recognition of his services, but
which was now taken from his family because he had been one of Ieyasu's
active opponents. The Kuroda family received as its inheritance a portion
of the province of Chikuzen with its capital at Fukuoka, which it held
until the abolition of feudal tenures in 1871.

Ieyasu was a peaceful and moderate character, and in the settlement of the
disturbances which had marked his advent to power, he is notable for
having pursued a course of great kindness and consideration. With the
exception of the cases already mentioned there were no executions for
political offences. It was his desire and ambition to establish a system
of government which should be continuous and not liable, like those of
Nobunaga and Taiko Sama, to be overturned at the death of him who had
founded it. By the gift of Taiko Sama he had already in his possession a
large part of the Kwanto. And by the result of the war which had ended at
Sekigahara, he had come into possession of a great number of other fiefs,
with which he could reward those who had been faithful to him. It was the
difficult and delicate part of his work to distribute judiciously among
his supporters and retainers the confiscated estates. To realize how
completely the feudal system as reformed by Ieyasu was bound to him and
constituted to support and perpetuate his family, it is only necessary to
examine such a list of the daimyos(198) as is given in Appert's _Ancien
Japon_.(199) Out of the two hundred and sixty-three daimyos there
enumerated, one hundred and fifty-eight are either vassals or branches of
the Tokugawa family. But while he thus carefully provided the supports for
his own family, he spared many of the old and well-rooted houses, which
had incorporated themselves into the history of the country. He built his
structure on the old and tried foundation stones. With far-sighted
statesmanship he recognized that every new form of government, to be
permanent, must be a development from that which precedes it, and must
include within itself whatever is lasting in the nature of its forerunner.

The dual form of government had for many centuries existed in Japan, and
the customs and habits of thinking, and the modes of administering justice
and of controlling the conduct of men had become adapted to this system.
It was therefore natural that Ieyasu should turn his attention to
reforming and perfecting such a form of government. A scheme of this kind
seemed b