in the first place, it is
undeniable that he made the peace of the realm, the welfare of the
people, and the stability of the throne his second purposes, and that
he pursued them with ardour. Thus, one of his earliest acts when he
obtained the control in Kyoto was to appoint officials for
impartially administering justice, to reduce the citizens' taxes; to
succour widows and orphans, and to extend to all the blessings of
security and tranquillity. In 1572, we find him sending messengers to
the provinces with instructions to put in hand the making of roads
having a width of from twenty-one to twelve feet; to set up
milestones and plant trees along these roads; to build bridges; to
remove barriers, and generally to facilitate communications.

Towards the Throne he adopted a demeanour emphatically loyal. In this
respect, he followed the example of his father, Nobuhide, and
departed radically from that of his predecessors, whether Fujiwara,
Taira, or Ashikaga. As concrete examples may be cited the facts that
he restored the shrines of Ise, and reinstituted the custom of
renovating them every twenty years; that, in the year following his
entry into the capital, he undertook extensive repairs of the palace;
that he granted considerable estates for the support of the Imperial
household, and that he organized a commission to repurchase all the
properties which had been alienated from the Court. Finally, it is on
record that when, in recognition of all this, the sovereign proposed
to confer on him the rank of minister of the Left, he declined the
honour, and suggested that titles of lower grade should be given to
those of his subordinates who had shown conspicuous merit.

DEATH OF MITSUHIDE

It was plainly in Hideyoshi's interests that he should figure
publicly as the avenger of Nobunaga's murder, and to this end his
speedy arrival in Kyoto was essential. He therefore set out at once,
after the fall of Takamatsu, with only a small number of immediate
followers. Mitsuhide attempted to destroy him on the way, and the
details of this attempt have been magnified by tradition to
incredible dimensions. All that can be said with certainty is that
Hideyoshi was, for a moment, in extreme danger but that he escaped
scathless. Immediately on arriving in Kyoto, he issued an appeal to
all Nobunaga's vassal-barons, inviting them to join in exterminating
Mitsuhide, whose heinous crime "provoked both heaven and earth."

But it was no part