The Making of Modern Japan / An Account of the Progress of Japan from Pre-feudal Days to Constitutional Government & the Position of a Great Power, With Chapters on Religion, the Complex Family System, Education, &c.

by John Harington Gubbins

The working of the treaties had been on the whole satisfactory, as satisfactory, that is to say, as it was reasonable to expect from the exceptional circumstances attending their negotiation; and there seemed to be no special points in regard to which revision was in any way urgent. This, however, was not the view taken by the Japanese Government. Very soon after the coming into operation of the treaties of 1858 the Japanese authorities and people seem to have taken umbrage at the extra-territorial privileges enjoyed by foreigners in Japan under Treaty stipulations. It is more than probable that this feeling with regard to extra-territoriality may not have been altogether spontaneous, but may have been inspired at this time by foreigners actuated by mixed motives, and inclined to draw hasty conclusions. In any case, the Japanese early became aware that the enjoyment of extra-territoriality was regarded generally as a privilege conceded under pressure to the subjects of countries possessing, or claiming to possess, a civilization more advanced in some respects than that of the country from which the concession was obtained. The pride of the nation rebelled against the discrimination thus exercised, and not unnaturally it was eager to seize the first opportunity that presented itself to get rid of the obnoxious extra-territorial clauses that stood in the way of the exercise of Japanese jurisdiction over foreigners in Japan. This was the main motive underlying the desire for revision of the treaties.

There were, however, additional objects in view in sending the mission. To the foreign representatives the Government explained their anxiety to communicate to the Governments of Treaty Powers details of the internal history of their country during the years preceding the revolution of 1868, and their wish to inform them of the actual state of affairs, and the future policy it was intended to pursue. They also considered it important, it was added, to study the institutions of other countries and to gain a precise knowledge of their laws, of the measures in force regarding commerce and education, as well as of their naval and military systems.

So far as these minor objects were concerned, the proceedings of the mission were attended with success. This was shown not only by the period of its absence abroad, which extended over two years, far longer than had been intended, but also by the rapid progress of the work of reform after its return. The information gained by its members, amongst whom were some of the most talented men of the day, was later on of much service to their country; while the insight they gained into foreign affairs, and the disposition of foreign Governments towards Japan, was of the greatest value. In the matter of the ostensible purpose of the mission, however, nothing was accomplished. The efforts of the ambassadors in this direction met with no encouragement. The foreign Governments concerned were indisposed to overlook the constant obstructions to the fulfilment of Treaty stipulations caused by indifference and ill-will on the part of Japanese officials. Nor, in view of the short interval that had elapsed since Japan had emerged from feudalism, were they in any haste to gratify the aspirations expressed in the Letter of Credence presented by the head of the mission to the President of the United States—the first country visited—which spoke of an “intention to reform and improve the treaties, so that Japan might stand on an equality with the most enlightened nations.” They accordingly declined to enter into any discussion on the subject on the ground that the moment had not arrived when the discussion could be useful.

The rebuff thus administered caused disappointment and ill-feeling, and led before long to the beginning of an agitation for Treaty revision, which did much mischief to foreign relations; was frequently used as a convenient cry by politicians in the course of attacks directed against the Government of the day; and lasted until the first of the new revised treaties was signed by Great Britain in the summer of 1894. Its chief effect, however, so far as foreigners were concerned, was to strengthen the Japanese Government in its determination to resist all efforts on the part of foreign Powers to obtain further access to the interior of the country, and to restrict in every way possible the granting of any additional facilities for foreign trade and intercourse under existing treaties.

Much space has been devoted in previous chapters to the abolition of feudalism as being the starting-point of Japan’s modern progress. The immediate effect of that step, as well as the various measures relating to land tenure and land taxation, which were its natural sequel, have also been explained in some detail. There is, however, no intention to trace with the same minuteness, or in strict chronological order, the successive stages of the work of reform. Our purpose being to give a general idea of the process which brought about the gradual transformation of an Oriental country into a progressive modern Empire, we shall pass lightly over many matters, dwelling mainly on such conspicuous and outstanding features as will illustrate most clearly the character and course of Japan’s modern development.

Before touching on other measures of reform undertaken in the first years following the Restoration, it may be well to glance at the conditions under which the work of reform proceeded. The initial difficulty which hampered the reformers at the outset was the absence of any definite scheme of reconstruction. Beyond the surrender of feudal fiefs nothing in the nature of a detailed programme had been thought out. They had to feel their way. As one of the leading figures in the events of the Restoration said some years later, “They could not look far ahead; it was sufficient if they could agree on the next step to be taken.” Another difficulty with which they had to contend was the question of language. The spread of Christianity in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries had not been accompanied by the introduction, to any appreciable extent, of any of the languages of the three nationalities—Portuguese, Spanish and Italian—to which the early missionaries belonged. The use of Latin in the religious services, and the study of Japanese by the missionaries, had rendered this unnecessary. And when Christianity disappeared, what little Portuguese, or other Latin language, had come with it disappeared too. But with the advent of the Dutch things were changed. The Dutch language became the medium of commerce, and also the medium through which all Western learning, and indeed all knowledge of the West, was received. A class of Dutch-speaking interpreters, who found employment in foreign trade, grew up; and with the enterprise, unsubdued by constant official repression, and the curiosity for what is new, which have always distinguished the Japanese people, men took to learning Dutch in order to educate themselves.

So, when foreign relations were renewed on a wider basis in the middle of the nineteenth century, Dutch was the language to which Japanese and foreigners naturally turned as the medium for the conduct of the newly established intercourse. All communications were carried on in this language, and it became the authentic text of all the earlier treaties, including those of 1858. Harris, the first American representative in Japan, in his diary gives us some idea of the trouble and vexation involved on both sides in wrestling with the language problem. The Dutch the Japanese had learnt was, he tells us, a mercantile patois, the correct Dutch spoken by the Dutch interpreters attached to his mission being quite strange to them. When it came to drawing up written agreements in both languages, they insisted that every word in the Dutch version should stand in the same order as its equivalent in the Japanese version. This, he says, occasioned some difficulty, and we feel that he is not overstating the case.

The employment of Dutch as the medium of communication in the early days of renewed foreign intercourse, though inevitable, was unfortunate. And for this reason. During many years of the Dutch monopoly—so far as Western nations were concerned—of trade with Japan, Holland was at the zenith of her power. If not actually mistress of the seas, she occupied a position of pre-eminence as a maritime state. But by the time the first treaties with Japan were negotiated Holland had lost this high position. She was no longer a great Power, and consequently the knowledge of Dutch possessed by many Japanese ceased to be useful to Japan. It was necessary for some other language to take its place. Thanks to the growing commerce and power of Great Britain and the United States, English was the language which stepped naturally into the breach, and it became necessary for the Japanese to abandon Dutch, and turn their attention to the acquisition of the new language which had superseded it.

So far we have dwelt on the difficulty connected with the languages of the foreigners who had made their more or less unwelcome appearance on the scene, and from whom Japan was intent on borrowing the materials of the contemplated reforms. If we now turn to the other side of the question, the difficulty arising from the Japanese language itself, it will be seen how serious an obstacle to Japan’s modern progress her own language presented.

Until the seventh century of our era Japan had, as we have seen, her own language. This was spoken, not written. Then by one of those unaccountable impulses which affect the destinies of nations, she followed the example of Korea, which had also spoken dialects of her own, and adopted the written language of China. Later on, from the Chinese characters thus borrowed, she evolved syllabaries, filling the place for her of our alphabet for us, and so developed native scripts of her own. But this native written language never prospered in its competition with the Chinese characters from which it was derived. Though it was employed in poetry, and other native classical literature and served a useful purpose as a literary vehicle for women of the upper classes, in whose hands it displayed unexpected potentialities, and for the uneducated masses, it eventually found its most usual place in literature as a simple adjunct to the use of Chinese.