Page:Brinkley - Japan - Volume 4.djvu/167

 the "rice-boilers" (meshi-taki), and the "water-drawers" (mizu-kumi).

From all this it will be seen that, in the case of the great bulk of the people, namely, the commoners and the inferior samurai, education during the last century and a half of Tokugawa sway had no wider range of subjects than caligraphy, the principles of Confucian ethics, and a superficial study of criminal law as actually in force. There were, of course, special teachers of the tea ceremony, of flower-setting, of music, of dancing, and of incense-burning; but these constituted polite accomplishments, and were beyond the range of ordinary education.

Passing from this examination of ethical and educational factors of progress to the actual life of the people, the first noticeable fact is that, on the accession of the Tokugawa Shōguns, Yedo becoming at once the administrative and the military capital of the Empire, the manners and customs of its citizens were dictated by samurai canons, and the influence of the city's example was felt throughout the whole of eastern Japan. Not only the Mikawa-bushi (Tokugawa vassals), but also retainers of all the other feudal chiefs assembled there, and it resulted, as will be understood from what has already been written about the "way of the warrior," that commerce and industry were not counted of any importance, soldierly accomplishments alone being esteemed.