May 21, 1886.] 



SCIENCE. 



465 



12.5 cents, and of women 8 cents : in winter 

 they are paid 14.5 and 9.1, and 9.8 and 5.5 cents 

 respectively. This is in addition to board. The 

 highest price paid in any province is, in summer, 

 27 cents for men, and 20 cents for women. The 

 average price per year is $30.50 ; the maximum, 

 $74 ; the minimum, $13.70 ; in Tokio, $31.40. 

 Taking all things into consideration, in com- 

 parison with the sums paid for similar labor in 

 Germany, farm-labor is decidedly dearer in Japan. 



These high wages may be taken as an expression 

 of a more uniform distribution of property than 

 obtains in the European countries, and speak in 

 favor, rather than against, the social conditions of 

 the kingdom. There does not prevail that sharp 

 contrast between luxurious wealth and hungering 

 misery ; and as a result, class hatreds, with all 

 then- attendant evils, are foreign to Japan. Wages, 

 however, are much higher at present than they 

 were even a few years ago. In some provinces 

 during the last twenty years they have increased 

 seven or eight fold. 



It will be of interest to give the actual produc- 

 tion of the staple products of the kingdom for 

 1882, as nearly as can be obtained from statistics. 





Entire production. 



Per acre. 



Rice (meadow and up- 

 land) 



Wheat 



Millet 



Potatoes 



162.269,090 bush. 

 53.933,050 

 12,782,380 

 11,927,819 " 

 14,981,874 " 

 367.784 " 

 3,458.639 " 

 74,117,611 lbs. 

 2,150,975,313 " 



25.25 bush. 

 22.50 " 

 14.1 

 11.9 



9 5 " 

 3,700.00 lbs. 

 6,250 00 " 



It is necessary to observe, in explanation of 

 these figures (a calculation of which will show an 

 apparently greater number of acres than are ac- 

 tually under cultivation), that in many cases two 

 or even more crops are obtained annually from 

 the same field. 



The entire value of these crops reached, accord- 

 ing to the statistics of 1882, the sum of 158,884,113 

 yen ($123,462,655). This gives a gross sum of 

 $12.44 per acre, and less than $8 for each individual 

 engaged in agricultural pursuits. In comparing 

 these figures with those of the averages of the 

 eight older Prussian provinces, between the years 

 1859 and 1864 they are found to be more than one- 

 third less. The net results, however, of the re- 

 turns, per capita, are considerably less ; scarcely, 

 in favorable cases, reaching $3.50. They do not, 

 however, indicate the true condition of affairs. A 

 laboring man requires for annual consumption, 

 about five bushels of rice, and the average for 

 man and woman may be placed at four bushels. 

 As the cost of this quantity is over four dollars 



(4.5yen per koku=1.8 hectolitres), the people would 

 be reduced to a much cheaper way of living, 

 which is not the case. The exports and imports 

 are comparatively trivial, and will nearly balance 

 each other. 



More than one-eighth of all the rice grown is 

 consumed in the production of sake, the alcoholic 

 drink universally used in Japan, leaving, on an 

 average, about 3.5 bushels as the annual amount 

 per capita. Adding to rice other productions, 

 it is found that 5.7 bushels of grain represent the 

 quantity annually consumed by each individual of 

 the population, to which should also be added 

 about 60 pounds of potatoes. 



During the twelve years between 1868 and 1879 

 the entire export of rice amounted to a little over 

 seven million bushels, with the imports a little 

 more than twice 'that quantity. Of the other 

 produce, figures cannot be given. It will thus be 

 seen that the annual production of food-stuffs 

 suffices for the entire population, although it is 

 true the quota is by no means equally distributed 

 throughout the population. The better-situated 

 half takes the lion's share, to the deprivation of 

 the lower class. 



Statistics of the cultivation of rice sufficiently 

 trustworthy to entitle them to our acceptance, 

 reach back for nearly a thousand years, and show 

 that there has been a steady decrease in the yield 

 per acre. Thus in the period between 923 and 930 

 the area devoted to its culture amounted to 

 2,558,390 acres, with a yield of 95,924,326 bushels ; 

 while in 1868, with an area of 6,559,192 acres, the 

 yield was only 157,153,500 bushels. Thus, while 

 the entire area devoted to the crop has doubled, 

 the crop itself has only increased about one-half. 

 Undoubtedly a part of this is due to the added 

 lands being less adapted to rice-cultivation. 



The agriculture of Japan has progressed in its 

 peculiar way without reference to stock-raising. 

 For a very long period religious prejudices have 

 not favored the use of flesh as a food, although it 

 has not been strictly forbidden. There has been 

 no demand for this food, and domestic animals 

 were looked upon only as beasts of burden and 

 sources of fertilizing-material. This exclusion of 

 stock-raising has markedly influenced the exten- 

 sion of strictly agricultural industries. In the 

 vicinity of the coasts the smallest portions of suita- 

 ble land are cultivated, while at a distance the 

 extent of untilled land becomes much greater. In 

 thickly populated regions fertilizing-material, es- 

 pecially that from human sources, — the chief ones 

 in Japan, — exists in much greater abundance, as 

 also such material as fish-guano, seaweed, etc., 

 furnished by the sea ; but these cannot be made 

 use of at any distance from the coast, for, under 



