"(5) If an Englishman dies in Japan of disease or any other cause, his effects shall be handed over without fail.
"(6) Forced sales of cargo and violence shall not take place.
"(7) If one of the English should commit an offence, he should be sentenced by the English general according to the gravity of his offence."*
*In this article, Ieyasu recognizes the principle of extra-territorial jurisdiction.
The terms of the above show that Saris was expected to make Yedo his headquarters. Had he done so he would have been practically free from competition; would have had the eastern capital of the empire for market, and would have avoided many expenses and inconveniences connected with residence elsewhere. But he did not rise to the occasion, and the result of his mistaken choice as well as of bad management was that, ten years later (1623), the English factory at Hirado had to be closed, the losses incurred there having aggregated £2000—$10,000. It has to be noted that, a few months after the death of Ieyasu, the above charter underwent a radical modification. The original document threw open to the English every port in Japan; the revised document limited them to Hirado. But this restriction may be indirectly traced to the blunder of not accepting a settlement in Yedo and a port at Uraga. For the foreign policy of the Tokugawa was largely swayed by an apprehension that the Kyushu feudatories, many of whom were not over-well disposed to the rule of the Bakufu, might derive from the assistance of foreign trade such a fleet and such an armament as would ultimately enable them to overthrow the Tokugawa. Therefore, the precaution was adopted of confining the English and the Dutch to Hirado, the domain of a feudatory too petty to become formidable, and to Nagasaki, which was one of the four Imperial cities, the other three being Yedo, Kyoto, and Osaka.
ENGRAVING: THE "ATAKA MARU" (Shogun's Barge)
It is easy to see that an English factory in Yedo and English ships at Uraga would have strengthened the Tokugawa ruler's hand instead of supplying engines of war to his political foes; and it must further be noted that the question of locality had another injurious outcome. For alike at Hirado and at Nagasaki, the foreign traders "were exposed to a crippling competition at the hands of rich Osaka monopolists, who, as representing an Imperial city and therefore being pledged to the Tokugawa interests, enjoyed special indulgences from the Bakufu. These shrewd traders who were then, as they are now, the merchant-princes of Japan, not only drew a ring around Hirado, but also sent vessels on their own account to Cochin China, Siam, Tonkin, Cambodia, and other foreign lands with which the English and the Dutch carried on trade." One can scarcely be surprised that Cocks, the successor of Saris, wrote, in 1620, "which maketh me altogether aweary of Japan."
It is, however, certain that the closure of the English factory at Hirado was voluntary; from the beginning to the end no serious friction had occurred between the English and the Japanese. When, the former withdrew from the Japanese trade, their houses and stores at Hirado were not sold, but were left in the safe-keeping of the local feudatory, who promised to restore them to their original owners should the English company desire to re-open business in Japan. The company did think of doing so on more than one occasion, but the idea did not mature until the year 1673, when a merchantman, the Return, was sent to obtain permission. "The Japanese authorities, after mature reflection, made answer that as the king of England was married to a Portuguese princess, British subjects could not be permitted to visit Japan. That this reply was suggested by the Dutch is very probable; that it truly reflected the feeling of the Japanese Government towards Roman Catholics is certain."*
*Encyclopaedia Britannica (11th Edition)'; article "Japan," by
Brinkley.