Scenes in Japanese Cemeteries
The survey of the anchorage having been completed, Matheson proceeded, on the 31st, to the bay of Shimoda, on the other side of the promontory of Izu, where he spent five days in surveying, and was detained two days longer by the weather. After the second day, he was visited by an interpreter, who understood Dutch, and by two officers from Uraga, apparently spies on each other, to watch his proceedings; and finally an officer of rank, from a town thirteen miles off, came on board. There were three fishing villages at the anchorage, and he landed for a short time, but the Japanese officers followed, begging and entreating him to go on board again. The ship was supplied with plenty of fish, and boats were furnished to tow her out.
In 1850, the Japanese sent to Batavia, in the annual Dutch ship, three American sailors who had been left in 1848 on one of the Kurile Islands, also thirty-one other sailors belonging to the English whaling-ship Edmund, of Robertstown, wrecked on the coast of Yezo. At the same time, probably in consequence of the numerous recent visits to their coasts, the Dutch were requested to give notice to other nations, that although it had been determined, in 1842, to furnish with necessary supplies such foreign vessels as arrived on the coast in distress, this was not to be understood as indicating the least change as to the policy of the rigorous exclusion of foreigners.[111]
CHAPTER XLV
Foreign Relations—New Shōgun—Dutch Trade—Chinese Trade—American Embassy—Its Object—Letter to the Emperor—Perry’s first visit to the Bay of Yedo—Death of the Shōgun—Perry’s second visit to the Bay of Yedo—Negotiation of a Treaty—The Treaty as agreed to—Shimoda—Hakodate—Additional Regulations—Japanese Currency—Burrow’s visit to the Bay of Yedo—Third visit of the American Steamers—Russian and English Negotiations—Exchange of Ratifications—Earthquake.
We have seen in the last chapter how the whale fishery, on the one hand, and the opening of China to foreign trade, on the other, had more and more drawn attention to Japan; in the conduct of whose functionaries, however, no indication appeared of any disposition to abandon their ancient exclusive policy. It has even been asserted[112] that a new Shōgun [Iyeyoshi], who had succeeded in 1837 (after a fifty years’ reign on the part of his predecessor), had imposed new restrictions on foreign products, and, by special encouragement to home productions of similar kinds, had endeavored to supersede the necessity of receiving anything from abroad. It is certain that the Dutch trade rather diminished than increased. The amount of that trade, from 1825 to 1833, inclusive, is stated by Jancigny, from official returns, or those reputed to be such, at 289,150 florins ($115,620) for importations, and 702,675 florins ($281,078) for exportations. In 1846, the importations reached only 231,117 fr. ($92,446), and the exportations 552,319 fr. ($220,927); and those of the preceding year had been about the same. The private trade, and the attempts at smuggling connected with it, were very narrowly watched. Within the preceding ten years, one interpreter had been executed, and another had been driven to cut himself open, in consequence of complicity in smuggling. The private trade had been farmed out, for the benefit of those interested in it, at 30,000 fl. ($12,000) annually,—the amount at which Kämpfer had reckoned the profits from that source of the director alone. Among the Dutch imports upon government account, woollens, silks, velvets, cotton goods, gold, silver, tin, lead, mercury, and a few other articles are mentioned. Sugar, formerly a leading article, no longer appears on the list. The returns continued to be exclusively in camphor and copper, the latter furnished by the Japanese government at the old rates, much below the current price, by which advantage alone was the Dutch trade sustained. Among the private importations were spices, chemicals, and a great variety of Paris trinkets, for which various Japanese manufactures and products were taken in exchange.
The Chinese trade had declined not less than that of the Dutch. The ten junks a year, to which it was now restricted, all came from Sha-po (not far from Chusan), half of them in January and the other half in August—their cargoes, which include a great variety of articles, being partly furnished by private merchants who come over in them, but chiefly by a commercial company at Sha-po, for whom the captains of the junks act as supercargoes. Except as to some trifling articles, this trade seems, like that of the Dutch, to be pretty much in the hands of the government, who, or some privileged company under them, purchase the imports and furnish a return cargo to each junk, two fifths in copper and the remainder in other articles. The Chinese, however, still continued to be allowed much more liberty than the Dutch of personal intercourse with the inhabitants of Nagasaki.
The settlement of California, the new trade opened thence with China, and the idea of steam communication across the Pacific, for which the coal of Japan might be needed, combined with the extension of the whale fishery in the Northern Japanese seas to increase the desire in America for access to the ports of Japan. Shortly after the visit of the “Preble,” the American government resolved to send an envoy thither, backed by such a naval force as would ensure him a respectful hearing—the cases of Biddle and Glyn seeming to prove that the humoring policy could not be relied upon and that the only way to deal successfully with the Japanese was to show a resolution not to take no for an answer.
Accordingly, Mr. Webster, as Secretary of State, prepared a letter from the President to the Emperor of Japan; also a letter of instructions to the American naval commander in the China seas, to whom it was resolved to entrust the duty of envoy, and whose force was to be strengthened by additional ships. The sailing, however, of these ships was delayed till after Mr. Webster’s death; and in the mean time Commodore Matthew C. Perry was selected as the head of the expedition. A new letter,[113] dated November 5, 1852, addressed from the State Department to the Secretary of the Navy, thus defined its objects:
“1. To effect some permanent arrangement for the protection of American seamen and property wrecked on these islands, or driven into their ports by stress of weather.