346 EXPEDITION TO JAPAN. 



sailors were to be armed with muskets, cutlasses and pistols, and dressed in blue jackets and 

 trowsers and white frocks. The musicians were each to he supplied with cutlass and pistol, and 

 every man of the escort provided with either musket or pistol cartridge boxes. 



At half-past eleven o'clock the escort, consisting of about five hundred officers, seamen and 

 marines, fully armed, embarked in twenty-seven boats, under the command of Commander 

 Buchanan, and forming a line abreast, pulled in good order to the shore. When the escort 

 had landed, the marines ^ere drawn iip in a hollow square, leaving a wide open space between 

 them, while the naval officers remained in a group at the wharf. The ship's boats were arranged 

 in two separate divisions of equal numbers on either side of the landing, with their bows point- 

 ing in regular order from the shore. The Commodore now embarked from the Powhatan in his 

 barge, under a salute from the Macedonian of seventeen .guns. The Commodore, on landiiig, 

 was received by the group of officers, who, falling into a line, followed him. The bands now 

 struck up a lively tune, and the marines, whose orderly ranks in complete military appointment, 

 with their blue and white uniforms, and glistening bayonets, made quite a martial and effective 

 show, presented arms as the Commodore, followed in procession by his immediate staff, his guard 

 of fine looking sailors and a number of his subordinate officers, proceeded up the shore. A group 

 of richly costumed Japanese guards, or retainers, with banners, flags and streamers, were gath- 

 ered on each side of the entrance of the treaty house. As the Commodore and his party passed 

 up between these they were met by a large number of Japanese officials who came out, and 

 uncovering, conducted them into the interior of the building. As they entered, by a precon- 

 certed arrangement, howitzers which had been mounted on the bows of the larger ship's boats, 

 that were floating just by the shore, commenced firing in admirable order a salute of twenty- 

 one guns in honor of the Emperor, which were succeeded by a salute of seventeen for Hayashi 

 Daigaku-no-kami, the high commissioner, and the hoisting of the Japanese striped flag from 

 the masthead of the steamer Powhatan in the bay. 



The apartment into which the Commodore and his officers first entered was a large hall, 

 arranged in a similar manner to that at Gori-hama. Thick rice-straw mats carpeted the floor, 

 long and wide settees, covered with a red cloth, extended along the sides, with tables spread 

 with the same material arranged in front of them. The windows were composed of panes of 

 oiled paper, through which a subdued and mellow light illuminated the hall, while a com- 

 fortable temperature was kept up — for, although the spring, which is early in Japan, had 

 already opened, the weather was chilly — by copper braziers of burning charcoal, which, 

 supported upon lacquered wooden stands, were freely distributed about. Hangings fell from 

 the walls around, with paintings of trees, and representations of various animals and birds, 

 particularly of the crane, with its long neck in every variety of strange involution. 



The Commodore and his officers and interpreters had hardly taken their seats on the left, the 

 place of honor, and the various Japanese officials, of whom there was a goodly number, theirs 

 on the right, when the five commissioners entered from an apartment which opened through 

 an entrance at the upper end of the hall. As soon as they presented themselves the subordinate 

 Japanese officials prostrated themselves on their knees, and remained in that attitude during 

 their presence. 



The commissioners were certainly august looking personages, and their grave but courteous 

 manners, and their rich flowing robes of silk, set them ofi" to the highest advantage. Their 

 costume consisted of an under garment somewhat similar to the antique doublet, and a pair of 

 very wide and short trowsers of figured silk, while below the legs were encased in white cotton 



