Shipping. The shipping industry is one of the most important in Japan, holding now, as it would seem to have done from time immemorial, a prominent place in the commerce of the country. The reason for this is not far to seek, being found in Japan's insular position, her extensive sea-board, and her mountainous interior. The Japanese take kindly to a seafaring life. During the Middle Ages, they were distinguished among Oriental nations for their spirit of maritime enterprise. Korea, China, Formosa, even the distant Philippine Islands, Cambodia, and Siam saw the Japanese appear on their coasts, now as peaceful traders, now as buccaneers. The story of one of these buccaneers, named Yamada Nagamasa, alias Tenjiku Hachibei, who ended by marrying a Siamese princess and becoming viceroy of the country, reads more like a chapter from the "the Arabian Nights" than like sober reality. It is evident, too, that the Japanese of the early part of the seventeenth century were determined not to be left behind in the art of shipbuilding. The English master-mariner Will Adams, who came to Japan in the year 1600, built ships for Ieyasu, the then Shōgun, one of which made voyages to Manila and even to Mexico. Suddenly all was changed. Alarmed beyond measure at the progress of Catholicism, and fearing that in Japan, as elsewhere, the Spanish monk would be followed by the Spanish soldier of fortune, Iemitsu, the third Shōgun of the Tokugawa dynasty, issued an edict in the year 1636, whereby all foreign priests were expelled from the empire, foreign merchants were restricted to the two south-western ports of Nagasaki and Hirado, and all Japanese subjects were forbidden under pain of death to leave Japan. Drastic measures were resorted to in order to enforce the terms of this edict, all vessels of European build and even all large vessels of native build were ordered to be destroyed, only small junks sufficient for coasting purposes being allowed to be retained. This is the style of junk still seen at the present day in Japanese waters. It is distinguished by a single square sail, which is so awkward as to render the vessel difficult to handle except when running before the wind.
