s which still remained in Korea.

Thus ended a chapter in the history of Japan, on which her best friends
can look back with neither pride nor satisfaction. This war was begun
without any sufficient provocation, and its results did nothing to advance
the glory of Japan or its soldiers. The great soldier who planned it and
pushed it on with relentless energy gained nothing from it except
vexation. Much of the time during which the war lasted he sat in his
temporary palace at Nagoya in Hizen, waiting eagerly for news from his
armies. Instead of tidings of victories and triumphs and rich conquests,
he was obliged too often to hear of the dissensions of his generals, the
starving and miseries of his soldiers, and the curses and hatred of a
ruined and unhappy country. All that he had to show for his expenditure of
men and money were several _sake_ tubs of pickled ears and noses with
which to form a mound in the temple of Daibutsu, and the recollection of
an investiture by the emperor of China, which could only bring to him pain
and humiliation.

The only beneficial results to Japan that can be traced to all this was
the introduction into different provinces of some of the skilled artisans
of Korea. The prince of Satsuma, Shimazu Yoshihiro, in A.D. 1598, brought
home with him when he returned from the Korean war seventeen families of
Korean potters,(187) who were settled in his province. They have lived
there ever since, and in many ways still retain the marks of their
nationality. It is to them that Satsuma _faience_ owes its exquisite
beauty and its world-wide reputation.

[Illustration]

Hideyoshi.

When the Taiko realized that his recovery was impossible he tried to
arrange the affairs of the empire in such a way as to secure a
continuation of the power in his son Hideyori, who was at that time only
five years old. For this purpose he appointed a council consisting of
Tokugawa Ieyasu, Maeda Toshi-ie, Mori Terumoto, Ukita Hide-ei and Uesugi
Kagekatsu, of which Ieyasu was the president and chief. These were to
constitute a regency during his son's minority. He also appointed a board
of associates, who were called middle councillors, and a board of military
officers called _bugyo_. He called all these councillors and military
officers into his presence before he died, and made them swear allegiance
to his successor Hideyori. There seems to have been among th