The Farmers - Everyday Life in Traditional Japan - page 72

spillage,forexample,andtherewasafurtherpercentageofriceexactedtomakeupforany
wastage during transportation.
For various reasons, such as insect damage, failure of the rainy season or ruin brought
by a typhoon just as the rice was ripening, crops might fail, and the farmers be unable to
produce their taxes. In these circumstances a lord with a large domain and considerable re-
sources would excuse the payment of part or even the whole of the tax, and even, if his
stores allowed it, hand out rice to starving farmers ( 42 ) . But there were some lords who
could not do this, and were hard put to it to get together enough rice to feed their retainers.
If their farmers had no rice to hand in, they insisted on the payment of the money equi-
valent, and if the farmers had not the money, they had to borrow it against the security of
future crops, at exorbitant rates of interest. Such a lord might find difficulty in feeding his
men even in ordinary years, and would exact a money payment early in the season: here
again the farmer would have to mortgage his crop to the money-lender, and in severe cases
would have to pledge crops not only for the year in question but for the years ahead.
(42)Famine.Afarmerhasdiedofstarvation.Aneighborpointsouttoavillageofficialand
aBuddhistpriest(withhisrosary)thatthedeadman'smoneywasofnoavail,fortherewas
no food to be bought.