ABSTRACT
The purpose of this chapter is to form a collection and to group together here the most prominent dates which the author have met with in reading the works quoted regarding the foreign trade of the Japanese in former times. Because they will show the change which has taken place here, as well as in many other departments, by comparing the ways and means of those days with the present foreign commerce. The trade between Japan and the Philippines lasted over fifty years, from 1580. During this time Japanese enterprise developed itself also in other directions. Japanese seamen not only took service on foreign ships and made long journeys in them, but, in conjunction with merchants, fitted out junks themselves. Induced by letters from William Adams, the English East India Company soon thereafter determined to enter into trade with Japan.
