Mr. Van Valkenburgh to Mr. Seward.
Sir: In continuation of my dispatch No. 80, of the 13th instant, I have the honor to inform you that the intelligence reported in my dispatches No. 61 and 68 of this series, in regard to the Miya Sama, has again come in this day from sources which have hitherto proved reliable. This high dignitary is now said to have formally entered upon the duties of Mikado, taking the Haguro Mountain temples for the residence of himself and court.
The functions of a Mikado have always been to intercede with the gods on behalf of the people and their wants; and the government of this country, the chief executive authority, was hereditarily vested in the Tokugawa dynasty, with the title of Shogoon or Tycoon. No supreme legislative authority existed, it being supposed that the law of Gongen Sama was quite sufficient for all time to come, and it was only on extraordinary occasions that the Mikado was consulted.
The Mikado at Kioto, by abolishing the Tycoonate and assuming the government of this country, appears to have acted in defiance of ancient customs, and from the point of view of many Japanese of rank and of even a majority of the officers of his own court to have usurped supreme authority both legislative and executive. It may be taken for granted that the Miya Sama or new Mikado would not have assumed this exalted dignity unless such an important step could be justified on legal ground, though expediency will probably prove to have been his principal motive.
The humbler classes in the country and on the seaboard are very superstitious, and a spiritual chief was undoubtedly required in the north, so as to insure the general belief that they are not forsaken by their gods, which they would deem a great calamity, and certainly render them less fit to act the part required from them by their chiefs in the great struggle that is evidently approaching.
[Page 806]When the crop of silk-worm eggs is good it is held to be a fair indication of a large crop, not only of mulberry leaves and silk but also of rice.
The crop of silk-worm eggs in the north has been unusually good this year; the prospects of the rice crop therefore are excellent, and the Miya Sama or new Mikado, who probably bided his time, has now entered upon his functions with an immense prestige for power and benevolence.
His removal to the north would appear to have been a master stroke on the part of the Tokugawa chief, as his presence consolidated the great northern coalition, and by allaying superstitious fears among the people more than doubled its power.
The history of Japan offers two precedents of the coexistence of two Mikados—on the latter occasion, for a period of nearly ninety years. With the establishment of a hereditary Skogoonate some two hundred and sixty years ago, this division in the supreme spiritual authority was supposed to have been rendered impossible forever. It may safely be assumed, therefore, that nothing but absolute necessity and the good of his country could have induced the Miya Sama to take the important step above mentioned. Ever since the commencement of the present civil strife, he took an active part in favor of the late Tycoon, with whom he has always been on the most friendly terms.
Instead of one Tycoon Japan now has two Mikados. While the one at Kioto declared to assume the reins of government, the new Mikado of the north, I am informed, is not likely to follow that example; and if he adheres to that resolution there is every reason to believe that this self-denial will insure him many followers, thus greatly increase his influence and enhance his importance.
In the eleven provinces, the Tokugawa domains, many Daimios and noblemen of this great clan declared in favor of the (Kioto) Mikado’s government. As soon as a chief made such a declaration he was at once ordered to furnish proof of his loyalty by joining the forces engaged against the northern Daimios, and immediately on his reporting himself in camp he was ordered to the front. As my informant observes: “Only one-half of those chiefs remained faithful to Tokugawa or the late Tycoon, and those are by far the most respectable portion, though not the most powerful perhaps. Those who, in these trying times, could betray their master, are quite likely to betray their new friends, with whom they have in fact no affinity, and not even a language in common”—the dialect in the several parts of Japan differing to such an extent.
The wisdom of the late Tycoon in not taking up arms himself for the defense of his undoubted rights is now well proven. The enemies of the Shogoonate are held together by the cohesive power of plunder, and the majority of its retainers, of high and low degree, are actuated by no better motives.
Since the fight at the temple of Wuyeno, in Yedo, about eighty of the Tokugawa Shogitai, or volunteers, have been successively captured and beheaded. Several of these men had family relations arrested at the same time, and the criminal code of Japan was mercilessly applied in all cases. I regret to have to write it, but no allowance was made for age or sex; the relations had to share the fate of these men; the family tablet showing the pedigree was first destroyed, and then those unfortunates, men and women, old and young, even children, were executed or murdered.
Incredible as it may appear, I am positively assured of the truth of this information, and I feel no longer at liberty to doubt it. I can only add, that no prisoners are made on either side; it is war à outrance.
[Page 807]The consciousness that the contempt of foreign nations is sure to follow such horrible practices will probably be the means of eventually substituting a milder criminal code for the barbarous ancient laws now in force. Fortunately the despotism of the laws is losing strength, owing to the absence of those two-sworded men who used to carry them out, and who are now either fighting each other or remain passive in abject neutrality. Never, I trust, can these laws regain their lost prestige, and the present convulsion, instead of being fraught with danger to the independence of the people, as they imagine, will undoubtedly secure for them, in the creation of a middle class, the first gleam of real liberty, without which their independence, so called, is a sham, and no more.
Whoever may be the next ruler of a united Japan, I feel confident, will profit by experience, and base the policy of this country upon the support of the people instead of the two-sworded class. He will have to choose between producers and consumers, and the choice cannot be difficult. And when such a policy shall have been adopted, it may be expected that a healthier foreign intercourse will be one of the results.
The horrible practices described appropriately illustrate under what immense difficulties those often labor whose duty it is to cultivate friendly relations with the governing classes of Japan.
I look forward, however, with confidence to the future, and wish I could only look with some degree of certainty to the time when this country shall have returned to peace; that time I apprehend is quite remote; the feelings of the combatants are overwrought and intensely bitter, and compromise is apparently unattainable.
I have the honor to be, sir, very respectfully, your most obedient servant,
Hon. William H. Seward, Secretary of State, Washington, D. C.