration. Japanese Buddhism is a distinct product among the many forms of that Asiatic religion. Buddhism secured life and growth on Japanese soil only by being Japanized, by being grafted on the original stock of ideas in the Japanese mind. Thus, in order to popularize the Indian religion, the ancient native heroes and the local gods were all included within the Buddhist pantheon, and declared to be the incarnations of Buddha in his various forms. A class of deities exist in Japan who are worshiped by the Buddhists under the general name of gongen. They are all deified Japanese heroes, warriors, or famous men. Furthermore, many of the old rites and ceremonies of Shinto were altered and made use of by the bonzes. It may be doubted whether Buddhism could have ever been popular in Japan, had it not become thoroughly Japanized. Some of the first-fruits of the success of the new religion was the erection of temples, pagodas, idols, wayside shrines, monasteries, and nunneries; the adoption of the practice of cremation, until then unknown; and the cessation of the slaughter of animals for food. The largest and richest of the ecclesiastical structures were in or near Kioto. The priests acted as teachers, advisers, counselors, and scribes, besides officiating at the altars, shriving the sick, and attending the sepulture of the dead.

Among the orders and sects which grew and multiplied were many similar to those in papal Europe—mendicants, sellers of indulgences, builders of shrines and images, and openers of mountain paths. The monasteries became asylums for the distressed, afflicted, and persecuted. In them the defeated soldier, the penniless and the dissatisfied, the refugee from the vendetta, could find inviolate shelter. To them the warrior after war, the prince and the minister leaving the palace, the honors and pomp of the world, could retire to spend the remnant of their days in prayer, worship, and the offices of piety. Often the murderer, struck with remorse, or the soldier before his bloody victim, would resolve to turn monk. Not rarely did men crossed in love, or the offspring of the concubine displaced by the birth of the legitimate son, or the grief-stricken father, devote himself to the priestly life. In general, however, the ranks of the bonzes were recruited from orphans or piously inclined youth, or from overstocked families. To the nunneries, the fertile soil of bereavement, remorse, unrequited love, widowhood furnished the greater number of sincere and devout nuns. In many cases, the deliberate choice of wealthy ladies, or the necessity of escaping an uncongenial marriage planned by relatives, undesirable attentions, or the lusts of rude men in unsettled times, gave many an inmate to the convents.

In general, however, natural indolence, a desire to avoid the round of drudgery at the well, the hoe, or in the kitchen, or as nurse, sent the majority of applicants to knock at the convent doors. Occasionally a noble lady was won to recluse life from the very apartments of the emperor, or his ministers, by the eloquence of a bonze who was more zealous than loyal. In a few of the convents, only ladies of wealth could enter. The monk and nun, in Japanese as in European history, romance, and drama, and art, are staple characters. The rules of these monastic institutions forbade the eating of fish or flesh, the drinking of sake, the wearing of the hair or of fine clothes, indulgence in certain sensuous pleasures, or the reading of certain books. Fastings, vigils, reflection, continual prayer by book, bell, candle, and beads, were enjoined. Pious pilgrimages were undertaken. The erection of a shrine, image, belfry, or lantern by begging contributions was a frequent and meritorious enterprise. There stand today thousands of these monuments of the piety, zeal, and industry of the mediaeval monks and nuns. Those at Nara and Kamakura are the most famous. The Kamakura Dai Butsu (Great Buddha) has been frequently described before. It is a mass of copper 44 feet high, and a work of high art. The image at Nara was first erected in the eighth century, destroyed during the civil wars, and recast about seven hundred years ago. Its total height is 53 feet; its face is 16 feet long, and 9 feet wide. The width of its shoulders is 28 feet. Nine hundred and sixty-six curls adorn its head, around which is a halo 78 feet in diameter, on which are sixteen images, each 8 feet long. The casting of the idol is said to have been tried seven times before it was successfully accomplished, and 3000 tons of charcoal were used in the operation. The metal, said to weigh 450 tons, is a bronze composed of gold (500 pounds), mercury (1954 pounds), tin (16,827 pounds), and copper (986,080 pounds). Many millions of tons of copper were mined and melted to make these idols. Equally renowned were the great temple-bells of Kioto, and of Miidera, and various other monasteries. Some of these were ten feet high, and adorned with sacred texts from the Buddhist Scriptures, and images of heavenly beings, or Buddha on the sacred lotus in Nirvana, in high relief. As usual, the nimbus, or halo, surrounds his head. Two dragon-heads formed the summit, and ear, by which it was hung to its beam by an iron Jink. The bell was struck on a raised round spot, by a hammer of wood—a small tree-trunk swung loosely on two ropes. After impact, the bellman held the beam on its rebound, until the quivering monotone began to die away. Few sounds are more solemnly sweet than the mellow music of a Japanese temple-bell. On a still night, a cir cumference of twenty miles was flooded by the melody of the great bell of Zozoji, The people learned to love their temple-bell as a dear friend, as its note changed with the years and moods of life.

The casting of a bell was ever the occasion of rejoicing and public festival. When the chief priest of the city announced that one was to be made, the people brought contributions in money, or offerings of bronze gold, pure tin, or copper vessels. Ladies gave with their own hands the mirrors which had been the envy of lovers, young girls laid their silver hair-pins and bijouterie on the heap. When metal enough and in due proportion had been amassed, crucibles were made, earth-furnaces dug, the molds fashioned, and huge bellows, worked by standing men at each end, like a seesaw, were mounted; and, after due prayers and consultation, the auspicious day was appointed. The place selected was usually on a hill or commanding place. The people, in their gayest dress, assembled in picnic parties, and with song and dance and feast waited while the workmen, in festal uniform, toiled, and the priests, in canonical robes, watched. The fires were lighted, the bellows oscillated, the blast roared, and the crucibles were brought to the proper heat and the contents to fiery fiuidity, the joy of the crowd increasing as each stage in the process was announced. When the molten flood was finally poured into the mold, the excitement of the spectators reached a height of uncontrollable enthusiasm. Another pecuniary harvest was reaped by the priests before the crowds dispersed, by the sale of stamped kerchiefs or paper containing a holy text, or certifying to the presence of the purchaser at the ceremony, and the blessing of the gods upon him therefor. Such a token became an heir-loom; and the child who ever afterward heard the sol-emn boom of the bell at matin or evening was constrained, by filial as well as holy motives, to obey and reverence its admonitory call. The belfry was usually a separate building apart from the temple, with elaborate cornices and roof.

In addition to the offices of religion, many of the priests were useful men, and real civilizers. They were not all lazy monks or idle bonzes. By the Buddhist priests many streams were spanned with bridges, paths and roads made, shade or fruit trees planted, ponds and ditches for purposes of irrigation dug, aqueducts built, unwholesome localities drained, and mountain passes discovered or explored. Many were the school-masters, and, as learned men, were consulted on subjects beyond the ken of their parishioners. Some of them, having a knowledge of medicine, acted as physicians. The sciences and arts in Japan all owe much to the bonzes who from Corea personally introduced many useful appliances or articles of food. Several edible vegetables are still named after the priests, who first taught their use. The exact sciences, astronomy and mathematics, as well as the humanities, owe much of their cultivation and development to clerical scholars. In the monasteries, the brethren exercised their varied gifts, in preaching, study, calligraphy, carving, sculpture, or on objects of ecclesiastical art.

The monuments by which the memory of many a saintly bonze is still kept green exist today as treasures on the altars, or in the temple or its shady precincts, in winged words or material substance. A copy of the Buddhist Scriptures, a sacred classic, in roll or bound volume, might occupy a holy penman before his brush and ink-stone for years. The manuscript texts which I have often seen in the hall of worship on silky paper bound in damask, in Japanese monasteries, could not be improved in elegance and accuracy by the printer's art. The transcription of a sutra on silk, made to adorn the wall of a shrine, in many cases performed its mission for centuries.

Another monk excelled in improvisation of sacred stanzas, another painted the pictures and scrolls by which the multitude were taught by the priest, with his pointer in hand, the mysteries of theology, the symbols of worship, the terrors of the graded hells and purgatories, and the felicities of Nirvana. Another of the fraternity, with cunning hand, compelled the wonder of his brethren by his skill in carving. He could, from a log which today had its bark on, bring forth in time the serene countenance of Buddha, the ravishing beauty of Kuanon, the Goddess of Mercy, the scowling terrors of the God of War, the frightful visage of Fudo, or the hideous face of the Lord of Hell. Another was famous for molding the clay for the carver, the sculptor, or the bronzesmith. Many articles of altar furniture, even to the incense-sticks and flowers, were often made entirely by clerical hands.

During the Middle Ages, the arts of pottery, lacquering, gilding, bronze-casting, engraving and chasing, chisel and punch work, sword-making, goldsmith's work, were brought to a perfection never since excelled, if indeed it has been equaled. In enameled and inlaid metal work the hand of the Japanese artisan has undoubtedly lost its cunning. Native archaeologists assert that a good catalogue of "lost arts" may be made out, notably those of the composition and application of violet lacquer, and the ancient cloisonné enamel. The delicacy of tact, freedom of movement, and perfection of finish visible on Japanese work, are the result of long hereditary application and concentrated skill. Hidden away in sequestered villages, or occupying the same workshop in cities for centuries, generations of craftsmen wrought upon one class of objects, until from the workman's hand is born the offspring of a long pedigree of thought and dexterity. Japanese antiquarians fix the date of the discovery of lacquer-ware variously at A.D. 724 and 900. Echizen, from the first, has been noted for the abundance and luxuriant yield of lacquer-trees, and the skill of her workmen in extracting the milk-white virgin sap, which the action of the air turns to black, and which by pigments is changed to various colors. In the thirteenth century the art of gold-lacquering attained the zenith of perfection. Various schools of lacquer art were founded, one excelling in landscape, another in marine scenery, or the delinea-tion, in gold and silver powder and varnish, of birds, insects, and flowers. The masters who flourished during the Hojo period still rule the pencil of the modern artist.

Kioto, as the civil and military as well as ecclesiastical capital of the empire, was the centre and standard of manners, language, and etiquette, of art, literature, religion, and government. No people are more courtly and polished in their manners than the Japanese, and my visit to Kioto in 1873 impressed me with the fact that the citizens of this proud miako surpass all others in Japan in refined manners, and the graces of address and etiquette. The direct influences of court life have made themselves perceptibly felt on the inhabitants of the city.

From this centre radiated the multifarious influences which have molded the character of the nation. The country priest came as pilgrim to the capital as to the Holy City, to strengthen his faith and cheer his soul amidst its inspirations, to see the primate and magnates of his sect, to pray at the famous shrines, to study in the largest monasteries, under the greatest lights and holiest teachers. Returning to his parish, new sanctity was shed from his rustling robes. His brethren welcomed him with awe, and the people thronged to see and venerate the holy man who had drunk at the very fountains of the faith. The temple coffers grew heavy with the weight of offerings because of him. The sons of the noblemen in distant provinces were sent to Kioto to be educated, to learn reading and writing from the priests, the perfection of the art of war in the army, the etiquette of palace life as pages to, or as guests of, the court nobles. The artisan or rich merchant from Oshiu or Kadzusa, who had made the journey to Kioto, astonished his wondering listeners at home with tales of the splendor of the processions of the mikado, the wealth of the temples, the number of the pagodas, the richness of the silk robes of the court nobles, and the wonders which the Kioto potters and vase makers, sword-forgers, goldsmiths, lacquerers, crystal-cutters, and bronze-molders, daily exposed in their shops in profusion.

In Kioto also dwelt the poets, novelists, historians, grammarians, writers, and the purists, whose dicta were laws. By them were written the great bulk of the classic literature, embracing poetry, drama, fiction, history, philosophy, etiquette, and the numerous diaries and works on travel in China, Corea, and the remote provinces of the country, and the books called "mirrors" (kagami) of the times, now so interesting to the antiquarian student. Occasionally nobles or court ladies would leave the luxury of the city, and take up their abode in a castle, tower, pagoda, or temple room, or on some mountain overlooking Lake Biwa, the sea, or the Yodo River, or the plains of Yamato; and amidst its inspiring scenery, with tiny table, ink-stone and brush, pen some prose epic or romance, that has since become an immortal classic. Almost every mansion of the nobles had its "looking-room," or "Chamber of Inspiring View," whence to gaze upon the landscape or marine scenery. Rooms set apart for this aesthetic pleasure still form a feature of the house of nearly every modem native of means. On many a coigne of vantage may be seen also the summer-houses or rustic booths, where gather pleasure parties on picnics.

In the civil administration of the empire, the chief work was to dispense justice, punish offenders, collect taxes, and settle disputes. After the rude surveys of those days, the boundaries of provinces and departments were marked by inscribed posts of wood or stone. Before the days of writing, the same end was secured by charcoal buried in the earth at certain points, the durability of which insured the mark against decay. The peasants, after the rice-harvest was over, brought their tribute, or taxes, with joyful ceremony, to the goverment granaries in straw bags, packed on horses gayly decorated with scarlet housings, and jingling with clusters of small bells. A relic of this custom is seen in the bunches of bells suspended by red cotton stuff from the rear of the pack-saddle, which dangle musically from the ungainly haunches of the native sumpters.

From earliest times there existed seki (guard gates or barriers) between the various provinces at mountain passes or strategic points. As feudalism developed, they grew more numerous. A fence of palisades, stretched across the road, guarded the path through which, according to time, or orders of the keepers, none could pass with arms, or without the password or passport. Anciently they were erected at the Hakone and other mountain passes, to keep up the distinction between the Ainos and the pure Japanese. The possession of these barriers was ever an important object of rival military commanders, and the shifts, devices, and extraordinary artifices resorted to by refugees, disguised worthies, and forbidden characters, furnish the historian, the novelist, and dramatist with some of their most thrilling episodes.

It is related of Yoshitsuné, after he had incurred the wrath of Yoritomo, that, with Benkei, his servant, he arrived at a guard gate kept by some Genji soldiers, who would have been sure to arrest him had they discovered his august personality. Disguised as wandering priests of the Buddhist sect Yama-bushi, they approached the gate, and were challenged by the sentinel, who, like most of his class at that time, was ignorant of writing. Benkei, with great dignity, drawing from his bosom a roll of blank paper, began, after touching it reverently to his forehead, to extemporize and read aloud in choicest and most pious language a commission from the high-priest at the temple of Hokoji, in Kioto, in which stood the great image of Buddha, authorizing him to collect money to cast a colossal bell for the temple. At the first mention of the name of his reverence the renowned priest, so talismanic in all the empire, the soldier dropped down on his knees with face to the ground, and listened with reverent awe, unaware that the paper was as blank as the reader's tongue was glib. To further lull suspicion, Benkei apologized for the rude conduct of his servant-boy, who stood during the reading, because he was only a boor just out of the rice-fields; and, giving him a kick, bid him get down on his marrow-bones, and not stand up in the presence of a gentleman and a soldier. The ruse was complete. The illustrious youth and his servant passed on.

Medical science made considerable progress in the course of centuries. The materia medica, system, practice, and literature of the healing art were borrowed from China; but upon these, as upon most other matters, the Japanese improved. Acupuncture, or the introduction of needles into living tissues for remedial purposes, was much improved by the Japanese. The puncturing needles, as fine as a hair, were made of gold, silver, or tempered steel, by experts. The bones, large nerves, or blood-vessels were carefully avoided in the process, which enjoyed great repute in cases of a peculiar violent colic, to which the natives are subject, and which sometimes becomes endemic. On the theory that this malady was caused by wind, holes were made in the stomach or abdomen, to the mystic number of nine—corresponding to the nine apertures of the body. Moxa (Japanese, mokusa; mo, fire, from moyeru, to burn, and kusa, herb, grass), or the burning of a small cone of cottony fibres of the artemisia, on the back or feet, was practiced as early as the eleventh century, reference being made to it in a poem written at that time. A number of ancient stanzas and puns relating to Mount Ibuki, on the sides of which the mugwort grows luxuriantly, are still extant. To this day it is an exception to find the backs of the common people unscarred with the spots left by the moxa. The use of mercury in corrosive sublimate was very anciently known. The do-sha powder, however, which was said to cure various diseases, and to relax the rigid limbs of a corpse, was manu-factured and sold only by the bonzes (Japanese, bozu) of the Shin Gon sect. It is, and always was, a pious fraud, being nothing but uneflicacious quartz sand, mixed with grains of mica and pyrites.

Of the medieval sports and pastimes within and without of doors, the former were preferred by the weak and effeminate, the latter by the hale and strong. Banquets and carousals in the palace were fre-quent. The brewing of sake from rice was begun, according to record, in the third century, and the office of chief butler even earlier. The native sauce, sho-yu, made of fermented wheat and beans, with salt and vinegar, which the cunning purveyors of Europe use as the basis of their high-priced piquant sauces, was made and used as early as the twelfth century. The name of this saline oil (sho, salt ; yu, oil) ap-pears as "soy" in our dictionaries, it being one of the three words (soy, bonze, moxa) which we have borrowed from the Japanese. At the feasts, besides the wine and delicacies to please the palate, music, song, and dance made the feast of reason and the flow of soul, while witty and beautiful women lent grace and added pleasure to the festivities.

In long trailing robes of white, crimson, or highly figured silk, with hair flowing in luxuriance over the shoulders, and bound gracefully in one long tress which fell below the waist behind, maids and ladies of the palace rained glances and influence upon the favored ones. They fired the heart of admirers by the bewitching beauty of a well-formed hand, foot, neck, face, or form decked with whatever added charms cosmetics could bestow upon them. Japanese ladies have ever been noted for neatness, good taste, and, on proper occasions, splendor and luxuriance of dress. With fan, and waving long sleeve, the language of secret but outwardly decorous passion found ample expression. Kisses, the pressure of the hand, and other symbols of love as expressed in other lands, were then, as now, unknown. In humble life also, in all their social pleasures the two sexes met together to participate in the same delights, with far greater freedom than is known in Asiatic countries. As, however, wives or concubines had not always the attractions of youth, beauty, wit, maidenly freshness,or skill at the koto, the geisha, or singing-girl, then as now, served the sake, danced, sung, and played, and was rewarded by the gold or gifts of the host, or perhaps became his Hagar. The statement that the empress was attended only by "vestals who had never beheld a man" is disproved by a short study of the volumes of poetry, amorous and otherwise, written by them, and still quoted as classic. As to the standard of virtue in those days, I believe it was certainly not below that of the later Roman empire, and I am inclined to believe it was far above it.

In the court at Kioto, besides games of skill or chance in the house, were foot -ball, cock-fighting, falconry, horsemanship, and archery. The robust games of the military classes were hunting the boar, deer, bear, and smaller game. Hunting by falcons, which had been introduced by some Corean embassadors in the time of Jingu Kogo, was almost as extensively practiced as in Europe, almost every feudal lord having his perch of falcons. Fishing by cormorants, though a useful branch of the fisherman's industry, was also indulged in for pleasure. The severe exercise of bunting for sport, however, never became as absorbing and popular in Japan as in Europe, being confined more to the professional huntsman, and the seeker for daily food.

The court ladies shaved off their eyebrows, and painted two sable bars or spots on the forehead resembling false eyebrows. In addition to the gentle tasks of needle-work and embroidery, they passed the time in games of chess, checkers, painted shells, and a diversion peculiar to the palace, in which the skill of the player depended on her sensitiveness in appreciating perfumes, the necessary articles being vials of fragrant extracts. Their pets were the peculiar little dogs called chin. They stained their teeth black, like the women of the lower classes; an example which the nobles of the sterner sex followed, as they grew more and more effeminate. One of the staple diversions of both sexes at the court was to write poetry, and recite it to each other. The emperor frequently honored a lady or noble by giving the chosen one a subject upon which to compose a poem. A happy thought, skillfully wrought stanza, a felicitous grace of pantomime, often made the poetess a maid of honor, a concubine, or even an empress, and the poet a minister or councilor.

Another favorite means of amusement was to write and read or tell stories —the Scheherezade of these being a beautiful ladv, who often composed her own stories. The following instance is abbreviated from the Onna Dai Gaku ("Woman's Great Study") : Isé no Taiyu was a daughter of Sukeichika, the mikado's minister of festivals, and a highly accomplished lady. None among the ladies of the court could equal her. One day a branch of luxuriant cherry-blossoms was brought from Nara. The emperor gave it to her, and asked her to extemporize a verse. She did so, and the courtiers were all astonished at the beauty and delicate sentiment of the verse.

Here is another : Murasaki Shikibu was the daughter of the lord of Echizen. One day a lady of Kamo asked if there was any new entertaining literature or novels, as the empress-dowager wished to read something new. The lady invited Murasaki to write some stories. She, knowing that the great Chinese scholar Shomei completed his collection of the essays of ancient writers by building a high house and secluding himself in it, had a high tower erected at Ishiyama overlooking Lake Biwa, and affording a glorious view of the mountains, especially in the moonlight. There she retired, and one night when the full moon shone upon the waters she was so inspired that she wrote in one night two chapters of the Genji Monogatari a book containing fifty-four chapters in all, which she finished in a few weeks. She presented it to the empress-dowager, who gave it to the mikado. To this day it is a classic.

Sei Shonagon was the daughter of Kiyowara no Motosuké. She was one of the imperial concubines. She was well read in Japanese and Chinese literature, and composed poetry almost from infancy, having a wonderful facility of improvisation. One day, after a fall of snow, she looked out from the southern door of the palace. The emperor, having passed round the wine-cup to his lords and ladies at the usual morning assembly of the courtiers and maids of honor, said, "How is the snow of Kuroho?" No one else understood the meaning, but Sei Shonagon instantly stepped forward and drew up the curtains, revealing the mountains decked in fresh-fallen snow. The emperor was delighted, and bestowed upon her a prize. Sei Shonagon had understood his allusion to the line in an ancient poem which ran thus:

"The snow of Kuroho is seen by raising the curtains."

Once when a certain kuge was traveling in a province, he came, on a moonlight night, to a poor village in which the cottages had fallen into picturesque decay, the roofs of which gleamed like silver. The sight of the glorified huts inspired the noble with such a fine frenzy that he sat up all night gazing rapturously on the scene, anon composing stanzas. He was so delighted that he planned to remain in the place several days. The next morning, however, the villagers, hearing of the presence of so illustrious a guest among them, began busily to repair the ruin, and to rethatch the roofs. The kugé, seeing all his poetic visions dispelled by this vandal industry, ordered his bullock-car, and was off, disgusted.

During the first centuries of writing in Japan, the spoken and the written language were identical. With the study of the Chinese literature, and the composition of works by the native literati almost exclusively in that language, grew up differences between the colloquial and literary idiom and terminology. The infusion of a large number of Chinese words into the common speech steadily increased; while the learned affected a pedantic style of conversation, so interlarded with Chinese words, names, and expressions, that to the vulgar their discourse was almost unintelligible. Buddhism also made Chinese the vehicle of its teachings, and the people everywhere became familiar, not only with its technical terms, but with its stock phrases and forms of thought. To this day the Buddhist, or sham-religious, way of talking is almost a complete tongue in itself, and a good dictionary always gives the Buddhistic meaning of a word separately. In reading or hearing Japanese, the English-speaking resident continually stumbles on his own religious cant and orthodox expressions, which he believes to be peculiar to his own atmosphere, that have a meaning entirely different from the natural sense : "this vale of tears," "this evil world," "gone to his reward," "dust and ashes," "worm of the dust," and many phrases which so many think are exclusively Christian or evangelical, are echoed in Japanese. So much is this true, that the missionaries, in translating religious books, are at first delighted to find exact equivalents for many expressions desirable in technical theology, or for what may fairly be termed pious slang, but will not use them, for fear of misleading the reader, or rather of failing to lead him out of his old notions into the new faith which it is desired to teach. So general have the use and affectation of Chinese become, that in many instances the pedantic Chinese name or word has been retained in the mouths of the people, while the more beautiful native term is almost lost. In general, however, only the men were devoted to Chinese, while the cultivation of the Japanese language was left to the women. This task the women nobly discharged, fully maintaining the credit of the native literature. Mr. W. G. Aston says, "I believe no parallel is to be found in the history of European letters, to the remarkable fact that a very large proportion of the best writings of the best age of Japanese literature was the work of women." The Genji Monogatari is the acknowledged standard of the language for the period to which it belongs, and the parent of the Japanese novel. This, with the classics Isé Monogatari and Makura Zoshi, and much of the poetry of the time, are the works of women.

It is to be noted that the borrowed Chinese words were taken entirely from the written, not the colloquial, language of China, the latter having never been spoken by the Japanese, except by a few interpreters at Nagasaki. The Japanese literary style is more concise, and retains archaic forms. The colloquial abounds in interjectional and onomatopoetic words and particles, uses a more simple inflection of the verb, and makes profuse use of honorific and polite terms. Though these particles defy translation, they add grace and force to the language. As in the English speech, the child of the Avedded Saxon and Norman, the words which express the wants, feelings, and concerns of everyday life—all that is deepest in the human heart—are for the most part native; the technical, scientific, and abstract terms are foreign. Hence, if we would find the fountains of the musical and beautiful language of Japan, we must seek them in the hearts, and hear them flow from the lips, of the mothers of the Island Empire. Among the anomalies wnth which Japan has surprised or delighted the world may be claimed that of woman's achievements in the domain of letters. It was woman's genius, not man's, that made the Japanese a literary language. Moses established the Hebrew, Alfred the Saxon, and Luther the German tongue in permanent form; but in Japan, the mobile forms of speech crystallized into perennial beauty under the touch of woman's hand.

THE GROWTH AND CUSTOMS OF FEUDALISM.

Japan, of all the Asiatic nations, seems to have brought the feudal system to the highest state of perfection. Originating and deve-oping at the same time as in Europe, it became the constitution of the nation and the condition of society in the seventeenth century. When in Europe the nations were engaged in throwing off the feudal yoke and inaugurating modern government, Japan was riveting the fetters of feudalism, which stood intact until 1871. From the beginning of the thirteenth century, it had come to pass that there were virtually two rulers in Japan, and as foreigners, misled by the Hollanders at Déshima, supposed, two emperors.

The growth of feudalism in Japan took shape and form from the early division of the officials into civil and military. As we have seen, the Fujiwara controlled all the civil offices, and at first, in time of emergency, put on armor, led their troops to battle, and braved the dangers of war and the discomforts of the camp. In time, however, this great family, yielding to that sloth and luxury which ever seem, like an insidious disease, to ruin greatness in Japan, ceased to take the field themselves, and delegated the uncongenial tasks of war to certain members of particular noble families. Those from which the greatest number of shoguns were appointed were the Taira and Minamoto, that for several centuries held the chief military appointments. As luxury, corruption, intrigue, and effeminacy increased at the capital, the difficulty of keeping the remote parts of the empire in order increased, especially in the North and East. The War Department became disorganized, and the generals at Kioto lost their ability to enforce their orders.

Many of the peasants, on becoming soldiers, had, on account of their personal valor or merit, been promoted to the permanent garrison of household troops. Once in the gay capital, they learned the details of intrigue and politics. Some were made court pages, or attendants on men of high rank, and thus learned the routine of official duty. They caught the tone of life at court, where every man was striving for rank and his own glory, and they were not slow to imitate their august examples. Returning to their homes with the prestige of having been in the capital, they intrigued for power in their native districts, and gradually obtained rule over them, neglecting to go when duty called them to Kioto, and ignoring the orders of their superiors in the War Department. The civil governors of the provinces dared not to molest, or attempt to bring these petty tyrants to obedience. Having armor, horses, and weapons, they were able to train and equip their dependents and servants, and thus provide themselves with an armed following.

Thus was formed a class of men who called themselves warriors, and were ever ready to serve a great leader for pay. The natural consequence of such a state of society was the frequent occurrence of village squabbles, border brawls, and the levying of black-mail upon defenseless people, culminating in the insurrection of a whole province. The disorder often rose to such a pitch that it was necessary for the court to interfere, and an expedition was sent from Kioto, under the command of a Taira or Minamoto leader. The shogun, instead of waiting to recruit his army in the regular manner—a process doubtful of results in the disorganized state of the War Department and of the country in general—had immediate recourse to others of these veteran "warriors," who were already equipped, and eager for a fray.

Frequent repetition of the experience of the relation of brothers in arms, of commander and commanded, of rewarder and rewarded, gradually grew into that of lord and retainers. Each general had his special favorites and followers, and the professional soldier looked upon his commander as the one to whom his allegiance was directly due. The distant court at Kioto, being utterly unable to enforce its authority, put the whole power of quieting the disturbed districts, whenever the disorder increased beyond the ability of the civil magistrate to repress it, into the hands of the Minamoto and Taira. These families thus became military clans and acquired enormous influence, enjoyed the monopoly of military patronage, and finally became the virtual rulers of the land.

The power of the sword was, as early as the twelfth century, lost to the court, which then attempted, by every means in its power, to check the rising influence of the military families and classes. They began by denying them high rank, thus putting them under social ban. They next attempted to lay an interdict upon the warriors bv forbidding them to ally themselves with either the Taira or the Minamoto. This availed nothing, for the warriors knew who rewarded them. They then endeavored, with poor success, to use one family as a check upon the other. Finally, when the Minamoto, Yoriyoshi, and Yoshiiye conquered all the north of Hondo, and kept in tranquillity the whole of the Kuanto for fifteen years, even paying governmental expenses from their private funds, the court ignored their achievements. When they petitioned for rewards to be bestowed on their soldiers, the dilatory and reluctant, perhaps jealous, nobles composing the court not only neglected to do so, but left them without the imperial commission, and dishonored their achievements by speaking of them as "private feuds." Hence they took the responsibility, and conferred upon their soldiers grants of the conquered land in their own name. The Taira followed the same policy in the south and west.

When Yoritomo became Sei-i Tai Shogun at Kamakura, erected the dual system, and appointed a military with a civil governor of each province in the interest of good order, feudalism assumed national proportions. Such a distribution soon ceased to be a balance, the military pan in the scale gained weight and the civil lost until it kicked the beam. At the end of the Hojo domination, the court had lost the government of the provinces, and the kugé (court nobles) had been despoiled and impoverished by the buké (military). So thoroughly had feudalism become the national polity, that in the temporary mikadoate, 1534-1536, the Emperor Go-Daigo rewarded those who had restored him by grants of land for them to rule in their own names as his vassals.

Under the Ashikagas, the hold of even the central military authority, or chief daimio, was lost, and the empire split up into fragments. Historians have in vain attempted to construct a series of historical maps of this period. The pastime was war —a game of patchwork in which land continually changed possessors. There was no one great leader of sufficient power to overawe all; hence might made right; and whoever had the ability, valor, or daring to make himself pre-eminent above his fellows, and seized more land, his power would last until he was overcome by a stronger, or his family decayed through the effeminacy of his descendants. During this period, the great clans with whose names the readers of the works of the Jesuits and Dutch writers are familiar, or which have been most prominent since the opening of the empire, took their rise. They were those of Hosokawa Uyesugi, Satake, Takeda, the "later Hojo of Odawara," Mori, Otomo, Shimadzu, Riuzoji, Ota, and Tokugawa,

As the authority of the court grew weaker and weaker, the allegiance which all men owed to the mikado, and which they theoretically acknowledged, was changed into loyalty to the military chief. Every man who bore arms was thus attached to some "great name" (daimio), and became a vassal (kerai). The agricultural, and gradually the other classes, also put themselves, or were forcibly included, under the protection of some castle lord or nobleman having an armed following. The taxes, instead of being collected for the central government, flowed into the treasury of the local rulers. This left the mikado and court without revenue. The kugé, or Kioto nobles, were thus stripped of wealth, until their poverty became the theme for the caricaturist. Nevertheless, the eye of their pride never dimmed. In their veins, they knew, ran the blood of the gods, while the daimios were only "earth- thieves," and the parvenus of feudalism. They still cherished their empty titles; and to all students of history their poverty was more honorable than all the glitter of the shogun's train, or the splendor of the richest daimio's mansion.

The daimios spent their revenues on their retainers, their personal pleasures, and in building castles. In almost every feudal city, or place of strategic importance, the towers, walls, and moats of these characteristic specimens of Japanese architecture could be seen. The strictest vigilance was maintained at the castle-gates, and a retainer of another damio, however hospitably entertained elsewhere, was never allowed entrance into the citadel. A minute code of honor, a rude sort of chivalry, and an exalted sense of loyalty were the growth of the feudal system.

Many of the mediaeval military customs were very interesting. During this period the habit originated of the men shaving the hair off their temples and from the middle of the scalp, and binding the long cue into a top-knot, which was turned forward and laid on the scalp. The object of this was to keep the hair out of the eyes during battle, and also to mark the wearer as a warrior. Gradually it became a universal custom, extending to all classes.

When, in 1873, the reformers persuaded the people to cut off their knots and let their hair grow, the latter refused to "imitate the foreigners," and supposed they were true conservatives, when, in reality, the ancient Japanese knew nothing of shaven faces and scalps, or of top-knots. The ancient warriors wore mustaches, and even beards. The practice of keeping the face scrupulously bare, until recently so universally observed except by botanists and doctors, is comparatively modern.

The military tactics and strategic arts of the Japanese were anciently copied from the Chinese, but were afterward modified as the nature of the physical features of their country and the institutions of feudalism required. No less than seven distinct systems were at different times in vogue; but that perfected by Takeda and Uyesugi, in the Ashikaga period, finally bore off the palm. These tactics continued to command the esteem and practice of the Japanese until the revolution wrought by the adoption of the European systems in the present century. The surface of the country being so largely mountainous, uneven, and covered with rice-swamps, cavalry were but little employed. A volley of arrows usually opened the battle, followed by a general engagement along the whole line. Single combats between comanders of hostile armies were of frequent occurrence. When they met on the field, their retainers, according to the strict etiquette of war, gave no aid to either, but encouraged them by shouts, as they called out each other's names and rushed to the combat. The battle slackened while the leaders strove, the armies becoming spectators. The victor cut off the head of his antagonist, and, holding it up, shouted his name and claimed the victory. The triumph or defeat of their leaders often decided the fate of the army. Vengeance against the victor was not permitted to be taken at the time, but must be sought again, the two armies again joining battle. The fighting over, those who had slain distinguished personages must exhibit their heads before their chiefs, who bestowed rewards upon them. This practice still continues; and during the expedition in Formosa in 1874, the chief trophies were the heads of the Boutan cannibals; though the commander, General Saigo, attempted to abolish the custom. Whoever saved his chieftain's life on the field was honored with the place of highest rank in the clan. These customs had a tremendous in- fluence in cultivating valor and a spirit of loyalty in the retainer toward the prince. The meanest soldier, if brave and faithful, might rise to the highest place of honor, rank, emolument, and influence. The bestowal of a reward, the investiture of a command, or military promotion, was ever an occasion of impressive ceremony.

Even in time of peace the samurai never appeared out-of-doors unarmed, invariably wearing their two swords in their girdle. The offensive weapons—spears long and short, the bows, arrows, and quiver, and battle-axes—were set on their butts on the porch or vestibule in front of the house. Within doors, in the tokonoma, or recess, were ranged in glittering state the cuirass, helmet, greaves, gauntlets, and chain-mail. Over the sliding partitions, on racks, were the long hal-berds, which the women of the house were trained to use in case of attack during the absence of the men.

The gate of a samurai, or noble's, house was permanently guarded by his armed retainers, who occupied the porter's lodge beside it. Standing upright and ready were three long instruments, designed to entangle, throw down, and pin to the earth a quarrelsome applicant. Familiar faces passed unchallenged, but armed strangers were held at bay till their business was known. A grappling-iron, with barbed tongues turned in every direction, making a ball of hooks like an iron hedgehog, mounted on a pike-staff ten feet long, thrust into the Japanese loose clothing, sufficed to keep at a wholesome length any swash-buckler whose sword left its sheath too easily. Another spiked weapon, like a double rake, could be thrust between his legs and bring him to the earth. A third, shaped like a pitchfork, could hold him helpless under its wicket arch. Three heavy quarter staves were also ready, to belabor the struggling wight who would not yield, while swords on the racks hung ready for the last resort, or when intruders came in numbers. On rows of pegs hung wooden tickets about three inches square, branded or inscribed with the names of the retainers and servants of the lord's house, which were handed to the keeper of the gate as they passed in or out.

The soldiers wore armor made of thin scales of iron, steel, hardened hide, lacquered paper, brass, or shark-skin, chain-mail, and shields. The helmet was of iron, very strong, and lined within by buckskin. Its flap of articulated iron rings drooped well around the shoulders. The visor was of thin lacquered iron, the nose and mouth pieces being removable. The eyes were partially protected by the projecting front piece. A false mustache was supposed to make the upper lip of the warrior dreadful to behold. On the frontlet were the distinguishing symbols of the man, a pair of horns, a fish, an eagle, dragon, buck-horns, or flashing brass plates of various designs. Some of the helmets were very tall. Kato Kiyomasa's was three feet high. On the top was a hole, in which a pennant was thrust, or an ornament shaped like a pear inserted. The "pear-splitter" was the fatal stroke in combat and the prize-cut in fencing. Behind the corslet on the back was another socket, in which the clan flag was inserted. The breastplate was heavy and tough; the arms, legs, abdomen, and thighs were pro- tected by plates joined by woven chains. Shields were often use; and for forlorn-hopes or assaults, cavalrymen made use of a stuffed bag resembling a bolster, to receive a volley of arrows. Besides being-missile-proof, it held the arrows as spoils. On the shoulders, hanging loosely, were unusually wide and heavy brassarts, designed to deaden the force of the two-handed sword-stroke. Greaves and sandals completed the suit, which was laced and bound with iron clamps, and cords of buckskin and silk, and decorated with crests, gilt tassels, and glittering insignia. Suits of armor were of black, white, purple, crimson, violet, green, golden, or silver colors.

The rations of the soldiers were rice, fish, and vegetables. Instead of tents, huts of straw or boughs were easily erected to form a camp. The general's head -quarters were inclosed by canvas, stretched on posts six feet high, on which his armorial bearings were wrought. The weapons were bows and arrows, spear, sword, and, rarely, battle-axes and bow-guns; for sieges, fire-arrows. The general's scabbard was of tiger-skin. Supplies of this material were obtained from Corea, where the animal abounds. His baton was a small lacquered wand, with a cluster of strips of thick white paper dependent from the point. Flags, banners, and streamers were freely used; and a camp, castle, or moving army, in time of war, with its hundreds and thousands of flags, presented a gay and lively appearance. Drums, hard-wood clappers, and conch-shells sounded the reveille, the alarm, the onset, or the re- treat.

Owing to the nature of the ground, consisting chiefly of mountains and valleys, or plains covered with rice-swamps intersected by narrow paths, infantry were usually depended upon. In besieging a castle, the intrenchments of the investing army consisted chiefly of a line of palisades or heavy planks, propped up from within by hinged supports, at an angle of forty-five degrees, behind which the besiegers fought or lived in camp life, while sentinels paced at the gates. Lookouts were posted on overlooking hills, in trees, or in towers erected for the purpose. Sometimes huge kites able to sustain a man were flown, and a bird's-eye view of the interior of the enemy's castle thus obtained. Fire, treachery, stratagem, starvation, or shooting at long range having failed to compel surrender, an assault took place, in which the gates were smashed in, or the walls scaled. Usually great loss resulted before the besiegers were driven off, or were victorious. Rough surgery awaited the wounded. An arrow-barb was usually pulled out by a jerk of the pincers. A sabre-cut was sewed or bound together with tough paper, of which every soldier carried a supply. The wonderfully adhesive, absorptive, and healing power of the soft, tough, quickly wet, easily hardening, or easily kept pliable, Japanese paper made excellent plasters, bandages, tourniquets, cords, and towels. In the dressing of wounds, the native doctors to this day, as I have often had occasion to witness, excel.

Seppuku (belly-cut) or hara-kiri also came into vogue about the time of the beginning of the domination of the military classes. At first, after a battle, the vanquished wounded fell on their swords, drove them through their mouth or breast, or cut their throats. Often a famous soldier, before dying, would flay and score his own face beyond recognition, so that his enemies might not glory over him. This grew into a principle of honor; and frequently the unscathed survivors, defeated, and feeling the cause hopfeless, or retainers whose master was slain, committed suicide. Hence arose, in the Ashikaga period, the fashion of wearing two swords; one of which, the longer, was for enemies; the other, shorter, for the wearer's own body. The practice of hara-kiri as a judicial sentence and punishment did not come into vogue until in the time of the Tokugawas.

Thrust into a tiny scabbard at the side of the dirk, or small sword, was a pair of chopsticks to eat with in camp. Anciently these were skewers, to thrust through the top-knot of a decapitated enemy, that the head might be easily carried. Besides, or in lieu of them, was a small miniature sword, ko-katana (little sword), or long, narrow knife. Although this was put to various trivial uses, such as those for which we employ a penknife, yet its primary purpose was that of the card of the owner. Each sword was adorned with some symbol or crest, which served to mark the clan, family, or person of the owner.

The Satsuma men wore swords with red-lacquered scabbards. Later, the Tokugawa vassals, who fought in the battle of Sekigahara, were called "white hilts," because they wore swords of extraordinary length, with white hilts. The bat, the falcon, the dragon, lion, tiger, owl, and hawk, were among the most common designs wrought in gold, lacquer, carving, or alloy on the hilts, handles, or scabbard; and on the ko-katana was engraved the name of the owner.

Feudalism was the mother of brawls innumerable, and feuds between families and clans continually existed. The wife whose husband was slain by the grudge-bearer brought up her sons religiously to avenge their father's death. The vendetta was unhindered by law and applauded by society. The moment of revenge selected was usually that of the victim's proudest triumph. After promotion to office, succession to patrimony, or at his marriage ceremony, the sword of the avenger did its bloody work. Many a bride found herself a widow on her wedding-night. Many a child became an orphan in the hour of the father's acme of honor. When the murder was secret, at night, or on the wayside, the head was cut off, and the avenger, plucking out his ko-katana thrust it in the ear of the victim, and let it lie on the public highway, or sent it to be deposited before the gate of the house. The ko-katana, with the name engraved on it, told the whole story.

Whenever the lord of a clan wished his rival or enemy out of the way, he gave the order of Herodias to her daughter to his faithful retainers, and usually the head in due time was brought before him, as was John's, on a charger or ceremonial stand.

The most minutely detailed etiquette presided over the sword, the badge of the gentleman. The visitor whose means allowed him to be accompanied by a servant always left his long sword in his charge when entering a friend's house; the salutation being repeated bowing of the forehead to the floor while on the hands and knees, the breath being sucked in at the same time with an impressive sound. The degree of obeisance was accurately graded according to rank. If alone, the visitor laid his sword on the floor of the vestibule. The host's servants, if so instructed by their master, then, with a silk napkin in hand, removed it inside and placed it, with all honor, on the sword-rack. At meetings between those less familiar, the sheathed weapon was withdrawn from the girdle and laid on the floor to the right, an indication of friendship, since it could not be drawn easily. Under suspicious circumstances, it was laid to the left, so as to be at hand. On short visits, the dirk was retained in the girdle; on festal occasions, or prolonged visits, it was withdrawn. To clash the sheath of one's sword against that of another was a breach of etiquette that often resulted in instantaneous and bloody reprisal. The accompanying cut by Hokusai represents such a scene. The story is a true one, and well told by Mitford. Fuwa Banzaemon —he of the robe marked with the nurétsubami (swallow in a shower)—and Nagoya Sanzaburo—he of the coat figured with the device of lightning—both enemies, and ronin, as their straw hats show, meet, and intentionally turn back to back and clash scabbards, holding their hands in tragic attitude. In a moment more, so the picture tells us, the insulted scabbards will be empty, and the blades crossed in deadly combat. In the story, which has been versified and dramatized, and which on the boards will hold an audience breathless, Nagoya finally kills Fuwa The writing at the side of the sketch gives the clue to the incident : saya-até (scabbard-collision), equivalent to our "flinging down the gauntlet."

To turn the sheath in the belt as if about to draw was tantamount to a challenge. To lay one's weapon on the floor of a room, and kick the guard toward a person, was an insult that generally resulted in a combat to the death. Even to touch another's weapon in any way was a grave offense. No weapon was ever exhibited naked for any purpose, unless the wearer first profusely begged pardon of those present, A wisli to see a sword was seldom made, unless the blade was a rare one. The owner then held the back of the sword to the spectator, with the edge toward himself, and the hilt, wrapped in the little silk napkin which gentlemen always carry in their pocket-books, or a piece of white paper, to the left. The blade was then withdrawn from the scabbard, and admired inch by inch, but never entirely withdrawn unless the owner pressed his guest to do so, when, with much apology, the sword was entirely withdrawn and held away from those present. Many gentlemen took a pride in making collections of swords, and the men of every samurai family wore weapons that were heir-looms, often centuries old. Women wore short swords when traveling, and the palace ladies in time of fires armed themselves.

In no country has the sword been made an object of such honor as in Japan. It is at once a divine symbol, a knightly weapon, and a certificate of noble birth. "The girded sword is the soul of the samurai." It is "the precious possession of lord and vassal from times older than the divine period." Japan is "the land of many blades." The gods wore and wielded two-edged swords. From the tail of the dragon was born the sword which the Sun-goddess gave to the first emperor of Japan. By the sword of the clustering clouds of heaven Yamato-Dake subdued the East. By the sword the mortal heroes of Japan won their fame.

"There's naught 'twixt heaven and earth that man need fear, who carries at his belt this single blade." "One's fate is in the hands of Heaven, but a skillful fighter does not meet with death." "In the last days, one's sword becomes the wealth of one's posterity." These are the mottoes graven on Japanese swords.

Names of famous swords belonging to the Taira, Minamoto, and other families are, "Little Crow," "Beard-cutter," "Knee-divider." The two latter, when tried on sentenced criminals, after severing the heads from the body, cut the beard, and divided the knee respectively. The forging of these swords occupied the smith sixty days. No artisans were held in greater honor than the sword-makers, and some of them even rose to honorary rank. The forging of a blade was often a religious ceremony. The names of Munechicka, Masamune, Yoshimitsu, and Muramasa, a few out of many noted smiths, are familiar words in the mouths of even Japanese children. The names, or marks and dates, of famous makers were ahvaj's attached to their blades, and from the ninth to the fifteenth century were sure to be genuine. In later times, the practice of counterfeiting the marks of well-known makers came into vogue. Certain swords considered of good omen in one family were deemed unlucky in others. I had frequent opportunities of examining several of the master-pieces of renowned sword-makers while in Japan, the property of kugés, daimios, and old samurai families, the museum at Kamakura being especially rich in famous old blades. The ordinary length of a sword was a fraction over two feet for the long and one foot for the short sword. All lengths were, however, made use of, and some of the old warriors on horseback wore swords over six feet long. The Japanese sword-blade averages about an inch in width, about seven-eighths of which is a backing of iron, to which a face of steel is forged along its entire length. The back, about one-fourth of an inch thick, bevels out very slightly to near the centre of the blade, which then narrows to a razor edge. The steel and the forging line are easily distinguished by a cloudiness on the mirror-like polish of the metal. An inch and a quarter from the point, the width of the blade liaving been decreased one-fourth, the edge is ground off to a semi-parabola, meeting the back, which is prolonged, untouched; the curve of the whole blade, from a straight line, being less than a quarter of an inch. The guard is often a piece of elaborate workmanship in metal, representing a landscape, water -scene, or various emblems. The hilt is formed by covering the prolonged iron handle by shark-skin and wrapping this with twisted silk. The ferule, washers, and elects are usually inlaid, embossed, or chased in gold, silver, or alloy. The rivets in the centre of the handle are concealed by designs, often of solid gold, such as the lion, dragon, cock, etc.

In full dress, the color of the scabbard was black, with a tinge of green or red in it, and the bindings of the hilt of blue silk. The taste of the wearer was often displayed in the color, size, or method of wearing his sword, gay or proud fellows affecting startling colors or extravagant length. Riven through ornamental ferules at the side of the scabbards were long, flat cords of woven silk of various tints, which were used to tie up the flowing sleeves, preparatory to fighting. Every part of a sword was richly inlaid, or expensively finished. Daimios often spent extravagant sums on a single blade, and small fortunes on a collection. A samurai, however poor, would have a blade of sure temper and rich mountings, deeming it honorable to suffer for food, that he might have a worthy emblem of his social rank as a samurai. A description of the various styles of blade and scabbard, lacquer, ornaments, and the rich vocabulary of terms minutely detailing each piece entering into the construction of a Japanese sword, the etiquette to be observed, the names, mottoes, and legends relating to them, would fill a large volume closely printed. A considerable portion of native literature is devoted to this one subject.

The bow and arrows were the chief weapons for siege ana long-range operations. A Japanese bow has a peculiar shape, as seen in the engraving. It was made of well-selected oak (kashi), incased on both sides with a semi-cylinder of split bamboo toughened by fire. The three pieces composing the bow were then bound firmly into one piece by thin withes of rattan, making an excellent combination of lightness, strength, and elasticity. The string was of hemp. Arrows were of various kinds and lengths, according to the arms of the archer. The average length of the war-arrow was three feet. The "turnip-head," "frog crotch," "willow-leaf," "armor- piercer," "bowel-raker," were a few of the various names for arrows. The "turnip-top," so named from its shape, made a singing noise as it flew. The "frog-crotch," shaped like a pitchfork, or the hind legs of a leaping-frog, with edo'ed blades, was used to cut down flags or sever helmet lacings. The "willow-leaf" was a two-edged, unbarbed head, shaped like the leaf of a willow. The "bowel-raker" was of a frightful shape, well worthy of the name; and the victim whose diaphragm it penetrated was not likely to stir about afterward. The "armor-piercer" was a plain bolt-head, with nearly blunt point, well calculated to punch through a breastplate. Barbs of steel were of various shape; sometimes very heavy, and often handsomely open worked. The shaft was of cane bamboo, with string-piece of bone or horn, whipped on with silk. Quivers were of leather, water-proof paper, or thin lacquered wood, and often splendidly adorned. Gold-inlaid weapons were common among the rich sol-diers, and the outfit of an officer often cost many hundreds of dollars. Not a few of these old tools of war have lost their significance, and have b-come household adornments, objects of art, or symbols of peace. Such especially are the emblems of the car- penter's guilds, which consist of the half-feathered "turnip-head" arrow, wreathed with leaves of the same succulent, and the " frog-crotch," inserted in the mouth of a dragon, crossed upon the ancient mallet of the craft. These adorn temples or houses, or are carried in the local parades and festivals. As Buddhism had become the pro- fessed religion of the entire nation, the vast majority of the military men were Buddhists. Each had his patron or deity. The soldier went into battle with an image of Buddha sewed in his helmet, and after victory ascribed glory to his divine deliverer. Many temples in Japan are the standing monuments of triumph in battle, or vows performed. Many of the noted captains, notably Kato, inscribed their banners with texts from the classics or the prayers, "Namu Amida Butsu," or "Namu mio ho," etc., according to their sect. Amulets and charms were worn almost without exception, and many a tale is told of arrows turned aside, or swords broken, that struck on a sacred image, picture, or text. Before entering a battle, or performing a special feat of skill or valor, the hero uttered the warrior's prayer, "Namu Hachiman Dai-bosatsu" (Glory to Hachiman, the incarnation of Great Buddha). Though brave heroes must, like ordinary men, pass through purgatory, yet death on the battlefield was reckoned highly meritorious, and the happiness of the warrior's soul in the next world was secured by the prayers of his wife and children.

NOBUNAGA, THE PERSECUTOR OF THE BUDDHIi^TS.

READING HALL

THE DOORS OF WISDOM