CHAPTER XV
Progress of the Corean War—Success of the Japanese—Konishi Settsu-no-kami, Viceroy of Corea—Edict of the Emperor for disarming the Converts in Shimo—Disgrace and Downfall of the Royal Family of Bungo—Terazawa, Governor of Nagasaki—His Conversion and Friendly Acts—A. D. 1592-1593.
Though the emperor did not himself pass into Corea, he sent thither such reinforcements as to raise his army there to the number of two hundred thousand men. But the Coreans having abandoned their cities and fled to inaccessible places, burning everything, even to provisions which they could not carry away (thus setting an example long afterwards followed by the Russians on a similar occasion), this great force was soon reduced to extremities, by which its numbers were rapidly diminished. The Chinese also came to the assistance of the Coreans; and the grand admiral, with forces so reduced as to be greatly inferior in numbers, was obliged to encounter these new enemies in several desperate engagements. Compelled at last to retreat, he fell back upon a garrison which he had left to keep up his communications with the coast, the command of which he had entrusted to Yoshimune, king of Bungo. But that feeble prince, in a moment of terror, had abandoned his post; and, the grand admiral’s communications thus cut off, nothing but his distinguished firmness and courage saved his army from total destruction. After a drawn battle under the walls of the Corean capital, terms of peace were agreed upon, according to which five of the eight provinces of Corea were assigned to the Japanese; and the commerce between China and Japan, which by the act of the former had for some time been broken off, was again renewed.[58]
The admiral was named viceroy of Corea, and the converted princes were still detained there at the head of their troops. The missionaries, thus separated from their protectors, were filled with new alarms by an order of the emperor for disarming all their converts in Shimo. The king of Bungo, as a punishment for his cowardice, was stripped of his estates; and in the end he and his family, reduced to absolute poverty, were obliged to retire to Nagasaki, and to live there on the charity of the Jesuits. His territories were assigned to pagan lords, and the converted inhabitants soon felt the consequences of the change. Indeed, throughout Shimo the converts suffered greatly by the absence of their princes, of whom several died about this time. But, in general, the Catholics stood firm; and several of the Jesuit fathers having made their way to Corea, new converts were made in the ranks of the army.
The missionaries also found a new friend in Terazawa, a young man appointed governor of Nagasaki, and who, not long after, was secretly baptized. He represented to the emperor that, if the Portuguese merchants were still to be admitted to trade at Nagasaki, they ought to be allowed some priests, since it was the influence and authority of the priests that kept the merchants in order, settled their quarrels, and obliged them to strict justice in their commercial transactions; and, upon the strength of these plausible representations, Terazawa obtained leave for the Jesuits to rebuild their house and church at Nagasaki. Father Gnecchi, also, in consideration of his age and infirmities, was allowed to remain at Miyako, though without any church, or permission to celebrate divine service openly.