Page:Brinkley - Japan - Volume 6.djvu/176

 high. Rates of interest ranged from five per cent to eight per cent monthly, and in the middle of the thirteenth century loans without tangible security were wholly interdicted. Military rule was not in any sense favourable to the development of trade. It has been shown that while the administration of affairs remained in the hands of the Kyōtō Court, special provision was made for maintaining horses and oxen at the various post towns, but under the feudal government the people were required to furnish horses and other assistance for carriers travelling on public service. One horse and two baggage-carriers represented the assessment for every twelve and one-half acres of rice land or twenty-five acres of upland, and whenever the Shōgun travelled between Kamakura and Kyōtō, an additional contribution of four hundred mon had to be made for each acre. This levy on account of a Shōgun's progress meant, if translated into modern prices and currency, a payment of about three shillings per acre.

China under the Sung and Yuan dynasties had numerous articles for which a ready sale should have existed in Japan. She did indeed send con- siderable quantities of brocades, damask, "Indian" ink, stone-ware, and matting, and all these found eager purchasers. But the Mongol invasion (thirteenth century), the series of incidents that preceded it, and the piratical tendency subsequently shown by the Japanese, greatly inter-