INTRODUCTION. 43 



hired at Batavia by tlio Dutch, wlio they knew had sometimes sought to carry on their 

 commerce, without risk of capture, under the flag of the United States. To ascertain the 

 truth, M. Doeff himself went on board, when M. Waardenar met him with evident embarrass- 

 ment, and handed him a letter. The Dutch director saw that there was something not yet 

 intelligible to him, and prudently declined opening the letter until he should reach the factory, 

 whither he soon returned accompanied by Waardenar and his secretary. 



When they reached Dezima, Doeff opened the letter in the presence of Blomhoff and of 

 Waardenar and his secretary. It was signed "Raffles, Lieutenant Governor of Java and its 

 Dependencies," and announced that M. Waardenar was appointed commissary in Japan, with 

 supreme power over the factory. The poor director was utterly bewildered. In his long isola- 

 tion great events, and among them the utter absorption of his own nation into that of France, 

 and the subjugation of all the Dutch colonies, had occurred; and he asked in amazement, "Who 

 is Eaffles?" Then was opened to him the last five years of European history, and he learned 

 that Holland no longer had an independent national existence, and that Java belonged to Eng- 

 land ; that Sir Stamford Eaffles, who ruled there, had appointed Waardenar and Dr. Ainslie, an 

 Englishman, as commissioners in Japan, and required of him a surrender of everything into 

 their hands. It was an ingenious but most hazardous attempt on the part of Eaffles to transfer 

 the trade which the Dutch had so long monopolized to the hands of the English. . 



Doeff instantly refused compliance, on the ground that Japan was no dependency of Java, and 

 could not be affected by any capitulation the Dutch might have made on the surrender of that 

 island ; and further, that if Java was now an English island, then the order to him came from 

 an authority to which he, as a Dutchman, acknowledging no allegiance to England, certainly 

 owed no obedience. Doeff, who was exceedingly shrewd, saw also in an instant that the ships 

 and crews were completely at his mercy. He had but to tell the Japanese the facts he had 

 just learned, and, exasperated as they were by the affair of the Phaeton, the destruction of the 

 ships and their crews would inevitably follow. He saw his advantage, and shaped his course 

 accordingly. Fraissinet (who in his work on Japan is very much of an apologist for the Dutch 

 in all cases) represents this conduct on the part of M. Doeff as an example of exalted humanity 

 and patriotism ; while MacFarlane intimates that, such was the hatred of Doeff to the English, 

 he would probably have denounced the ships to the Jaj^anese but for the fact that M. Waardenar 

 was his countryman, his friend, and early benefactor. We cannot undertake to arbitrate between 

 these conflicting views, our business is to record the fact that, in the exercise either of loyalty, 

 or friendship, or humanity, as the case may be, he contrived to preserve, in all its purity, the 

 high reputation of the Dutch for taking care of their commercial interests in Japan, at any 

 expense, particularly when such expense could be made to fall upon others. 



The Dutch factory had for five years been without its annual supplies from Batavia, and had 

 consequently been obliged to contract a large debt to the Japanese for their support during this 

 long period. M. Doeff, after working upon the fears of Waardenar and Ainslie by a threat of 

 exposure to the Japanese, induced them to enter into an arrangement with him, and to bind 

 themselves in writing to the fulfilment of the contract, which was in substance this : In the first 

 place, the ships were to be passed off as being American, employed by the Dutch, for the sake 

 of obtaining the protection of the neutral flag of the United States. Secondly, the presence of M. 

 Waardenar, well known to the JajDanese as a Dutchman, and formerly President of Dezima, was 

 to give countenance to this view. Thirdly, M. Doeff" demanded as the price of holding his 



