We propose to relate, with necessary brevity, what is most important of the
little that is known of this interesting people. All records bearing upon
the subject are imperfect, and the best of them are more profuse in
speculation and surmise than in solid fact. The information possessed has
been drawn bit by bit from the reluctant Japanese. The difficulties of
investigation have been almost insurmountable,--no visitor, during two
hundred years, having been allowed the slightest freedom of association
with the people, or opportunity for travel. With very few exceptions,
foreigners have been confined to the extremest limit of the islands, and
forbidden even to leave the coast; and in no case has any disposition been
shown to satisfy the curious demands of those who have attempted to break
through the national reserve.
The origin of the Japanese is still involved in obscurity, and the date of
the settlement of the islands is unknown. The boldest theory is, that a
tribe proceeded thither directly from the land of Shinar, at the division
of the races. In support of this, the purity of the Japanese language,
which, in its primitive form, bears very slight affinity to any other
tongue, and the evident dissimilarity of the people to those of any other
Asiatic country, are adduced. The more general belief is, that the Japanese
are an offshoot of the Mongol family, and that their emigration to these
islands was at so remote a period that tradition has preserved no
recollection of it.
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