The Shogun troop, having seized the cannon of Toro’s division, turned them upon the Imperialists. Fresh troops, ordered to the palace some days before by Aidzu, now arriving, overwhelmed by sheer swamping effect the artillery of Mori, once their fire was drawn. Most of Mori’s artillery was now in the hands of the shogunates.
As the flood of fighting men surged through the city of Kioto in diverse, disintegrating directions, fire ingulfed large portions of the city. A gale sprang up from the west, fanning the work of incendiarism and cannon. Houses, squares, streets, yashishikis of the visiting daimios, whole districts were destroyed, while the bakufu followers cannonaded and beat to pieces the public store-houses, lest some Choshui men should find hiding there. The lowly Eta in their peaceful villages were driven out and their houses consumed before the breath of angry war. An Imperial city fell almost to ashes and ruin in a day and night.
But scattered and isolated as they were, the valorous men of Choshui, once they recovered themselves from the disaster of the palace, made a last, wild, determined resistance.
A party under Toro, now insane with grief, occupied house after house and building after building, as with their rifles they brought down the enemy during a slow retreat, when they fired every edifice they were forced to abandon.
Darkness drew no kindly curtain over the red-heated stage of action. The light of vast conflagrations gave sufficient illumination for sword to meet sword in a shock broken only by death. The houseless, homeless residents of the city, non-combatants, fleeing to the hills for their lives, deepened the tragedy of the scene.
In the confusion of this isolated series of battles, Oguri had come upon the cavalry division. Vaulting into an empty saddle, he took command. Diffused as the avenging wave of the young Mito had now become, it could be broken through in some single spot, Oguri believed. The bakufu men thought only of attack, not of being attacked.
Through a quarter of the town as yet untouched by the fury of either party, Oguri led the cavalry back towards the palace. Coming upon Toro’s party, he added them to his forces. But with his meeting of Toro he had chanced upon a fighting zone. Through the cleared space on which still smouldered the ruins of buildings fired by Toro, Oguri directed a charge against the infantry opposed to him, and passed on. In this way, Oguri gained gradually a passage towards the palace. Whenever he came to a region of houses from which he was attacked, Toro and his followers, become pioneers and sappers, levelled and set fire to them, clearing the way for a new charge of Oguri’s horse.
Slowly, still undiscovered by the main body of the enemy, they reached the palace.
Gray, dismal, haggard dawned the day, as though fearing to look with sun eyes upon the horror wrought by dark night. From the burning city great mists of smouldering débris hastened to veil, as though in sympathy, the eyes of the lord of day.
Within the palace Mori came to consciousness. He lay in a chamber looking upon what he recognized as the inner court of the Imperial palace. One hand wandered in convulsive movements down his person. He found that his armor was still upon him, though loosened. Upon the floor by the side of his divan lay his swords and helmet. Mori fell, rather than rose, from the divan, and stood dizzily, uncertainly erect. Then attempting to raise his sword, he fell from weakness.