Page:Brinkley - Japan - Volume 2.djvu/94

 sufficed to convert the fragile, flimsy structures of wood and clay, with their boarded towers and single-planked gates, which the soldiers of the Hōjō and the Ashikaga called strongholds, into colossal castles, with broad moats, lofty battlements, and stupendous escarpments of masonry.

The site chosen for Osaka Castle was a lofty plateau on the bank of the Yodo River. At the time when Hideyoshi fixed his eyes on this spot, it was occupied by a large monastery of Shinshiu monks, who, owing mainly to the splendid advantages that the position offered, had managed in previous years to beat off an assault made upon them by Hideyoshi's patron, the renowned soldier, Oda Nobunaga. That fact had much to do with the steps that Hideyoshi took to obtain an order from the Emperor for the removal of the monastery and its replacement by a castle which should protect the approaches to the Imperial city from the sea. The plan of the fortress showed three surrounding moats and escarpments, an arrangement which has always been adopted whenever possible by the architects of Japanese castles. These moats were about one hundred and fifty feet wide and twenty feet deep, and they not only contained from six to ten feet of water, but had numbers of wooden stakes fixed in the bottom to prevent an enemy from wading across. The revetment of the escarp was built with polygonal granite blocks, put together in the fashion of Japanese masonry, the blocks being pyramidal and