In the history of British Colonial (Imperial) Conferences, the second one which was held in Ottawa, 1894, has been almost neglected by historians. The reason they have pointed out is that it was not held in the mother country but in a colony or that much of its discussion was not concentrated on political or military problem but on commercial union. It must be mentioned, however, that they seem to have certain bias that the history of British Empire should be written from the mother country's and constitutinal point of view. In contrast with them, when we examine Ottawa Conference in the light of development of imperial trade policy, one would discover its importance and be obliged to re-appraise its value in the history of British Empire. Ottawa Conference was summoned by Canadian government who, with other self-governing colonies, wished to establish imperial commercial union. For several years they had demanded imperial government to call the second Colonial Conference, but the rejection of the mother country obliged them to summon the conference by themselves. Therefore it was a conference which offered them for the first time to discuss officialy the imperial trade policy question. After long sessions they passed some resolutions calling for the commercial union by means of imperial preferential tariff based on their existing protective tariff policy. Clearly this was the first public resistance against the mother country's traditional free trade policy. The growing sentiment of "colonial nationalism" had made them further adopt the resolution that if the mother country could not accept preferential tariff, they should make their effort to give each other the inter-colonial reciprocity. So it would be safe to say that Ottawa Conference was not only the first expression of commercial independence of self-governing colonies but also the first step toward the famous Ottawa Agreement, 1932, which achieved the completion of imperial preferential tariff system. In spite of these importances, Ottawa Conference could not get immediate and practical result. The strong opposition of the mother country, difference of trade policies among colonies and unmatured inter-colonial trade have limited the development of inter-colonial reciprocity. For the final completion of imperial preferential tariff system, they had to wait for the radical conversion of British trade policy through the great economic crisis after World War I.

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The Ryo-no-shuge is the colleted commentaries on the Ryo code, which were written by Koremune Naomoto in the mid-ninth century. Of its original 50 volumes only 35 remain today. It is generally thought that most of the existing manuscripts can be traced back to the Kanazawabunko MSS. which was contained in the document collection of the Kananazawa family. This collection was established by Kanazawe Sanetoki in the mid-thirteenth century. In this paper the author, by reexamining various notations written at the end of each volume by copyists and readers (okugaki), offers proof that there were actually two different Kanazawabunko MSS.. The manuscript which the author refers to as MS. A is the Kanazawa Sanetoki-bon which contains Vol.1 through 10 of the now existing 35 vols. of the Ryo-no-Shuge. This manuscript was transcribed from the Kazanin MS. which was owned by Kazanin Morotsugu (1222-1281). In MS. A there are okugaki which indicate that it was read by Kanazawa Sanetoki in 1269. MS. B is the Kenji-ninen-okugaki-bon and consists of 36 vols. (Vol.7 being subdivided into two separate volumes). Vol.10 and 20 of MS. B are transcriptions of the Ogimachi MS. the MS. owned by the Ogimachi branch of jurists within the Nakahara family (Hoka-Nakaharashi-Ogimachiryu). Transcriptions of the remaining 34 vols. of MS. B were made using the previously mentioned Kazanin MS. in Keuji 2 (1276). Both MSS. A and B were removed from the Kanazawabunko by Toyotomi Hidetsugu. The former was presented to Imadegawa Harusue in 1593 along with manuscripts of the Ritsu code and the Ryo-no-Gige both of which had also been contained in the Kanazawabunko. MS. A itself has been lost, but there is an excellent transcription called the Momijiyamabunko MS. which was originaly contained in the archives of the Tokugawa shogun, and which is now kept in the Japanese government archives (Naikakubunko). MS. B has been lost as well. However excellent transcriptions may be found in the private collection of Tanaka Yutaka (Tanaka MS.) and also in the archives of the Natioual Diet Library (Seike MS.). While the Tanaka MS. was transcribed in the early Edo period, the Seike MS. was copied between 1597 and 1599 by Funahashi Hidekata whose original family name was Kiyohara, which is abbreriated as "Seike." For further details concerning the Kanazawabuuko MS., please refer to the author's paper entitled "A Search for the Ryo-no-Shuge Kanazawabunko MSS." in Nihonrekishi, no. 371 (April, 1979).

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