L. L. Janes (1837-1909) is well known in Japanese Christian history as the father of Kumamoto Band together with W. Clark of Sapporo and S. Brown of Yokohama. He was an earnest teacher of English at the Kumamoto Senior High School from Meiji 4 (1872) to Meiji 9 (1877). The book of Seisan Shoho is a Japanese translation of the lecture on farming of Kumamoto Prefecture that Janes gave in English in his extracurricular seminar at the School. This book was published at Tokyo around 1875, but for a wonder we have not been able to find it among the bibliography related to Japanese agriculture in the Meiji era. By courtesy of Dr. Akio Honda I had a chance to have a copy of the book a few years ago. After some biographical studies about Janes, I thought that the valuable contents of the book had to be introduced. Seisan Shoho includes comments and recommendations for improvement of agricultural production in Kumamoto Prefecture early in the Meiji era. The various literatures on Japanese agriculture having contact with the European agricultural science early in the Meiji era can be categorized into the following three: 1) Translations of European agricultural books into Japanese, 2) Publications by Japanese who had studied in European countries, and 3) The comments and recommendations by European or American learned to Japanese agriculture. Seisan Shoho belongs obviously to the third category. Other well known books in this category are the works by Max Fesca, Oskar Kellner and so on, but those works were published since the middle of the Meiji era. Janes' Seisan Shoho was published early in the Meiji era and distinguished owing to the comments and recommendations for improvement of agricultural production of a particular area (Kumamoto Prefecture). The book of Seisan Shoho consists of some chapters ―the improvement of silk production, tea production, manure application, and rice production, and conclusion. The important recommendations by Janes for improvement of agricultural production of Kumamoto Prefecture include: 1) Specialization o f farming with the native products of high value, 2) Perspective of profitability of silk, tea and rice among the native products in Kumamoto Prefecture at that time, 3) Increase in silk and tea production by reclamation of new arable land except paddy land, and 4) The adaptation of European implements such as plough and hallow to the farming on the newly reclamated areas. Since the middle of the Meiji era, silk and tea industry in Kumamoto Prefecture progressed remarkably as Janes pointed out early in his book.
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