112 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Jan. 



when the struggle became open and bitter, as it did largely 

 through the elder Saigo's courageous championship of the 

 emperor's cause, after fifteen years of marvellous adventure 

 and hardship, he naturally became the leader of the imperial 

 forces ; and it was due to the wonderful success of his lead- 

 ership that the war of the restoration was so brief. 



At its close the Mikado decreed him a liberal pension, and 

 in 1871 he was appointed to the imperial cabinet. Two 

 years later he was made general-in-chief of the army ; his 

 old opponent, the ex-commander of the Shogun's forces, 

 entering the cabinet in the same year. 



Disagreement in the cabinet soon led to Saigo's with- 

 drawal, after which, despite the overtures of the government, 

 and even the commands of the emperer ordering the return 

 of the man most influential in his restoration, he lived in 

 Satsuma in comparative retirement, devoting his time to the 

 direction of what were avowedly private schools, but which 

 the Satsuma rebellion of 1877 disclosed to be military acade- 

 mies, containing several thousand students under foreign 

 instructors, and supported in part by the pension which the 

 Mikado had bestowed upon him. In the last throes of this 

 rebellion, of which he became the leader, while general of 

 the imperial army, he lost his life ; by whose hand it is 

 uncertain. 



At the outbreak of the Satsuma rebellion the younger 

 Saigo was also a general in the imperial army, and the uni- 

 versal query was, " What Avill he do? " He was immediately 

 appointed acting minister of war, and, vibrating between the 

 seat of government and the scene of the rebellion, where, with 

 Kuroda, they directed the campaign against their late chief, 

 his brother, he put forth every efibrt for his country. Six 

 months saw the end of the conflict, when he was spared the 

 pain of justifying his elder brother's beheadal by that 

 brothers mysterious death. The living Saigo soon after 

 became, and still continues, minister of war. 



A story of the wonderful prowess and strategic skill and 

 diplomacy which marked his debut on the political stage was 

 told me. Prior to the restoration, while going to Satsuma 

 with others of his clan to attend a meeting of the Imperialists 

 at Kioto, they fell in with another party whose leaders were 



