When Achi had resided seventeen years in Japan, he and his son were sent to Wu (China) for the purpose of engaging women versed in making dress materials. The title of omi (chief ambassador) seems to have been then conferred on the two men, as envoys sent abroad were habitually so designated. They did not attempt to go by sea. The state of navigation was still such that ocean-going voyages were not seriously thought of. Achi and his son proceeded in the first instance to Koma (the modern Pyong-yang) and there obtained guides for the overland journey round the shore of the Gulf of Pechili. They are said to have made their way to Loh-yang where the Tsin sovereigns then had their capital (A.D. 306). Four women were given to them, whom they carried back to Japan, there to become the ancestresses of an uji known as Kure no kinu-nui and Kaya no kinu-nui (clothiers of Kure and of Kaya), appellations which imply Korean origin, but were probably suggested by the fact that Korea had been the last continental station on their route. The journey to and from Loh-yang occupied four years. This page of history shows not only the beginning of Japan's useful intercourse with foreign countries, but also her readiness to learn what they had to teach and her liberal treatment of alien settlers. THE ART OF WRITING It is not infrequently stated that a knowledge of Chinese ideographs was acquired by the Japanese for the first time during the reign of Ojin. The basis of this belief are that, in A.D. 284, according to the Japanese chronology--a date to which must be added two sexagenary cycles, bringing it to A.D. 404--the King of Kudara sent two fine horses to the Yamato sovereign, and the man who accompanied them, Atogi by name, showed himself a competent reader of the Chinese classics and was appointed tutor to the Prince Imperial. By Atogi's advice a still abler scholar, Wani (Wang-in), was subsequently invited from Kudara to take Atogi's place, and it is added that the latter received the title of fumi-bito (scribe), which he transmitted to his descendants in Japan. But close scrutiny does not support the inference that Chinese script had remained unknown to Japan until the above incidents. What is proved is merely that the Chinese classics then for the first time became an open book in Japan.