Behind the large story of the shogunate's last years lie any number of small events for which the main history has no room. What the party saw and did on the embassy to the United States in 1860 was set down in many forms in the voyage diaries of those who went and in their later recollections.
Collected here are those stories about the people, and what they saw abroad, which the pages of the chronology and his works could not take in. Most rest on hearsay or on fragments of record, and where a thing cannot be stated as fact it is left as “is said to”.
Articles in this chapter
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Barter diplomacy: Arabian horses for silkworm egg cards
The story that Arabian horses and Western harness came as a return for the silkworm egg cards the shogunate sent to France.
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Japanese at Commodore Perry's house, and the story of his dog
The mission called at the house left by Commodore Perry, who had died by then, and his dog, so the story goes, was delighted at the sight of them.
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The largest ship in the world, the Great Eastern
At New York on the way home they went to look at the British ship then held to be the largest in the world, and were struck by its size.
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“The ablest Japanese of them all”, as Americans saw him
Judgments of Oguri in the American record, and the odd romanized spelling the newspapers used for his name.
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Katsu Kaishū's seasickness, and the affair of the flag
Stories told of the Kanrin Maru: Katsu Kaishū keeping to his cabin, and the order in which the flags were hoisted.
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Schools for the blind and the deaf, and surprise at an America that cared for its people
The schools for the blind and the deaf, the orphanage and the hospital they visited in America, and their surprise at how such care was arranged.