That not a few Chinese migrated to Japan in remote times is clear. The Records show that in the year A.D. 540, during the reign of Kimmei, immigrants from Tsin and Han were assembled and registered, when their number was found to be 7053 households. The terms "Tsin" and "Han" refer to Chinese dynasties of those names, whose sway covered the period between 255 B.C. and A.D. 419. Hence the expression is too vague to suggest any definite idea of the advent of those settlers; but the story of some, who came through Korea, has already been traced. It was in A.D. 552, during the reign of this same Kimmei, that Buddhism may be said to have found a home in Japan. China was then under the sceptre of the Liang dynasty, whose first sovereign, Wu, had been such an enthusiastic Buddhist that he abandoned the throne for a monastery.. Yet China took no direct part in introducing the Indian faith to Japan, nor does it appear that from the fourth century A.D. down to the days of Shotoku Taishi, Japan thought seriously of having recourse to China as the fountain-head of the arts, the crafts, the literature, and the moral codes which she borrowed during the period from Korea. Something of this want of enterprise may have been attributable to the unsettled state of China's domestic politics; something to the well-nigh perpetual troubles between Japan and Korea--troubles which not only taxed Japan's resources but also blocked the sole route by which China was then accessible, namely, the route through Korea. But when the Sui dynasty (A.D. 589-619) came to the Chinese throne, its founder, the Emperor Wen, on the one hand, devoted himself to encouraging literature and commerce; and on the other, threw Korea and Japan into a ferment by invading the former country at the head of a huge army.* This happened when Shotoku Taishi was in his sixteenth year, and though the great expedition proved abortive for aggressive purposes, it brought China into vivid prominence, and when news reached Japan of extensions of the Middle Kingdom's territories under Wen's successor, the Japanese Crown Prince determined to open direct intercourse with the Sui Court; not only for literary and religious purposes, but also to study the form of civilization which the whole Orient then revered. This resolve found practical expression in the year 607, when the omi Imoko was sent as envoy to the Sui Court, a Chinese of the Saddlers' Corporation, by name Fukuri, being attached to him in the capacity of interpreter. China received these men hospitably and sent an envoy of her own, with a suite of twelve persons, to the Yamato sovereign in the following year. *Reputed to have mustered 300,000 strong.