No-Kami, as Nara hoped and expected, flushed with easy victory, and drunk with blood, resigned himself for a while to luxury, and neglected public business. A horde of rapacious bravos and licensed bandits sucked the lifeblood and paralysed the energies of the people. The weight of taxes, that ever crushes the spirit of the Asiatic peasant, grew heavier, day by day, until existence became intolerable. How was an end to be put to this nightmare? That was the question which all were fearfully whispering, and to which there seemed no solution. No-Kami, if self-indulgent and ruthless, was no zany. He knew that his position was to be maintained by fear and a strong hand, and that enervation meant destruction. Bundles of bamboo, when bound together, will dam a stream, though each separate stem is but a feeble wand. The insurrection of effeminate Kugés had been precipitate and foolish. If the whole country were to rise like one man, he would, as he was aware, be swept like rice chaff into the sea. In the mutual jealousy of the Daimios lay his chief safeguard. While plunging each in separate discomfort, union at all costs must be prevented. Attempts at conspiracy among the nobles, or at combinations among the lower classes, must be frustrated, and to that end he gave strict orders to officials and tax-collectors to allow of no public meetings. The people were to pay what was demanded of them, humbly and dutifully, as best they could, but on no account were to be permitted to hold gatherings. Even the great festivals of the year were for a while to be discontinued. Over and above these precautions, the tyrant surrounded his person with a picked body-guard of Samurai, or two-sword men; hedged his fortress with bristling defences; and recalled his brother, the brilliant Sampei, from his career of victory abroad. Urged possibly by a spirit of contrariness, a contempt for the society of his prisoner and the Kugés--perhaps by a sense of freedom from personal danger there--the favourite abode of No-Kami was his castle of Tsu, four days' journey from the capital, over precipitous hills. Here he loved to dwell, surrounded by his brawling warriors; sojourning from time to time, when business called him to Ki[^y]oto, at a small but superb villa, called the Golden House, which stood secluded in a park on the outskirts of the sacred city.