It will be seen that for the year 1920 there was a big drop. The population of 55,961,140 for the year 1920 is the actual population as returned by the census; the figures of the preceding years are "based," it is explained to me, "on the local registrars' entries. The national census has demonstrated that the figures were larger than the actual number of inhabitants, the discrepancies being partly due to erroneous and duplicate registration and partly to the exodus of persons to the colonies or foreign countries whilst retaining their legal domiciles at home. But the table serves to show the rate of increase." A million and three-quarters is a substantial figure, however, to account for in this way. It would seem reasonable to suppose that the increased cost of living, marriage at a later age than formerly and increased mortality due directly or indirectly to the factory system have arrested the rate of increase of the population in recent years. For trustworthy figures of the Japanese population we must await the next census and compare its figures with those of the 1920 census, the first to be taken scientifically.
A considerable part of Japan is uninhabitable. Of how much of the British Isles can this be said? The fact that there are in Japan fifty more or less active volcanoes, about a thousand hot springs and two dozen mountains between 12,000 and 8,000 ft. high speaks for itself. Ben Nevis is only 4,400, Snowdon only 3,500 ft.
The population of Korea in 1920 (17,284,207) was 239 per square mile. According to Whitaker for 1921 the population of Manchuria (11 millions) is 30 per square mile, and of Mongolia (3 millions) 2.8.
[ SMALL FARMS DECREASING [XXXI].]
| Year | Below 5 tan | Over 5 tan | Over 1 chō | Over 2 chō | Over 3 chō | Over 5 chō |
| 1908 | 37.28 | 32.61 | 19.51 | 6.44 | 3.01 | 1.15 |
| 1912 | 37.14 | 33.25 | 19.61 | 5.96 | 2.83 | 1.21 |
| 1918 | 35.54 | 33.30 | 20.70 | 6.33 | 2.82 | 1.31 |
| 1919 | 35.36 | 33.18 | 20.68 | 6.21 | 2.83 | 1.74 |
See also [Appendix XLVII].
[ FORESTS [XXXII].] The following figures for 1918 show, in thousand chō, the ownership of forests (bared tracts in brackets): Crown, 1,303 (89); State, 7,288 (392); prefectures, cities, towns and villages, 2,894 (1,383); temples and shrines, 111 (15); 7,186 (1,630); total, 18,782 (3,509). The largest yield is from sugi (cryptomeria), pine and hinoki (Charmae-cyparis obtusa).
[ ARMAMENTS [XXXIII].] 1,505 million yen of the national debt is for armaments and military purposes against 923 million yen for reproductive undertakings (railways, harbours, drainage, roads, steelworks, mining, telephones, etc.), 143 million for exploitation of Formosa, Korea and Saghalien, 123 million for financial adjustment and 98 million for feudal pensions and feudal debt. Of the expenditure for 1920-1, 846 million, some 395 million were for the army and navy. During a period of 130 years the United States Government has spent nearly four-fifths of its revenue on war or objects related to war.
[ LANDOWNING AND FARMING [XXXIV].] Before the Restoration the farmers were the tenants of the daimyos' vassals, the samurai, or of the daimyos direct. When the daimyos gave up their lands the Crown made the farmers the owners of the land they occupied. Its legal value was assessed and the national land tax was fixed at 3 per cent, and the local tax at 1 per cent. Various adjustments have since taken place.
The Japanese Constitutional Labour Party has insisted in a communication to the International Labour Conference at Geneva that Japanese tenant farmers are not properly called farmers but that they are "labourers pure and simple." See [Appendix LXXVI].