Nay, If They
Had Any King At All In Whom They Could Boast, It Certainly Was The King
Of England, Who Had Hitherto Been Their Protector, And Without Whose Aid
They Had Never Been Able To Brag Of Their States.
This retort made the
Spaniards and Portuguese laugh heartily at the poor Hollander, and made
him shut his mouth.
And now for the news of this country. The emperor is great enemy to the
name of Christians, especially to the Japanese who have embraced the
faith; so that all such as are found are put to death. While at Meaco, I
saw fifty-five martyred at one time, because they would not forsake the
faith, and among them were some children of five or six years old, who
were burnt in the arms of their mothers, calling on Jesus to receive
their souls. Also, in the town of Nangasaki, sixteen others were
martyred for the same cause, of whom five were burnt, and the rest
beheaded and cut in pieces, and their remains put into sacks and cast
into the sea in thirty fathoms deep: Yet the priests got them up again,
and kept their remains secretly as relics. There are many others in
prison, both here and in other places, who look hourly to be ordered for
execution, as very few of them revert to paganism. Last year, about
Christmas, the emperor deposed one of the greatest princes in all Japan,
called Frushma-tay, lord of sixty or seventy mangocas, and banished
him to a corner in the north of Japan, where he has a very small portion
in comparison with what was taken from him, and he had the choice of
this or of cutting open his own belly. It was thought that this would
have occasioned great troubles in Japan, for all the subjects of
Frushma-tay were up in arms, and meant to hold out to the utmost
extremity, having fortified the city of Frushma, and laid in
provisions for a long time. But the tay and his son, being then at the
emperor's court, were commanded to write to their vassals, ordering them
to lay down their arms and submit to the emperor, or otherwise to cut
open their own bellies. Life being sweet, they all submitted, and those
were pardoned who had taken up arms for their tay. The emperor has
given their dominions, which were two kingdoms, to two of his own
kinsmen; and this year the emperor has ordered the castle belonging to
Frushma to be pulled down, being a very beautiful and gallant fortress,
in which I saw him this year, and far larger than the city of Rochester.
All the stones are ordered to be conveyed to Osaka, where the ruined
castle, formerly built by Fico-Same, and pulled down by Ogosha-Same,
is ordered to be rebuilt three times larger than before; for which
purpose all the tonos or kings have each their several tasks appointed
them; to be executed at their several charges, not without much
grumbling: For they had got leave, after so many years attendance at
court, to return to their own residences, and were now sent for again
all of a sadden to court, which angreth them not a little: "But go they
must, will they nill they, on pain of belly-cutting."
At this time there runs a secret rumour, that Fidaia Same is alive,
and in the house of the Dairo[67] at Meaco; but I think it has been
reported several times before this that he was living in other places,
but proved untrue. There are some rich merchants here that belong to
Meaco, who are much alarmed by this report, lest, if true, the emperor
may burn Meaco; and who are therefore in haste to get home. Were Fidaia
actually alive it might tend to overthrow the emperor's power, for,
though a great politician, he is not a martial man: But be this as it
may, things can hardly be worse for us. I advised you in my last of the
destruction of all the Christian churches in Japan; yet there were some
remnants left at Nangasaki till this year, and in particular the
monastery of Misericiordia was untouched, as were all the church-yards
and burying-places; but now, by order of the emperor, all is destroyed,
all the graves and sepulchres of the Christians opened, and the bones of
the dead taken out by their parents and kindred, to be buried elsewhere
in the fields. Streets have been built on the scites of these churches,
monasteries, and burying-grounds, except in some places, where pagodas
have been erected by command of the emperor, who has sent heathen
priests to occupy them, thinking utterly to root out Christianity from
Japan. There were certain places near Nangasaki where several jesuit
fathers and other Christians were martyred, in the reign of Ogosha
Same, and where their parents and friends had planted evergreen-trees,
and erected altars near each tree, where many hundreds went daily to say
their prayers; but now, by command of the emperor, all these trees are
cut down, the altars destroyed, and the ground all levelled, it being
his firm resolution utterly to root out the remembrance of all matters
connected with Christianity.
[Footnote 67: The Dairo was formerly the sovereign of Japan, uniting the
supreme civil and spiritual power, committing the military affairs to a
kind of generalissimo, who usurped supreme authority, and reduced the
Dairo to be a kind of sovereign pontiff or chief-priest. - E.]
In the months of November and December, 1618, there were two comets seen
all over Japan. The first, rising in the east, was like a great fiery
beam, rent to the southwards, and vanished away in about the space of a
month. The other rose also in the east, like a great blazing star, and
went northwards, vanishing quite away within a month near the
constellation of Ursa-Major or Charles-waine.
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