PREFACE. 



The folio win2: note is the result of a ten weeks' tour in Janan 

 in 1906, during which I paid various visits of inspection to 

 experimental stations, schools, fishing villages, etc., consulted 

 various local authorities, and obtained a variety of informa- 

 tion, largely through special translations, which has been 

 partly embodied in the I^Jote. Now that the Note has been 

 written, many lacuna? and imperfections are obvious to myself, 

 imperfections which I hope to correct in a later visit, but 

 which at present must remain. The difficulties of the lan- 

 guage, the scarcity of interpreters, the paucity of reports in 

 European languages, the difficulty of ascertaining the existence 

 or nature of laws, reports, and so forth, the impossibility of 

 reading a single word for myself in Japanese, the strangeness 

 of the country, and the shortness of my visit, must be my 

 apologies for many of the imperfections and for, possibly, 

 erroneous statements or inferences. But certain unavoidable 

 errors apart — and I trust they are of a minor character — the 

 broad facts are undoubted, and it is to these that I would 

 direct attention ; errors in detail matter little, since it is not a 

 history or technical description of Japanese fisheries at which 

 I have aimed, but a presentation of the broad outlines of 

 fishery work and modern methods of development especially by 

 Government institutions. 



The difficulties adverted to were greatly smoothed by the 

 invariable courtesy extended to me from the highest official 

 to the simplest fisherman ; Japanese courtesy is proverbial, 

 but it must be sorely tried by the now frequent foreigner 

 whose business is the asking of questions, the demanding of 

 information, the pursuit of the Japanese " how " and " why " ; 

 to those whose patience may have been tried by cross- 

 questioning or whose time was occupied by interviews I tender 



