furlong of the city of Yedo. The ship was surrounded by three cordons of boats, one hundred feet apart, to the number of nearly one thousand, and officers were kept constantly on the ship, by whom the captain was told that none of the crew would be allowed to land, and that if any of them attempted it they would be killed.
The vessel was permitted to remain for four days, during which time the shipwrecked Japanese were put ashore, and the ship supplied with fresh provisions and water. The governor of Yedo told the captain that "the only reason he was allowed to remain in the waters of Japan was because the emperor felt assured that he could not be a bad-hearted foreigner by his having come so far out of his way to bring poor people to their native country, who were wholly strangers to him." When the captain suggested that he might find other shipwrecked mariners and would bring them back, the governor said, "Carry them to some Dutch port, but never come to Japan again;" and added that the emperor would prefer to have them abandoned than that strangers should visit his dominions.[1]
The government of the United States was on the alert to second the efforts of private American enterprise whenever opportunity should offer. When, in 1832, Mr. Roberts was dispatched to negotiate treaties with Siam and Muscat, he was furnished with letters of credence to the emperor of Japan also, and was instructed, if he found "the prospect favorable," to visit that empire and seek to establish official relations. But the situation at that time did not encourage the attempt.
- ↑ Honolulu Friend, February 2, 1846.
