of public sentiment against the Tokugawa Shogunate a rare opportunity
of accomplishing their cherished aim. They lent their arms and money
for the support of the patriots in carrying out their plan. Satsuma
and Choshiu became the rendezvous of eminent scholars and zealous
patriots. And in the council-halls of Satsuma and Choshiu were hatched
the plots which were soon to overthrow the effete Shogunate.

Thus everything was ready for the revolution of 1868 before Perry
came. We saw the Shogun, under the bombastic title of Tycoon, in spite
of the remonstrance of the Emperor and his court, conclude a treaty
with Perry at Kanagawa in 1854. Here at last was found a pretext for
the Imperialists to raise arms against the Shogun. The Shogun or his
ministers had no right to make treaties with foreigners. Such an act
was, in the eyes of the patriots, heinous treason. The cry of "Destroy
the Shogunate and raise the Emperor to his proper throne!" rang from
one end of the empire to the other. The constant disturbance of the
country, the difficulty of foreign intercourse, the sense of necessity
of a single and undoubted authority over the land, and the outcry
of the Samurai thus raised against the Shogun, finally led to his
resignation on November 19, 1867. His letter of resignation, in the
form of a manifesto to the Daimios, runs thus:

"A retrospect of the various changes through which the empire has
passed shows us that after the decadence of the monarchical authority,
power passed into the hands of the Minister of State; that by the
wars of 1156 to 1159 the governmental power came into the hands of the
military class. My ancestor received greater marks of confidence than
any before him, and his descendants have succeeded him for more than
two hundred years. Though I perform the same duties, the objects of
government and the penal laws have not been attained, and it is