Just about this time, intelligence of the death of Hideyoshi reached the Japanese commanders in Korea, and immediately an armistice was arranged. The withdrawal of the invading forces followed, not without some serious difficulties, and thus the six years' campaign terminated without any direct results except an immense loss of life and treasure and the reduction of the Korean peninsula to a state of desolation. It has been repeatedly pleaded for the wholly unprogressive state into which Korea thenceforth fell. But to conclude that a nation could be reduced by a six-years' war to three centuries of hopelessness and helplessness is to credit that nation with a very small measure of resilient capacity.
INDIRECT RESULTS
The war was not altogether without indirect results of some value to Japan. Among these may be cited the fact that, a few decades later, when the Tsing dynasty destroyed the Ming in China, subjugated Korea, and assumed a position analogous to that previously held by the Yuan, no attempt was made to defy Japan. The memory of her soldiers' achievements on the Korean battle-fields sufficed to protect her against foreign aggression. Another material result was that, in compliance with Hideyoshi's orders, the returning Japanese generals brought back many Korean art-artisans who contributed largely to the development of the ceramic industry. On no less than seven different kinds of now well-known porcelain and pottery in Japan did these experts exercise marked influence, and their efforts were specially timely in view of the great vogue then enjoyed by all utensils used in connexion with the tea ceremonial. It is not to be supposed, however, that these Korean artisans showed any superiority to the Japanese as artists. The improvements they introduced were almost entirely of a technical character. Another benefit derived by Japan from her contact with Korea at this time was the introduction of movable type. Up to this time the art of printing had been in a very primitive condition in Japan, and the first book printed with movable type made its appearance in the Bunroku era (1592-1595).
ENGRAVING: SIGNATURE OF TAKEDA SHINGEN
ENGRAVING: NAGOYA CASTLE
CHAPTER XXXVI
THE MOMO-YAMA EPOCH
MOMO-YAMA
THE epochs of Japanese history from the eighth century until the fall of the Ashikaga shogunate are generally divided into the Nara, the Heian, the Kamakura, the Muromachi, and the Higashi-yama. To these has now to be added the Momo-yama (Peach Hill), a term derived from the name of a palatial residence built by Hideyoshi in the Fushimi suburb of Kyoto. The project was conceived in 1593, that is to say, during the course of the Korean campaign, and the business of collecting materials was managed on such a colossal scale that the foundations could be laid by September in the same year. Two months sufficed not only to construct a mansion of extraordinary magnificence and most elaborate interior decoration, but also to surround it with a spacious park presenting all the choicest features of Japanese landscape gardens. The annals state that fifty thousand men were engaged on the work, and the assertion ceases to seem extravagant when we consider the nature of the task and the singularly brief period devoted to its completion. It was Hideyoshi's foible to surpass all his predecessors and contemporaries alike in the magnitude of his designs and in the celerity of their achievement. Even his pastimes were conceived on the same stupendous scale. Thus, in 1594, at the very time when his armies in Korea were conducting an oversea campaign of unprecedented magnitude, he planned a flower-viewing fete which will live in the pages of history as more sumptuous and more magnificent than the hitherto unrivalled festivities of Yoshimasa. The places visited were the cherry-clad hills of Yoshino and the venerable monastery of Koya, and some idea of the scale of the fete may be gathered from the fact that to a shrine on Koya-san, dedicated to the memory of his mother, Hideyoshi presented a sum equivalent to £14,000 or $68,000.
Still more lavish was a party organized four years later to visit the cherry blossoms at Daigo in the suburbs of Kyoto. This involved the rebuilding of a large Buddhist temple (Sambo-in) to accommodate Hideyoshi and his party as a temporary resting-place, and involved also the complete enclosing of the roads from Momo-yama to Daigo, as well as of a wide space surrounding the slopes of the cherry-clad hills, with fences festooned in silk curtains. Numerous tea pavilions were erected, and Hideyoshi, having sent home all his male guests and attendants, remained himself among a multitude of gorgeously apparelled ladies, and passed from pavilion to pavilion, listening to music, witnessing dancing, and viewing works of art.