222 The National Geographic Magazine 



sovereign of Japan, the Mikado, which 

 had been taken away from him for a 

 period of 682 years (1 186-1868) and 

 which had been wielded by the de facto 

 sovereign, the shogun or the military 

 government. The history of Japan dates 

 back 2,565 years, exclusive of the ages 

 of gods, when our first Emperor, Jimmu, 

 laid the foundations of the Empire, and 

 our august ruler of today is the 121st of 

 the Emperors descended from the direct 

 and unbroken line of the Imperial family. 



Even prior to 1186 the powers of the 

 Mikados had, in a large measure, passed 

 into the hands of the Fujira family, but 

 at that period Yoritomo, a military man 

 of great ability, founded the shogunate 

 or military government for the first time 

 in Japanese history, whereby he prac- 

 tically usurped the political powers of 

 the Mikado and substituted his rule for 

 that of the legitimate sovereign. It was 

 an incidental consequence of one of the 

 phases of human history. In Japan, as 

 in other feudal countries, there had been 

 an alternate tendency toward strong and 

 weak central governments. In order to 

 maintain peace and order and to preserve 

 the nation as a compact unit against a 

 strong tendency toward decentralization 

 which was then prevailing, Yoritomo 

 had fought a series of bloody battles 

 with local chieftains and magnates, and 

 finally succeeded in establishing a vigor- 

 ously centralized military government 

 over the whole Empire and by the side 

 of that of Mikado. This was the be- 

 ginning of the dual government in Japan 

 which so much perplexed the westerners 

 at the beginning of the foreign inter- 

 course. 



The letters of credence which the 

 President of the United States addressed 

 to the Emperor of Japan were handed 

 over by Commodore Perry to the shogun 

 of the time, and when Townsend Har- 

 ris, the first United States minister to 

 Japan, was told by the shogun that the 

 treaty required the approval of the Mi- 

 kado he was astounded. Since the es- 



tablishment of the first shogunate by 

 Yoritomo, in 1186, down to the fall of 

 the Tokugawa shogunate, in 1868, all 

 real power, civil and military, had passed 

 entirely from the hands of the Mikados, 

 they themselves being allowed to retain 

 only an outward semblance of author- 

 ity. It was remarkable, however, that 

 through the period of nearly seven cen- 

 turies when the military government 

 was in predominance no one ever dis- 

 puted the legality of the Imperial author- 

 ity. On the contrary, all the shoguns 

 formally recognized that authority by 

 obtaining the Imperial sanction for the 

 appointment of each successor to the 

 shogunate government, as well as in 

 other matters. 



It was in 1868 that this de jure sover- 

 eignty of Japan was restored to full au- 

 thority after the nominal existence of 

 seven centuries. The manner in which 

 it was brought about is almost unique in 

 the annals of mankind, but what made it 

 more remarkable was the inauguration of 

 a new policy so radically different from 

 what had existed before in Japan, upon 

 which the foundation of New Japan was 

 firmly laid down. 



THE FEUDAL SYSTEM OF JAPAN IN 

 1868 



In order to realize the real magnitude 

 of the dramatic period of Japanese his- 

 tory it is necessary to know something of 

 the political regime that existed in Japan 

 at the time of the restoration. Roughly 

 speaking, Japan, under the Tokugawa 

 government, had a feudal system with 

 276 daimios or feudal barons. These 

 barons had their own respective domin- 

 ions, and within them they wielded an 

 autocratic power, without any restric- 

 tions outside of a certain sort of super- 

 vision exercised by and a certain homage 

 paid to the chief baron or shogun. The 

 size of the dominions, the revenues and 

 expenditures, the number of the vassals 

 or retainers, called Samurai or military 

 class, the barons possessed differed ac- 



