“Those who attend the service of the Kami temples, though not collected into monasteries, like the Buddhist clergy, but secular and married persons, yet assume to themselves a far higher degree of holiness and respect than they think the common bulk of secular persons deserve. They live with their families in houses built for them in the descent of the mountains. Their way of life, as well as their common dress at home and abroad, is no ways different from that of the other inhabitants, except that they do not shave their heads, but let their hair grow, and tie it together behind. When they go to the temple they dress in an ecclesiastical habit, with various head-dresses, according to every one’s office and quality. They maintain themselves by the alms and offerings given them by those who come to worship in their temples, or at their appearance in solemn processions.
“The ecclesiastics of the Buddhist religion have no processions nor other public solemnities, like the Shintō clergy. They always keep within the district of their convent, where they mind little else but their prayers in the temple at certain stated hours. Their maintenance arises from the fees given them for prayers to be said in their temples, or at funerals for the relief of departed souls, as also from voluntary and charitable contributions.”
The gardens in and about the city and the neighboring villages abundantly furnish it with all sorts of fruits, vegetables and roots, with firewood, and also with some venison and poultry; but the domestic supply of rice is insufficient, and that capital article has to be imported from the neighboring provinces. The harbor and neighboring coast yield plenty of fish and crabs. The rivers that run through the town provide it with clear and sweet water, “very fit,” says Kämpfer, “for daily drink; the sake, or rice beer, as it is brewed in Japan, being too strong, and that in particular made at Nagasaki of a disagreeable taste[149].”
Except articles made of gold, silver and Sawaas (?),—a mixture of gold, silver, and copper,—for the foreign trade, manufactures at Nagasaki are not so good as in other parts of the empire; and yet everything is sold dearer, chiefly to foreigners.
The inhabitants are mostly merchants, shop-keepers, tradesmen, handicraftsmen, artificers, brewers, besides the numerous retinue of the governors, and the people employed in the Dutch and Chinese trade, by which, in fact, the town is mainly supported. There are many poor people and beggars, most of them religious mendicants.
“The town,” says Kämpfer, “is never without a great deal of noise. In the day, victuals and other merchandise are cried up and down the streets. Day-laborers and the seamen in the harbor encourage one another to work with a certain sound. In the night the watchmen and soldiers upon duty, both in the streets and harbor, show their vigilance, and at the same time indicate the hours of the night, by beating two pieces of wood against each other. The Chinese contribute their share chiefly in the evening, when they burn some pieces of gilt paper, and throw them into the sea, as an offering to their idol, or when they carry their idol about its temple; both which they do with beating of drums and cymbals. But all this is little compared with the clamor and bawling of the priests and the relations of dying or dead persons, who, either in the house where the corpse lies, or else upon certain days sacred to the deceased’s memory, sing a Namida [Namu-amida-butsu], that is, a prayer, to their god Amida[150], with a loud voice, for the relief of his soul. The like is done by certain fraternities or societies of devout neighbors, friends, or relations, who meet by turns in their houses, every day, in the morning or evening, in order to sing the Namida by way of precaution for the future relief of their own souls.”
Nagasaki, down to the year 1688, had, like the other imperial cities, two governors, commanding by turns; the one not in the immediate exercise of authority being resident meanwhile at Yedo. In 1688, the policy was adopted of having three governors; two to be always resident at Nagasaki, to watch each other, and presiding alternately for two months, while the third was to come in each alternate year from Yedo to relieve the senior resident[151]. The resident governors leave their families at Yedo as hostages for their good behavior, and, during the time of their absence from court, are strictly prohibited, so it is stated, to admit any woman within their palaces. The establishments of these imperial governors, as described by Kämpfer, may probably be taken as a specimen of the ordinary way of life with the higher order of Japanese officials. Their salary did not exceed fifteen hundred or two thousand koku of rice (in money, the price of the article being very variable, from seven thousand to ten thousand taels); but the perquisites were so considerable that in a few years they might get vast estates, did not the presents which must be made to the emperor and the grandees of the court consume the greater part of their profits. Out of their allowance they were obliged to maintain an extensive retinue,—two Karō, or stewards of the household, ten Yoriki, all noblemen of good families, who acted both as civil and military officers, and thirty Dōshin, likewise military and civil officers, but of inferior rank.
The business of the Yoriki was to assist the governor with their advice, if required, and to execute his commands, either as military officers or as magistrates. They had, besides their food and a new suit annually, an allowance of one hundred taels a year; but this hardly sufficed to enable them to keep the servants necessary to their dignity, such as a pike-bearer, a keeper of their great sword, and a shoe or slipper bearer, and much less to maintain a family. The Dōshin were a sort of assistants to the Yoriki. They served as guards, and did duty on board ship, especially in the guard-boats, either as commanding officers or as privates. Sometimes they did the office of bailiffs or constables, and put people under arrest, for which purpose they always carried a halter about them. Their yearly allowance, beside their board, did not exceed fifty taels, out of which they must maintain each a servant.[152] The governors had still other domestics, of inferior rank, to dress and undress them, to introduce visitors, and to bring messages, besides numerous menial servants.
At the entrance of their palaces, within the court-yard, a guard was kept of four or five Dōshin. No domestic could leave the house without taking from its place in the guard-room a square wooden tablet, which he hung up again on his return, so that it could be known at a glance how many and who were absent. Within the great door or main entrance into the house, another guard was kept by some of the Yoriki, one of whom had charge of a book, in which he entered, as the custom is at the houses of persons of rank, the names of all who go in or out, for the information of the master of the house, who sometimes at night examines the entries.
The governor’s equipage and attendance when going abroad consisted of a led horse, a Norimono, in which he was carried, by the side of which walked four of the gentlemen of his bedchamber, and behind it two pike-bearers, followed by a train of Karō, Yoriki, and Dōshin, with their own servants and attendants.