"And," said the Viscount, "we had in the old days another sort of suicide, examples of which sometimes occur even to this day. When a man believed profoundly in something, and was unable to attract attention to the thing in which he believed, he would sometimes commit seppuku as a means of drawing notice to it. He would leave a paper setting forth his beliefs, and people would give it attention, feeling that if a man was willing to die in order to emphasize a point, his message was worth considering."
The Viscount paused. Then rather reflectively he added: "It is as though he were to underscore his protest—in red."
CHAPTER XVII
The Old-time Anti-Foreign Sentiment—Prince Yoshinobu Tokugawa—Emperor and Shogun—Prince Yoshinobu becomes Shogun—His Highness, Akitaké, Goes to France—Humorous Episodes—The Defeat of Prince Yoshinobu's Army—Various Explanations—The Restoration of the Emperor—Prince Yoshinobu's Retirement—The Viscount's Theory—Prince Keikyu Tokugawa—A Roosevelt Anecdote—Swords and Watchchain
"I was a boy of fourteen," said Viscount Shibusawa "when your Commodore Perry came to Japan. At that time, and for a considerable period afterwards, I was 'anti-foreigner'—that is, I was opposed to the abandonment of our old Japanese isolation, and to the opening of relations with foreign powers.
"The majority of thoughtful men felt as I did. Our trouble with the Jesuits, in the latter part of the sixteenth and early part of the seventeenth century came about through a fear which grew up amongst us that the Jesuits were trying to get political control of Japan. This fear brought about their expulsion from the country, as well as some persecution of themselves and their converts, and it was then that our policy of isolation began. More lately we had seen the Opium War in China, and that had added to our conviction that foreign powers were merely seeking territory, and that they were utterly unscrupulous.
"When I reached the age of twenty-five, I became a retainer of Yoshinobu Tokugawa, a powerful prince, kinsman of Iyemochi Tokugawa, who was then Shogun. Not being of noble family, I did not belong to Prince Yoshinobu's intimate circle, but was a member of what might be termed the middle group at his court.
"He was then acting as intermediary between the Shogun and the Imperial Court at Kyoto—for though the Shogun ruled the land, as shoguns had for centuries, there was maintained a fiction that he did so by imperial consent.