Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
not sink much capital in the building of their own ships, preferring to charter them from
other specialist shipping-lines.
At the end of the seventeenth century the Kōnoike extended their range to take in the
Nagasaki trade, and thus had a part in the commerce with the outside world, dealing in
such items as drugs and medicaments, raw silk, and sugar. In 1669 this trade amounted
to 228,000
monme
of silver. The house had started an exchange business in 1656, partly
to help with the transfer of credits from Edo to Osaka in connection with their
sake
sales,
and also to deal with their loans to
daimyō
and to other merchants. After the Kōnoike had
joined the “ten men” on the foundation of this organization in 1662, their connection with
daimyō
grew at the expense of the others, until they had 122 of them on their topics. They
handledagreatdealofricewhich
daimyō
senttoOsakaforsale,andcontinuedinthesame
line until the Meiji Restoration, when they formed a banking-house, the first Western-type
company to come into being in Japan.
The profession of moneychanger was thus very important and basic among merchant
circles in Japan. In the higher reaches, as among the “ten men” in Osaka, it involved mak-
ing loans to
daimyō,
loans that were secured by the rice and other products that the
daimyō
hadtosell.Todemonstratefurtherhowtheeconomicorganizationofthecountrydepended
upon the merchants, it will be necessary to give a summary description of the processes
and paths that rice went through from the farm up to the rice-dealers. In the first place, it
must be realized that most
samurai
received more rice than they could consume, and that
although their salaries, and the status that these salaries gave, were expressed in terms of
rice, most recipients were in fact paid in money. Only the lowest ranks, whose incomes ap-
proximated to their consumption, were likely to take their rations in kind; the same might
happen with impoverished
daimyō,
but in many cases these would have been forcing their
farmerstopayupinmoneybeforeharvesttime.Therewasalwaysaquantityofwhatmight
be called “private” rice available in the domains: farmers would sell part of that which was
lefttothemaftertheirtaxeswerepaid,whilemoneylenderswhohadadvancedcashagainst
futurecropswouldtaketheseoverwhentheymatured,andtherewasalsoacertainamount
of illicit cultivation. This “private” rice would be bought on site and would find its way
mainly to Osaka, as would much of the tax-rice from the domains other than those of the
Shogun.
The method of dealing with this rice varied from place to place. The picture of what
happened to that from the Shogun's territories seems fairly clear. His residence and the
center of his government being in Edo, his rice had to go there. The farmer had the re-
sponsibility of getting it to the bailiff 's office, or other convenient point, after a prelimin-
ary collection at the village headman's store. After inspection at the office it was taken to
the port by the farmers again, and loaded on vessels for transport to Edo. These ships were
hired for this purpose, with one-third of the freight payable on loading, and two-thirds on
