Page:The Truth about China and Japan - Weale - 1919.djvu/40

 The reply given to this questionnaire was deemed unsatisfactory and Hideyoshi issued his famous edict of expulsion. For at least ten years considerations of trade prevented the edict from being carried out, but with the coming of Franciscan monks a new phase was reached.

The Franciscans were Spaniards and were rivals of the Portuguese. Established at Manila, where their compatriots carried on a regular trade with Spanish South America, they bitterly disliked the rival order of Jesuits and were determined to humiliate them. The Jesuits, having been placed under a ban, were carrying on their religious observances secretly. The Franciscans scouted their methods. In spite of a Papal bull, which put Japan beyond their scope, they persisted in going into the country, penetrating even to Kyoto, which was then the Imperial residence, and making a number of converts. A purely fortuitous act brought their doom. A Spanish galleon, on her way from Manila to South America, drifted on to the rocks and, being very richly laden, was seized as a prize. The pilot, in a last effort to save his vessel, showed the Japanese officers a map of the world and the vast extent of the Spanish dominions. Asked to explain how one