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In his volume of reminiscences there is an interesting statement connected with finance. It quotes Hagiwara Shigehide, commissioner of the Treasury, as saying that the shogun's estate at that time yielded four million koku annually, in addition to which there accrued from 760,000 ryo to 770,000 ryo in money, representing the proceeds of dues and taxes.
Once again Hagiwara Shigehide had recourse to adulteration of the coinage. This time he tampered mainly with the copper tokens, but owing to the unwieldy and impure character of these coins, very great difficulty was experienced in putting them into circulation, and the Bakufu financiers finally were obliged to fall back upon the reserve of gold kept in the treasury for special contingencies.
In connexion with Arai Hakuseki's impeachment of the Treasury commissioner, Hagiwara Shigehide, it was insisted that an auditor's office must be re-established, and it was pointed out that the yield of rice from the shogun's estates had fallen to 28.9 per cent, of the total produce instead of being forty per cent., as fixed by law.
The immediate outcome of this incident was the summoning of a council to discuss the financial situation, and after much thought the suggestion of Hagiwara Shigehide, chief of the Treasury, was accepted, namely, wholesale debasement of the gold, silver, and copper coins.
During the year that followed the reconstruction of the auditor's office, the yield of the estates increased by 433,400 bags of rice, and the cost of riparian works decreased by 38,000 ryo of gold, while, at the same time, the item of shipwrecked cereals disappeared almost completely from the ledgers. In consequence of these charges the commissioner, Shigehide, was dismissed.
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