244 ATTACK ON BRITISH LEGATION. Chap. XV. 
and that, should he die, his brothers would take 
care that he was avenged. The gentleman in 
question was tried at the British Consulate and 
sentenced to deportation ; and to this sentence he 
probably owed his life, which, after what had 
happened, was not safe for an hour in Japan. 
During my residence in Japan there were several 
other instances in which foreigners were obliged 
to take a hasty leave of the country in order to 
save their lives. 
But although we knew the Japanese to be proud 
and revengeful, and not very particular as to the 
identity of their foes provided they were foreign- 
ers, and although the community had to deplore 
the murder of several of its members, apparently 
innocent and unoffending men, yet nothing had 
taken place recently to give us any uneasiness. 
The Japanese, we fancied, were getting accustomed 
or resigned to the presence of foreigners amongst 
them ; or our rough manners — at times somewhat 
frolicsome and boisterous — were seen to be harm- 
less, and not intended to hurt or annoy them. 
But when the news of the murderous attack on 
H. B. M. Legation reached us, the scales fell at 
once from our eyes, and we saw we had been 
sitting in fancied security on the top of a mine 
which was liable to an explosion at any moment. 
Various and contradictory accounts of the attack 
reached us at Kanagawa. As an authentic account 
has however been sent home by Mr. Alcock to 
Earl Russell and presented to both Houses of 
