autocratic, and hereditary, but constitutional and representative.  Town, provincial, and national legislative assemblies are established, and in fairly good working order, all over the land.  The old feudal customs have been replaced by well codified laws, which are on the whole faithfully administered according to Occidental methods.  Examination by torture has been abolished.  The perfect Occidentalization of the army, and the creation of an efficient navy, are facts fully demonstrated to the world.  The limited education of the few—–­ and in exclusively Chinese classics—­has given place to popular education.  Common schools number over 30,000, taught by about 100,000 teachers (4278 being women), having over 4,500,000 pupils (over 1,500,000 being girls).  The school accommodation is insufficient; it is said that 30,000 additional teachers are needed at once.  Middle and high schools throughout the land are rejecting nearly one-half of the student applicants for lack of accommodation.

Feudal isolation, repression, and seclusion have given way to free travel, free speech, and a free press.  Newspapers, magazines, and books pour forth from the universal printing press in great profusion.  Twenty dailies issue in the course of a year over a million copies each, while two of them circulate 24,000,000 and 21,000,000 copies, respectively.

Personal, political, and religious liberty has been practically secure now for over two decades, guaranteed by the constitution, and enforced by the courts.

Chinese medical practice has largely been replaced by that from the West, although many of the ignorant classes still prefer the old methods.  The government enforces Western hygienic principles in all public matters, with the result that the national health has improved and the population is growing at an alarming rate.  While in 1872 the people numbered 33,000,000, in 1898 they numbered 45,000,000.  The general scale of living for the common people has also advanced conspicuously.  Meat shops are now common throughout the land—­a thing unknown in pre-Meiji times—­and rice, which used to be the luxury of the wealthy few, has become the staple necessity of the many.

Postal and telegraph facilities are quite complete.  Macadamized roads and well-built railroads have replaced the old footpaths, except in the most mountainous districts.  Factories of many kinds are appearing in every town and city.  Business corporations, banks, etc., which numbered only thirty-four so late as 1864 are now numbered by the thousand, and trade flourishes as in no previous period of Japanese history.  Instead of being a country of farmers and soldiers, Japan is to-day a land of farmers and merchants.  Wealth is growing apace.  International commerce, too, has sprung up and expanded phenomenally.  Japanese merchant steamers may now be seen in every part of the world.

All these changes have taken place within about three decades, and so radical have they been,—­so productive of new life in Japan,—­that some have urged the re-writing of Japanese history, making the first year of Meiji (1868) the year one of Japan, instead of reckoning from the year in which Jimmu Tenno is said to have ascended the throne, 2560 years ago (B.C. 660).