During the closing years of Hideyoshi's life, his adopted son Hidetsugu, in whose favor he had resigned the office of kwanpaku so greatly abused his power that Hideyoshi became indignant and ordered him into retirement in the monastery of Kōya-san, where, shortly afterward, he received instructions to commit suicide. Hideyoshi bequeathed his rank and titles to his son Hideyori, who was a mere child at the time of his illustrious father's decease. A few hours before his death the great captain and administrator summoned all his generals to his side, and made them swear to protect his youthful successor, appointing Mayeda Toshiiye to the post of guardian. The generals, however, entertained toward each other sentiments of such jealousy and hostility that the old disorders would have been renewed but for the transcendent ability and prowess of Tokugawa Iyeyasu.
Chapter XI
THE FOUNDATION OF THE EDO GOVERNMENT. 1603-1651
We have now to speak of the fifth line of shōguns, the Tokugawa at Edo, who held administrative sway for 255 years from 1603 to the time of the imperial restoration in 1868, a period which is not far removed from the present; and during which the feudal organization of Japan attained its most perfect development.
The original name of the Tokugawa family was Matsudaira. They were of the same blood as Nitta and Ashikaga and of the clan of Minamoto. From the time of the Southern and Northern dynasties their forefathers, generation after generation, espoused the cause opposed to the Ashikaga, and consequently during the Muromachi shōgunate they were relegated to a position of insignificance. Subsequently, they acquired large territorial possessions and had their seat in Mikawa during eight generations. But being surrounded by powerful enemies, they experienced no little difficulty in maintaining themselves. When Iyeyasu was a mere child, he was confined in various places as a surety for his family's conduct. These experiences probably helped to sharpen his naturally great abilities. At the age of seventeen he succeeded to the headship of the family, and as he grew to manhood he gave proofs of magnanimity and coolness, no less than of strategical skill. Gradually and astutely he encroached upon the neighboring provinces, taking clever advantage of the disordered state of the country, until finally he obtained possession of all the provinces that had belonged to the Takeda and the Imagawa and found himself the strongest chieftain in Tōkai-dō, lord of the five provinces of Mikawa, Tōtōmi, Suruga, Kai, and Shinano. In 1590, when Hideyoshi had overthrown the Hōjō at Odawara, all the eight provinces of Kwantō—Sagami, Musashi, Izu, Kazusa, Shimōsa, Kōzuke, Shimotsuke, and Hitachi—hitherto held by the Hōjō, were given to Iyeyasu, the taikō receiving in their stead the five provinces previously possessed by Iyeyasu in Tōkai-dō; an exchange doubtless suggested to the taikō by the comparative propinquity of the latter five provinces to Kyōto, and the advisability of relegating to a distant part of the empire a chieftain of such commanding gifts as Iyeyasu exhibited. Having come into possession of the eight provinces, Iyeyasu made his headquarters at Edo (now Tōkyō). A castle had been built here more than a century before by Ota Dōkan, a vassal of the Uyesugi, but it was of insignificant dimensions, and the town which it overlooked was touched on three sides by the Musashino plain, its southeastern front being washed by the sea. The streets, where one and a half million citizens now congregate, were then overgrown with reeds. So soon, however, as Iyeyasu moved thither, he inaugurated extensive improvements, leveling hills, filling marshes, digging great moats, and building colossal parapets, until a site was fully prepared for a great capital.
Iyeyasu, though of indomitable courage in war, was a man of gentle methods. His keen perception showed him every aspect of an affair, and his patience in unraveling difficulties never failed. So long as the reins of administration remained in his hands, quiet obedience was everywhere accorded to his sway. No one opposed him. As for Hideyoshi, he soon appreciated the Tokugawa chief and treated him with all the consideration due to his great gifts. Iyeyasu had large ambition. Coming into possession of the Kwantō provinces, he sat down quietly to foster his strength and bide his time, Hideyoshi, meanwhile, wasting his resources in fruitless attacks upon Korea and thus impairing the prosperity which his transcendent abilities had obtained for him. Finally, before his foreign wars had reached any issue, he died, bequeathing his power to his son, Hideyori, then a lad of only seven years. The usual results of a minor's administration ensued. The government fell into disorder. Once more the old rivalry sprang up among the feudal chiefs, each struggling for supremacy. Above them all towered Tokugawa Iyeyasu, for his influence was superior even to that of the Toyotomi family.
Gradually the various dissentient elements disposed themselves into two great parties. The one, including Katō Kiyomasa, Fukushima Masanori, Kuroda Nagamasa, Asano Yukinaga, and other notables, was under the leadership of Iyeyasu, and the other, to which belonged Mōri Terumoto, Uyesugi Kagekatsu, Ukita Hideiye, and forty-three other feudal chiefs, hostile to the Tokugawa, was under the real leadership of Ishida Mitsunari, a favorite of the late Hideyoshi, and under the nominal leadership of the taikō's son, Hideyori. The latter party had their headquarters in the Ōsaka castle, and the struggle for mastery was finally concluded in a great battle, fought on September 15, 1600. Iyeyasu was the assailant. Marching westward at the head of an army of 80,000, he encountered Mitsunari's forces, numbering 130,000, on the Sekigahara plain in Mino, the Ōsaka confederates having moved thus far to the combat. Swords were crossed at eight in the morning, and the battle waged with the utmost fierceness for six hours, the Ōsaka army being ultimately defeated with a loss of 30,000. Mitsunari and Yukinaga were among the slain, and tradition says that the whole plain was red with gore. So decisive was this victory that other nobles who had espoused the cause of Hideyori and were fighting for it in their own districts now laid down their arms and hastened to come to terms with the victor. Iyeyasu now set himself to consolidate his power. Confiscating, wholly or in part, the estates of the chiefs who had opposed him, he made ample grants to his own supporters. The administrative power of the empire came wholly into his hands, and every part of the country accepted his control. Three years later he was nominated sei-i-tai-shōgun, and thenceforth, through many generations, his family ruled in Edo.