“When Perry came to Shimoda, he took a ramble through the town, and happened to enter a monastery yard. It was in summer, and two bonzes were taking a nap. Of course they were shaved as to their heads, and their bodies were more than half uncovered. At first glance, Perry thought that these shaven-pated and nude savages were in an unseemly act. ‘This is a savage land’, he said; and until he saw and talked with the better representatives of Japan, he was of a mind to treat the Japanese as he would the lowest African tribes.”
Without a yard of canvas spread, the four ships moved rapidly out of the Bay on the morning of March 17th. The promontory of Uraga was black with spectators who watched that stately procession whose motor was the child born of wedded fire and water.
Japan now gave herself up to reflection.
| [28] | Ota Dō Kuan the founder of Yedo (Gate of the Bay) in the fifteenth century, wrote in the summer-house of his castle a poem, said to have been extant in 1854, and to have been pointed out as fulfilled by Perry: “To my gate ships will come from the far East, Ten thousand miles.” —Dixon’s Japan, p. 218. |
CHAPTER XXXII.
JAPANESE PREPARATIONS FOR TREATY-MAKING.
The Mississippi touching at Napa, found there the Supply, and met the Vandalia on the way to Hong Kong, where the Commodore arrived on the 7th of August. The Powhatan returned from a futile visit to Riu Kiu on the 25th. To protect American lives and property against the imminent dangers of the Tai-ping rebellion, the Supply was sent to Canton and the Mississippi anchored off Whampoa. The remainder of the squadron was ordered to Cum-sing-moon, between Macao and Hong Kong, where the machinery which sadly needed repair was refitted.
Having thus disposed of his force, the Commodore, in order to arrange the accumulated results of his voyage to Japan, took a house at Macao for his own accommodation and that of the artists and surveying party. A hospital, which was also established in the town, under the care of the fleet surgeon, was soon full of fever patients; and an annex, in the form of a cemetery, was found necessary. The Japan expedition left American graves at Macao, Napa, Uraga, Yokohama, Shimoda, and Hakodaté. Among the officers lost, was Lieutenant John Matthews drowned at the Bonin islands. His name was given by Perry to a bay near Napa, which he surveyed. His monument in Vale Cemetery at Schenectady, N. Y. was erected by his fellow-officers of the Asiatic Squadron.
The Commodore himself, worn-out by heavy and multifarious duties, was finally prostrated by an attack of illness. Nevertheless the work of the expedition suffered no remission. The making of charts, and the completion of nearly two-hundred sketches and drawings, and the arrangement and testing of the scientific apparatus which was to be proved before the Japanese, were perfected. The daguerreotype, talbotype, and magnetic telegraphic apparatus were especially kept in working order. The Japanese from the first, as it proved, were mightily impressed by these “spirit pictures,” into which as they believed, went emitted particles of their actual souls.
The lengthened stay of the Commodore at Macao enabled him to see the places of interest and to study life in this old city, once so prosperous; whence had sailed, three centuries before, in the Portuguese galleons explorers, traffickers and missionaries to Japan. The opulent American merchants of Canton made Macao their place of summer sojourn, so that elegant society was not lacking. With the French commodore, Montravel, whose fleet lay at anchor in the roadstead, and with Portuguese whom he had met in Africa, his intercourse was especially pleasant. It had been the intention of the Commodore to wait until spring before sailing north, but the suspicious movements of the French and Russians, spoken of below, induced him to alter his plans.