Part 4

To return to the Emperor’s early life, he is ever ready to avow himself indebted to the ability and wisdom of his tutors, foremost among whom were the Princes Sanjo and Iwakura, whose part in the making of the Japan of to-day is elsewhere referred to in detail. They were Court nobles (kuge), and both are long since dead, but it was to their teaching in great measure, aided by that of other gifted counsellors, that was due the strikingly complete emancipation of his mind from old-fashioned ideas, and his adoption of the principles of government upon sound and progressive lines. His Majesty began his reign with a declaration, wholly spontaneous, that he would as soon as practicable create a deliberative assembly for the discussion of public affairs, that personal freedom should be secured to all his subjects, that whatever evil or pernicious customs were in existence should be abolished, and that a new system, based on the study of the experience of foreign nations, particularly as regarded the defence of the Empire, should be forthwith inaugurated. This was the substance of his Majesty’s Coronation oath, as it was termed, and is the Magna Charta of the rights and privileges of the Japanese people. The sovereign voluntarily repeated this promise at a Meeting of the feudal princes and barons assembled at the Palace in Kioto in April 1869, two years after his accession to the throne. But the interval had been occupied in effecting that radical change in the system of administration which has been the wonder of the world, and in quelling an insurrection which was the direct outcome of the abolition of the Shogun’s office, though personally the holder thereof had discouraged the rebellion as far as he could by resigning his post. The Emperor had accepted that renunciation of his rights by the Shogun Keiki, but the adherents of the Shogunate had fought on in spite of their titular leader’s withdrawal. In after years the sovereign, as we shall find, magnanimously abolished the decree which had in 1868 declared the Shogun to be in rebellion, and wholly absolved him from any intentional disobedience. But for the time being there was civil war in the Land of Sunrise, and the history of those unhappy eighteen months subsequent to the Emperor’s accession must briefly be told, though, as is the case with regard to the strife of the early sixties, in the United States of America, the memory of those terrible days when clan fought against clan in Japan has ceased to trouble the Ten-shi’s subjects, and those who once were sworn enemies are and have for many years past been good friends. The events of 1867 were especially important in respect of the influence that they were to exert on the future of the country. In the first place the powerful Satsuma clan had obtained a conspicuously influential position in the councils of the Empire. The prime mover in this had been Shimadzu Saburo, who was the real father of the feudal lord of the province, but as the previous daimio, who in reality was Shimadzu’s brother, had adopted the young prince as his son, it followed under the Japanese laws concerning adoption that the father became uncle to his own child. In the course of the violent controversy which had arisen Shimadzu had most vehemently opposed the Shogun, and accordingly he was classed among those who were averse to the opening of the treaty ports to foreign trade, but in reality he was not unfavourable to the admission of aliens, and was actually willing that the entire province of Satsuma should be open to foreign enterprise. To this suggestion, however, the Shogun had offered objections.

Satsuma had benefited by its trade with Nagasaki, the only port that had remained accessible to vessels from Europe during the long seclusion of the nation from Western intercourse. In the year 1866 the British Minister, Sir Harry Parkes, had accepted an invitation to visit the headquarters of the Satsuma clan, three years after the bombardment of the town of Kagoshima by Admiral Kuper’s squadron. The Minister made the voyage in the warship _Princess Royal_, accompanied by the _Serpent_ and the _Salamis_, and the young prince of Satsuma came off to welcome his guest in a magnificent state barge. Sir Harry Parkes, on landing at Kagoshima on the 27th July, found that adjoining the daimio’s palace within the castle walls were a foundry and well-equipped workshops, and that at the foundry they had succeeded in casting a number of very serviceable cannon, and quantities of shot and shell. Near by was a glass works, and in one of the workshops was a steam lathe. These facts afford strong testimony to the progressive spirit manifested even at that period by the Satsuma clan, and the appreciation of the value of Western appliances which had thus early in the history of the Restoration struggle prompted the samurai of Satsuma to fit themselves to attain a commanding position among the supporters of the Ten-shi, as opposed to those who favoured the regime of the Shogunate.

The inability of the Shogun’s forces to subdue the Choshiu samurai had placed the Shogun himself in a position that was obviously intolerable. Not only was one of the most powerful of the feudal lords openly antagonistic to the Shogunate but it was known for a fact that the Satsuma clan was virtually allied to Choshiu in this effort to repudiate the Shogun’s right to exact obedience from the great feudatories. It is to the infinite credit of Tokugawa Keiki that at this crisis in his country’s affairs he recognised the need of a more centralised and uniform system of administration,—one in which the real power and control should be vested in the person of the Ten-shi. He resigned the office which had been in his family for 264 years, and begged that he might be permitted to retire into private life. The Emperor Mutsuhito accepted the voluntary surrender by the Shogun of his time-honoured privileges and in doing so opened a new chapter in the record of the Japanese Empire. The manifesto was in the sovereign’s own words and was substantially as follows:—

It has pleased Us, at his request, to dismiss the Shogun. Henceforward We shall exercise supreme authority, in both the internal and the external affairs of the nation. For the term “Tycoon” (meaning Shogun) which has hitherto been employed in the Treaties must henceforth be substituted that of Emperor.

To this historic document were appended the great seal of “Dai Nihon” and the signature in the monarch’s own caligraphy—_Mutsuhito_—it being, perhaps, the first time in all Japanese history that the personal name of the ruler had been used officially during his lifetime. The retiring Shogun left the capital and for a brief period took up his abode in the castle of Osaka. But it was to the chief town of Suruga province, midway between Tokio and Kioto, that he finally withdrew, and thereafter lived the unobtrusive life of a country gentleman on a small estate which the Emperor bestowed upon him. In this way, in the perfect seclusion of Shidzu-oka (_lit._: the Hill of Peace) he was able to wholly divest himself of political connections, and was now and then to be seen setting out on a fishing excursion with perhaps but one attendant, preferring the quietude of his existence apart from the cares of State, and revelling in his emancipation from the pomp and circumstance of that Court of which for a brief interval he had been the acknowledged and puissant head. Never, perhaps, did a potentate more completely renounce his rights, nor so absolutely efface himself on doing so, in the history of mankind, but he has had his reward in the confidence and favour of the real sovereign whose deputy he had been, and from whom he has received in recent years the highest honours. He has the rank of Prince under the new regime, while Prince Tokugawa Iyesato, the head of the Tokugawa family, has also been raised to the same rank, and holds office as President of the House of Peers. Thus the family of Tokugawa, which from the close of the Sixteenth Century until 1868 virtually ruled Japan, retains, by the magnanimity of the Emperor, a status among the nobility of the land that is unsurpassed by any princely or ducal house, and actually boasts the possession among its ranks of two princes, since his Majesty thought fit in 1900 to request his former Shogun to visit Tokio, and then and there conferred upon him the title which he now holds, declaring at the same time that he was perfectly absolved of all participation in the events of 1867-8, which would no longer blot the record. There has been nothing in the personal relations of his Majesty with his dutiful and supremely loyal people which has more endeared him to them than his extreme generosity, and inasmuch as there were necessarily among all classes of his subjects many thousands—even hundreds of thousands—who had in their early days been proud to own allegiance to the Shogun and the Tokugawa house, the sovereign’s attitude has been more widely appreciated than it is possible, perhaps, for strangers to the country to comprehend.

The surrender of his privileges by the Shogun in 1868 was resented by the bulk of his adherents, and though they were compelled to retreat towards the north before the determined advance of the Satsuma, Choshiu, Hizen, and Tosa men, under the command of Saigo Takamori, whose notable history will be found elsewhere in this volume, the struggle lasted for many months. In support of the Tokugawa side the stoutest resistance was maintained by the Aidzu clan, whose chieftain dwelt in the castle of Wakamatsu, midway, or nearly so, between the capital and the straits of Tsugaru which separate the northern island of Hokkaido or Yeso from Hondo, the mainland. The prince of Aidzu had been guardian of the “Nine Gates” of the Ten-shi’s palace at Kioto under the Tokugawa regime, until the _coup d’état_ of the 3rd January 1868, by which his opponents contrived to secure the person of the young Emperor, whereupon an imperial edict appeared appointing, instead of the Aidzu men, the clans of Satsuma, Tosa, and Geishiu, as guardians of the Gates. Loyalty to the old regime led the Aidzu chieftain to oppose as far as he was able the deposition of the Shogun, until he was made aware that Keiki’s resignation had been accepted by the Emperor.

Clan jealousy was of course responsible to a very great extent for the opposition of the northern feudatories to the proposed changes, and in the broad sense of the term this was a conflict in which the south waged war on the north. For according to that spirit of loyalty to a chief which prevailed then and, happily for Japan, still prevails, throughout the Ten-shi’s realms, in spite of his subjects having taken for a model the matter-of-fact latter-day civilisation of the Occident, it was permissible to regard the Shogun’s voluntary submission as an act prompted solely by a desire to spare the lives of his followers, and as such one of which they were not obliged to take cognisance, for although there was no act of self-sacrifice in which they were not ready to join if it could be proved to be needful in their country’s interests, they held themselves to be in no way bound by a promise or declaration that their chief had been compelled, as they deemed it, to make under the pressure of circumstances. They regarded the Shogun as the victim of a political combination, and were indisposed on that account to yield to the ambitious dominance of the clansmen of the south. The Aidzu men, therefore, continued to oppose a solid front to the Kioto party, and in the vicinity of Wakamatsu itself many desperate contests took place. All the males of a family, from the father to the youngest son, are known in some cases to have taken the field in defence, as they believed, of their lord’s interests, and warfare of that determined character which those who have watched the career of the Japanese soldier of to-day can fully comprehend lasted in the north of Japan until late in 1868. During the preceding summer there was a fierce engagement at sea, close to the town of Hakodate, which resulted in the defeat of the Shogun’s squadron, at that time commanded by Admiral Yenomoto. Ultimately a general amnesty was proclaimed, and the ships which remained under the Tokugawa flag were handed over to the newly-formed department of the imperial navy.

But before this came to pass, incredible as it may seem, an attempt was made, it was declared, to establish in Yeso some sort of republic, and the signatures to the remarkable document in which proclamation was made of the intentions of the promoters of this scheme included that of Otori Keisuke (now Baron), who later represented his nation with distinction as its Minister to the Court of Seoul. On board one of the vessels commanded by Admiral Yenomoto, moreover, in the engagement at Hakodate, was a young officer who in his later years has been the recipient of the highest honours in recognition of the splendid services rendered to his country in the course of a distinguished diplomatic career.

Strictly speaking, though the proceedings have been described at various times as tantamount to an effort to establish a republic it is impossible that the idea can ever have been entertained of overthrowing the authority of the Ten-shi, whose rule is based on principles which are in the minds of all his subjects immutable and indestructible. What the advocates of a republic for Yeso had in view could in reality have been but the setting up of an independent administration for the northern island, distinct from that of the Central government which it was proposed to provide for the whole Empire at Tokio. But the Shogunate Republic in Yeso, had it ever taken actual shape, would have been nothing more than a local administration owning allegiance to the sovereign power at Kioto, and it would have been more an imperial dependency than a republic.

The Shogun, at the time that he tendered his resignation of his office, had urged upon his imperial master the advisability of convening a meeting of daimios at the capital of Kioto, and his advice was taken. The lords of the various provinces assembled while the War of the Restoration, as it is termed, was yet in progress. A form of Government was decided upon in which the control of the administration was vested in a Council of State, presided over by a Chancellor (the Dai-jo-dai-jin) assisted by two Vice-chancellors (the Sa-dai-jin, or Vice-chancellor of the Left, which in Japan ranks highest, and the U-dai-jin, or Vice-chancellor of the Right). The Administrative departments of State comprised those of the Imperial Household, Foreign Affairs, Finance, War, Education, Justice, and Religion, each with its departmental chief or Minister. The First Council as finally formed was composed of:—

Prince Sanjo Sanetomi Dai-jo-dai-jin: a Court noble. Prince Iwakura Tomomi Sa-dai-jin: a Court noble. Prince Shimadzu Saburo U-dai-jin. Of Satsuma. Saigo Takamori Of Satsuma. Okubo Toshimichi Of Satsuma. Kido Takakoto Of Choshiu. Inouye Bunda Of Choshiu. Ito Hirobumi Of Choshiu. Okuma Shigenobu Of Hizen. Itagaki Taisuke Of Tosa.

The Ministry was in reality constituted to give equal representation to the four leading clans, as far as practicable, though the Choshiu and Satsuma influence actually predominated.

Acting under authority of his Majesty the members of the Council here mentioned had in the preceding January, on the occasion of the _coup d’état_, established a provisional government, and had called upon the Shogun to surrender his heritage and to submit himself entirely to the will of his imperial master. For some months past there had been frequent conferences at the Nijo Castle in Kioto between the Shogun and Goto Shojiro (late Count Goto), who, with Komatsu of the Satsuma clan, persistently urged upon the Shogun the advisability of establishing an Imperial Government, with the effect that his Highness had been on the point of yielding to their arguments. Goto was the trusted representative of the Tosa clan, and had brought a letter from his feudal lord addressed to the Shogun, in October 1867, recommending his Highness to resign his position of Shogun, for patriotic reasons. There is excellent ground for the belief widely entertained in Japan, and which it is palpable his Majesty shares, that the Shogun, had he been wholly free to follow the dictates of his own heart, would have relinquished his office there and then, but a new complication arose through his followers coming to blows with the Satsuma retainers, thus compelling him either to repudiate them or to accept a position of absolute hostility to the new government of which the Satsuma chieftain was a leading member. It was with that extreme clemency which has throughout characterised the rule of the present monarch that in after years his Majesty spontaneously recognised that the Shogun had no real intention of being hostile to himself, and that it was mainly the acts of the adherents of the Tokugawa family which drove the Shogun into seeming antagonism to the party of reform. As already explained, the Emperor has recently conferred on the former Shogun a title by which his once lofty position in pre-Restoration days is fittingly acknowledged.

But for the time, as has been said, there was civil war, and its progress was marked by the almost continuous defeat of the Shogun’s forces, and their gradual retreat through the provinces of the Tokaido, the great eastern coast road, on the Shogun’s capital of Yedo, now Tokio. There in the famous castle some of the Tokugawa clansmen were closely besieged, while others made their way northward to the more remote regions of Aidzu and Oshiu, and again defied the imperialists until the future Field-marshal Yamagata finally hunted them down and compelled them to surrender as the only alternative to extermination. The Shogun himself finally retired into private life, at the urgent solicitation of Katsu, the lord of Awa province, in May 1868, five months after his resignation of his office in the first place had been formally accepted by the sovereign, and for what happened after May, until the autumn of that eventful year of 1868 saw the terrible internecine strife brought to a close, the Shogun cannot be held directly responsible. By many he has been blamed because he did not remain by the side of the young sovereign at Kioto in the stormy period which marked the last month of 1867 and the beginning of 1868, but it must be remembered that as a consequence of the _coup d’état_ of the 3rd January the provisional government had already thrust the Shogun aside and was issuing edicts for which it had the direct authority of the monarch. The Shogun’s office had in reality ceased by that time to exist. His presence at Kioto may well have seemed to him in those days to have become superfluous, and his sense of self-respect prompted him to retire to his own castle of Osaka three days later, on the 6th January, seeing that he was no longer being consulted on affairs of State. In the same month of January 1868, there was a naval engagement off Awaji, that “foam-land” to which reference has been made in connection with Japanese mythology, and which lies athwart the Inland Sea a little west of Kobé, the opposed squadrons consisting of the Satsuma vessels _Lotus_, _Kiang-Su_, and _Scotland_, and the Shogun’s _Kaiyo Maru_ (the frigate bought from the Dutch), the yacht _Emperor_ (Queen Victoria’s present to himself) and the _Fujiyama_, another steamer purchased abroad. The three Satsuma ships were part of the fleet which had in recent years gradually been formed by the lord of the fief in pursuance of his conviction that the possession of powerful vessels would some day or other prove advantageous to the clan. They held their own fairly against the stronger ships of which the Tokugawa party had simultaneously possessed itself, and though the _Scotland_ was sunk off Awa Bay as a result of the encounter the Satsuma men had no reason to be ashamed of the figure they cut in this early clash of armaments at sea. The Satsuma vessels had been under fire before, for they had taken part in the resistance offered by the Satsuma clan to Admiral Kuper at Kagoshima, when he undertook to chastise the lord of their province in 1863. The Tokugawa ships returned to Osaka, or rather to Tempo-san, which is to the great commercial port of Japan what Gravesend is to London, and there they awaited the progress of events in that spring of 1868 which must be accounted the most stirring period of Japanese modern history, as the events already narrated when taken in conjunction with those which have to be related will, it is believed, sufficiently demonstrate. It may be observed that after the battle of Fushimi, midway between Osaka and Kioto, which soon afterwards occurred, and in which the Tokugawa men were signally defeated, the frigate _Kaiyo Maru_ was of the utmost service to the Shogun in conveying him from the region where his forces were meeting with nothing but disaster to a safe retreat for the time being at Yedo. He took passage in her from Tempo-san, and safely reached his own castle in what is now Tokio after two nights at sea.

The then British Minister, Sir Harry Parkes, early in the spring of 1868 despatched Messrs Satow and Willis to express to the newly formed Kioto Government his hope that the time might be deemed opportune for the inauguration of direct relations between the accredited representatives of Western powers and his Imperial Majesty, the Shogun having actually resigned three months or more before. Dr Willis was the medical officer attached to the British Legation, and at a later date took up his residence in Kagoshima, the chief town of Satsuma, where he was physician to the hospital which the clan established, and his services during the stormy days of the Restoration struggle and subsequently when the Satsuma men were nominally in rebellion were invaluable. The British Minister’s messengers were well received and hospitably entertained in Kioto, and were permitted to walk freely in the streets of the ancient capital of the Ten-shi, which was something that no foreigners had ever done before. The anti-foreign feeling was still very strong throughout Japan, as was proved by the wholesale massacre of a French vessel’s boat’s crew at Sakai, near Osaka. An officer and eleven men were killed in all, and the French Minister, M. Roches, made an imperative demand on the Shogun’s government, which at that time (February 1868) was administering the affairs of the country, for the delivery of the bodies of the murdered men within twenty-four hours, a request which it was found practicable as well as politic to comply with. Also a number of Bizen soldiers hailing from that province washed by the Inland Sea, west of Awaji, had in passing through the newly opened port of Hiogo, vented their animosity towards the strangers whom they saw in the streets by running amok among them and firing with their rifles right and left. This crime, like that perpetrated at Sakai, was avenged, for the Government was strong enough to issue orders for the performance of seppuku by the culprits and to insist on execution of the sentences. The Bizen men were marching from Okayama to Osaka at the time when they allowed their anti-foreign ideas to outrun their discretion, the actual order to fire on the foreign residents being given by one Heiki Tatewaki, whose death was decreed by imperial edict and the then Governor of the port, the present Marquis Ito, was directed as his Majesty’s representative, to see the act of seppuku carried out in due form.