CHAPTER XXXVIII
SAVING THE ARMADA

The news of the victory had spread rapidly, and by the time Shibusawa reached Kyoto the whole south was in a state of unrestrained enthusiasm. From the first days of the shogunate, the south had never at any time yielded complete submission. They had always believed in the divine right of the mikado, and still cherished the hope of his complete restoration. They had fought many battles before, but somehow this one sounded a deeper note. A new leader had risen, and they rallied to his support with a better heart and bolder purpose.

While the force of the great success had been thus encouraging in the south it worked a radically different effect in the north. The news had travelled faster than the terrified shogun, and long before he reached Tokyo they had heard of Tetsutaisho’s misfortune and of the crushing defeat Hitotsubashi had suffered to befall the brave samurai.

On the return march he was openly jeered, and nowhere did the retreat meet with even respectful consideration. Everywhere throughout the north the people bowed down with sorrow; but in their hearts there arose a feeling of contempt for the halting, fleeing shogun.

“Had Tetsutaisho but escaped disablement!” became the suppressed cry on every hand.

Hitotsubashi re-entered his palace a broken-hearted man, and there shut himself in, a prisoner and a failure. It wanted only the bidding of the first comer to startle and frighten him into a weak and puerile submission: he waited and the time quickly came.

In the readjustment of the army, Shibusawa not only took advantage of the strong public sentiment greatly to augment and newly equip the force at hand, but introduced an entirely new system of arrangement and discipline. He made of the army three great divisions: the Central or Home division, over which he himself retained the immediate command; the Right or South division, the command of which he intrusted to Saigo; the Left or North division, which, strange to say, Tetsutaisho, his most bitter enemy, was named to command.

Shibusawa alone was responsible for the arrangement, which, not at first entirely understood, soon became generally known and proved most effective in its workings. Without in any manner weakening his effective forces he had placed his strongest enemy in the light of a rebel—than which there is none more odious in the eyes of his countrymen—and rather than bear the stigma of being so called many withdrew their support from the shogunate or came over entirely to the side of the mikadate.

While these sweeping changes were in progress, an expedition was also being planned that should carry the seat of warfare far to the northward, and even to the very door of the shogun’s palace itself. Such a thing had never before been thought possible, and now, when the most unheard of changes were the regular order, it was looked upon with wonder. Still the people, though amazed, had confidence in Shibusawa, who carried on his work with a full understanding of its probable effect at home, as well as its possibilities in the north. Nor was he unappreciative of the advisability of following up his first victory while its consequences were yet fresh in the minds of all. Hastening his movements as much as seemed consistent with good judgment, he began mobilising a vast army near the seashore at Owara, and there rendezvoused all the ships at his disposal or that he could buy or build in the meantime.

So rapidly did Shibusawa move that by the middle of April he held in readiness a fleet of two thousand craft of all sorts and an army fully one-half the size of that which Tetsutaisho had three months before marched against them. Thereupon he notified Tokyo that the mikado had proclaimed the shogun a rebel, demanding his immediate surrender; also advised Tetsutaisho that if he longer refused to submit to orders from Kyoto he did so at his peril.