Note 101 — Chapter XLIII

Yet Kahei wore two swords, though perhaps he did it in the character of a ship-master, or as an officer in authority in the island to which he traded from Hakodate, carrying on the fishery there chiefly by means of native Kuriles. These islands appear to have been farmed out by the government to certain mercantile firms, which thus acquire a certain civil authority over the inhabitants. The privilege of wearing swords, like other similar privileges elsewhere, is probably rather encroached upon by the unprivileged. On festival days, even the poorest inhabitants of Nagasaki decked themselves out, according to Kämpfer, with at least one sword. The present of a sword as a marriage gift—and it is ceremonies practised among the mercantile class, to which reference is made—is mentioned on p. 181.