seniors were not publicly permitted, although such transactions
evidently took place. Even the manumission of a slave required
official sanction. Thus it is recorded that, in the reign of the
Empress Jito, Komaro, an asomi, asked and obtained the Court's
permission to grant their freedom to six hundred slaves in his
possession. Another rule enacted in Jito's time was that the slaves
of an uji, when once manumitted, could not be again placed on the
slaves' register at the request of a subsequent uji no Kami. Finally
this same sovereign enacted that yellow-coloured garments should be
worn by freemen and black by slaves. History shows that the sale and
purchase of human beings in Japan, subject to the above limitations,
was not finally forbidden until the year 1699.

THE MILITARY SYSTEM

It has been seen that the Emperors Kotoku and Temmu attached much
importance to the development of military efficiency and that they
issued orders with reference to the training of provincials, the
armed equipment of the people, the storage of weapons of war, and the
maintenance of men-at-arms by officials. Compulsory service, however,
does not appear to have been inaugurated until the reign of the
Empress Jito, when (689) her Majesty instructed the local governors
that one-fourth of the able-bodied men in each province should be
trained every year in warlike exercises. This was the beginning of
the conscription system in Japan.

THE ORDER OF SUCCESSION OF THE THRONE

That the throne should be occupied by members of the Imperial family
only had been a recognized principle of the Japanese polity from
remotest epochs. But there had been an early departure from the rule
of primogeniture, and since the time of Nintoku the eligibility of
brothers also had been acknowledged in practice. To this latitude of
choice many disturbances were attributable, notably the fell Jinshin
struggle, and the terrors of that year were still fresh in men's
minds when, during Jito's reign, the deaths of two Crown Princes in
succession brought up the dangerous problem again for solution. The
princes were Kusakabe and Takaichi. The former had been nominated by
his father, Temmu, but was instructed to leave the reins of power in
the hands of his mother, Jito, for a time. He died in the year 689,
while Jito was still regent, and Takaichi, another of Temmu's sons,
who had distinguished himself as commander of a division of troops in
the Jinshin campaign, was made P