We were met at the tea-house by Mr. Sibbald, interpreter, and young Hodges, studying to become one; and attended by a mounted escort from Yedo, as unlike cavalry soldiers as a feminine dress and diminutive appearance could make them. The present Legation, although not large, is most pleasantly situated on high ground, with a flag-staff on which the flag of _Perfide Albion_ may be seen from every part of Yedo! [Sidenote: Yedo, June 18.] We found Bertram Mitford delightfully situated on another eminence within a few minutes’ walk, while Adams had taken possession of the snug little house formerly occupied by Mitford. A small cemetery separating the two--most convenient for the joint mess. Sibbald came in during the evening; he had accompanied the Tycoon’s younger brother in his travels and visited with him most of the Courts of Europe. He described the young Jap as intelligent and shrewd in his remarks, although he got occasionally bored by over-sightseeing. In answer to one of his questions why our ladies exposed so much of their persons in evening dress, he was told, “Out of compliment to His Highness”; on which he supposed if his Emperor had been there they would have come naked! Nor could he understand high personages dancing: a performance in his country he paid people for doing. Nothing can be cleaner, prettier, or nicer than these Jap houses for summer residences. The house at Yokohama, engrossing all the best furniture, the accommodation here assumed a most agreeable sort of “roughing it.” A party on horseback, and two carriages, in one of which Parkes drove my wife, went to see the tombs of the Shogoons (so Mitford spells what we pronounce Tycoon, and he is sure to be right) at Zôôji, at Shiba, the castle, and other sights in Yedo, which I, fancying I had seen before, did not join, preferring the cool of the pretty grounds about the Legation. [Sidenote: June 21.] Have some two days’ back journal to write up. In the afternoon news reached us of the loss of the _Haya Maro_, a fine steamer bound to Osaka, which seems to have struck on the same rock as the _Nepaul_ about two years ago, situated about 200 yards to the eastward of the well-known Plymouth rocks. She was going at the rate of 14 knots, her bottom was torn out and she went down head foremost in less than five minutes in 40 fathoms water. The only excuse for cutting the point so close was to shorten the distance a cable’s length, the captain having made a bet he would accomplish the voyage to Osaka in thirty hours. Among the twenty-one lives lost was an old China friend, Margesson, who dined with us only a week ago. Poor fellow! after service as a merchant for some twenty-eight years, he was on his way home to enjoy the fruits of his labours.