A History of the Japanese People Part 57

These tallies were distributed to several high constables, to five great temples, and to merchants in Hyogo and Sakai, the corresponding tallies* being entrusted to the Ouchi family, which, having now recovered its power, was charged with the duty of superintending the trade with China. Meanwhile, So Sadamori of Tsushima had established commercial relations with Chosen, and received from thence a yearly consignment of two hundred koku of soy beans, the vessel that carried the staple being guarded by boats known as Tsushima-bune.

*The tallies were cards on which a line of ideographs were inscribed.

The card was then cut along the line, and a moiety was given to the trader, the corresponding moiety being kept by the superintendent.

Thus, it fell out that the right of supervising the trade with China and Korea came into the exclusive possession of the Ouchi and the So, respectively, and being liberally encouraged, brought great wealth to them as well as to other territorial magnates of the central and southern provinces. The records show that large profits were realized. Four or five hundred per cent, is spoken of, and, further, the Ming sovereign, in Yoshimasa's time, responded generously, as has been already shown, to the shogun's appeal for supplies of copper cash. One j.a.panese fan could be exchanged for a copy of a valuable book, and a sword costing one kwan-mon in j.a.pan fetched five kwan-mon in China. Such prices were paid, however, for rare goods only, notably for j.a.panese raw silk, fifty catties (sixty-seven lbs.) of which sold for ten kwan-mon (15, or $75, approximately). Gold, too, was much more valuable in China than in j.a.pan. Ten ryo of the yellow metal could be obtained in j.a.pan for from twenty to thirty kwan-mon and sold in China for 130. Sealskins, swords, spears, pepper, sulphur, fans, lacquer, raw silk, etc. were the chief staples of exports; and velvet, musk, silk fabrics, porcelains, etc., const.i.tuted the bulk of the imports. The metropolis being Kyoto, with its population of some 900,000, Hyogo was the most important harbour for the trade, and after it came Hakata,* in Chikuzen; Bonotsu, in Satsuma; Obi, in Hyuga, and Anotsu, in Ise. The customs duties at Hyogo alone are said to have amounted to the equivalent of 15,000, or $75,000, annually.

*Hakata's place was subsequently taken by Hirado.

In China, Ningpo was the chief port. It had a mercantile-marine office and an inn for foreign guests. The tribute levied on the trade was sent thence to Nanking. In size the vessels employed were from 50 to 130 tons, greater dimensions being eschewed through fear of loss.

An invoice shows that the goods carried by a ship in 1458 were: sulphur (410,750 lbs.); copper (206,000 lbs.); spears (11); fans (1250); swords (9500); lacquered wares (634 packages), and sapan-wood (141,333 lbs.). During the days of Yoshimasa's shogunate such profits were realized that overtrading took place, and there resulted a temporary cessation. Fifty years later, when Yoshiharu ruled at Muromachi (1529), a Buddhist priest, Zuisa, sent by the shogun to China, and an envoy, Sosetsu, despatched by the Ouchi family, came into collision at Ningpo. It was a mere question of precedence, but in the sequel Zuisa was seized, Ningpo was sacked, and its governor was murdered. The arm of the shogun at that time could not reach the Ouchi family, and a demand for the surrender of Sosetsu was in vain preferred at Muromachi through the medium of the King of Ryukyu.

Yoshiharu could only keep silence.

The Ming sovereign subsequently (1531) attempted to exact redress by sending a squadron to Tsushima, but the deputy high constable of the Ouchi compelled these ships to fly, defeated, and thereafter all friendly intercourse between j.a.pan and China was interrupted, piratical raids by the j.a.panese taking its place. This estrangement continued for seventeen years, until (1548) Ouchi Yos.h.i.taka re-established friendly relations with Chosen and, at the same time, made overtures to China, which, being seconded by the despatch of an envoy--a Buddhist priest--Shuryo from Muromachi, evoked a favourable response. Once more tallies were issued, but the number of vessels being limited to three and their crews to three hundred, the resulting commerce was comparatively small. Just at this epoch, too, Occidental merchantmen arrived in China, and the complexion of the latter's oversea trade underwent alteration. Thereafter, the Ashikaga fell, and their successor, Oda n.o.bunaga, made no attempt to re-open commerce with China, while his successor, Toyotomi Hideyoshi, planned the invasion of the Middle Kingdom, so that the sword was more in evidence than the soroban.

j.a.pANESE PIRACY

It is difficult to trace the beginnings of j.a.panese piracy in Far Eastern waters, but certainly it dated from a remote past and reached its extreme in the middle of the sixteenth century. The records show that Murakami Yoshihiro, of Iyo province, obtained control of all the corsairs in neighbouring seas and developed great puissance. Nor did any measure of opprobrium attach to his acts, for on his death he was succeeded by Morokiyo, a scion of the ill.u.s.trious Kitabatake family.

Numbers flocked to his standard during the disordered era of the War of the Dynasties, and from Korea in the north to Formosa and Amoy in the south the whole littoral was raided by them.

For purposes of protection the Ming rulers divided the coast into five sections, Pehchihli, Shantung, Chekiang, Fuhkien, and Liangkw.a.n.g, appointing a governor to each, building fortresses and enrolling soldiers. All this proving inefficacious, the Emperor Taitsu, as already stated, addressed to Ashikaga Yoshimitsu a remonstrance which moved the shogun to issue a strict injunction against the marauders. It was a mere formality. Chinese annals show that under its provisions some twenty pirates were handed over by the j.a.panese and were executed by boiling in kettles. No such international refinement as extra-territorial jurisdiction existed in those days, and the j.a.panese shogun felt no shame in delivering his countrymen to be punished by an alien State. It is not wonderful that when Yoshimitsu died, the Chinese Emperor bestowed on him the posthumous t.i.tle Kung-hsien-w.a.n.g, or "the faithful and obedient king." But boiling a score of the Wokou* in copper kettles did not at all intimidate the corsairs. On nearly all the main islands of the Inland Sea and in the Kyushu waters they had their quarters. In fact, the governors of islands and a majority of the military magnates having littoral estates, took part in the profitable pursuit. No less than fourteen ill.u.s.trious families were so engaged, and four of them openly bore the t.i.tle of kaizoku tai-shogun (commander-in-chief of pirates). Moreover, they all obeyed the orders of the Ouchi family.

It is on record that Ouchi Masahiro led them in an incursion into Chollado, the southern province of Korea, and exacted from the sovereign of Chosen a promise of yearly tribute to the Ouchi. This was only one of several profitable raids. The goods appropriated in Korea were sometimes carried to China for sale, the pirates a.s.suming, now the character of peaceful traders, now that of ruthless plunderers. The apparition of these Pahan** ships seems to have inspired the Chinese with consternation. They do not appear to have made any effective resistance. The decade between 1553 and 1563 was evidently their time of greatest suffering; and their annals of that era repay perusal, not only for their direct interest but also for their collateral bearing on the story of the invasion of Korea at the close of the century.

"On the 23d of the fifth month of 1553, twenty-seven j.a.panese vessels arrived at Lungw.a.n.gtang. They looked like so many hills and their white sails were as clouds in the sky. On the fifth day of the fourth month of 1554, there appeared on the horizon a large ship which presently reached Lungw.a.n.g-tang. Her crew numbered 562. They blew conches after the manner of trumpets, marshalled themselves in battle array, and surrounding the castle with flying banners, attacked it.

On the fourth day of the ninth month of 1555, a two-masted ship carrying a crew of some hundreds came to Kinshan-hai, and on the next day she was followed by eight five-masted vessels with crews totalling some thousands. They all went on sh.o.r.e and looted in succession. On the 23d of the second month of 1556, pirate ships arrived at the entrance to Kinshan-hai. Their masts were like a dense forest of bamboo."

*Yamato enemies.

**Chinese p.r.o.nunciation of the ideographs read by the j.a.panese "Hachiman" (G.o.d of War). The pirates inscribed on their sails the legend Hachiman Dai-bosatsu.

Further records show that in 1556 the pirates entered Yang-chou, looted and burned the city; that in 1559 they attacked Chekiang; that in 1560, they made their way to Taitsang, and thence pushed on towards Shanghai, Sungteh, etc., looting towns almost daily. There was no effective resistance. We find also the following appreciation of j.a.panese ships:

"The largest of the j.a.panese vessels can carry about three hundred men; the medium-sized, from one to two hundred, and the smallest from fifty to eighty. They are constructed low and narrow. Thus, when they meet a big ship they have to look up to attack her. The sails are not rigged like those of our ships which can be navigated in any wind.

But wicked people on the coast of Fuhkien sold their ships to the foreigners; and the buyers, having fitted them with double bottoms and keels shaped so as to cleave the waves, came to our sh.o.r.es in them."

Evidently the Chinese were better skilled in the art of shipbuilding than the j.a.panese. As for the defensive measures of the Chinese the following is recorded:

"The Government troops on sea and on land made every effort to keep off the pirates. They flew banners at morn and eve and fired guns seaward, so that the enemy, understanding by the flash and the detonation that we were prepared to resist, abstained from landing.

But when the pirates handled their swords skilfully, their attack was fearful. Our countrymen when they saw these swordsmen, trembled and fled. Their fear of the j.a.panese was fear of the swords. The pirates'

firearms were only guns such as men use in pursuit of game. They did not range over one hundred paces. But their skill in using their guns was such that they never missed. We could not defeat them. They rise early in the morning and take their breakfast kneeling down.

Afterwards their chief ascends an eminence and they gather below to hear his orders. He tells them off in detachments not exceeding thirty men, and attaching them to officers, sends them to loot places. The detachments operate at distances of from five hundred to a thousand yards, but unite at the sound of a conch.

"To re-enforce a detachment in case of emergency, small sections of three or four swordsmen move about. At the sight of them our men flee. Towards dark the detachments return to headquarters and hand in their loot, never making any concealment. It is then distributed.

They always abduct women, and at night they indulge in drinking and debauchery. They always advance in single rank at a slow pace, and thus their extension is miles long. For tens of days they can run without showing fatigue. In camping, they divide into many companies, and thus they can make a siege effective. Against our positions they begin by sending a few men who by swift and deceptive movements cause our troops to exhaust all their projectiles fruitlessly, and then the a.s.sault is delivered. They are clever in using ambushes, and often when they seem to be worsted, their hidden forces spring up in our rear and throw our army into a panic."

There is no reason to doubt the truth of these records, naive as are some of the descriptions. Unquestionably the Wokou were a terrible scourge to the Chinese on the eastern littoral.

INTERCOURSE WITH RYUKYU

j.a.panese annals say that the royal family of Ryukyu was descended from the hero Minamoto Tametomo who was banished to the island in 1156, and certainly the inhabitants of the archipelago are a race closely allied to the j.a.panese. But in 1373, the then ruler, Chuzan, sent an envoy to the Ming Court and became a tributary of the latter.

In 1416, however, an amba.s.sador from the islands presented himself at the Muromachi shogunate, and twenty-five years later (1441), the shogun Yoshinori, just before his death, bestowed Ryukyu on Shimazu Tadakuni, lord of Satsuma, in recognition of meritorious services.

Subsequently (1471) the shogun Yoshimasa, in compliance with a request from the Shimazu family, forbade the sailing of any vessel to Ryukyu without a Shimazu permit, and when, a few years later, Miyake Kunihide attempted to invade Ryukyu, the Shimazu received Muromachi's (Yos.h.i.tane's) commission to punish him. Historically, therefore, Ryukyu formed part of j.a.pan, but its rulers maintained a tributary att.i.tude towards China until recent times, as will presently be seen.

LITERATURE DURING THE MUROMACHI PERIOD

Throughout the Muromachi period of two and a half centuries a group of military men held the administration and reaped all rewards and emoluments of office so that literary pursuits ranked in comparatively small esteem. Some education was necessary, indeed, for men of position, but eminent scholars were exceptional. Noteworthy among the latter were Nijo Yoshimoto, Ichijo Fuyuyoshi, Doin Kinsada, Sanjonishi Sanetaka, and Kiyowara Naritada. Most renowned was Ichijo Kaneyoshi. Equally versed in the cla.s.sics of China and j.a.pan, as well as in Buddhism and Confucianism, he composed several works of high merit. A feature of the period was the erudition of the priests.

Gen-e, a bonze of the temple Hiei-zan, adopted the commentaries of the Sung savants, Chengtzu and Chutsu, rejecting those of the earlier Han and Tang writers. In other words, he adopted the eclectic system of Buddhism and Confucianism as compounded by the scholars of the Sung and the Yuan epochs, in preference to the system of earlier pundits. The Emperor Go-Daigo invited Gen-e to Court and directed him to expound the Sutras. Thereafter, the Sung philosophy obtained wide allegiance, being preached by the priests of the Five Great Temples in Kyoto, and by all their provincial branches. On the other hand, the hereditary schools of Oye and Sugawara, adhering to their old dogmas, fell behind the times and declined in influence.

The feature of the age in point of learning was that scholarship became a priestly specialty. From the Five Temples (Go-zari) students constantly flocked to China, where they received instructions in the exoterics and esoterics of Buddhism, as modified by the creed of Confucius, laying the foundations of systems upon which philosophers of later ages, as Kazan and Seiga, built fair edifices. These priests of the Five Temples were more than religious propagandists: they were ministers of State, as Tenkai and Soden were in after times under the Tokugawa, and they practically commanded the shoguns. One reason operating to produce this result was that, in an age when lineage or military prowess was the sole secular step to fortune, men of civil talent but humble birth had to choose between remaining in hopeless insignificance or entering the priesthood where knowledge and virtue were sure pa.s.sports to distinction. It was thus that in nearly every monastery there were found men of superior intellect and erudition.

The fact was recognized. When Ashikaga Takauji desired to take counsel of Muso Kokushi, he repaired to that renowned priest's temple and treated him as a respected parent; and Yoshimitsu, the third of the Ashikaga shoguns, showed equal respect towards Gido, Zekkai and Jorin, whose advice he constantly sought.

It was strange, indeed, that in an age when the sword was the paramount tribunal, the highest dignitaries in the land revered the exponents of ethics and literature. Takauji and his younger brother, Tadayoshi, sat at the feet of Gen-e as their preceptor. Yoshimitsu appointed Sugawara Hidenaga to be Court lecturer. Ujimitsu, the Kamakura kwanryo, took Sugawara Toyonaga for preacher. Yoshimasa's love of poetry impelled him to publish the Kinshudan.* Above all, Yoshihisa was an earnest scholar. He had a thorough knowledge of Chinese and j.a.panese cla.s.sics; he was himself a poetaster of no mean ability; he read canonical books even as he sat in his palanquin; under his patronage Ichijo Kaneyoshi wrote the Shodan-chiyo and** the b.u.mmei Ittoki; Fujiwara Noritane compiled the Teio-keizu; Otsuki Masab.u.mi lectured on the a.n.a.lects and Urabe Kanetomo expounded the standard literature of the East.

*The Embroidered Brocade Discourse.

**Rustic Ideals of Government.

Yet, side by side with these patrons of learning stood a general public too ignorant to write its own name. Military men, who formed the bulk of the nation, were engrossed with the art of war and the science of intrigue to the exclusion of all erudition. The priests were always available to supply any need, and the priests utilized the occasion. Nevertheless, it stands to the credit of these bonzes that they made no attempt to monopolize erudition. Their aim was to popularize it. They opened temple-seminaries (tera-koya) and exercise halls (dojo) where youths of all cla.s.ses could obtain instruction and where an excellent series of text-books was used, the Iroha-uta* the Doji-kyo, the Teikin-orai** and the Goseibai-shikimoku.*** The Doji-kyo has been translated by Professor Chamberlain (in Vol. VIII of the "Transactions of the Asiatic Society of j.a.pan"). A few extracts will serve to show the nature of the ethical teaching given to j.a.panese children in medieval days:

*A syllabary of moral precepts like the ethical copy-books of Occidentals.

**A model letter-writer.

***The criminal laws of Hojo Yasutoki. All these text-books remained in use until the Meiji era.

Let nothing lead thee into breaking faith with thy friend, and depart not from thy word. It is the tongue that is the root of misfortunes; if the mouth were made like unto the nose, a man would have no trouble till his life's end. In the house where virtue is acc.u.mulated there will surely be superabundant joy. No man is worthy of honour from his birth; 'tis the garnering-up of virtue that bringeth him wisdom and virtue; the rich man may not be worthy of honour. In thin raiment on a winter's night, brave the cold and be reading the whole night through; with scanty fare on a summer's day, repel hunger and be learning the whole day long. . . . A father's loving kindness is higher than the mountains; a mother's bounty is deeper than the sea.

. . . He that receiveth benefits and is not grateful is like unto the birds that despoil the branches of the trees they perch on. . . .

Above all things, men must practise charity; it is by almsgiving that wisdom is fed; less than all things, men must grudge money; it is by riches that wisdom is hindered. . . . The merit of an alms given with a compa.s.sionate heart to one poor man is like unto the ocean; the recompense of alms given to a mult.i.tude for their own sake is like unto a grain of poppy-seed.

This text-book, the Doji-kyo, was compiled by a priest, Annen, who lived in the second half of the ninth century. Its origin belongs, therefore, to a much more remote era than that of the Muromachi shoguns, but, in common with the other text-books enumerated above, its extensive use is first mentioned in the Ashikaga epoch. The Five Temples of Kyoto--to be spoken of presently--were seats of learning; and many names of the litterateurs that flourished there have been handed down. Not the least celebrated were Gido and Zekkai, who paid several visits to China, the fountain-head of ideographic lore. But these conditions were not permanent. The Onin War created a serious interruption. Kyoto was laid in ruins, and rare books lay on the roadside, no one caring to pick them up.

PRIVATE SCHOOLS AND LIBRARIES

Throughout the Ashikaga period the Kyoto university existed in name only, and students of j.a.panese literature in the provinces disappeared. A few courtiers, as Nakahara, Dye, Sugawara, Miyoshi, etc., still kept up the form of lecturing but they did not receive students at large. Nevertheless, a few military magnates, retaining some appreciation of the value of erudition, established schools and libraries. Among these, the Kanazawa-bunko and the Ashikaga-gakko were the most famous. The former had its origin in the closing years of the Kamakura Bakufu. It was founded during the reign of Kameyama (1260-1274) by Sanetoki, grandson of Hojo Yos.h.i.toki. A large collection of Chinese and j.a.panese works filled its shelves, and all desirous of studying had free access. Akitoki, son of Sanetoki, adopted Kanazawa as his family name and added largely to the library.

He caused the ideographs Kanazawa-bunko to be stamped in black on all Confucian works, and in red on Buddhist.

It is recorded in the Hojo Kudaiki that men of all cla.s.ses, laymen and priests alike, were shut up daily in this library where they studied gratis, and that Akitoki's son, Sadaaki, was as ardent a student as his father, so that men spoke of him as well fitted to be regent (shikken), thus showing that literary skill was counted a qualification for high office. Fire, the destroyer of so many fine relics of j.a.panese civilization, visited this library more than once, but during the reign of Go-Hanazono (1429-1464) it was restored and extended by the Uesugi family, who also rebuilt and endowed schools for the study of j.a.panese literature in the province of Kotsuke.

Among these schools was the Ashikaga-gakko, under the presidency of a priest, Kaigen, in the day of whose ninth successor, Kyuka, the pupils attending the schools totalled three thousand. A few great families patronized literature without recourse to priests. This was notably the case with the Ouchi, whose tradal connexions gave them special access to Chinese books. Ouchi Yos.h.i.taka, in particular, distinguished himself as an author. He established a library which remained for many generations; he sent officials to China to procure rare volumes, and it is incidentally mentioned that he had several ma.n.u.scripts printed in the Middle Kingdom, although the art of block-printing had been practised in j.a.pan since the close of the eighth century. A composition which had its origin at this epoch was the yokyoku, a special kind of libretto for mimetic dances. Books on art also were inspired by the Higashiyama craze for choice specimens of painting, porcelain, and lacquer. Commentaries, too, made their appearance, as did some histories, romances, and anthologies.

PICTORIAL ART

As j.a.pan during the Ashikaga period sat at the feet of the Sung masters in philosophy and literature, so it was in the realm of art.

There is, indeed, a much closer relation between literature and pictorial art in China than in any Occidental country, for the two pursuits have a common starting-point--calligraphy. The ideograph is a picture, and to trace it in such a manner as to satisfy the highest canons is a veritably artistic achievement. It has been shown above that in the Muromachi era the priests of Buddha were the channels through which the literature and the philosophy of Sung reached j.a.pan, and it will presently be seen that the particular priests who imported and interpreted this culture were those of the Zen sect.

There is natural sequence, therefore, in the facts that these same priests excelled in calligraphy and introduced j.a.pan to the pictorial art of the immortal Sung painters.

There were in China, at the time of the Ashikaga, two schools of painters: a Northern and a Southern. The term is misleading, for the distinction was really not one of geography but one of method. What distinguished the Southern school was delicacy of conception, directness of execution, and lightness of tone. To produce a maximum of effect with a minimum of effort; to suggest as much as to depict, and to avoid all recourse to heavy colours--these were the cardinal tenets of the Southern school. They were revealed to j.a.pan by a priest named Kao, who, during the reign of Go-Daigo (1318-1339), pa.s.sed ten years in China, and returning to Kyoto, opened a studio in the temple Kennin-ji, where he taught the methods of Li Lungmin of the Sung dynasty and Yen Hui of the Yuan. He revolutionized j.a.panese art. After him Mincho is eminent. Under the name of Cho Densu--the Abbot Cho--he acquired perpetual fame by his paintings of Buddhist saints.

But Mincho's religious pictures did not help to introduce the Sung academy to j.a.pan. That task was reserved for Josetsu--a priest of Chinese or j.a.panese origin--who, during the second half of the fourteenth century, became the teacher of many students at the temple Shokoku-ji, in Kyoto. Among his pupils was Shubun, and the latter's followers included such ill.u.s.trious names as Sotan, Sesshu, Shinno; Masanbbu, and Moton.o.bu. It is to this day a question whether j.a.pan ever produced greater artists than Sesshu and Moton.o.bu. To the same galaxy belongs Tosa no Mitsun.o.bu, the founder of the Tosa school as Moton.o.bu was of the Kano. That official patronage was extended to these great men is proved by the fact that Mitsun.o.bu was named president of the E-dokoro, or Court Academy of Painting; and Moton.o.bu received the priestly rank of hogen.

APPLIED ART