Japan and the Japanese

STREET GOVERNMENT. 266
solicit the interests of the town's people at the court of the governors,
and to keep them informed of the daily proceedings of the
mayors, for which purpose they had a small room at the governor's
palace, where they were always in waiting.
There was no town-house nor other public place of' assembly.
When the magistrates met on business, it was at the presiding
mayor's house. Besides the various bodies of interpreters and others,
connected with the foreign trade, there was a particular corporation
of constables and bailiffs, consisting of about thirty families, who
lived in a street by themselves. Their office was reputed military
and noble, and they had the privilege of wearing two swords, a
privilege which the mayors and mercantile people did not possess.
The tanners, obliged to act also as public executioners, were held
in execration, yet they also wore two swords. They lived in a
separate village near the place of execution, placed as everywhere
in Japan at the west end of the town.
But the most remarkable thing in the municipal government of
Nagasaki (and the same thing extended to all the other Japanese
towns) was the system of street government, mentioned in the nar-
ratives of Don llodrigo, Caron, and others, but which Kampfer
more particularly describes.
The house-owners of every street were arranged in companies, or
corporations, of five, or sometimes a few more, each street having
from ten to fifteen such companies. None but house-owners were
admitted into these corporations mere ; occupants were looked upon
as dependents on their landlords, with no voice in the affairs of the
/street, nor right to claim any share in the public money, though
they paid high' rents. Each street company had one of its number
for a head, who was responsible for the conduct of his four com
panions, and obliged, in certain cases at least, to share the punishment
of their crimes. The members of these corporations chose
from among themselves an Otlona, or chief magistrate of the street.
The choice was by ballot, and the name of the person having the
greatest number was presented to the governor, with a humble
petition that he might be appointed to the office, of which the
salary in Nagasaki was a ten-fold share of the annual distribution
to the inhabitants, derived from the duties on the foreign
trade.
The duty of the Ottona was, to give
the necessary orders in case