Japanese sightseers, or that a refusal of the amicable bargain proposed in such terms would be followed by the quiet withdrawal of the menacing squadron, which, as the Japanese had fully learned at Kagoshima and Shimo-no-seki, could raze their towns and shatter their ships with the utmost ease. Chōshiu rebels and all other domestic troubles were forgotten in the presence of this peril. The anti-foreign agitators, who had been virtually reduced to silence, raised their voices again in loud denunciation of the Shōgun's incompetence to preserve the precincts of the sacred city from such trespasses. The Emperor himself shared the general alarm, and in a moment the Shogunate was confronted by a crisis of the gravest nature. A resolute attitude towards either the Imperial Court or the foreigners could alone have saved the situation. But the Shōgun's ministers pursued their usual temporising tactics. They sought to placate the Foreign Representatives by half-promises, and they urged the Imperial Court to concede something.
The Emperor, brought once more under the influence of the anti-foreign party, took an extraordinary step at this stage. He dismissed from office and otherwise punished the ministers to whom the Shōgun had entrusted the conduct of the negotiations with the Foreign Representatives. That was an open violation of the Yedo Government's administrative rights. Noth-
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