464 



SCIENCE, 



[Vol. VII., No. 172 



of transportation. Railroads, so far, have done 

 little towards remedying the evil, and will not un- 

 less tariffs are sufficiently lessened to admit of 

 more extended commerce. The distance between 

 Tokio and Kofu is about sixty-four miles, one half 

 of which is easily, the other with difficulty, pass- 

 able. The cost of transportation by horses is 

 nine yen per load (over two dollars per hundred- 

 weight). The following market-prices at Tokio, 

 of a few of the more important productions, will 

 show the extent to which the cost of transporta- 

 tion affects the price : — 







CO 3 











o 



M 







<D 



Ph 









O 





$15.50 



15.5% 





18.00 



10.0* 





5.20 



25.3* 





66.00 



1.9* 





333.00 



0.5* 





The great cost of transportation of raw or bulky 

 articles has caused certain industries, as silk cul- 

 ture and weaving, where the manufactured ma- 

 terial is of light weight and easily transportable, 

 to be extensively prosecuted in the interior, espe- 

 cially by the women, and such industries are thus 

 properly classed as agricultural. 



Japanese statistics of agricultural productions 

 are necessarily imperfect, but they are sufficient to 

 afford a tolerably good idea of the resources of the 

 kingdom, or at least of some portions of it. The 

 area of the entire kingdom, as at present consti- 

 tuted, comprises 24,294 square ri (87,701 square 

 miles), or 11,054,019 cho (27,082,346 acres). The 

 following table will show the proportions of tilled, 

 tillable, and other lands, together with the prices 

 for the same : — 

















43 





Average 





Acres. 







price per 









a 



es 



acre. 

















PL) 









8,805,627 



23. 



80 



$194.00 





4,631,137 



16. 



80 



57.30 





18,601.427 



49 



85 



1.36 



Tillable (uncultivated land) 



1,890,150 



6 



85 



1.00 



Building - ground (villages 













871,350 







500.00 





15.910 







120.00 



The unoccupied tillable lands are covered with 

 scant vegetation, which serves for pasturage for 

 stock, though little used : doubtless the figures 

 given are too small, and should be increased at 

 the expense of those for forest-land. The salt 

 fields or yards (salzgdrten) are the only sources of 

 salt in Japan, and are for the evaporation of sea- 

 water. Rock-salt and salt-wells have not, so far, 



been discovered in the kingdom. Salt, it may be 

 mentioned, furnishes a good example of the varia- 

 tion in the cost of transportation, as in some parts 

 it commands nearly thirty times what it does in 

 others. The rice-land, it will be seen, comprises 

 nearly one-fourth of the entire superficial area, 

 and commands more than three times the price of 

 other tilled land. 



The price of really valuable land can in no wise 

 be considered as low, as compared with that of the 

 agricultural land s in Germany. The price of rice- 

 land is at least one-half greater, and, of the other 

 grain-lands, about half as great. 



The number of those engaged in agricultural 

 industries throughout the kingdom, from the re- 

 turns that are available, is as follows : males, 

 8,237,682 ; females, 7,398,431 ; total, 15,636,113. 

 The entire population of the kingdom was nearly 

 thirty-seven million ; and for such a distinctively 

 agricultural nation as Japan, the proportion de- 

 voted to agriculture appears small. This dispro- 

 portion may in part be attributed to the great 

 number of officials, and petty shops and pedlers, 

 — occupations which draw from the lower classes, 

 by reason of the less labor required, and the com- 

 paratively less onerous taxation imposed upon 

 them, than is the case in the agricultural pur- 

 suits ; and in part to the fact that those partially 

 engaged in other pursuits are often not counted 

 as agriculturalists. There are only about three- 

 fifths of an acre of tilled land to each individual 

 in the entire population, or less than three acres 

 to the average family. 



It will not be without interest to make some 

 mention of the foods used by the people. The 

 Japanese are almost exclusively vegetarians, — a 

 fact that is to be deplored, from the detrimental 

 influence it has upon the raising of live-stock. 

 On the coast, fish and other sea-foods are used 

 in considerable quantities ; but at a distance, from 

 the ever-recurring element of transportation cost, 

 these foods form only an immaterial proportion 

 of the alimentation. Rice is the chief comestible, 

 except in such higher regions where it cannot be 

 raised, and where the cost of importation virtu- 

 ally prohibits its use. The percentages of the 

 different foods consumed are as follows : — 



Rice f, 3.00 



Barley and wheat 27.00 



Millet and other grain 13 90 



Sweet-potatoes and garden-vegetables 6 00 



Fruit 0.05 



Algae 0.05 



Farm-laborers are paid throughout the king- 

 dom, on an average, in summer, 18 cents per day 

 for the best men, and 13.3 for the best women ; 

 for a poorer class of men the compensation is 



