Tokugawa Nariaki of Mito was a person who was reprimanded by the shogunate and ordered into retirement and confinement. On the 13th day of the 3rd month of Kaei 2 (1849), the shogunate lifted the order it had issued to Nariaki forbidding him from involvement in the domain’s administration. The occasion was, in the 7th month of Kōka 2 (1845), a request to borrow a telescope from Abe Masahiro. Sohō records this as the first window that the shut-in Nariaki opened to the outside.
After this, long letters urging the rebuilding of the domain and coastal defense arrived at Abe’s without ceasing. Sohō identifies Mito as the head house of the idea of expelling foreigners, and calls Aizawa Seishisai’s Shinron the book of its teaching. Kawaji Toshiakira, the Nara magistrate, who read this in Kaei 2, gave a harsh assessment. While calling it an argument that would place men in a position of death to fight, he wrote 7 days later that Aizawa was probably a considerable figure. Fujita Tōko, who was close to Nariaki, also wrote to a friend that he wished to quickly return to the Bunsei 8 order to drive away foreign ships.
Yet though there was thought, there was no preparation, and only a little coastal defense was built at Uraga and Bōsō. Nariaki submitted opinions on coastal defense many times from the Tenpō era onward, but Sohō writes that the shogunate did not adopt them. What the shogunate adopted instead was a policy of not letting people know of affairs abroad. Fujita Tōko lamented that this was like covering one’s ears after the thunder had already sounded. Sohō praised as an excellent argument the words of Katsu Kaishū explaining the harm of shutting off information.
Another thread toward revival was Nariaki’s child, the later Tokugawa Yoshinobu. In the 9th month of Kōka 4 (1847), he succeeded to the Hitotsubashi house. Shogun Tokugawa Ieyoshi repeatedly visited his residence, joining him in chanting and dance, and Sohō records that they were like father and son. On the 2nd day of the 5th month of Kaei 1, Yoshinobu visited his father at Komagome for the first time, and on the 11th day of the 12th month he astonished people with his skill in archery. In the same month, senior councilor Matsudaira Noriyasu conveyed word of an engagement with Chiyohime, daughter of Ichijō Tadaka.
Conditions were attached to the lifting of the order. These were that he refrain from acting on his own judgment, and that he not employ Toda Ginjirō and Fujita Toranosuke again. On the 15th day of the 3rd month, Nariaki sent a letter to Yoshiatsu, who had become domain lord at age 13, urging him to end discord within the domain. At the deer hunt at Koganehara on the 18th day of the 3rd month as well, he looked into old regulations and sent them to Abe. The closing of the poem he presented expressed a wish to drive out foreigners.
On the 21st day of the 9th month, Ieyoshi visited the Mito residence at Koishikawa, and himself worked a boat at Kōrakuen. At the evening banquet, Nariaki presented a folding screen of chrysanthemums that he had painted himself. Sohō writes that the gloom since Kōka 1 seemed to have lifted, yet the domain’s administration remained in the hands of those opposed to him. Yoshiatsu did not accept his father’s arguments, and even into Kaei 2 father and son had not become reconciled.
From the request to borrow a telescope to the boating party at Kōrakuen, these 4 years can be traced through Sohō’s Kinsei Nihon kokuminshi, The Situation before Perry’s Arrival.
The Seventh Month of Kōka 2: A Single Telescope
The seventh month of Kōka 2 (1845).Original
The matter concerned a request to borrow a telescope owned by Abe.OriginalOriginal
In the fifth month of the previous year, Nariaki had received censure from the shogunate and been ordered into retirement and confinement.Original
He was forty-five years old at the time.Original
His confinement was lifted in the eleventh month of that same year, but he was not permitted to take any part in the domain’s administration.Original
Tokutomi Sohō writes that the borrowing of the telescope was the first small window this confined man opened toward the outside.OriginalOriginal
而して彼の雄心は固より已む能はず、弘化二年七月、彼は閣老阿部正弘所藏の望遠鏡借用を申込、機緣として、彼と信書を往復するに至つた
Open the original page at the National Diet LibraryFrom this occasion, an exchange of letters began between Nariaki and Abe.Original
On domain reform.Original
On national defense.Original
Tokutomi Sohō reports that long letters were sent to Abe “almost without interruption.”OriginalOriginal
Mito’s Pure Doctrine of Expelling the Barbarians
The true home of the doctrine of expelling the barbarians was Mito.Original
So Tokutomi Sohō declares, calling Aizawa Seishisai’s Shinron its “gospel” and “scripture.”OriginalOriginal
That Shinron was read in Kaei 2 (1849) by Kawaji Toshiakira, magistrate of Nara.Original
He was an able official of the shogunate.Original
His assessment was harsh.Original
It was, he said, an argument that placed men in mortal danger and forced them into a desperate fight, likely meant to follow the precedent of Hōjō Tokimune’s beheading of the Yuan envoys; but the present age, which relied on daimyo, could not proceed as in the past.Original
Even so, seven days later he wrote in his diary that the author “must be quite a figure,” and wanted to know who had written it.Original
Tokutomi Sohō reads this as a sign that he had been stirred.OriginalOriginal
新論の意、先づ人を死地に置て、必死の場より、戰をなす積りに御座候。故に北條時宗が、元の使を斬たりし例による積りにて候。これ孫子より出たる論にて、おもしろきことには候得共、其時の大將は、誰にすべしと云、人選論は、素より前以出來申間敷義に有之。又當時大名を御遣ひなさるゝ世になりては、少もいにしへの風にはまいり不申候
Open the original page at the National Diet LibraryFujita Tōko, said to be Nariaki’s trusted right hand, was likewise an uncompromising advocate of expelling the barbarians.Original
In a letter dated the seventeenth day of the fourth month of Kaei 1, sent from his retreat at Takekuma to Takahashi Taichirō, he wrote as follows.Original
It meant that he earnestly wished to return, even a single day sooner, to the expulsion order of Bunsei 8.OriginalOriginal
Tokutomi Sohō says there could have been no posturing in a letter to a close comrade.Original
Before Perry’s arrival, the lord and retainers of Mito were all purely devoted to expelling the barbarians, and their argument came down to the single word “war.”Original
And with this opinion, Nariaki continued to stir the shogunate’s officials.OriginalOriginal
Empty-Handed Expulsion, A Secretive Shogunate
But though there was conviction, there was no preparation.Original
Tokutomi Sohō writes that only a little coastal defense had been built at Uraga and Bōsō.OriginalOriginal
In the third month of Kaei 1, Asano Nagayoshi, magistrate of Uraga, went to Uraga under the shogun’s direct order.Original
What he carried with him was Nariaki’s Meikun Ippanshō.Original
Andō Masayoshi, a junior inspector of the shogunate, had copied one volume and added a preface as a farewell gift.Original
Even Mito, the true home of expelling the barbarians, had no preparation.Original
If so, then both the shogunate and the various domains had merely chanted “expel the barbarians” with folded arms, letting precious years pass in vain.OriginalOriginal
Tokutomi Sohō declares flatly that the responsibility for this did not lie with Mito.Original
Nariaki had repeatedly submitted proposals on coastal defense since the Tenpō years, but the shogunate adopted not a single one.OriginalOriginal
What the shogunate adopted instead was a policy of secrecy.Original
Tokutomi Sohō cites as an example the case of Matsudaira Sadanobu banning Hayashi Shihei’s Sangoku Tsūran and Kaikoku Heidan.Original
Even when Britain was invading Qing nearby, the shogunate tried not to let even this become generally known.Original
Fujita Tōko lamented in a letter dated the twenty-seventh day of the third month of Kaei 1.Original
“It is like covering one’s ears at a sudden peal of thunder; the state of the times is truly lamentable, truly lamentable.”Original
This meant it was like covering one’s ears only after the thunder had already clapped, and that the state of the times was deplorable.OriginalOriginal
Here Tokutomi Sohō quotes at length the words of Katsu Kaishū.Original
As a result of forbidding the study of Western books and the making of instruments, and of stopping the people’s ears and eyes, when a foreign ship merely requested firewood and water, its intentions were suspected as malicious, and if it took soundings, people grew indignant, claiming the nation’s dignity had been insulted.Original
Knowing neither the enemy nor oneself.
“The harm of secrecy is the very source of this.”Original
Tokutomi Sohō judged this to be “truly a sound argument.”OriginalOriginal
Please consult the original page images for this source.
Open the original page at the National Diet LibraryThe Boy Who Came to Komagome
There was yet another thread in the path of Nariaki’s revival.Original
This was his son Shichirōmaro, who later became Hitotsubashi Yoshinobu.OriginalOriginal
In the ninth month of Kōka 4 (1847), Shichirōmaro succeeded to the Hitotsubashi house.Original
Tokutomi Sohō holds that there is no doubt this was a measure by which Shogun Tokugawa Ieyoshi took Nariaki’s feelings into consideration.Original
Ieyoshi said that Shichirōmaro closely resembled the late Yoshimasa, and his reputation in the Ōoku was also good.OriginalOriginal
Please consult the original page images for this source.
Open the original page at the National Diet LibraryOn the sixteenth day of the third month of Kaei 1, Ieyoshi visited the Hitotsubashi residence.Original
Thereafter he visited often; when the shogun sang, Yoshinobu danced, and when Yoshinobu sang, the shogun danced.Original
Tokutomi Sohō writes that they were “just like father and son.”OriginalOriginal
On the second day of the fifth month of that same year, Yoshinobu visited his father at the Komagome residence for the first time.Original
Nariaki went out to receive him as far as the second chamber.Original
In the inner hall there was singing and dancing, and Yoshinobu danced wearing a dance robe of Yamato brocade given to him by the shogun.Original
On the eleventh day of the twelfth month, together with his elder brother Gorōmaro, he shot five target bundles, astonishing everyone.Original
Nariaki’s joy “overflowed between his brows,” it is said.OriginalOriginal
On the fourth day of the same month, senior councilor Matsudaira Noriyasu, as shogunal envoy, informed Yoshinobu of his engagement to Chiyohime, daughter of Ichijō Tadaka.Original
This was arranged through the mediation of Anekōji, a senior lady-in-waiting of the Ōoku.Original
On the third day of the preceding month, it had been privately conveyed to Mito’s attendant chief retainer that Itonomiya, daughter of Arisugawa no Miya, would become the shogun’s adopted daughter and be married to the Mito domain lord Tokugawa Yoshiatsu.Original
A single boy had thus served as a “messenger of peace” linking his real father and the shogun.OriginalOriginal
Kaei 2 (1849), the thirteenth day of the third month
And so that day came.Original
On the thirteenth day of the third month of Kaei 2 (1849), the shogunate released the three branch-house guardians—Matsudaira Yoritane, Matsudaira Yorinobu, and Matsudaira Yorinawa—from their duties, and the domain lord Yoshiatsu was to govern in his own right.Original
At the same time, the order forbidding Nariaki from interfering in domain government was also lifted.Original
Yoshiatsu became domain lord at the age of thirteen.Original
Its administration had been in the hands of the three branch-house guardians and the senior officials whom Nariaki called the treacherous faction.Original
For nearly six years, a man of fighting spirit had looked on from the sidelines.Original
Two days later, on the fifteenth day of the third month, Nariaki wrote a letter to Yoshiatsu.Original
He wrote that he was “like a defeated general,” but since there was also a saying that one becomes a good physician after breaking one’s arm three times, he would set aside his shame and send his words regardless.Original
He urged that the domain’s discord be eliminated and that, except for those who betrayed the warrior’s way, people be treated with leniency.Original
The release, however, came with restraints attached.Original
Rewards, punishments, and personnel matters for the domain were to be discussed with the lord and the chief retainers, and unilateral decisive action was to be avoided.Original
And the reappointment of Toda Ginjirō and Fujita Toranosuke was, in the words used, “not to be permitted”—that is, it must not happen—a warning given by naming them directly.Original
Tokutomi Sohō writes that this shows how heavy a reputation the two men carried, and how much they were regarded as dangerous figures.OriginalOriginal
其政は三連枝-松平讃岐守賴胤、松平大學頭賴誠、松平播磨守賴繩-の後見によりて、專ら齊昭を排斥したる所謂る藤田黨の天狗派に對する姦黨の手に歸し
Open the original page at the National Diet LibraryThe Dust of Koganehara
On the same eighteenth day of the third month, the shogun Tokugawa Ieyoshi held a deer hunt at Koganehara.Original
This was a house custom dating from Ieyasu, which Yoshimune had revived and Ieyoshi now restored again.OriginalOriginal
狩獵は、家康以來の家法とも、家傳とも云ふ可く家光の如きも、屢ば之を試み、中興の主、吉宗に至りて、大いに之を恢復した。而して將軍家慶亦た嘉永二年二月に於て、之を擧行した
Open the original page at the National Diet LibraryNariaki was well versed in ancient precedent.Original
In a document dated the fourteenth day of the second month, he sent his findings to Abe, repeatedly proposing that sake be given to the farmers around the hunting grounds, and that the game be prepared and given to the attendant servants.OriginalOriginal
Abe Masahiro went ahead to the post town of Matsudo the night before.Original
The shogun arrived at the hour of nine at night, rested briefly at Shōryūji at the half-hour of seven, and proceeded to the hunting grounds on foot and on horseback.Original
At the signal of the great cannon, the guns fired all at once, and the rising dust made it impossible to tell boar from deer.Original
“It was truly like a battlefield,” Abe wrote to Nariaki.Original
The shogun himself speared two hares, and gave the battle surcoat he was wearing to Abe.Original
Abe took one boar and two hares with a bamboo spear.Original
Game was also bestowed upon Nariaki by the shogun.OriginalOriginal
Nariaki presented a eulogistic poem for this hunt.Original
Its closing line read: “I pray, by the might of the divine spirit, to drive out the barbarians of the four directions.”Original
It expressed the wish that, through divine power, the barbarians of the four directions be driven out.Original
Tokutomi Sohō records that Nariaki’s intent was, to the very end, to drive out the barbarians.Original
Perhaps, in the dust of the hunt, he was after all seeing a battlefield.Original
The Autumn Leaves of Kōrakuen
On the twenty-first day of the ninth month of Kaei 2 (1849), Ieyoshi visited the Mito residence in Koishikawa.Original
The stated purpose was to call on Hōjuin, wife of the late Narinobu.Original
Tokutomi Sohō surmises that it was in fact to meet Nariaki.OriginalOriginal
Nariaki had written to Abe in a letter dated the eleventh day of the seventh month.Original
He wrote that since this would be his wife’s first audience, “in part it is a pleasure, in part a worry; day after day I count the days and await it.”Original
It was, he said, both a joy and a worry, and he was counting the days as he waited.OriginalOriginal
Ieyoshi left the castle early in the morning and arrived at around eight in the morning.Original
He granted an audience to Nariaki and the others in the first chamber, and past noon strolled through Kōrakuen.Original
The attendant ladies-in-waiting numbered over a hundred, and the autumn leaves of the garden were reflected brilliantly against the vermilion-lacquered boat on the pond.Original
The shogun himself took up the pole and moved the boat.Original
In the evening, candles were lit at Kantokutei for a banquet.Original
Nariaki presented a screen of chrysanthemums he had painted himself, and Ieyoshi gladly accepted it.Original
Tokutomi Sohō records that the gloom pent up since Kōka 1 “seemed to open all at once.”OriginalOriginal
But in that same residence, domain government remained in the hands of the opposing faction.Original
The domain lord Yoshiatsu had grown up among those men since the age of thirteen, and had developed a tendency not to approve of his father’s words and conduct.Original
Mito’s troubles, it was held, were the result of his father’s self-indulgence offending the shogunate’s sensibilities, and that submission alone would bring good fortune to the domain and filial duty to his father.Original
Nariaki stopped going to the Koishikawa residence, and though Fujita Tōko had written a letter of remonstrance in the winter of Kōka 4, even by Kaei 2 father and son had not reconciled.OriginalOriginal
而して豫て利かぬ氣の齊昭は、之を苦々敷事に思ひ、愈よ父子疎隔を來たし、小石川邸へも往來せず、その爲めに藤田東湖の六三-六七〕如きは、憂慮の餘、齊昭の反省を希うてゐる。〔參照藤田の諫書は、弘化四年の冬であつたが、嘉永二年に至りても、父子の關係、今以て融和せず
Open the original page at the National Diet LibraryWhat, then, had Nariaki regained over the course of four years?Original
Beginning with a telescope, and passing through a boy’s dance, game from a hunt, and a shogun rowing a boat, he had been restored as a relative of Ieyoshi.Original
Yet the expulsion policy remained empty-handed, Toda and Fujita remained forbidden, and the lord of the residence to which the screen had been presented kept his distance from his father.Original
It can also be read that what had returned was the man Nariaki himself, not Nariaki’s governance.
The shogun grasping the pole beneath the autumn leaves, and the retired lord watching him.Original
Does not the brightness of that single day, rather, give a presentiment of the darkness that was to follow?Original
| Source text | Kinsei Nihon kokuminshi, The Situation before Perry’s Arrival (1929). National Diet Library Digital Collections (PDM). PID 3431221 |
| Checked against | Ishin shiryō kōyō, vol. 1 (1937). PID 1046665 |
| Dates and names | All 12 dates in the text exist in the calendar for their year, and the Western years given alongside them agree. Of the 16 people named in the text, 13 also appear in Ishin shiryō kōyō, vol. 1. |
| English gates | 120 of 120 sentences passed the checks on the English text. |
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.
