August. 1908.] 



151 



Miscellaneous. 



character of the tillage adopted. The 

 careful working of the soil has been 

 already noticed, and the second essential 

 in a country such as Japan, where plenti- 

 ful and regular rainfall obviates the 

 necessity for artificial irrigation is the 

 application of manure. In most parts 

 of the country there are no plough cattle, 

 and horses, pigs and goats are very few 

 • in number, while the use of mineral 

 fertilisers has not as yet become general. 

 As the fields are worked with human 

 labour, so they are enriched with human 

 "manure. From time immemorial this 

 material has been the chief source of 

 fertilisation. It is carefully preserved 

 and treated with a view to utilisation 

 in the fields, and is applied in liquid form 

 to the growing crops in small and fre- 

 quent doses as required. Then in the 

 homesteads no scrap of other organic 

 matter is allowed to go to waste. All is 

 collected with care, piled up under a 

 shed covered with earth, and allowed to 

 ferment together in a mass. " This is 

 occasionally turned over and left till 

 the whole has decomposed into a fine, 

 rich nutrient earth, which is passed 

 through a sieve and used as a fine 

 powder, especially at sowing time." 

 The peasantry, too, spend large sums 

 every year on fish mauure, chiefly 

 sardines and herrings dried in the suu, 

 and on oil cake. Not only do they not 

 permit the mass of cake produced from 

 their oil seeds to leave the country, 

 but they import large quantities, 

 valued in 1903 at over £1,000,000, 

 from China. Then the people have 

 large resources in their forests and 

 woodland blocks or plantations. Exclud- 

 ing the State forests, which cover a 

 large proportion of the wild and sparsely 

 populated area of North Japan, there is 

 an area of about eighteen and a half 

 million acres of private woodlands. 

 Most of these are in blocks of small area 

 attached to agricultural holdings or to 

 the communes (which are, as in Conti- 

 nental Europe, political corporations self- 

 governing and possessing property), so 

 that for each acre of cultivation there 

 is on the average one and a half acres of 

 woodland. These groves and woods, the 

 State assessment on which is nominal, 

 and for the preservation or replanting 

 of which special regulations are made 

 by the State, supply not only all the 

 timber and firewood necessary for rural 

 tracts, but are largely used by the people 

 for procuring manure grasses and her- 

 bage for use in their compost. The 

 virtues of green manuring are, of course, 

 known, and they are extensively prac- 

 tised. In the rice fields, many of which 

 grow no second crop, it is a common 

 practice to scatter the seeds off astra- 



galus or other leguminous crop on the 

 wet ground before the paddy is cut. 



Such are the characteristics of old- 

 time Japanese agriculture— economy of 

 space, careful tillage and utilisation of 

 all available material as manure. It is 

 not surprising that the produce is large. 

 The average produce of the rice fields is 

 given as 3,075 bushels of husked rice 

 weighing nearly 2,000 lb., and nearly 

 one-third of this land grew a second crop 

 of Avheat averaging 22 bushels or of 

 rape. In the uplands figures of outturn 

 are not so instructive as mixed crops, 

 and second crops are the rule, but the 

 average yield of wheat grown on ridges 

 20 inches apart, with another crop be- 

 tween them is given as 21 -8 bushels or 1-77 

 lb., which compares well with average 

 Indian produce. But Japanese states- 

 men for some part have seen that the 

 conditions of agriculture must be modi- 

 fied to suit the new conditions of the 

 country. Population increased between 

 1895 and 1905 by 13 per cent., but the 

 cultivated area during the same period 

 increased only by 35 per cent., and but 

 little further increase is possible. As 

 the author says, " methods and practices 

 suitable for a stationary population, and 

 a self-contained country do not suffice 

 for a progressive nation where continued 

 and rapid advances are essential if in- 

 telligent productivity is to keep pace 

 with competitors. The methods adopted 

 show that, as usual with these alert 

 statesmen, they searched the world for 

 the most fruitful ideas on the develop- 

 ment both of farmimg and of the farmer ; 

 America and Germany, as might be ex- 

 pected, seem to have supplied most of 

 the new ideas both as regards education, 

 State assistance, and organisation. As 

 in these countries the Government has 

 assisted not in one but in many ways, 

 by the establishment of a comprehensive 

 and expert Agricultural Department 

 under a Minister for Agriculture and 

 Commerce, which studies the agriculture 

 and agricultural systems of the world, 

 and applies the results to Japan through 

 its various agencies ; by wide and con- 

 tinuous inquiry and experiments in ex- 

 perimental stations scattered over the 

 country ; by the educative examples and 

 teaching provided in the farms, gardens, 

 libraries, etc., of these stations for the 

 adult peasant; by education, through 

 the medium of agricultural schools which 

 cover the country, and through the 

 lectures and teachings liberally provided 

 in the villages ; by the chain of Agricul- 

 tural Associations of every grade from 

 the Prefecture to the village, for finance 

 education or mutual assistance and sup- 

 port ; by the support given to financial 



