CHAPTER X

THE CRUISE OF H.M.S. _GALATEA_

IV. OLD JAPAN

NOTE

When Lord Charles Beresford visited Nippon (from the Chinese Jih Pun,

the place or rising of the sun, changed by English pronunciation to

Japan), it was the old Japan that he saw; the Japan of centuries of

isolation, inviolate save for the intrusion of the Jesuit missionaries

in the sixteenth century, and the little wedge of Dutch traders. It

had been the Japan of the Mikado, who was as a god; of the Tycoon, his

temporal representative, who, like a man walking the tight-rope above a

wood of transfixing swords, maintained a delicate equipoise of power

among the feudal seigneuralty, the great Daimios, each lord of his

domain and master of life and death over thousands of retainers. It

was the Japan of the Samurai, the two-sworded rufflers; of the Ronins,

the masterless men, the outlaws, who roved the country in bands,

patriotic, ferocious and pitiless. It was still the Japan in which the

common people, men and women and maidens, walked naked and unashamed;

in which the warriors went to battle clad in armour wrought of

tortoise-shell and silk, girt with swords and carrying bows and arrows;

in which the life of a barbarian foreigner was never safe from hour to

hour, so that he must be guarded by the two-sworded Yaconins, the

Government officers, who, knowing the hatred of the Government towards

their charges, seldom drew sword in {91} their defence until it was

just one blood-stained second too late; in which a fault in honour was

instantly expiated by hara-kiri, the fatal cross-cut upon the belly,

performed in the public eye, which was justly offended if the incision

were so clumsily executed that the entrails protruded. Such, at least,

is the ceremonial theory. In practice, the dagger is driven in below

the ribs, drawn horizontally across the belly, and up the other side;

an operation requiring inconceivable courage.

It is the land of tea-houses and temples, of running footmen and

palanquins; where houses and string and handkerchiefs are made of

paper; where the people wash themselves every day and their clothes

never; where the oldest profession in the world is counted honourable

service, and the pictures of courtesans adorn the temples in which the

bonzes intone prayers in the midst of games and dances: where the

writing is done from top to bottom, from right to left, and keys are

turned from left to right, and carpenters draw their planes towards

them, and the houses are built from the roof downwards, and horses are

mounted on the off-side, and ladies black their teeth. It was a land

of immense processional pageants: the processions of the high Daimios,

who once a year quitted their ancestral homes with a great train to

dwell in Yedo, the capital of the Tycoon, for six months; and returned

again, leaving as hostages for their loyalty their wives and children

for another six months. The two-sworded Samurai march in front, crying

"Shitanirio!" and all the spectators drop upon their knees and hide

behind their legs while the long procession ambles by, spearmen and

banners and baggage-carriers and palanquins; the norimons, which are

the palanquins of the notable, and the cangos, which are the palanquins

of the humble.

When the foreigner rode abroad in state, he was attended by the

Ward-guards, who marched in front, striking the earth at every step

with their long staves whereon loose iron rings were strung, so that

their jingling warned the populace to make way.

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At night, festivals were celebrated by immense processions filling the

streets, in which everyone carried a lighted lantern swaying upon the

end of a flexible bamboo, and the lanterns were painted with bats and

dragons, and the people wore horrible masks, distended with the

monstrous rictus of the devil-gods. In the Yoshiwara, where the women,

painted and gilded, sashed and bedecked, sit in a double row, each with

her price placarded upon her knee, there were the great priapic

processions, concerning which the English works upon Japan preserve a

shocked reticence.

In old Japan, the common ideal of the ruling classes was that their

country should maintain for ever intact its immemorial laws, traditions

and customs; an ideal whose attainment the entrance of the foreigner

would render impossible. As for the common people, they had no

aspirations beyond the day's work. Japan, in her own view, was

complete, self-sufficient and wholly satisfied with a civilisation

compared with which the politics of the Occident were of yesterday.

The Islands of Nippon were ensphered in holy crystal, whose flawless

preservation was the highest duty of a patriot.

Into that rare atmosphere, surcharged with perilous elements, sailed

Commodore Perry of the United States Navy in the year 1853. Some fifty

years later, Pierre Loti entered Japanese waters in a French warship.

"Et nous entrions maintenant dans une espèce de couloir ombreux, entre

deux rangées de très hautes montagnes, qui se succédaient avec une

bizarrerie symétrique--comme les 'portants' d'un décor tout en

profondeur, extrêmement beau, mais pas assez naturel--on eut dit que ce

Japon s'ouvrait devant nous, en une déchirure enchantée, pour nous

laisser pénétrer dans son cceur même" (_Madame Chrysanthème_).

It was Commodore Perry who rent open the heart of Old Japan, and her

blood flowed. The gallant commodore, anchoring off Cape Idzu on 8th

July, 1853, with two steam frigates and two sloops of war, demanded no

more than a treaty securing help and proper treatment to sailors

shipwrecked {93} on the coasts of Japan. The Japanese Government said

neither yes nor no; whereupon Perry gave them a year to consider the

matter, promising to return at the end of it with a "larger fleet."

And on 12th February, 1854, there was Commodore Perry in the Bay of

Yedo with three steam frigates and four sloops of war. After long

negotiations, a treaty of amity was signed, including a promise to

succour ships in distress, and (above all) opening two new ports. From

that moment the isolation of Japan was ended. The door opened but a

crack; but into that crack the wedge of commerce, driven by the lust of

gain, was thrust by America (1854), Russia (1857), England and France

(1858).

In 1859, Mr. (afterwards Sir) Rutherford Alcock, British representative

of H.B.M. Government in China was appointed her Majesty's Envoy

Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary in Japan. His book, _The

Capital of the Tycoon_ (London, 1863. Longman, 2 vols.), gives one of

the first authoritative accounts of Old Japan presented to the British

public. During his three years in that country he was constantly in

peril of assassination. In August, 1859, an officer and a sailor from

one of the Russian ships lying in the harbour were cut down and slashed

to pieces in the streets of Yedo, and a steward was severely wounded.

In the following year the Japanese linguist attached the British

Legation was stabbed to death, and two Dutch ship-captains were cut to

pieces in Yokohama. The next demonstration of the hatred of foreigners

was the murder of the Gotairo, the Regent, Iko-mono-no-kami. His

escort was suddenly attacked as it was leaving his castle by some

twenty swordsmen, wielding the terrible Japanese two-handed weapon.

The hands of the bearers of his norimon were severed on the pole and

the Regent himself decapitated, his head being carried away as a trophy.

In 1861, Mr. Heuskin, attached to the American Legation, was murdered.

Soon afterwards, one of the Governors (or Under-Secretaries) of Foreign

Affairs, {94} Oribeno-no-Kami, who had been especially friendly in his

intercourse with the Legations, "died," in the Japanese phrase,

"without the effects of medicine." To be more precise, he had

committed hara-kiri.

In July, 1861, the British Legation at Yedo was attacked at night by a

band of swordsmen, who passed the guards and rushed the building. Mr.

Oliphant, who had recently been appointed Secretary to the Legation,

was severely wounded. One of the guards, a porter, and a groom, and

two of the assailants, were killed outright. One of the assailants was

severely wounded, to six of the Legation party who were severely

wounded and eleven slightly wounded.

Such were the beginnings of Western influence in Japan. Sir Rutherford

Alcock's voluminous account of his three years' ministry reveals a

gallant, honest, kindly gentleman sorely perplexed by the ethical

problems involved in the forcible interference of one powerful nation

in the affairs of a weaker nation, whose sole ambition was to be let

alone. Hampered, on the one hand, by the greed and discourtesy of the

European traders, and on the other, by the immitigable duplicity and

the furtive and implacable enmity of the Japanese, yet singly

determined to do his duty to his Queen and country, Sir Rutherford

Alcock honourably fulfilled a task of extreme danger and incredible

difficulty.

Thenceforward, until the year 1869, the duel between East and West

continued with increasing ardour. The whole polity of old Japan was

shaken as by the earthquakes which agitate and rend its soil. There

were frequent assassinations of the foreign barbarians; the governing

classes, which consisted wholly of the military caste, employed every

invidious method to restrict trade with Europeans; while the Western

nations, on their side, brought their armed strength to bear in the

enforcement of treaty rights, which by the same means had originally

been wrung from the Tycoon's government. And here it falls to

distinguish between the divine prestige of the Mikado, {95} descendant

of the sun-goddess, and the temporal administration of the Tycoon, or

Shogun. In that dual administration resided a main factor of the

extraordinary difficulty of the situation. Both the spiritual and

temporal rulers, the Imperial Court and the Bakufu, or Tycoon's

Government, were equally inspired by hatred of the foreigner. But

whereas the Mikado, dwelling majestically apart, could avoid all

contact with the barbarians, the Tycoon was compelled by superior force

to negotiate with them. He was thus placed between two fires; on the

one side, the Mikado ordered him to expel the foreigner; on the other,

the foreigner threatened him with war unless the treaties were carried

into execution.

For long the Tycoon, or his advisers, maintained his position with

singular address. But no man born of woman could have solved its

complications. For the great Daimios, the feudal nobility, held

allegiance primarily to the Mikado. The Tycoon could and did detach

some of the clans to his side; but the great body of the western clans

defied him. The influence of the Tycoon began swiftly to decline. At

the same time the Imperial party began to perceive that the expulsion

of foreigners had become impossible. The immediate result was the

revolt of some of their adherents. Inspired as it was by hatred of the

foreigner, it was directed equally against Mikado and Tycoon, and

accompanied by expressions of loyalty to both parties.

In 1864 the troops of the Choshiu clan attempted to capture Kioto and

to obtain possession of the person of the Mikado. They were defeated

after heavy fighting. In June of the previous year, the Choshiu men

had fired upon the American ship _Pembroke_ while she was passing

through the Inland Sea, and also upon the Dutch corvette _Medusa_. The

French commander-in-chief of the station, Admiral Jaurès proceeded to

Shimoseki and destroyed the batteries. In August a British naval force

under the command of Vice-Admiral Kuper proceeded to Kagoshima in order

to enforce {96} the payment of the indemnity due for the murder of Mr.

Richardson, bombarded the town and destroyed the batteries. It was

these two actions which for the first time really convinced the ruling

classes in Japan that it was hopeless any longer to endeavour to

prevent the intrusion of foreign influence.

In 1866 the Tycoon Iyemochi died. In the same year a new and enlarged

Convention was concluded with Great Britain, France, America and

Holland. In the following year Keiki, very unwillingly, became Tycoon,

an office which by this time had become exceedingly insecure. In the

same year the Mikado, Komei, died and was succeeded by his son

Mutsuhito, a minor. In the following year the Mikado assumed the whole

administrative power hitherto vested in the Tycoon, and a new system of

Government was promulgated. Followed, civil war and the defeat of the

Tycoon, who retired into seclusion. In the meantime the Mikado had

invited the Representatives of Foreign Powers to visit him at Kioto.

"That the Mikado of Japan, who claims to be descended from the

sun-goddess, and in whose person a peculiar odour of sanctity was

considered to exist, should voluntarily invite to his palace at Kioto

the Envoys of nations who had hitherto been looked upon as outer

barbarians, and intercourse with whom was a profane thing, was indeed a

great step in advance. No foreigner had ever yet crossed the Imperial

threshold, or looked upon the face of the sacred Emperor of Japan. It

was a proof that a new order of things was inaugurated, and gave good

hopes for the future" (Adams, _History of Japan_. Lond., 1875).

But although the Imperial Government perceived the wisdom of accepting

the inevitable, the hatred of the foreigner, bred in the blood of the

military caste, could neither be dissembled nor controlled; and the

attack made upon the British Envoy, Sir Harry Parkes, while actually on

his way to the Imperial Palace on 23rd March, 1868, illustrates the

condition of affairs. On the road to Kioto {97} and in the sacred city

itself, the Europeans had been regarded by the people with a polite and

respectful curiosity, nor was there any sign of hostility.

Sir Harry Parkes left the temple of Chi-on-in, where he lodged, to

proceed to the audience, with a mounted escort of twelve

ex-Metropolitan mounted police, under the command of Inspector Peacock,

with whom rode a Japanese officer, Nakai Kozo. Behind these massive

veterans rode Sir Harry himself, accompanied by Goto Shojiro, of the

Japanese Foreign Department, and followed by Mr. Mitford, Mr. Satow,

Dr. Willis, and other members of the Legation. Then came a guard of

forty men of H.M.'s 9th Regiment under the command of Lieutenant

Bradshaw and Lieutenant Bruce. A native guard preceded the train, and

another guard followed it. Just as the policemen were turning the

corner of a narrow street, Sir Harry observed signs of confusion, and

the next moment a Japanese, his great sword flashing and hewing, dashed

round the corner, closely pursued by two policemen. Sir Harry cried

out to the soldiers behind him to stop the Samurai. Turning his head,

he saw his companion, Goto Shojiro, on foot, sword in hand rushing

forward to attack a second Samurai, who was already fighting hand to

hand with Nakai Kozo, the Japanese officer who had been riding

alongside Inspector Peacock at the head of the policemen. Behind Sir

Harry, shots rang out as the soldiers fired at the first assassin. Sir

Harry Parkes was suddenly aware of the wild figure of a Japanese

warrior, advancing towards him through the press. His face was a mask

of blood; in one hand shone a long sword, dripping red from hilt to

point; in the other, the victor lifted the bloody head, shorn clean

from the shoulders, of his countryman. It was Nakai Kozo. Nakai gave

the following ingenuous account of his deed of arms to Mr. Adams,

secretary of the Legation, who quotes it in his _History_, as follows:--

"I saw a man running down the line cutting at one man after another. I

jumped off my horse, drew my sword, and {98} rushed after him; he

turned and we engaged; he cut me on the head. Then Goto came up and

dealt him a blow which felled him to the ground. Unfortunately Goto's

sword-hilt, which was of lacquer, slipped from his hands, and I had to

cope with the fellow alone. I could only see out of one eye, the other

being covered with blood, but I kept chopping at him, and after about

ten blows I managed to cut his head off. I then took the head and

showed it to Sir H. Parkes."

The soldiers bayoneted the first Samurai, who was still alive when he

was finally secured by Mr. Mitford. He was afterwards beheaded by the

Imperial Government. But those two desperate enemies of the foreigner

wounded thirteen men and five horses ere they were cut down. One of

the wounded was a soldier, another a native groom; the remaining nine,

of whom two were so seriously hurt that they were invalided home, were

ex-Metropolitan policeman to whom the methods of the Samurai must have

been startling. These trained fighters wield their two-handed swords,

heavy, perfectly balanced, razor-sharp weapons, with an appalling

swiftness and dexterity. At a single blow they can cleave a man to the

chin, or cut off his head, or lop off a limb.

In May, 1868 Sir Harry Parkes presented his credentials, which had

hitherto been addressed to the Tycoon, to the Emperor. On the 23rd was

celebrated the Queen's birthday, when many Japanese of high rank, some

of whom had never before made acquaintance with a foreigner, were

entertained by Vice-Admiral Sir Henry Keppel, commander-in-chief of the

China Station, on board H.M.S. _Rodney_. It was not until November

that the civil war was ended by the submission of the rebels. The

Emperor then took up his residence for a time in Yedo--now called

Tokio--which had been the capital of the Tycoon, and which was

henceforth to be the eastern metropolis of the Emperor, as Kioto was

the western capital. In the following year, after another insurrection

had been suppressed, the great Daimios made their memorable sacrifice,

offering their lands and servants to the Emperor; thereby deliberately

exchanging their {99} almost independent state for a condition of

subservience to the central Government.

Such, in brief, was the beginning of the New Japan; and it was at this

stage in its development that, for the first time in history, a foreign

prince, in the person of H.R.H. the Duke of Edinburgh, visited the

Mikado.

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