Page:Brinkley - Japan - Volume 3.djvu/217

 attitude simulated by it to pacify the conservatives became flagrantly divergent. To such preparations, therefore, the Tairō and his coadjutors now devoted all their strength.

During the course of the negotiations in Kyōtō, the Yedo envoys had discovered clear evidence of a formidable plot to overthrow the Shogunate. The Tairō was not the man to palter with such an affair. Wholesale arrests were made, and the conspirators, cited before a court whose bench had been carefully purged of all half-hearted elements, were mercilessly sentenced. Capital punishment and banishment were the lot of the most active among the subordinates; the leaders fared according to the canons of the time. The Prince of Mito was condemned to perpetual confinement in his fief; the Prince of Owari, to permanent retirement; Keiki, ex-candidate for the succession to the Shogunate, forfeited his office and was directed to live in seclusion; the heads of three branch houses of Mito, several officials of the Imperial Court, in short, a number of notable personages, were overtaken by loss and disgrace.

This event produced a profound sensation throughout the Empire. It is tolerably certain that much injustice was done. Political views found very vague expression at that time. A man's opinions were generally inferred from the company he kept, and there is reason to think that ties of personal friendship were sometimes