fu began to
wane steadily, and the restoration of the administrative power to the
sovereign came to be discussed, with bated breath at first, but
gradually with increased freedom. It is undeniable, however, that the
decline of the Tokugawa was due as much to an empty treasury as to
the complications of foreign intercourse. The financial situation in
the first half of the nineteenth century may be briefly described as
one of expenditures constantly exceeding income, and of repeated
recourse by the Bakufu to the fatal expedient of debasing the
currency. Public respect was steadily undermined by these displays of
impecuniosity, and the feudatories in the west of the empire--that is
to say, the tozama daimyo, whose loyalty to the Bakufu was weak at
the best--found an opportunity to assert themselves against the Yedo
administration, while the appreciation of commodities rendered the
burden of living constantly more severe and thus helped to alienate
the people.

SUMPTUARY LAWS

While with one hand scattering abroad debased tokens of exchange, the
Bakufu legislators laboured strenuously with the other to check
luxury and extravagance. Conspicuous among the statesmen who sought
to restore the economical habit of former days was Mizuno Echizen no
Kami, who, in 1826 and the immediately subsequent years, promulgated
decree after decree vetoing everything in the nature of needless
expenditures. It fared with his attempt as it always does with such
legislation. People admired the vetoes in theory but paid little
attention to them in practice.

FAMINE IN THE TEMPO ERA (1830-1844)

From 1836 onward, through successive years, one bad harvest followed
another until the prices of rice and other cereals rose to
unprecedented figures. The Bakufu were not remiss in their measures
to relieve distress. Free grants of grain were made in the most
afflicted regions; houses of refuge were constructed where the
indigent might be fed and lodged during a maximum period of 210 days,
each inmate receiving in addition a daily allowance of money which
was handed to him on leaving the refuge, and this example of charity
was obeyed widely by the feudatories. It is on record that twenty
thousand persons availed themselves of these charitable institutions
in Yedo alone. One particularly sad episode marks the story. Driven
to desperation by the sight of the people's pain and by his own
failure to obtain from wealthy folks a sufficient measure of aid,