Japan and the Japanese

350 JAPAN. A. D. 1C90 1692.
commodities, and the chief mercantile town in the empire. There
is scarce ;i house in this large capital where there is not something
made or sold. Here they refine copper, coin money, print hooks,
weave the richest stuffs, with gold and silver flowers. The best
and scarcest dyes, the most artful carvings, all sorts of musical
instruments, pictures, japanned cabinets, all sorts of things wrought
in gold and other metals, particularly in steel, as the best tempered
blades, and other arms, are made here in the utmost perfection, as
are, also, the richest dresses, and after the best fashion, all sorts
of toys, puppets, moving their heads of themselves, and, in short,
there is nothing can be thought of but what may be found at Miako,
and nothing, though never so neatly wrought, can be imported
from abroad, but what some artist or other in this capital will un-
dertake to imitate it. Considering
this, it is no wonder that the
manufactures of Miako are become so famous throughout the em-
pire as to be easily preferred to all others (though, perhaps, inferior
in some particulars), only because they have the name of being
made there. There are but few houses in all the chief streets
where there is not something to be sold, and, for my part,
I could
not help admiring whence they can have customers enough for such
an immense quantity of goods. 'T is true, indeed, there is scarce
anybody passes through but what buys something or other of the
manufactures of this
city, either for his own use, or for presents to
be made to his friends and relations.
The lord chief justice resides at Miako, a man of great power
and authority, as having the supreme command, under the emperor,
of all the bugios, governors, stewards, and other officers, who are
any ways concerned in the government of the imperial cities, crown
lands and tenements, in all the western provinces of the empire.
Even the western princes themselves must, in some measure, de-
pend on him, and have a great regard to his person as a mediator
and compounder of quarrels and difficulties that may arise between
them. Nobody is suffered to pass through Array and Fakone, two
of the most important passes, and, in a manner, the keys of the im-
perial capital and court, without a passport, signed by his hand.
" The political government and regulation of the streets is the
same at Miako as it is at Osaka and Nagasaki. The number of
inhabitants of Miako, in the year of our visit, will appear by the