Note 58 — Chapter XL

From Thunberg’s account of the arms of the Japanese, they cannot be regarded as very formidable soldiers. He mentions bows and arrows, scymitars, halberts, and guns. Their bows are very large and their arrows long, like those of the Chinese. The bowman, in order to shoot, places himself on one knee, a position which renders it impossible to discharge his arrows with any great rapidity. Guns were not ordinarily employed. Thunberg saw them, apparently matchlocks, only as articles of show in the houses of the imperial officers, displayed upon a stand in the audience chamber. The few cannon at Nagasaki, which once belonged to the Portuguese, were discharged only once in seven years, the Japanese knowing little or not at all the proper management of them, and fixing the match to a long pole, so as to touch them off at a safe distance. Their longer swords are broad-backed, a little curved, a yard long, and of excellent temper; the hilts somewhat roundish and flat, furnished with a round substantial guard without any bow. The scabbard is thick and rather flat, made of wood, and sometimes covered with shagreen and lackered. The shorter sword is straight. These swords are costly and rated at a high value.

From a Japanese work, Siebold states their method of making sword-blades: “The blades, forged out of good bar-steel, are plastered over with a paste of potash, porcelain clay, and powdered charcoal, and dried in the sun. They are next exposed to the fire and heated till the mass assumes a white hue. The glowing blades are then plunged into luke-warm water, three-fifths boiling to two-fifths cold, and cooled gradually. Often the edge only is heated, and then the cooling is with cold water. The reforging of old blades is not uncommon.” Of the two swords worn by the Japanese, one is long and slightly curved, the other short and straight. [See also paper on “Japanese Armour,” in vol. ix of the Transactions of the Asiatic Society of Japan.—Edr.]