Sleepless Nights and a Hasty Hand ―― Tokugawa Nariaki’s Letter to Anekōji, Senior Lady-in-Waiting of the Great Interior

The first day of the eighth month of Kōka 3 (1846).Original
Even as night deepened, the lamp did not go out.
The letter was addressed to Anekōji, a senior lady-in-waiting of the great interior.Original
A single phrase was appended at the end.Original
It meant: written in a disordered hand on a sleepless night.OriginalOriginal

Working on the Shogun through the Great Interior

At this time, the shogun’s anger toward Nariaki had somewhat subsided, and his confinement had been lifted.Original
But he could not touch the domain’s administration.Original
He remained confined to his residence in Komagome.OriginalOriginal

A year earlier, he had already had his own work, the *Meikun Ippanshō*, placed before the eyes of Shogun Tokugawa Ieyoshi through the hand of senior councilor Abe Masahiro.Original
That was the path through the front.
He must have thought that alone was not enough.
This time, he would use the back path, through the great interior.OriginalOriginal

Both Nariaki and Tokugawa Ieyoshi had taken wives from the Arisugawa family.Original
They were thus brothers-in-law.Original
Anekōji, the most powerful figure in the great interior, was the sister of Hananoi, a senior lady-in-waiting of the Mito house.Original
Through this connection, Nariaki always kept open a line of communication with the shogun, Sohō writes.OriginalOriginal

Nariaki was “not the sort of man to abandon something he had set his mind to after just one or two attempts.”Original
He was not a man to give up something he had resolved to do after a failure or two, Sohō says.OriginalOriginal

The Threat of Foreign Ships and the Case for Shipbuilding

The letter opens with a seasonal greeting.Original
Amid the lingering summer heat, he expresses his joy that the two lordships—that is, Shogun Ieyoshi and heir apparent Iesada—were in good spirits.Original
From there he moves at once to the main subject.OriginalOriginal

He notes that rumors of foreign ships, current since the previous year, Kōka 1, must have reached even the women’s quarters.Original
He himself had “realized thirty years ago that this would surely come to pass.”Original
That is, he had recognized thirty years before that things would inevitably turn out this way.Original
But as a man still living as a cadet without office, he had no means to speak of it.Original
After unexpectedly succeeding to the Mito house, he had, heedless of consequence, spoken to his superiors and to the senior councilors alike.Original
Even so his views were not taken up, and in the end he was made to retire.OriginalOriginal

He might well have given up by now, Nariaki writes.Original
Since then, for the past ten years, he had gone on giving thought to the matter without anyone noticing.Original
Now he could not sleep at night, suffered headaches every morning, and sometimes even ran a fever.OriginalOriginal

His picture of the crisis is concrete.Original
If Ryūkyū and Ezo were seized and the foreigners built outposts there, Japan would be caught in a pincer from north and south.Original
Edo is a city of “several million people.”Original
If the shipment of rice were delayed even a month, many would starve, and all of Edo would be thrown into an uproar.Original
If foreigners attacked at such a moment, the city would fall with no means of resistance.Original
“As clear as if seen reflected in a mirror even now.”Original
Nariaki declares that it is as plain as looking into a mirror this very moment.OriginalOriginal

There is only one way to prevent it.
To build ships more formidable than the enemy’s, and drive off the foreign vessels.Original
Ships that cross ten thousand leagues of sea must always have some weakness somewhere.Original
Our side, he says, is certain to win.Original
He had been telling Abe Masahiro this very thing for ten years already, yet still nothing had been decided.OriginalOriginal

The Realm Belongs to the People of the Realm

Nariaki urges Anekōji to look at the map of the world.Original
“To one such as you, Japan may seem a great country, but it is nothing more than a single small island.”Original
She likely thought Japan a great nation, but it was merely a single small island.Original
The foreigners had already seized the great nations of the world, and Japan alone remained.OriginalOriginal

Next year, Kōka 4, Ryūkyū would be in danger.Original
Then Ezo and Matsumae would follow.Original
While deliberation dragged on, both Ryūkyū and Ezo would be taken, and then the whole of Japan besides.OriginalOriginal

Here Nariaki offers the analogy of a fire in the main citadel.Original
No one, until that very evening, had ever dreamed that the main citadel would burn.Original
Once the fire breaks out, even waking to it does no good—it turns to ashes all at once.Original
A building can be restored later by rebuilding it.Original
But “once this realm is handed over to the barbarians, it can never be taken back again.”Original
Once the realm is given to the foreigners, it can never be reclaimed.OriginalOriginal

And then a striking passage follows.Original
“The realm is the realm of the people of the realm, not a realm belonging solely to the Tokugawa.”Original
That is, the realm belongs to the people of the realm as a whole, not to the Tokugawa alone.Original
Empress Jingū, though a woman ruler, crossed the sea and took Korea.Original
If the Tokugawa realm, while remaining within its own borders, failed to repel the foreigners and was seized, there would be no way to answer to Amaterasu Ōmikami or to the Tōshōgū.OriginalOriginal

Sohō regards this passage as weighty.Original
He notes that the language is “quite fierce and urgent,” and suggests that Nariaki must have believed nothing less would move the shogun’s heart.Original
At the same time, Sohō points out, the idea that the realm belongs to the people of the realm, though not yet common at the time, was a thought that was gradually fermenting among men of learning.Original
Nariaki said this for the sake of the Tokugawa main house, but others did not necessarily share that intent.Original
Sohō writes that one can sense, even from a single reading of this passage, that the popular sentiment which had long taken serving the Tokugawa shogun as an inborn and unquestioned duty was beginning to waver.OriginalOriginal

While We Deliberate, the Blossoms Scatter

Nariaki goes on to cite an anecdote about the Tōshōgū.Original
One night Tokugawa Ieyasu dreamed that he grasped the character “ze” (this) in his left hand.Original
A diviner told him that if the character “ze” were broken apart it meant “the man beneath the sun,” an auspicious sign of grasping the realm.Original
Yet it was said that though the hand would remain closed through the fifth generation, from the sixth generation onward the hand would begin to open, and by the time ten generations had passed it would open entirely—so this point was of the greatest importance.Original
In both Japan and China, two or three hundred years of peace lead to neglect of military preparedness, and it is then that other nations invade.Original
Therefore, Nariaki says, he wishes that even now they would begin once more to grasp the character “ze.”OriginalOriginal

He quotes a poem.Original
Its meaning is: while one sings of the peaceful, peaceful spring, the blossoms will have already scattered.Original
If they spend their days in Odawara-style deliberation, it will be too late.Original
Before the ships are completed, both Ryūkyū and Ezo will be taken.OriginalOriginal

He also wrote: do not rely on the gods.
When Ieyasu spoke of the foreign invasion of Kōan 4, he too held that one could not rely on a divine wind.Original
Even if the gods protect the realm, it must still be defended by human strength.Original

In a postscript there is one more urgent point.Original
If trade were to begin in Ryūkyū, the Ryūkyūans would convert to Christianity, and in time Ōsumi and Satsuma too would come to believe in secret.OriginalOriginal

Sohō reads Nariaki’s intent here.Original
Nariaki suspected that Satsuma had secretly begun trade with foreigners in Ryūkyū.Original
On the sixth day of the sixth month of Kōka 3, heir apparent Shimazu Nariakira had been entrusted by the shogunate with handling the matter of foreign ships arriving in Ryūkyū and their demands for trade, and was on his way home.Original
Sohō says that the meaning of Nariaki’s letter becomes clear of itself when set against this affair.Original
Nariaki and Nariakira lent and borrowed Dutch books and exchanged gifts, appearing outwardly close.Original
But Nariaki regarded Satsuma with suspicion, as though it harbored some hidden design, while Nariakira for his part did not fully trust Nariaki’s character.Original
Nariaki was, among the daimyo of his day, uncommonly brilliant, learned, and talented, but he was “fond of scheming, a man of two faces.”Original
Sohō comments that one cannot blame the shogunate alone for regarding him as a dangerous man not to be trusted.OriginalOriginal

The Reply on the Evening of the Sixth Day of the Eighth Month

The reply came quickly.Original
Anekōji’s letter is dated the evening of the sixth day of the eighth month.OriginalOriginal

She writes that she herself could only receive such rumors with awe, but felt it would not do to keep such a matter, offered for the shogun’s sake, to herself alone.Original
Today, since the shogun had been at ease, she had reported the letter’s contents point by point, just as written.Original
Shogun Ieyoshi responded that he found it “quite reasonable.”Original
That is, he thought it was indeed reasonable.OriginalOriginal

This morning he had also looked over the document sent to the front.Original
Sohō supposes this refers to the document Nariaki had given to Abe Masahiro.Original
And “he had promptly ordered that the matter of the expulsion order be looked into as well.”Original
That is, he had ordered that the matter of driving off foreign ships be investigated at once.Original
She also conveyed that what had been reported to the inner quarters would not be disclosed to the front, but that any points noticed would be conveyed in due course.Original
Anekōji herself writes candidly, “As for this matter of expulsion, it is something we ourselves do not understand at all.”Original
That is, she had no idea what the expulsion order even meant.OriginalOriginal

Sohō sees it this way.Original
Shogun Ieyoshi had read through both of Nariaki’s letters in full and ordered an inquiry into the matter of expulsion.Original
The expulsion in question was likely the restoration of the Bunsei 8 expulsion order, undoing the Tenpō 13 relaxation that had allowed the provision of firewood and water.Original
Sohō suggests that even if the shogun did not personally care for Nariaki, he must have recognized him as a reliable kinsman in case of emergency.OriginalOriginal

Nariaki, a man of boundless energy, sent off another letter the moment he received the reply.Original
This time it was a formal memorial.Original
Sohō emphasizes that his purpose was not simply expulsion.Original
Rather, it was the building of great ships and heavy guns, especially great ships.Original
Nariaki presses his case with numbers.Original
The foreign ships were “over fifty or sixty ken long, with a hundred large guns and two or three thousand medium and small guns.”Original
Hulls exceeding fifty or sixty ken carried a hundred cannon and two or three thousand medium and small guns, and some were even plated in black iron.Original
Against this, our side had only “fishing boats scarcely seven or eight ken long.”Original
Borrowed fishing boats scarcely seven or eight ken long would be shattered by a single cannon shot.Original
With this, certain victory could not be hoped for.Original
Nariaki argued that the proper order was first to strengthen defenses at home, and only then to order the expulsion of foreign ships.OriginalOriginal

The Character “Ze” That Should Now Be Grasped

Sohō records the subsequent course of events, citing the *Tokugawa Yoshinobu-kō Den*.Original
The shogun found the written proposal reasonable and answered that once the investigation into expulsion was complete and a document prepared, it would be shown to Nariaki.Original
But two years passed with nothing happening.Original
In Kaei 2, Abe Masahiro asked the various officials for their opinions on whether to restore the Bunsei-era expulsion order.Original
The preface noted that black ships had been passing frequently near Tsushima, Nanbu, Tsugaru, and Matsumae, that American ships had come to Nagasaki, and that British ships had come to Uraga and Shimoda and even conducted surveys.Original
Yet many argued against restoring the order, and Nariaki’s proposal “in the end found no opportunity to be carried out.”Original
It was never, in the end, put into practice.Original
Sohō acknowledges that Nariaki drew much criticism, but writes that his “tireless, unresting exertion” was something the daimyo of that peaceful age, standing about like so many dolls, could never have dreamed of matching.Original
The hasty writing of a sleepless night did indeed reach the shogun’s desk.Original
The shogun said it was “reasonable.”Original
Yet still no ships were built, and the blossoms scattered amid deliberation.Original
Whose hand would now take up again the character “ze” that Ieyasu had grasped in his dream?Original
Or had the very man who wrote this letter already laid his finger upon that character himself?OriginalOriginal

This article is a reading of Kinsei Nihon kokuminshi, The Situation before Perry’s Arrival. Tokutomi Sohō’s views are those of the 1920s and 1930s and may differ from current scholarship. The source text is a century old and may differ from current scholarship.