AGRICULTURAL INDUSTRIES. 131 



2. Tobacco, Nicotiana Tabaciirn, L., and N. rustica, L. 



The foreign origin of this world-wide narcotic article of luxury- 

 is indicated not merely by the name Tabako, — the Japanese have 

 no name of their own for it, — but also by authentic historical 

 accounts of its introduction. Like Christianity, gunpowder, and 

 fire-arms, tobacco first reached Japan through the " Nanban " 

 (pronounced Namban) or *' southern barbarians." By " Namban," 

 however, were meant distinctively the Portuguese, and then later 

 the Spaniards who came from Manila. One may say that smoking 

 was introduced in the last decades of the sixteenth century. The 

 planting of tobacco, however, began about the year 1605. A 

 physician named Saka, of Nagasaki, made some interesting and 

 characteristic observations about it in a family chronicle of that 

 period.^ In 1607 he writes: "Of late a thing has come into 

 fashion, called tobacco. It is said to have originated in Nanban, 

 and consists of large leaves, which are cut up, and of which one 

 drinks the smoke." Two years later the same observer remarks : 

 " For the last two or three years an article called Tabako has been 

 coming from Nanban, with which all classes of Japanese regale 

 themselves. It is said to be a cure for all diseases. On the other 

 hand, however, there have been cases where people got sick after 

 they had drunk tobacco-smoke. Now since no medicinal work 

 contains directions for the treatment of such patients, no medicine 

 could be offered them." In another record, of the year 1605, 

 according to Satow, there is found the following note : *' In this 

 year tobacco was brought in ships of the Nanban-people, and sown 

 near Nagasaki. The inhabitants of the capital (Kioto) contend 

 with one another in smoking, and the habit is rapidly spreading 

 over the country." ^ We may be sure that the innovation, before 

 it got to Nagasaki, was known in Bungo, the chief foothold of the 

 Portuguese from the beginning, and in Satsuma, which to this day 

 has a great reputation throughout Japan for its tobacco, and had 

 been visited by Pinto and likewise by Xavier. And there can be 

 scarcely any doubt that smoking came to the Coreans and the 

 neighbouring Mandschu from Japan, at the time of Hideyoshi, 

 through the expedition and subsequent efforts between the years 

 1592 and 1597. On the other hand, China proper was blessed with 

 tobacco vid Luzon, as can be proved from several sources, among 

 them Satow. 



In China, as in Japan, smoking spread among all classes of the 

 people and in both sexes, with incredible rapidity. As vain as 

 the efforts of Pope Urban VII. and James I., to check the habit in 



^ See Satow: "The Introduction of Tobacco into Japan," /^J^^^ Weekly Mail ^ 

 Nov. 17, 1877. Kein : " Zur Geschichte der Verbreitung des Tabaks und Mais 

 in Ostasien." Peterm., Mitth., 1878. 



2 We here expressly remark that other narcotic luxuries, such as smoking 

 opium or hemp and chewing betel, are unknown. 



