MACEDONIAN AGROUND. 327 



usual promptitude and judgment, and before night the Macedonian was towed into a safe 

 anchorage. Meanwhile the other vessels were brought to anchor for the night, having been 

 joined on the same afternoon by the Lexington, which, it will be recollected, sailed from Napha 

 iu company with the Macedonian and Vandalia. In the course of the night a boat came along- 

 side the Commodore's flag-ship, having been dispatched by Lieutenant Commanding Boyle of 

 the Southampton, which vessel, another of Captain Abbott's division, had arrived the day before 

 at the American anchorage in the Bay of Yedo. 



Lieutenant Boyle had received information from the Japanese authorities that two ships had 

 arrived off Kama-kura, and that one of them was ashore, and very promptly and properly 

 dispatched the launch of the Southampton, with two officers and a suitable crew, to render all 

 practicable assistance. 



Tlie friendly disposition of the Japanese toward the Americans was handsomely illustrated 

 by their ofi'ers of assistance as soon as the Macedonian was observed ashore. Such, too, was 

 their courteous and scrupulous regard for the interests and property of their visitors, that they 

 actually took the trouble of sending to the squadron, then at a distance of twenty miles, a hogs- 

 head of bituminous coal, which had been thrown overboard on lightening the ship, and subse- 

 quently washed ashore. 



Next morning (February 13) after the Macedonian had been relieved from her hazardous 

 position, in the bight of Kawatsu, near Kama-kura, the whole squadron moved up the Bay of 

 Yedo, sailing in a line ahead, the Lexington, Vandalia, and Macedonian being in tow respect- 

 ively of the Susquehanna, Powhatan, and Mississippi. With the experience of navigation 

 acquired during the previous visit, there was no occasion for the ships to feel their way, but they 

 passed along the magnificent bay with confidence, bringing into view at each turn various 

 points of the land on eitlier side, wliich had now the aspect of familiar ground. 



Tlie precipitous coasts of Sagami rose bleakly in the winter atmospliere on the left, while far 

 inland could be seen the lofty ranges of the mountains covered witli snow, and the high peak of 

 Fusi-Yama^ about the lofty summit of which the clouds were scudding in reckless succession. 

 There was the distant coast of Awa, some twelve miles away on the opposite side, and along the 

 shores everywhere were the numberless villages and towns, though snugly rej)osing under the 

 cover of the high land which rose behind tliem, yet looking desolate and exposed, in comparison 

 with their former aspect of rural comfort when nestling in the full-leaved groves of summer. 

 Abreast was the town of Goriliama, the scene of the delivery of the President's letter, and in 

 front extended out from the land the promontory of Uraga, with its harmless forts, and as the 

 ships doubled it and came abreast the city, numerous government boats, with their athletic 

 oarsmen sculling vigorously, and their little striped flags fluttering in the wind, pushed off to 

 intercept the squadron, as on the previous visit. The Japanese officials, however, who had 

 risen from their places midships, and seemed to be directing their boats towards the squadron, 

 were warned off, and the strangers moved majestically on, with tlieir train of formidable men- 

 of-war, without altering their course a line, or lingering a moment in their speed until they 

 reached the anchorage, at three o'clock in the afternoon, (February 13.) The government boats 

 were left in the distance, but were seen sculling rapidly along and following in the wake of the 

 squadron. 



The position in which the three steamers and the four ships, including the Southampton, 

 ■which had preceded the squadron, had anchored was named, in the previous visit, the " American 



