WEAPONS AND OPERATIONS
chief of Sakai. The scene of Masatoki's exploit was the Sanjusan-gen-do in Yedo, for in the Fukugawa suburb of the latter city a hall had been erected on exactly the same lines as those of the Kyōtō building, its sole purpose being archery. It was the custom to commence these trials of skill and endurance at sunset, and to continue the shooting all through the night by torchlight until an appointed hour on the following day. Masatoki fired the first shaft at seven p. m. on the 19th of May, 1852, and the last at three p. m. on the 20th. During that interval of twenty hours he discharged 10,050 arrows, and 5,383 flew true down the one hundred and twenty- eight yards of corridor. He discharged nine shafts per minute, approximately, and more than half of them were successful. Possibly it is not inaccurate to conclude that the Japanese of the Military epoch, if not the greatest archers in the world, were certainly second to none.
In three essential respects their method of shooting differed from that of Occidental bowmen. Instead of raising the point of the arrow in sighting, they lowered it, and instead of hooking the three first fingers round the string, they held it between the bent thumb and the index finger, a grasp which greatly facilitated smoothness of release. Finally, they discharged the arrow from the right side of the bow. The bow-arm remained slightly bent, even at the moment of release, so that no guard for the fore-arm
133
