rs on Japanese history profess to see in the pantheon of
Japan, pictured in the Kojiki and Nihonki, nothing more than a
collection of distinguished personages who lived and labored and
contended in the country before the historic period, thus bringing
deified men and women down to earth again. Such persons accept the
records of Jimmu-Tenno's origin as essentially accurate in so far as
they state what is human and reasonable, rejecting them only when they
set forth what is supernatural, and, to them, unbelievable.

Others, on the contrary, consider, or profess to consider, the
supernatural portions of those narratives as perfectly trustworthy, and
discredit only those statements concerning the first of the sacred
emperors which would seem in any way to detract from his divinity. I
should be sorry to have to argue the case with either of these parties,
but I must take the liberty of accepting as sufficiently accurate as
much of the recorded lives of Jimmu and his successors as the modern
prosaic histories in Japan are content to put forth, and no more.

Proceeding upon this basis, there is not much to be said of the reigns
of the mikados who ruled before the Christian era, beyond what has been
already stated. As regards the first emperor, his ancestor Ninigi no
Mikoto--whether a god or not, or whether he came down from the sun by
means of "the bridge of heaven" or not--appears to have established his
residence at the ancient Himuka, now Hiuga; there it was that
Jimmu-Tenno first resided, and thence it was that he started on his
historic and memorable career. The central parts of Japan were
militarily occupied by rebels (whose names are preserved), and it was to
subdue them that he proceeded eastward. He stopped for three years at
Taka Shima, constructing the necessary vessels for crossing the waters,
and then, in the course of years, making his way victoriously as far as
Nanieva, the modern Osaka, encountered his foes at Kawachi, and defeated
them, the chief general being left dead on the battle-field.

Jimmu was now sole master of Japan, as then known, and in the following
year he mounted the throne. The eastern and northern parts of the
country were, however, still, and long afterwards, peopled by the Aino
race, who were at a later period treated as troublesome savages, and
conquered by a famous prince, Yamato-Dake, by help of the sacred sword.
The spot selected by the Emperor Jimmu for his capital was Kashiwabara,
in