The foundations of Japan

by J. W. Robertson Scott

(NAGANO)

The condition of the lower orders is the true mark.—Johnson

The Buddhist temple in which I lived for about two months stands on high ground in a village lying about 2,500 ft. above sea-level in the prefecture of Nagano and does not seem to have been visited by foreigners. It is reached by a road which is little better than a track. No kuruma are to be found in the district, but there are a few light two-wheeled lorries. Practically all the traffic is on horseback or on foot. There is a view of the Japanese Alps and of Fuji.

Running through the village[ ^[195]] is a river. Most of the summer it may be crossed by stepping stones, but the width of the rocky bed gives some notion of the volume of water which pours down after rains and on the melting of the snow. Two or three miles up from the village a considerable amount of water is drawn off into two channels which have been dug, one on either side of the river, at a gentler slope than that at which the stream flows. The rapid fall of the river is indicated by the fact that these channels reach the village more than 100 ft. above the level at which the river itself enters it. The channels, cut as they have been through sharply sloping banks packed with boulders and big stones, and strengthened throughout by banking, in order to cope as far as possible with the torrents which rage down the hillside in winter, represent a vast amount of communal labour. By the side of each channel the excavated earth and stones have been used to make a path for pack horses. The water which comes down these channels serves not only for the ordinary uses of the village but for irrigating the rice fields and for driving the many water wheels, the plashing and groaning of which are heard night and day.

THE BUDDHIST TEMPLE (WITH SHINTO SHRINE ON THE LEFT) IN WHICH THIS CHAPTER WAS WRITTEN

The whole area of the oaza is officially recorded as 800 chō, but the real area may be double, or even more than that. About 40 per cent. is cultivated either as paddy or as dry land. The remaining 60 per cent., from which 18 chō may be deducted for house land, is under grass and wood. Half of this grass and woodland belongs to the oaza and half to private persons. The grass is mostly couch grass and weeds. In places there is a certain amount of clover and vetch. Of the 200 families, numbering about 1,700 people, less than a dozen are tenants. Of the others, a third cultivate their own land and hire some more. The remaining two-thirds cultivate their own land and hire none. The outstanding crop beyond rice is mulberry. A considerable amount of millet and buckwheat is also grown.

The village is obviously well off. The signs are: successful sericulture, the large quantity of rice eaten, the number of well-looking horses (the millet seems to be grown largely for them, but they also receive beans and wheat boiled), the fact that no attempt is made to collect the considerable amount of horse manure on the roads, the cared-for appearance of the temple and shrines, the almost complete absence of tea-houses, the ease with which new land may be obtained and the contented look of the people.

One does not expect to find in a remote and wholly Buddhist village many other animals than horses, and in this community the additional live stock consists of ten goats (kept for giving milk for invalids), two pigs and a number of poultry. A working horse over four years was worth 150 yen. The value of land[ ^[196]] is to be considered in relation to local standards of value. It is doubtful if the priest, who seemed to be comfortably off, is in receipt of more than 250 yen a year. The midwife, who belongs to the oldest family and has been trained in Tokyo, gets from 2 to 2½ yen per case. As new land is always available on the hillsides there is very little emigration to the towns, but twenty girls are working in the factories in the big silk-reeling centre twelve miles off. The hillside land which is owned by the village is not sold but rented to those who want it. To make new paddies is primarily a question of having enough capital with which to buy the artificial manure required for the crops.