The morning star and Catholic messenger. [volume] (New Orleans [La.]) 1868-1881, 1874-02-01
The Paper-Money of Japan.
From Appleton's Journal.

in the drawing room, the nursery, and the
kitchen, in ways that are dark to q for
eigner. A Japanese is never at loss for
string, sheet for a letter, wrapper,
handkerchief, towel, or a plaster. In his
bosom is roll of paper, and what paper |
can accomplish is known only to the native |
of Japan. When little Yezaburo or Kin |
taro cute his finger, bandage is applied !
and tears are dried with the same article. |
The e1quisitely.dressed young lady takes
a roll of paper from her girdle, and 10 it
becomes a handkerchief. Pass into the
street on a rainy day in Yeddo, and you'll
see for miles panorama of moving disks
of paper. Both umbrellas and parasols are
water proof clothes, hat, coat, trousers,
and shoes, may be bought almost anywhere
in Japan. Boxes, pipe-cases, Irvine, dishes,
tea-trays, carpets, chimneys, roasting
pans for firing tea, windows, doors, parti-
tions, and screens, are everywhere made OF
paper.
The paneled walls of houses are made
of hardened paper-pulp. Old Japanese
armor is largely made of compressed lac
quered paper. Perhaps Europeans adopt
ed the custom of papering the walls of
their houses from these people, The dwell.
| lings of the better classes of the Japanese
people are always papered, though the
sheets used are not over foot or eighteen
| inches square. They are polished, silver
ed, gilded, colored, or printed, with 6irds,
flowers, animals, and many tasteful de-
signs. In looking over paper-deafer's
sample book in Yeddo, one rarely sees a
cloud" or uncouth pattern, always except
| ing that of the dragon, in which the nor
NAL Japanese doth so delight.
The GROWING utility of this fabric is it's
as money is fondly believed to be the in
vention of modern civilized nations. 1t
was known to the Chinese before the
Christian era. The European aichemists
toiled for centuries to transmute lead into
gold. The Chinese tried paper, and it
scholarship date the first issue of paper
money in China at I19 B. c.. The custom
was initiated at an early age in japan,
though the exact date at which the Japan.
csc tried this sort of financiering cansot
be so accurately stated. For centuries,
place with the Japanese. Until within
} five years ago, every great daimlo was
allowed to issue paper. money. Inc IRA
Weller in the interior of Japan still! meets
with these curious relics of the feudal sys-
tenn from which japan has just emerged.
J + lived for one year in the city of Fukuwi,
, in the province of Yechizen, where the
money used for daily purchases were the
local issues of the "Hau," or prefecture OF
Fukuwi. These we're strips of stiff white
or yellow paper, from four to eisht inche %
I long, and two inches wide. The values Of
] these formidable looking cards were one
| tenth, one-ffth, and one half cent, and one
two, three, four, five, ten, twenty, twenty
five, and fifty cents, respectively. Ih'
" designs engraved upon them were cnaIac
o seated on a throne of rice-bags, was the
8 most common figure. Rice is not only th'
Y staff of life, but the sinews of war, II
= Japan. It is the standard of value Sal
i. aries are paid in it, estate are appraised /,
o it's terms, and it is to the ''bulls and bears
hot ia tn a
Q gentlemen of Wall Street.
@ Nothing else, then, but bags full or TIC
l. would suffice to build throne for tn
It Japanese god of wealth, who does not lool
t. at all like Mammon, and is as fat as TWO o
d three of Mr.. Barnum's feshly immensstle
q rolled into one. The treasure ship IN th
q distance, coming homeward, was anothe
=. favorite vignette. "When my ship come
IL in" is as common a saying among Tn
n Japanese as it is with us. The 'plie" Q
every Japanese hopes to I" raise" before b
D. dies, and of warehouses by wharves file
% with unloading ships, alse helped to max
q. the people believe that stamped paper wa
X real money. The local issues of one of til
"a "Hans," or procedures, adjoining that o
"A Fukuwi, were but an inch wide and 81
N inches long. In another, they were thre
M inches wide and four long.
re When the mikado was reinstated int
I'd his ancient power at Yeddo, the lmperla
government, feeling the need both OF mar
Id cash and an easy currency, listened Will
r. ingly to the brilliant suggestion of samu
10 ras Of the Yechizen clan, which was; t tha
20 on a grand scale, what every diamio ha
ID been used to do, and should issue nations
it paper money. The resolution was speed
is ~ taken. The order was given, and Nit
g. suoka ("three hills'O of Fukuwi was CON
10 missioned to execute the orders of th
is government. The contract to furnish til
to paper was awarded to noted paper. make
to of one of the villages near Fuk1wi, VIII
to promised to furnish within a specified tim
he enough paper to print fifty one- millio
is dollars worth of kinsatsu ("money- cards
,e as the imperial paper is called. lmmedis
lie tely TRIPPING his force of laborers, and div
ID iding them into three companies, the COZ
Id tractor worked them night and day unit
* the several acres of hard, white, and silky
lustrous cardboard, cut into square fee
is were piled, in the Imperial Treasury
A. Kura Sho), in Toxic (Yeddo). After bein
m engraved, they were rapidly taken VI
or circulated throughout the empire, and al
It, still in daily use, rarely falling more tina
4 NOR ha1o ba MeYica