Download or read book Shadow Shoguns written by Jacob M. Schlesinger and published by Stanford University Press. This book was released on 1999 with total page 372 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is a vivid account of the corrupt and improbable political machine that ran Japanese politics for twenty years, from the early 1970s to the early 1990s, the period during which Japan became the world's second-largest economy. Reviews "Washington lobbyists, Moscow mafiosi, and Beijing party bosses stand back! . . . Here is one of the longest running big-time political sleaze serials of the past quarter-century. . . . This was a book waiting to be written, and not only has Schlesinger done it, but he has also produced a fine job of political reporting." --New York Times Book Review "In a rollicking style, Schlesinger . . . demolishes the popular misconception that politicians are boring. His is a tale of monstrous personalities. . . . This is the most entertaining short history of Japanese politics this reviewer has encountered." --The Economist "A story which is told vividly in this well researched and reliable account. . . . A superb analysis of Japan's politics and economic affairs." --Washington Post Book World "Shadow Shoguns is a lively and anecdote-rich account of the eerie parallels between Tokyo's now-battered political machine and New York's Tammany Hall. . . . Schlesinger masterfully demonstrates why Prime Minister Tanaka personified the collusive ties between Japanese politicians and Big Business." --Business Week "A fascinating and penetrating tale about the Tanaka machine that dominated Japan's politics for several decades and whose demise in the early 1990s has created a political vacuum that accounts for many of Japan's current problems." --Foreign Affairs

Download or read book Samurai Revolution written by Romulus Hillsborough and published by Tuttle Publishing. This book was released on 2014-03-25 with total page 409 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "With his easily readable and entertaining style, Hillsborough does a great job of elucidating the complex customs that ruled Edo Period life and politics. --The Japan Times"

Download or read book Shinsengumi written by Romulus Hillsborough and published by Tuttle Publishing. This book was released on 2013-06-25 with total page 188 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Shinsengumi: The Shogun's Last Samurai Corps is the true story of the notorious samurai corps formed in 1863 to arrest or kill the enemies of the Tokugawa Shogun. The only book in English about the Shinsengumi, it focuses on the corps' two charismatic leaders, Kondo Isami and Hijikata Toshizo, both impeccable swordsmen. It is a history-in-brief of the final years of the Bakufu, which collapsed in 1867 with the restoration of Imperial rule. In writing Shinsengumi, Hillsborough referred mostly to Japanese-language primary sources, including letters, memoirs, journals, interviews, and eyewitness accounts, as well as definitive biographies and histories of the era. The fall of the shogun's government (Tokugawa Bakufu, or simply Bakufu) in 1868, which had ruled Japan for over two and a half centuries, was the greatest event in modern Japanese history. The revolution, known as the Meiji Restoration, began with the violent reaction of samurai to the Bakufu's decision in 1854 to open the theretofore isolated country to "Western barbarians." Though opening the country was unavoidable, it was seen as a sign of weakness by the samurai who clamored to "expel the barbarians." Those samurai plotted to overthrow the shogun and restore the holy emperor to his ancient seat of power. Screaming "heaven's revenge," they wielded their swords with a vengeance upon those loyal to the shogun. They unleashed a wave of terror at the center of the revolution--the emperor's capital of Kyoto. Murder and assassination were rampant. By the end of 1862, hordes of renegade samurai, called ronin, had transformed the streets of the Imperial Capital into a "sea of blood." The shogun's administrators were desperate to stop the terror. A band of expert swordsmen was formed. It was given the name Shinsengumi ("Newly Selected Corps")--and commissioned to eliminate the ronin and other enemies of the Bakufu. With unrestrained brutality bolstered by an official sanction to kill, the Shinsengumi soon became the shogun's most dreaded security force. In this vivid historical narrative of the Shinsengumi, the only one in the English language, author Romulus Hillsborough paints a provocative and thrilling picture of this fascinating period in Japanese history.

Download or read book Stranger in the Shogun s City written by Amy Stanley and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2020-07-14 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: *Finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in Biography* *Winner of the 2020 National Book Critics Circle Award* *Winner of the PEN/Jacqueline Bograd Weld Award for Biography* A “captivating” (The Washington Post) work of history that explores the life of an unconventional woman during the first half of the 19th century in Edo—the city that would become Tokyo—and a portrait of a city on the brink of a momentous encounter with the West. The daughter of a Buddhist priest, Tsuneno was born in a rural Japanese village and was expected to live a traditional life much like her mother’s. But after three divorces—and a temperament much too strong-willed for her family’s approval—she ran away to make a life for herself in one of the largest cities in the world: Edo, a bustling metropolis at its peak. With Tsuneno as our guide, we experience the drama and excitement of Edo just prior to the arrival of American Commodore Perry’s fleet, which transformed Japan. During this pivotal moment in Japanese history, Tsuneno bounces from tenement to tenement, marries a masterless samurai, and eventually enters the service of a famous city magistrate. Tsuneno’s life provides a window into 19th-century Japanese culture—and a rare view of an extraordinary woman who sacrificed her family and her reputation to make a new life for herself, in defiance of social conventions. “A compelling story, traced with meticulous detail and told with exquisite sympathy” (The Wall Street Journal), Stranger in the Shogun’s City is “a vivid, polyphonic portrait of life in 19th-century Japan [that] evokes the Shogun era with panache and insight” (National Review of Books).

Download or read book The Collapse of the Tokugawa Bakufu written by Conrad D. Totman and published by University of Hawaii Press. This book was released on 1980-01-01 with total page 620 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Shogun Japan written by Social Studies School Service and published by Social Studies. This book was released on 2005-12 with total page 56 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Paladin Unbound written by Jeffrey Speight and published by Literary Wanderlust. This book was released on 2021-07 with total page 334 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The last of a dying breed, a holy warrior must rise up against a growing darkness in Evelium. The most unlikely of heroes, a lowly itinerant mercenary, Umhra the Peacebreaker is shunned by society for his mongrel half-Orc blood. Desperate to find work for himself and his band of fighters, Umhra agrees to help solve a rash of mysterious disappearances, but uncovers a larger, more insidious plot to overthrow the natural order of Evelium in the process. As Umhra journeys into the depths of Telsidor's Keep to search for the missing people, he confronts an ancient evil and, after suffering a great loss, turns to the god he disavowed for help. Compelled to save the kingdom he loves, can he defeat the enemy while protecting his true identity, or must he risk everything?

Download or read book American Shogun written by Robert Harvey and published by John Murray. This book was released on 2007-03-22 with total page 480 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the mid-nineteenth century on, America and Japan were caught in an extraordinary political, military and economic duel. This clash was characterised by a cultural incompatibility that was to haunt the negotiations of their two leaders, Emperor Hirohito and General MacArthur. Hirohito was a remarkable man. Diffident, uncharismatic and apparently obtuse, he survived as god-ruler of Japan for six decades through internal strife, war, defeat, occupation and economic victory. But Hirohito met his equal in MacArthur. Brash and domineering, MacArthur merited the honorary Japanese epithet shogun or 'army leader' for his almost single-handed six year rule over Japan. In this absorbing dual biography Robert Harvey traces their tense and complex relationship. His broad scope encompasses two great nations in war and peace - a momentous period of history which provides illuminating insight into American actions across the world today.

Download or read book Carry the One written by Carol Anshaw and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2012-10-23 with total page 278 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When a car of inebriated guests from Carmen's wedding hits and kills a girl on a country road, Carmen and the people involved in the accident connect, disconnect, and reconnect throughout twenty-five subsequent years of marriage, parenthood, holidays, and tragedies.

Download or read book The Fall of the Shogun written by Dov Silverman and published by . This book was released on 1986 with total page 535 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Samurai written by Michael Wert and published by . This book was released on 2019 with total page 129 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Chapter One: Becoming Those Who Served -- Chapter Two: Early Warrior Authority -- Chapter Three: War and Culture -- Chapter Four: Warriors in an Age of Peace -- Chapter Five: Samurai Invention and Decline -- Notes -- Further Reading -- Index.

Download or read book The Outlook written by and published by . This book was released on 1913 with total page 1070 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Taiko written by Eiji Yoshikawa and published by Vertical, Inc.. This book was released on 2012-08-03 with total page 944 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the tempestuous closing decades of the sixteenth century, the Empire of Japan writhes in chaos as the shogunate crumbles and rival warlords battle for supremacy. Warrior monks in their armed citadels block the road to the capital; castles are destroyed, villages plundered, fields put to the torch. Amid this devastation, three men dream of uniting the nation. At one extreme is the charismatic but brutal Nobunaga, whose ruthless ambition crushes all before him. At the opposite pole is the cold, deliberate Ieyasu, wise in counsel, brave in battle, mature beyond his years. But the keystone of this triumvirate is the most memorable of all, Hideyoshi, who rises from the menial post of sandal bearer to become Taiko--absolute ruler of Japan in the Emperor's name. When Nobunaga emerges from obscurity by destroying an army ten times the size of his own, he allies himself with Ieyasu, whose province is weak, but whose canniness and loyalty make him invaluable. Yet it is the scrawny, monkey-faced Hideyoshi--brash, impulsive, and utterly fearless--who becomes the unlikely savior of this ravaged land. Born the son of a farmer, he takes on the world with nothing but his bare hands and his wits, turning doubters into loyal servants, rivals into faithful friends, and enemies into allies. In all this he uses a piercing insight into human nature that unlocks castle gates, opens men's minds, and captures women's hearts. For Hideyoshi's passions are not limited to war and intrigue-his faithful wife, Nene, holds his love dear, even when she must share it; the chaste Oyu, sister of Hideyoshi's chief strategist, falls prey to his desires; and the seductive Chacha, whom he rescues from the fiery destruction of her father's castle, tempts his weakness. As recounted by Eiji Yoshikawa, author of the international best-seller Musashi, Taiko tells many stories: of the fury of Nobunaga and the fatal arrogance of the black-toothed Yoshimoto; of the pathetic downfall of the House of Takeda; how the scorned Mitsuhide betrayed his master; how once impregnable ramparts fell as their defenders died gloriously. Most of all, though, Taiko is the story of how one man transformed a nation through the force of his will and the depth of his humanity. Filled with scenes of pageantry and violence, acts of treachery and self-sacrifice, tenderness and savagery, Taiko combines the panoramic spectacle of a Kurosawa epic with a vivid evocation of feudal Japan.

Download or read book Japanese Armies 1868 1877 written by Gabriele Esposito and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2020-03-19 with total page 50 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The restoration of the Meiji Imperial dynasty in 1868, after 250 years of the Tokugawa Shogunate, decisively opened Japan to the outside world and the monarchy embraced modernization, including the creation of a new Westernized army. However, this modernization process was resisted by the traditional Samurai feudal nobility, leading to a series of battles. The first clash between the two cultures came swiftly. During the Boshin War of 1868–69, a French military adviser, Jules Brunet, changed sides to join the insurgents. They won several engagements before the final crushing of the rebel Ezo Republic. After this point, the Imperial Army continued to modernize along French lines, and social changes began to impoverish Samurai noblemen, who lost their social and political role and their associated privileges. During 1876, the powerful Satsuma Domain, around Kagoshima in south-west Kyushu, became a focus for discontent. Its leader Saigo Takamori effectively ignored the central government, and in January 1877, increasing unrest broke out into open rebellion. The Imperial forces were now much stronger, and the Navy could land troops and bombard Kagoshima. The bitter Satsuma siege and attempted capture of Kumamoto Castle finally failed in April, and the Samurai made a last stand at Shiroyama on 24 September, choosing to go down fighting. This marked the final defeat and displacement of the Samurai class. This fully illustrated title explores the fall of the Samurai in detail, examining the arms, tactics, key figures of both sides, and charting the increasing Westernization of the Imperial forces.

Download or read book Osaka 1615 written by Stephen Turnbull and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2012-06-20 with total page 96 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A highly illustrated account of the siege by the Tokugawa ruling dynasty against the samurai, defenders of the shogunate. In 1614-15 Osaka Castle was Japan's greatest fortification, measuring approximately 2 miles in length with walls 100 feet high. It was guarded by 100,000 samurai, determined to defend the last of the once-powerful Toyotomi clan. The castle was seemingly impenetrable; however, Tokugawa Ieyasu, the founder of the ruling dynasty, was determined to destroy this remaining threat. This book explores the bitter struggle of the Summer and Winter campaigns, which eventually saw the last great clash of the samurai and defined the balance of power in Japan for years to come.

Download or read book Encyclopedia Britannica written by Hugh Chisholm and published by . This book was released on 1911 with total page 2070 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book MAKERS OF JAPAN written by JOSEPH E. MORRIS and published by BEYOND BOOKS HUB. This book was released on 2023-06-02 with total page 236 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Modern Japan dates from the advent on the coast of Idzu province of the American squadron under Commodore Perry in 1853. Prior to that time, however, more than one attempt, predestined to failure, had been made to bring about the abolition of the feudal system, the agitators, in nearly every case, paying the penalty of their boldness with their lives. Among the more famous of these heroes were Fujita Toko, Yoshida Shoin, and Sakuma Shozan, — patriots who shone during the first half of the nineteenth century. They were in advance of their age. They lived in the days of the Tokugawa Shogunate, when old ideas on the subject of foreign intercourse still were uppermost. It was dangerous to advocate, as these men did, a policy of complete reconstruction on an imperialistic basis, yet they had the courage of their opinions, and with might and main advocated recourse to Occidental arts and sciences for the express object of rendering their country strong to resist aggression in every form. Their memory is held by all their fellow-countrymen in the very highest respect, not more for their self-sacrifice than for the real benefits that are seen to have accrued to the people from their foresight. One lost his life in a terrible earthquake another was executed by order of the Sho-gun, and the third was stabbed to death by Ro-nins, or “Wave-men,” the turbulent spirits of an epoch of social and political unrest. All three are esteemed as martyrs in the cause of progress. And although the country was not reopened, after its voluntary seclusion of two centuries and a half, until the treaty with the United States which Perry negotiated became operative in 1854, many surreptitious efforts had been made to obtain a footing in the Japanese empire, between the time of the East India Company’s withdrawal in 1623 and the appearance of the “black ships” of the American squadron in Kurihama Bay. The Portuguese had found their way to the isles of Japan as early as 1542, and might have remained there indefinitely had they not aimed at the acquisition of political power, as well as at the spread of the Christian religion. Expulsion followed persecution, and the sins of the Portuguese were visited on all foreigners indiscriminately, access to the Land of the Rising Sun being from that date denied to all aliens alike, save a few Dutchmen who were permitted on somewhat humiliating conditions to remain at Nagasaki for purposes of trade. Will Adams, sailor and shipwright, of Limehouse, London, passed the last twenty years of his life at Yedo, and died on the 6th of May 1620, while still in the service of the Shogun Iyemitsu, and contemporarily with him there dwelt for a time at Hirado, a tiny island on the west coast of Kiu-shiu, between which and the mainland flow the “Spex Straits,” a certain Captain John Saris, founder of the East India Company’s depot there. These men were in reality the first to obtain a footing on Japanese soil as representatives of England. Adams died and was buried near Yokohama, and Saris returned to London, on the retirement of his Company, for the time being, from the Japanese trade. There came also to the Japanese ports at various times travellers from Russia, including an embassy under M. Resanoff, whalers from the United States, and several British warships and merchantmen. The Eclipse of Boston, Mass., was at Nagasaki as early as 1807, and the British man-of-war Phaeton called at that port the following year. M. Golownin spent two years in captivity to the feudal lord of Matsumaye in Yeso, in 1811-1813, and the famous Dr Von Siebold was able to pass four years, from 1825 to 1829, in the Shogun’s capital of Yedo, or as it was then commonly spelt, Jeddo. The King William who reigned in Holland in 1844 contrived, it is said, to have his autograph letter presented in that year to the supposed ruler of Japan, in reality the Shogun, urging the opening of Japan to foreign intercourse. There was an American whaler in Yedo Bay in 1845, and two such vessels were wrecked soon afterwards on the Japanese coasts, their crews being well treated by the inhabitants. Five years before Commodore Perry landed at Uraga there had been some American vessels in Yedo Bay under Commodore Biddle, and a British ship, the Mariner, found her way thither in 1849. By such means more and more had come to be known of Japan and its people, though in a vague, disjointed fashion, among the dwellers in the Occident, despite the existence of Iyemitsu’s edict prohibiting travel. Still, the rule was very strictly enforced, and even those subjects of the Japanese Emperor who had chanced to be carried off to America in vessels by which they had been saved when shipwrecked in their own junks were not permitted to return to their own country until after its formal opening to commerce in 1854. Some who had thus involuntarily quitted their native land as children were scarcely able to speak their mother tongue on their return, though well acquainted with English, which they had acquired in the interval. Needless to say, they speedily recovered the use of Japanese as a language and became of immense service to their country as interpreters at a time when very few who knew English were to be met with there. Much more was known in those days of Dutch than of any other foreign tongue, as works in Dutch had been procured of the “Oranda-jin” — as the Hollanders were termed — then dwelling in Nagasaki, and had been most diligently studied, not less for the sake of learning the language than of absorbing the information on scientific matters which those works were fitted to convey. Concurrently with the growth of a desire for the restoration of the true imperial rule there had been a revival of learning, and Confucianism, long in decay by reason of the greater attachment of the masses to the tenets of Buddhism, began again to take hold of the popular mind. Chinese literature had become once more the study of the educated classes, and a demand arose for everything introduced from China which was only equalled, perhaps, by that created a half-century later for things European. In proportion as Buddhism lost its hold of the people the ancient Shinto religion, which is based upon the veneration of ancestors, and is directly connected with the patriotic devotion of the subjects of the Ten-shi to the Imperial house, acquired fresh strength, to the complete overthrow of the Buddhistic faith and its disestablishment as a State religion. Under the Tokugawa regime it had attained to immense power and influence, but with the conviction gaining ground everywhere that the best interests of the country were to be served only by the assumption of the active duties of sovereignty by the real monarch instead of his delegate, the cult of Shinto triumphed and the Buddhistic religion, though by no means extinguished, took second place in the estimation of his Majesty’s loyal subjects. But this was not until nearly eighteen years had elapsed from the date of Perry’s arrival at Uraga, and in the interval the country underwent innumerable vicissitudes, the effects in reality of the sharp divergences of opinion which the proposal to throw open the country to foreign trade and intercourse created. There were two parties in the State — viz. the Jo-I or party of exclusion, and the Kai-koku or party of admission. Jo signifies expulsion, — to thrust from one, — and I means a barbarian. Kai-koku, on the other hand, was literally “to open the country,” and the distinction between the two parties was therefore most marked. Eventually the Jo-I party became the O-Sei or party of Imperial Government, in opposition to the Baku-fu, lit.: Military Curtain government, by which was meant the government of the Shogun. Naturally all those who were opposed from one cause or another to the prolongation of the prevailing system of government by the Shogun ranged themselves under the banner of the Jo-I, whether actually hostile to aliens or not, but when the cry for expulsion had served its purpose the promoters of the movement against the Bakufu were willing enough that it should be abolished, in favour of a term which more aptly expressed the real objects and desires of the party so constituted. It is a fact that many of Japan’s foremost statesmen were originally members of the Jo-I organisation, though it certainly is not from that to be inferred that they were at any period of their careers downright hostile to foreigners. The famous motto was adopted essentially as a matter of policy. Anxieties were multiplied for the Baku-fu when an Englishman, who formed one of a party out riding on the highroad between Yokohama and Yedo, was cut down and killed by swordsmen belonging to the retinue of the Prince of Satsuma. That was in September 1862, and it brought matters to a climax. The British Charge d’Affaires, Colonel Neale, demanded instant reparation, but though indemnities were paid to Mr Richardson’s relatives, both by the Shogun’s government and the daimio of Satsuma, the actual assailants escaped justice. A little while prior to this outrage the chiefs of Satsuma and Choshiu had united in a league for the “subjugation and expulsion of the Barbarians,” and as loyal retainers of their respective lords many of the men who have since been most prominent in the establishment of a new Japan were greatly embarrassed, for while their convictions led them to the adoption of every art and science that was likely to render Japan a strong nation, their strict obedience to their chieftain’s views would have entailed the complete abandonment of their hopes of profiting by the experience and knowledge of the Occident, since it would have involved a return to conditions which had prevailed in the years preceding 1853. Those Choshiu men in particular, who were known to favour the introduction of Western arts, went, therefore, with their lives in their hands, and one to whom reference will be made at a later stage, bears to this day the marks of cuts which he received in an attempt made upon his life by some of his fellow-clansmen, whose ideas on the subject of foreign intercourse were not identical with his own. I allude to Count Inouye, whose cheek was sliced by an antagonist’s weapon whilst he was stoutly defending himself against an altogether unexpected onslaught by a Yamaguchi samurai. The alliance of the two great Southern daimios for the repudiation of the treaties and the expulsion of aliens was not of a lasting character, nor was it intended, perhaps, that it should live long, for the object, no doubt, was to exert pressure on the Shogun rather than to wage war on the strangers. Nevertheless the attitude assumed towards foreigners, to be consistent, could not be other than one of hostility for the time being, and accordingly we find the lords of the two provinces named drifted soon afterwards into open defiance of the Occidentals’ naval power and the actions of Kagoshima and Shimonoseki, the first as a consequence of the daimio’s refusal to punish his people for the Richardson murder, and the second as the result of persistency in firing on passing European vessels, ensued, in 1863 and 1864. How far the feudatories named were indulging their own caprices in thus defying the Western powers, and how far they sought merely to carry out what they conceived to be their Emperor’s wishes, cannot now be known, but that they were amply warranted by Imperial orders in impeding the entry of aliens is proved by the Emperor Komei having sent a high official of the Court to Yedo with a letter to instruct the Shogun to expel all foreigners. This remarkable despatch conveyed the Emperor’s desire that the Shogun would forthwith proceed to Kioto to take counsel with the court nobles and thereupon despatch orders to the various clans, throughout the empire, to the effect that by dint of all their strength they should combine to thrust out the barbarians and restore tranquillity to the land. Though the Shogun did not go to Kioto just then, it was not through disobedience to his Imperial master’s commands, and it is probable that had not the trouble with the Satsuma procession occurred on the Tokaido, near Tsurumi village (where there is now a railway station), and had not Richardson’s life been forfeited, the Shogun would have felt himself obliged to take measures to enforce the Emperor’s order for the foreigners’ expulsion. That the Emperor Komei was very much in earnest about the matter is to be inferred from the fact that the official charged with the conveyance of the message to the Shogun was accompanied by the Prince of Satsuma, at the imperial desire, and it was when the Satsuma chieftain was returning to his own province after the execution of the Emperor’s instructions to escort his messenger to Yedo that the deplorable affair occurred at Tsurumi, and the Satsuma clan was plunged into direct antagonism with the subjects of foreign powers. The failure on the part of the Shogun to punish it, not from lack of inclination, but from military inability to perform the task, resulted in the bombardment of Kagoshima by the British squadron in the following summer. It deserves mention that, despite their avowed antipathy to the admission of foreigners to their country, the Satsuma clansmen were ready at that early date to avail themselves of Western appliances to the utmost, and on the principle that to retain her position among the nations Japan must adopt all the arts and sciences that would help her to become strong to hold her own, they had bought guns, and ships, of modern type, and proceeded to make the best use of both, as far as their limited experience could serve them, immediately that the British admiral entered the Bay of Kagoshima with his fleet. They did not wait for him to open fire: they took the initiative themselves, and with unquestionable courage and skill. Satsuma has, indeed, from the very beginning of the new regime been prominent in both the army and the navy, and though it must always be a matter of extreme difficulty to draw distinctions where the clansmen were without exception prompt to wield the sword on slight provocation in defence of their own or the national honour, the men of Satsuma ever bore the reputation under the old regime of being a warlike and indomitable race. After 1863 their attitude towards the strangers speedily became less hostile, and they imported machinery for a cotton mill, bought more steamers, and in every way evinced a resolve to lose no further time in vain efforts to sweep back the tide that they saw was steadily and irresistibly advancing. On the contrary, they perceived that it would be to their advantage to float with it, for the clans that might be the first to arm themselves on the foreign model, and likewise most prompt to adapt themselves to changed circumstances, by copying the European methods of warfare, would be the first to profit by the military supremacy they could hardly fail to acquire over the others. Gradually the notion of expelling foreigners lost ground, so the way was paved for a better understanding with the nations of the Occident. And the trend of opinion in Satsuma was quickly seen to be communicating itself to Choshiu, where the feudal chieftain Mori, after his defeat at Shimonoseki by the combined fleet under Admiral Kuper, was willing to enter into peaceful relations with the subjects of other powers, and exhibited every disposition to be on terms of friendship for the future. It is recorded of the lord Mori that in 1864 he declared his readiness to admit foreigners to the ports in his barony of Choshiu, within a few months only of the actual engagement between his forts and the combined fleet, and the daimio’s attitude may have been modified by the representations of Ito and Inouye, who although they failed to impress on him the futility of opposing the allied squadrons may nevertheless have in some degree led their chieftain to recognise the benefits that would accrue to a speedy adoption of modern weapons and the arts of the Occident, as conferring exceptional strength on those who might be content to sink their prejudices and avail themselves of the improved appliances which lay ready to their hands. At all events it seems to be fair to assume that the supremacy of the Satsuma and Choshiu clans in the councils of the state which in later years became so noticeable as to excite the jealousy of others had its origin in the willingness evinced by the daimios of those clans to listen to the recommendations of patriotic samurai who owned allegiance to them. What is true of Satsuma and Choshiu is of course equally true of the other clans prominent in the struggle for the revival of imperial rule, namely Hizen and Tosa. In the course of this work it will be fitting that I should invite attention to the individual share which each of those who are classed as Makers of Japan actually took in the most remarkable undertaking of recent years, though in the earlier phases of the Restoration struggle they were merely units of the clans to which most of them belonged. And fame rests with those Southern clans since it was by their combined action and unity of purpose that the Emperor Mutsuhito was invested, almost from the first, with that direct sovereign government of his subjects which for so many centuries had been denied to his predecessors on the throne, and which is now so conspicuously predominant in the relations that exist in Japan between the monarch and his dutiful and contented people. With the assent of the Emperor Komei in 1865 to the Treaties made by the Shogun began brighter days for Japan, and if it must be owned that the benefits were at first unrecognised, and that considerable opposition was in some quarters manifested to the innovations proposed, matters had advanced so far, prior to the accession to the throne of the present sovereign, that there was hope of the total abolition of feudalism, and the inauguration of an essentially new regime. The world has never ceased to marvel at the ease with which this stupendous alteration was effected. In other lands when a revolution has been brought about it usually has been only at a vast cost in human life. True, the northern and southern clans fought in Japan, but the strife was not of long duration, nor was it of a particularly sanguinary character in comparison with the terrible slaughter that has often accompanied revolution elsewhere. It left behind it no traces of animus to disturb the harmony of the future among the subjects of the Japanese Emperor. That these magnificent results were attained, and that Japan has never one inch receded from the position that she took up nearly forty years ago, are facts that may in a large degree be ascribed to the prudence, genius, and statesmanlike capacity of many of those pioneers in thought and action of whose careers these pages are intended to form a brief, and necessarily most imperfect, record. In the preparation of this volume my object has been to convey (a) A general impression of Japan and her people; (b) The workings of reform, as exemplified in the lives of some of her patriots. In the several chapters devoted to the history of these Makers of Japan I have sought to explain the part which each played in the introduction of reforms, and to portray the situation in Japan now that those measures for which they were responsible may be said to have taken full effect. In brief, the aim has been to supply History through the medium of Biography. I cannot do better, perhaps, than quote a sentence or two which recently fell from the lips of one of Japan’s greatest statesmen, Count Okuma, and whose career is briefly recorded in the following pages: — “Now that peace has crowned the tremendous efforts which Japan made in the War with Russia the effect upon herself will be that she will be able to make still greater progress in the paths of civilisation, and the true spirit of the Japanese nation will have more room to display itself. Japan has never been an advocate of war, and will never draw her sword from its sheath unless compelled to do so by the pressure of foreign powers. She fought to secure peace, not for the sake of making war, and was only too glad to lay down her weapons as soon as peace was obtainable, and to devote herself to the promotion of interests of a nobler kind. The eminence of Japan is ascribable to no mere mushroom growth; it has its roots in the past, and her progress is to be explained by natural causes which anyone may comprehend who cares to study her history attentively. The late war was not one of race against race, or of religion against religion, and the victory of Japan points to the ultimate blending into one harmonious whole of the ancient and modern civilisations of East and West.” My thanks are due to His Excellency Viscount Hayashi and the members of the Japanese Embassy in London, by all of whom the most kindly interest has been taken in my work, and from whom I have received most valuable aid in its preparation. Also to Baron Suyematsu, who assisted me greatly with his personal reminiscences and who revised the chapter on Marquis Ito, his father-in-law. I have also to record my indebtedness to the Editor and Mr S. Imai of the Osaka Mainichi Shimbun, from whom I received material help in regard to the history of those earlier Makers of Japan who flourished in the first half of the Nineteenth Century. I have availed myself of every opportunity of consulting the writings of Messrs Black and Rein, and the works on Japan and its affairs by Count Matsukata, Sir R. Alcock, Sir E. Reed, Sir Robert K. Douglas, Messrs Hearn, Clement, and many others, and I have taken my figures for the most part from Japanese official publications. When in 1895 I wrote “Advance, Japan!” I ventured to predict the rise of Japanese influence in China and that Japan would be “the lever to set the Chinese mass in motion” though her efforts would “tend towards the consolidation of the Chinese Empire rather than to its disintegration.” That work was translated in 1904 into Russ avowedly in order that the Tsar’s people might learn something of the nation they were fighting. In 1898 I had written “What will Japan do?” and had based the story on a firm conviction that she would defeat Russia when the inevitable contest should occur, the date I ventured to assign for the outbreak of hostilities being, as it turned out, three years too soon. That little volume was at once translated into Japanese. If in the attempt that I have now made to assign to the chief personages their due positions in respect of their nation’s stirring history, I have in the smallest degree succeeded in conveying useful information concerning our allies and their country to the people of the Occident, I shall not have laboured in vain, and in submitting my work in all humility — conscious of its many defects and shortcomings — to the judgment of the public, my one hope is that it may be of some slight service to those who may honour me by perusing its pages. J. M... FROME THE BOOK.