Thus ended a military domination that had continued for seven hundred years. In 1167, Kiyomori had made himself military lord of the empire. In 1869, Mutsuhito, the one hundred and twenty-third mikado in lineal descent, resumed the imperial power which had so long been lost. Unlike China, over which so many dynasties have ruled, Japan has been governed by a single dynasty, according to the native records, for more than twenty-five hundred years.
The fall of the shogun was followed by the fall of feudalism. The emperor, for the first time for many centuries, came from behind his screen and showed himself openly to his people. Yedo was made the eastern capital of the realm, its name being changed to Tokio. Hither, in September, 1871, the daimios were once more summoned, and the order was issued that they should give up their strongholds and feudal retainers and retire to private life. They obeyed. Resistance would have been in vain. Thus fell another ancient institution, eight centuries old. The revolution was at an end. The shogunate and the feudal system had fallen, to rise no more. A single absolute lord ruled over Japan.
As regards the cry of "expel the barbarians," which had first given rise to hostilities, it gradually died away as the revolution continued. The strength of the foreign fleets, the advantages of foreign commerce, the conception which could not be avoided that, instead of being barbarians, these aliens held all the high prizes of civilization and had a thousand important lessons to teach, caused a complete change of mind among the intelligent Japanese, and they quickly began to welcome those whom they had hitherto inveterately opposed, and to change their institutions to accord with those of the Western world.
HOW THE EMPIRE OF CHINA AROSE AND GREW.
From the history of Japan we now turn to that of China, a far older and more extensive kingdom, so old, indeed, that it has now grown decrepit, while Japan seems still in the glow of vigorous youth. But, as our tales will show, there was a long period in the past during which China was full of youthful energy and activity, and there may be a time in the future when a new youth will come to that hoary kingdom, the most venerable of any existing upon the face of the earth.
Who the Chinese originally were, whence they came, how long they have dwelt in their present realm, are questions easier to ask than to answer. Their history does not reach back to their origin, except in vague and doubtful outlines. The time was when that great territory known as China was the home of aboriginal tribes, and the first historical sketch given us of the Chinese represents them as a little horde of wanderers, destitute of houses, clothing, and fire, living on the spoils of the chase, and on roots and insects in times of scarcity.
These people were not sons of the soil. They came from some far-off region. Some think that their original home lay in the country to the southeast of the Caspian, while later theorists seek to trace their origin in Babylonia, as an offshoot of the Mongolian people to whom that land owed its early language and culture. From some such place the primitive Chinese made their way by slow stages to the east, probably crossing the head-waters of the Oxus and journeying along the southern slopes of the Tian-Shan Mountains.
All this is conjecture, but we touch firmer soil when we trace them to the upper course of the Hoang-ho, or Yellow River, whose stream they followed eastward until they reached the fertile plains of the district now known as Shan-se. Here the immigrants settled in small colonies, and put in practice those habits of settled labor which they seem to have brought with them from afar. Yet there is reason to believe that they had at one time been nomads, belonging to the herding rather than to the agricultural races of the earth. Many of the common words in their language are partly made up of the characters for sheep and cattle, and the Chinese house so resembles the Tartar tent in outline that it is said that the soldiers of Genghis Khan, on taking a city, at once pulled down the walls of the houses and left the roof supported by its wooden columns as an excellent substitute for a tent.
However that be, the new-comers seem to have quickly become farmers, growing grain for food and flax for their garments. The culture of the silk-worm was early known, trade was developed, and fairs were held. There was intellectual culture also. They knew something of astronomy, and probably possessed the art of hieroglyphic writing,—which, if they came from Babylonia, they may well have brought with them.