Emperor of Japan: Meiji and His World, 1852’1912 (7 page)

The reactions of the court in Ky
ō
to to the Russian intrusion and later developments are not recorded in the official chronicle. It is not clear whether or not the emperor and his advisers, even after being informed of the arrival of the Americans and the Russians, were aware of how greatly the situation had already changed with respect to opening the country. In any case, other matters that were closer at hand seem to have monopolized the attention of those in the old capital. A terrible heat wave in the eighth month had dried up most of the wells, including the one on Nakayama Tadayasu’s property, and he feared that this might have a bad effect on the infant prince. He decided to drill a new well at the spot recommended by a yin-yang master. When the water from the new well was tasted, it was found to be exceptionally pure, and the delighted Tadayasu declared that henceforth this water would be used to meet the prince’s needs. Word of this reached the emperor, who was highly pleased and gave the well the name Sachi no i (Sachi’s Well) because of its special connection with Sachinomiya and because
sachi
meant good fortune.

In November the prince celebrated his first birthday. We might have expected that he would receive elaborate gifts from members of the court, delighted that an imperial offspring had attained this milestone in his life, but most of the presents were in fact bestowed by the prince—on the emperor, the imperial princesses, the consort, the ladies of the court, and members of Tadayasu’s household. He also invited to his birthday party the various doctors, wet nurses, and others who had served him. The little prince obviously had no part in choosing the ritual gifts, such as boxes of fresh bream, buns filled with bean paste, and saké; but he was probably glad to receive the dolls and toys presented to him by the emperor and members of the court, including his mother, Nakayama Yoshiko.

During the following week, however, the prince was afflicted with a severe illness marked by vomiting and fever. Doctors of every sort were summoned, and they prescribed traditional Chinese medicines with such exotic names as
shisetsu
(purple snow). When these failed to have any effect, messengers were sent by members of the court to various shrines to pray for the prince’s recovery. At times he seemed better, only for a relapse to set in. The court was plunged in gloom, as people remembered how many children of the imperial family had died in infancy. Numerous gifts—most of them totally unsuited to an infant—were offered in the hopes of comforting the prince, and his mother maintained a constant vigil over his sickbed. Ry
ō
jo, the former chief abbot of the Kakush
ō
-in, was summoned to perform incantations. The prince’s great-grandmother, Nakayama Tsunako, distraught at the possibility that they might lose him, composed this poem:

That night Nakayama Yoshiko collapsed with a mysterious illness that rendered her insensible to her surroundings. In addition to Buddhist incantations and readings of the sutras, yin-yang diviners were now called in to pray and twang their bows. These rites were apparently efficacious: by the end of the month, both the prince and his mother seemed to have recovered. But it was not long before the prince was stricken again, and another set of priests was summoned to pray for him. He was not completely cured until the end of the year. Although knowledge of medical science was steadily progressing in Japan—largely as the result of the increased study of European medicine—it was clear that it had yet to make headway in the palace. Indeed, apart from the number of prayers said on his behalf, a member of the imperial family was unlikely to receive medical treatment as effective as that given to persons of far humbler status.

On November 23 Tokugawa Iesada (1824–1858), the fourth son of the previous shogun, was officially appointed by the emperor as the thirteenth shogun. The emperor also named Iesada
seii taish
ō
gun
, or “great general and subduer of barbarians.” This title, always of major importance as a sign of the shogun’s legitimacy,
⁸
had possessed little military significance because the country was not threatened by barbarians; but at a time when the appearance of foreign ships was causing great consternation, it suddenly acquired immediacy. Emperor K
ō
mei sent the two
buke dens
ō
to Edo with an imperial message: the shogun was informed that his most important task as the “great general and subduer of barbarians” was to reassure the people of the country by driving off the foreign ships, in this way avoiding national disgrace and future troubles. Chancellor Takatsukasa Masamichi sent a message of his own to Abe Masahiro, the senior adviser of the shogunate, asking what steps the shogunate was planning to calm the emperor’s uneasiness with respect to the American ships. Abe replied that no decision had as yet been made but vowed he would do nothing without considering the emperor’s peace of mind. He also urged that in the future the emperor communicate his wishes without constraint, promising to do whatever he was asked.
⁹

The court had left the disposition of all state business to the shogunate, but ever since 1846, when K
ō
mei sent a message to the shogunate asking about sea defenses, he had repeatedly expressed dissatisfaction with the shogunate’s apparent reluctance to dispose of the barbarians. On March 31, 1854, without consulting the emperor, the shogunate signed the Treaty of Kanagawa with the United States. It provided that the ports of Shimoda and Hakodate would be opened to American ships, that an American consul might reside in Shimoda, and that firewood, water, and food would be supplied to ships in need of them. There was no mention of trade in this treaty of peace and amity, but the foundations for trade had been laid. The choice of Shimoda and Hakodate, both extremely inconvenient places, no doubt reflected the shogunate’s desire to keep the foreigners at arm’s length.
¹⁰

It is not clear when the court first learned of the treaty. In any case, its attention was diverted from the foreign menace by another disaster. On May 5 a fire broke out in the palace and, fanned by a strong wind, quickly consumed the main buildings. The emperor was hastily evacuated to the Shimogamo Shrine along with other members of the imperial family. The fire spread so rapidly that the six or seven of the emperor’s personal attendants who managed to arrive in time to escort him to safety went barefoot. Another officer hurried to the Nakayama house and evacuated Sachinomiya to the same shrine. The devastation caused by the fire was not restricted to the palace: more than 5,400 houses belonging to inhabitants of Ky
ō
to were reduced to ashes before the fire was extinguished.

The Shimogamo Shrine had been designated as the place of refuge in the event of a conflagration in the palace, but it was much too small to hold the members of the imperial family and their attendants. The empress returned temporarily to her original family, and others took refuge in one temple or another. The Nakayama house was one of the few inside the Gosho to escape destruction, and the prince returned there on May 15.
¹¹

The imperial family’s troubles were by no means at an end. At the end of June, Sachinomiya’s temperature suddenly shot up, and at first he did not respond to treatment. He eventually recovered, to the relief of everyone, only for a great earthquake to shake Ky
ō
to, the most violent ever recorded for the region. It caused many deaths and destroyed innumerable houses. Even though the Nakayama house again escaped destruction, it was so small and crowded as to seem especially vulnerable to earthquakes. As long as the tremors continued, Sachinomiya was kept in the garden, where, according to the official record, he tranquilly suckled at his nurse’s breast.

Even during the various calamities, the emperor continued his study of poetry and was inducted into the secret traditions. To express his congratulations on the emperor’s achievement, the prince, it is recorded, sent an official with a box of dried cuttlefish. Presents were offered at the court on every conceivable occasion, but they were rarely of the kind favored by European royalty. The most frequently offered item was fresh fish. No doubt fresh fish, especially from the sea, was a rarity in Ky
ō
to, situated miles inland, but it was hardly in the same class with caviar, let alone a Fabergé Easter egg. The court in Ky
ō
to indeed lived frugally by the standards of royalty elsewhere, the austerity of their lives probably occasioned not so much by economic stringency as by long-standing traditions and perhaps also by preference.

Even more upsetting to the emperor than the fire and the earthquake was the sudden appearance of the Russian warship
Diana
in
Ō
saka Bay on November 7, 1854.
¹²
Putiatin, whose flagship in the previous year had been the old tub
Pallada
, had now returned aboard a modern warship. The
Diana
remained in
Ō
saka for about two weeks, creating immense consternation in the capital. One can easily imagine how K
ō
mei, who bitterly opposed the slightest concession to the foreigners, reacted to the intrusion of a foreign warship almost on his doorstep. He not only ordered prayers for the nation’s safety to be offered at the usual seven Shint
ō
shrines and seven Buddhist temples but also reduced his daily meals to a minimum and observed austerities. The citizens of the capital were alarmed, and the shogunate, seeking to reassure them, commanded various domains to defend Ky
ō
to and environs. Some officials even favored moving the emperor to
Ō
saka Castle, more easily defended than the Gosho, but before further steps could be taken, the Russian ships had weighed anchor and left for Shimoda.

Negotiations between the Japanese—Tsutsui and Kawaji—and the Russians—headed by Putiatin—began in Shimoda on December 22. Putiatin, eager to obtain a treaty, expressed his government’s willingness to cede to the Japanese the island of Etorofu, even though the Russians had positive proof it belonged to them, providing the Japanese would permit trade between the two countries. Some progress was made, but the negotiations were adjourned for two days. The following day, a great earthquake struck Honsh
ū
, accompanied by a powerful tsunami that was particularly severe at Shimoda. Countless people on the shore were swept out to sea by the roaring waves, and the badly battered Russian ships narrowly escaped being dashed against the rocks. The Russians earned the gratitude of the Japanese by rescuing some Japanese from the sea.
¹³

Shimoda was almost completely destroyed by the tsunami, and talks between the Japanese and Russians could not be resumed for ten days. The negotiations were protracted.
¹⁴
In the meantime, the court in Ky
ō
to decided that an unlucky
neng
ō
(reign-name) had been responsible for the recent disasters, and Confucian scholars were commanded to prepare a list of suitable new
neng
ō
. The shogun chose from among the names presented to him Ansei, or Peaceful Government, a term derived from a passage in the early Confucian text
Hsün Tzu
, which states that if the common people are at peace with the government, the ruler will enjoy peace in his office.
¹⁵
Despite its auspicious name, the Ansei era (1854–1860) would not be characterized by peaceful government.

One of the first events of the Ansei era was peaceful enough—the baby prince first put on colored clothes in place of the white clothes he had hitherto worn. Naturally, yin-yang diviners were consulted before so momentous a step was undertaken. Tsuchimikado Hareo, the head diviner, decided that ten o’clock in the morning on the sixteenth day of the twelfth month (February 3, 1855) was the appropriate time. There was snow that day, and the baby prince, no doubt suitably bundled up for the cold, set out that morning for the temporary palace where his father resided, accompanied in his palanquin by his great-grandmother. Other members of his mother’s family, including Nakayama Tadayasu and his wife, walked behind the palanquin, reaching the palace at the prescribed hour. Not until noon, however, was Sachinomiya dressed in his first colored costume, a cloak of deep crimson worn over a white glossed-silk robe, both presents from the emperor. A ritual meal was served at which the prince was attended by his mother, Nakayama Yoshiko. After the ceremony, he was taken by his grandfather, Nakayama Tadayasu, to the temporary palace where the emperor granted him an audience and offered him two cups of saké. After having his clothes changed once again, the prince appeared before the emperor, who congratulated him and offered another cup of saké. Fruit and other delicacies were served, followed by gifts of dolls and toys, and the prince’s clothes were changed for the third time, this time to bright red. The ceremonies lasted until about four in the afternoon. On this occasion, the emperor gave the prince twelve sets of clothes, and other members of the court added to this wardrobe. Sachinomiya also gave presents to the emperor and others, mainly fish, which was followed by a general exchange of gifts among those who had participated in the ceremony.
¹⁶