The Satsuma Rebellion

The Meiji Restoration of 1868 signaled the beginning of the end for Japans samurai warriors.  After centuries of samurai rule, however, many members of the warrior class were understandably reluctant to give up their status and power.  They also believed that only the samurai had the courage and training to defend Japan from its enemies, internal and external.  Surely no conscript army of peasants could fight like the samurai!  In 1877, the samurai of the Satsuma Province rose up in the Satsuma Rebellion or Seinan Senso (Southwestern War), challenging the authority of the Restoration Government in Tokyo and testing the new imperial army. Background Located on the southern tip of Kyushu Island, more than 800 miles south of Tokyo, the Satsuma domain had existed and governed itself for centuries with very little interference from the central government.  During the latter years of the Tokugawa shogunate, just prior to the Meiji Restoration, the Satsuma clan began to invest heavily in armaments, building a new shipyard at Kagoshima, two weapons factories, and three ammunition depots.  Officially, the Meiji Emperors government had authority over those facilities after 1871, but Satsuma officials actually retained control of them. On January 30, 1877, the central government launched a raid on the arms and ammunition storage areas in Kagoshima, without any prior warning to the Satsuma authorities.  Tokyo intended to confiscate the weapons and take them to an imperial arsenal in Osaka.  When an Imperial Navy landing party reached the arsenal at Somuta under cover of night, locals raised the alarm.  Soon, more than 1,000 Satsuma samurai appeared and drove off the intruding sailors.  The samurai then attacked imperial facilities around the province, seizing weapons and parading them through the streets of Kagoshima.   The influential Satsuma samurai, Saigo Takamori, was away at the time and had no knowledge of these events, but hurried home when he heard the news.  Initially he was furious about the junior samurais actions. However, he soon learned that 50 Tokyo police officers who were Satsuma natives had returned home with instructions to assassinate him in the case of an uprising.  With that, Saigo threw his support behind those organizing for a rebellion. On February 13 and 14, the Satsuma domains army of 12,900 organized itself into units.  Each man was armed with a small firearm  Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã‚  either a rifle, a carbine, or a pistol  Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã‚  as well as 100 rounds of ammunition and, of course, his katana.  Satsuma had no reserve of extra weapons and insufficient ammunition for an extended war.  The artillery consisted of 28 5-pounders, two 16-pounders, and 30 mortars. The Satsuma advance guard, 4,000 strong, set out on February 15, marching north.  They were followed two days later by the rear guard and artillery unit, who left in the midst of a freak snowstorm.  Satsuma daimyo Shimazu Hisamitsu did not acknowledge the departing army when the men stopped to bow at the gates of his castle.  Few would return. Satsuma Rebellion The imperial government in Tokyo expected Saigo to come to the capital by sea or to dig in and defend Satsuma.  Saigo, however, had no regard for the conscripted farm boys who made up the imperial army. He led his samurai straight up the middle of Kyushu, planning to cross the straits and march on Tokyo.  He hoped to raise the samurai of other domains along the way. However, a government garrison at Kumamoto Castle stood in the Satsuma rebels path, manned by about 3,800 soldiers and 600 police under Major General Tani Tateki.  With a smaller force, and unsure about the loyalty of his Kyushu-native troops, Tani decided to stay inside the castle rather than venture out to face Saigos army.  Early on February 22, the Satsuma attack began. Samurai scaled the walls repeatedly, only to be cut down by small arms fire.  These attacks on the ramparts continued for two days, until Saigo decided to settle in for a siege.   The Siege of Kumamoto Castle lasted until April 12, 1877.  Many former samurai from the area joined Saigos army, increasing his force to 20,000.  The Satsuma samurai fought on with fierce determination; meanwhile, the defenders ran out of artillery shells. They resorted to digging up unexploded Satsuma ordinance and refiring it.  However, the imperial government gradually sent more than 45,000 reinforcements to relieve Kumamoto, finally driving the Satsuma army away with heavy casualties.  This costly defeat put Saigo on the defensive for the remainder of the rebellion. Rebels in Retreat Saigo and his army made a seven-day march south to Hitoyoshi, where they dug trenches and prepared for the imperial army to attack.  When the attack finally came, the Satsuma forces withdrew, leaving small pockets of samurai to hit the larger army in guerrilla-style strikes.  In July, the Emperors army encircled Saigos men, but the Satsuma army fought its way free with heavy casualties. Down to about 3,000 men, the Satsuma forces made a stand on Mount Enodake.  Faced with 21,000 imperial army troops, the majority of the rebels ended up committing seppuku (surrendering by suicide).  The survivors were out of ammunition, so had to rely on their swords.  Just about 400 or 500 of the Satsuma samurai escaped the mountain slope on August 19, including Saigo Takamori.  They retreated once more to Mount Shiroyama, which stands above the city of Kagoshima, where the rebellion began seven months earlier. In the final battle, the Battle of Shiroyama, 30,000 imperial troops bore down upon Saigo and his few hundreds of surviving rebel samurai.  Despite the overwhelming odds, the Imperial Army did not attack immediately upon arrival on September 8 but instead spent more than two weeks carefully preparing for its final assault.  In the wee hours of the morning on September 24, the emperors troops launched a three-hour-long artillery barrage, followed by a massed infantry assault that began at 6 am.   Saigo Takamori likely was killed in the initial barrage, although tradition holds that he was just gravely injured and committed seppuku.  In either case, his retainer, Beppu Shinsuke, cut off his head to ensure that Saigos death was honorable.  The few surviving samurai launched a suicide charge into the teeth of the imperial armys Gatling guns, and were shot down.  By 7 o clock that morning, all of the Satsuma samurai lay dead. Aftermath The end of the Satsuma Rebellion also marked the end of the samurai era in Japan.  Already a popular figure, after his death, Saigo Takamori was lionized by the Japanese people.  He is popularly known as The Last Samurai, and proved so beloved that Emperor Meiji felt compelled to issue him a posthumous pardon in 1889. The Satsuma Rebellion proved that a conscript army of commoners could out-fight even a very determined band of samurai  Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã‚  provided they had overwhelming numbers, at any rate.  It signaled the beginning of the Japanese Imperial Armys rise to domination in eastern Asia, which would end only with Japans eventual defeat in World War II almost seven decades later. Sources Buck, James H. The Satsuma Rebellion of 1877. From Kagoshima Through the Siege of Kumamoto Castle. Monumenta Nipponica. Vol. 28, No. 4, Sophia University, JSTOR, 1973. Ravina, Mark. The Last Samurai: The Life and Battles of Saigo Takamori. Paperback, 1 edition, Wiley, February 7, 2005. Yates, Charles L. Saigo Takamori in the Emergence of Meiji Japan. Modern Asian Studies, Volume 28, Issue 3, Cambridge University Press, July 1994.

Investment And Financial Data On Non Financial Firms Finance Essay - Free Essay Example

Sample details Pages: 6 Words: 1789 Downloads: 9 Date added: 2017/06/26 Category Finance Essay Type Narrative essay Did you like this example? Table 1 provides descriptive statistics on the investment and financial data for the sample of the 15 listed non-financial firms during the period 2000-2009. The sample consists of firms operating in 4 different sectors. It is to be noted furthermore that for the purpose of the descriptive analysis, the use of LOG was not taken into account. Inspection of the table reveals a high variation of investment among the listed non financial firms. The mean of the ratio of investment to total assets is 0.046, while the standard deviation is 0.072 which is about one and a half times the mean. The sample average Tobins Q of 0.72 reflects market expectations of quite strong growth opportunities for the firms. The mean of the leverage is 0.13 which suggests there is not so much reliance on long term debt finance and thus firms are not so highly leveraged. Don’t waste time! Our writers will create an original "Investment And Financial Data On Non Financial Firms Finance Essay" essay for you Create order 5.2 Table 5: Correlation among Independent Variables Investment Leverage Profitability Cash Flow Sales Tobins Q Investment 1 Leverage -0.09 1 Profitability 0.29 -0.08 1 Cash Flow 0.29 -0.07 0.85 1 Sales 0.74 0.10 0.42 0.48 1 Tobins Q -0.07 0.18 0.09 0.12 -0.05 1 Table 3 presents Correlation Coefficients for the variables used to assess the impact of leverage on firm investment. Investment is negatively correlated with leverage and Tobins Q. Except for Tobins Q where a positive relationship was expected, the other variable support the theory and gives the expected results as the case of leverage supporting the Agency Theory. But this negative related Tobins Q can be explained using the Low and high growth firms statement. This positive relation for profitability and business size is consistent with the pecking order theory and trade-off theory. Cash flow For instance, profitability may be positively related to cash flows since high cash flows may help in day to day running of a firms business. As seen in the above table, the correlation between profitability and cash flow are high, which is 0.8489. Fixed or random table Table: Random and Fixed tests Variables Fixed Random Coefficient p-value Coefficient Leverage -0.23 0.00 -0.22 Profitability 0.22 0.30 0.21 Cash flow -0.30 0.25 -0.30 Tobins Q 0.57 0.04 0.42 Sales 0.72 0.00 0.75 R-square = 0. 5886 Prob F = 0.0000 corr(u_i, Xb) = 0 No of Observation: 150 No of Company: 10 The Random Effect Model as well shows that not all variables are significant. However, the value of R-squared (R-sq) is 0.5886. This shows that the independent variables of the current model explain 58.86% of the investment opportunities of Mauritian firms. In fixed effect test, leverage, TobinQ, sales are significant in explaining investment. In the random effect model, only leverage, and sales are significant. Table 3: Hausman Test Hausman Probchi2 = 0.65 According to the Hausman test the Probchi2=0.65 as seen in Table 3. The result obtained show that the random effect model is the appropriate model to use. The random effect assumes that the error term is uncorrelated with the dependent variables. Random effect tests Table: Random test Variables Coefficient p-value t-ratios Leverage -0.21 0.00 -9.94 Profitability 0.14 0.03 2.15 Cash flow -0.22 0.00 -2.78 Tobins Q 0.17 0.07 1.84 Sales 0.76 0.00 32.97 The results, shown on the Table , are rather encouraging since the significance of the overall regression illustrates the existence of a relationship between investment opportunities and the determinants analysed. Apart from Tobins Q, all the other determinants are significant to the model. The most interesting factor, however, is given by the fact that all of the coefficients of the exogenous variables have the predicted sign except cash flow which is negative. Leverage Our variable of interest, i.e., the leverage is statistically significant at 1% and is negatively related to net investment as 1 unit increase of leverage ratio leads to a 21.43 % decrease in net investment suggesting that capital structure plays an important role in the firms investment policies. This implies that as leverage increases, firms in the sample struggle to increase investment. In fact, net investment decreases, as firms tend to become more dependent on debt as a source of long term financing. T The negative effect of leverage of firm investment tallies with the underinvestment and overinvestment theory and furthermore, As Myers (1977) stated earlier, that leverage is negatively related to investment because of an agency problem between shareholders and bondholders. If managers work in the interest of shareholders, they may give up some positive net present value projects in the interest of shareholders due to debt overhang. The theories of Jensen (1986), Stulz (1990) and Grossman and Hart (1982) also claimed leverage to have a negative effect on investment but their arguments are founded on agency problems between managers and shareholders. They believed that firms with free cash flow but low growth opportunities may invest or overinvest such that the manager may take on projects with negative NPV. But, such strategy is not costless to the manager, especially if the capital market takes into account such potential opportunism or if there is a take over of the firm by anothe r company, managers tend to increase leverage and pay out cash as interest and principal. Furthermore, there are direct costs involved in raising external funding, such as underwriting and administrative fees. There is also potential financial distress costs associated with using external finance. For example, as leverage increases, other things being equal, there may be a higher probability of the firm facing financial distress. In this case, the firm may incur direct bankruptcy costs such as legal expenses and trustee fees and indirect costs such as the disruption of operations, loss of suppliers or customers and the imposition of financial constraints. The present value of these expected costs should be reflected in current financing costs. Finally, there are issues of taxation, shareholder dilution, control of information, the need to maintain flexibility and liquidity that may also have an impact on a firms financing choices. Financial factors may therefore affect the cost and availability of capital and so influence the investment decision Profitability The coefficient for profitability is 13.79 which is statistically significant at 3.1% and is positively related to investment. It indicates that the operating efficiency of the total funds over investments is positive. Usually, high profitability also attracts funds from investors for expansion and growth. Furthermore, it contributes towards the social overheads for the welfare of the society and there is an effective use of capital. This result is consistent with the empirical literature whereby Myres, 1984 stated that firms prefer to finance new investments from retained earnings and raise debt capital only if the former is insufficient, the availability of internal capital depends on the profitability of the firm. This fact is in line with the pecking order theory Cash Flow From the results obtained from table above, it can be noted that cash flow is significant at 1% but it is negatively related to investment opportunities since as 1 unit increase of cash flow ratio leads to a 22.47 decrease in net investment. The overall negative and significant coefficient of cash flow suggests that overinvestment is severed in overinvesting firms if they hold more cash. According to Jensen (1986) as the free cash flows of overinvesting managers increase, so should the overinvestment, as they have more funds to waste The contradicting and statistically weak result might be explained by the fact that cash holdings for the funding of projects are of relatively little relevance to the studied group of firms, since the studied firms should have favorable access to external capital by being listed. Thus, the firms might fund their projects directly by share or debt issues, instead of building cash reserves. Possessing free cash flow is rather beneficial for a firm, but having excessive dormant cash flow is relatively is not good. When free cash flow is present and shareholding monitoring is incomplete, the typical manager-shareholder monitoring agency problem arises. Managers have a tendency to overinvest even in negative NPV projects while shareholders would prefer dividends to eliminate the free cash flow. Cash flow is rather used maybe for paying out dividend, debt-finance share repurchase, and the like. As argued by Whited (1992), Gomes (2001), Alti (2003), Cummins et al. (2006) among others, one important caution in the analysis that might explain the contradictory findings in the literature is that cash flow might convey information about the firms future investment opportunities. When this is the case, a significant cash flow and investment relationship might be observed that reflects increased investment opportunities rather than signalling financing frictions. In other words, the observed relation between cash flow and investment might be a spurious effect resulting from the inability to control for investment opportunities in the underlying investment equation. The investment of firms with higher leverage may be more sensitive to cash flows than that of firms with lower leverage. The increased debt servicing obligations resulting from higher leverage mean that the available cash flows of higher-geared firms are smaller and thus they have less of a buffer against disturbances. Sales It can be seen that firms are utilizing their total assets efficiently and it reflects the ability in producing large sales volume. The estimates of sales is 75.94 and the variable is statistically significant at 1%. Sales revenue does not support the popular belief that firm with more debt are investing to a lesser degree than their sales would suggest. This finding corresponds to that of Kopcke and Howrey (1994) who found that investment of 396 companies was not dependent on the sales revenue of the firms. Tobins Q From the table, it can be seen that Tobins Q is statistically insignificant at 6.5% and is positively related with investment. The regression estimate is 17.44. Firms which have a propensity to expand the scale of the business and managements ability to carry out such a policy is constrained by the availability of free cash flows and this constraint can be further tightened via financial leverage. The issuance of debt engages the firm to pay cash as interest and principal, forcing the managers to service such commitments with the funds that may have otherwise been allocated for investment projects. Hayashi (1982) explained that the Tobins Q variable should be an adequate enough variable to explain firm investment. However, if a major impact of Tobins Q is the presence of bubbles, forms of irrationality such as herding and other factors, then it might not be a statistic that captures the relevant information about profitability of projects invested in. In addition, he assumes that the market is fully efficient, the firm exhibits constant returns to scale and importantly, these firms have no market power. HIGH AND LOW GROWTH FIRM Arrellano and Bond Test Table: Arrellano and Bond Variables Coefficient p-value t-ratios Investmentlag -0.18 0.79 -0.26 Leverage 0.04 0.82 0.23 Profitability -0.33 0.94 -0.07 Cash flow 0.50 0.91 0.11 Tobins Q 0.73 0.78 0.27 Sales 0.06 0.97 0.04 The GMM results show that investment lag is not significant. There is no causality in investment. Sargan Tests Sargan p-value : 1.000 The p-value is above the 0.05. It indicates that the model is valid. The model passes the sargan test. Abond test abond p-value Order 1 Order 2 0.79 0.26 The p-value for both of Order 1 and Order 2 is greater than 0.05. There is no evidence of serial correlation in the dataset.

The Hawaiian Monk Seal, Or Monachus Schauinslandi

The Hawaiian monk seal, or Monachus schauinslandi, was one of the original species to be placed under the Endangered Species Act that was enacted in 1973. As of 2010, the population of the monk seal is approximately 1,100, with an annual decrease of approximately 4.5%. The Hawaiian monk seal is primarily found on the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands that are made up of coral reef atolls, seamounts, banks, and shoals. This is due to the fact that the monk seals primarily forage on the barrier reefs of the atolls, on submerged reefs, and on banks further from the atolls (Curtice et al, 2011). The monk seals are primarily benthic forgers and will search for food in a broad depth range up to 500m and over different substrates (National Marine†¦show more content†¦The population decline in monk seals is due to several different factors with the biggest reason due to the low pup and juvenile survival rates (Curtice et al, 2011). At the Kure Atoll on the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands , 32 pups were observed in 1964 and 30 pups were observed in 1965. Of these pups born, all but one died or disappeared within 60 days after birth. This was also seen in the 1970’s at Green Island and Kure Atoll, where a mean population of 17 and 14 seals, respectively, was counted on these beaches, with a birth total of 10 showing a population decline of 70% (Gilmartin et al, 2011). The juvenile survival rate is still seen today with one in five monk seals surviving to the reproductive age, with one year old seals having the highest mortality rates (Norris et al, 2011). One of the reasons this is occurring is due to human interaction. Adult females who are near birth or who have just given birth are very sensitive to disturbance (Gilmartin, Johanos, DeMaster, Henderson, 2011). In 1960, the U.S. Coast Guard built a station on Green Island that was previously unoccupied to humans, and as a result of this the female monk seals would encounter humans almost daily causing the fe male monk seals to leave that preferred hauling and birthing sites and go to beaches that were highly affected by flooding, shark predation, and

A Woman Of No Importance monologue Essay Example For Students

A Woman Of No Importance monologue Essay A monologue from the play by Oscar Wilde NOTE: This monologue is reprinted from A Woman of No Importance. Oscar Wilde. London: Methuen Co., 1916. MRS. ARBUTHNOT: I will never stand before God\s altar and ask God\s blessing on so hideous a mockery as a marriage between me and George Harford. I will not say the words the Church bids us to say. I will not say them. How could I swear to love the man I loathe, to honour him who wrought you dishonor, to obey him who, in his mastery, made me to sin? No; marriage is a sacrament for those who love each other. It is not for such as him, or such as me. Gerald, to save you from the world\s sneers and taunts I have lied to the world. For twenty years I have lied to the world. I could not tell the truth. No, Gerald, no ceremony, Church-hallowed or State-made, shall ever bind me to George Harford. Men don\t understand what mothers are. I am no different from other women except in the wrong done me and the wrong I did, and my very heavy punishments and great disgrace. And yet, to bear you I had to look on death. To nurture you I had to wrestle with it. Death fought with me for you. All women have to fight with death to keep their children. Death, being childless, wants our children from us. Gerald, when you were naked I clothed you, when you were hungry I gave you food. Night and day all that long winter I tended you. No office is too mean, no care too lowly for the thing we women loveand oh! how I loved you! And you needed love, for you were weakly, and only love could have kept you alive. Only love can keep any one alive. And boys are careless often, and without thinking give pain, and we always fancy that when they come to man\s estate and know us better they will repay us. But it is not so. The world draws them from our side, and they make friends with whom they are happier than they are with us, and have amusements from which we are barred, and interests that are not ours; and they are unjust to us often, for when they find life bitter they blame us for it, and when they find it sweet we do not taste its sweetness with them. . . . You made many friends and went in to their houses and were glad with them, and I, knowing my secret, did not dare to follow, but stayed at home and closed the door, shut out the sun and sat in darkness. My past was ever with me. . . . And you thought I didn\t care for the pleasant things of life. I tell you I longed for them, but did not dare to touch them, feeling I had no right. You thought I was happier working amongst the poor. That was my mission, you imagined. It was not, but where else was I to go? The sick do not ask if the hand that smooths their pillow is pure, nor the dying care if the lips that touch their brow have known the kiss of sin. It was you I thought of all the time; I gave to them the love you did not need; lavished on them a love that was not theirs. . . . And you thought I spent too much of my time in going to Church, and in Church duties. But where else could I turn? God\s house is the only house where sinners are made welcome, and you were always in my heart, Gerald, too much in my heart. F or though day after day, at morn or evensong, I have knelt in God\s house, I never repented of my sin. How could I repent of my sin when you, my love, were its fruit. Even now that you are bitter to me I cannot repent. I do not. You are more to me than innocence. I would rather be your motheroh! much rather!than have been always pure. . . . Oh, don\t you see? don\t you understand! It is my dishonour that has made you so dear to me. It is my disgrace that has bound you so closely to me. It is the price I paid for youthe price of soul and bodythat makes me love you as I do. Oh, don\t ask me to do this horrible thing. 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