commenced that process of national renovation which has astonished the world. With the fall of the Shogunate and the reorganisation of the national government the feudal system was doomed; for such a programme as Japan had already sketched out for herself was incompatible with that medieval form of government. This fact was soon recognised by the daimyo of Satsuma and Choshu, who offered in 1868 to surrender their fiefs; the generous offer was gladly accepted and their example was followed by all the other daimyo. But for the time the ex-daimyo were all appointed governors of their respective fiefs so that they might aid in bringing their former subjects to a full sense of the new condition of things. Three years later, in 1871, the clans were abolished and the whole country was divided into prefectures. The daimyo and their retainers received government bonds in commutation of the incomes they had thitherto derived from their fiefs. The substitution of prefectures for clans was made with the object of breaking up the clan bias which was prejudicial to national unity and of giving the central government a more complete control over the provinces by the appointment to prefectural offices of high officials from Tokyo. For to prevent disaffection or crush open revolt in the provinces, it was necessary to centralise as much as possible the government of the country; and with all its precautions, the new government had to cope with several little uprisings, culminating in the Satsuma rebellion which spread over a greater part of the island of Kyushu and taxed its resources to the utmost. But when this was quelled, the country enjoyed absolute peace; no internal disorder has since taken place with the sole exception of a small local trouble in 1884.