The farmers by the lake that we passed on our way south were described as “very poor,” for their soil was barren and their climate bad.  Their crops were only a third of what could be raised in another part of the prefecture.  The agriculture of all the prefectures through which I now journeyed south to Tokyo suffer from the cold temperature of the sea.  The east-coast temperature drops in winter to 7 degrees below freezing.[167] “Living is more and more difficult,” said someone to me.  “The number of tenants increases because farmers get into debt and have to sell their land.  Millet and buckwheat are much eaten.  Although the temperature is 5 per cent. colder in Hokkaido, the people do worse here because our soil is barren and there is no profitable winter occupation like lumbering.  Only 10 per cent. of the rural population save anything.  In bad times 65 per cent. of the families get into debt.”

At Morioka in Iwate prefecture I visited the excellent higher agricultural college, where there were 300 students.  The competition for places, as at every educational institution in Japan, was keen.  The number who sat at the last entrance examinations—­the average age was twenty—­was 317, of whom only 80 got in.  There were 15 professors and 10 assistants.  The charge to students was 300 yen for a year of ten months.  The annual cost of the college to the Government was 70,000 yen.  Of the foreign volumes among the 20,000 books in the library 50 per cent. were German, 30 per cent.  English and 20 per cent.  American.

An apiary of a single skep in a roped-off enclosure was an illustration of unfamiliarity with bees.  It seemed strange to find that in this up-to-date and efficient institution the biggest implement for cutting grass which was in use, a sickle of course, had a blade no longer than 8 inches.  Hung up at the back of a shed I noticed a rusty scythe.  When I tried to show what it could do it was suggested that the implement was “too heavy, too difficult and too dangerous.”

Iwate is the poorest of the northern prefectures, for bad weather so often comes when the rice is in flower.  As many as 40 per cent. of the people were just making ends meet.  Another 40 per cent. were always dogged by poverty.  Millet was the food of 10 per cent. of the farmers; millet, salted vegetables and bean soup were the meagre diet of 5 per cent; the staple food of the remainder was barley and rice.  There are few temples in Iwate compared with the rest of Japan.  “Education is more backward than in other prefectures,” someone said.  “The farmers are not able.  Too much sake is drunk.”  Farmers come in to Morioka to sell charcoal and wood and I saw some of them turning into the sake shops.