For the pictures of camps, fleets, the details of armory and commissariat, and all the pomp and circumstance that make up the bright side of Japanese war preparations in 1591 and 1592, we are indebted, not only to the Japanese writers, but to those eye witnesses and excellent “war correspondents,” the Portuguese missionaries then in Kiushiu, and especially to Friar Louis Frois. He tells us of the amplitude, vigor, and brilliancy of Taikō’s measures for invasion, and adds that the expenses therefor greatly burdened the “ethniques” or daimiōs who had to pay the cost. Those feudatories, whose domain bordered the sea, had to furnish a mighty fleet of junks, while to man them, the quota of every hundred houses of the fishing population was ten sailors. The land and naval forces assembled at Nagoya, in Hizen, now called Karatsu, and famous for being the chief place for the manufacture of Hizen porcelain. Here a superb castle was built, while huge inns or resting-places were erected all along the road from Kiōto. The armies gathered here during the war numbered 500,000 men; of whom 150,000 formed the army of invasion, 60,000 the first reserve, while 100,000 were set apart as Taikō’s body-guard; the remainder were sailors, servants, camp followers, etc. Beside the old veterans were new levies of young soldiers, and a corps of matchlock men, who afterward did good execution among the Coreans. The possession of this new and terrible weapon gave the invaders a mighty advantage over their enemies. Though firearms had been known and manufactured in Japan for a half century, this was the first time they were used against foreign enemies, or on a large scale. Taikō also endeavored to hire or buy from the Portuguese two ships of war, so as to use their artillery; but in this he failed, and the troops were despatched in native-built vessels. These made a gallant display as they crowded together by hundreds. At the signal, given by the firing of cannon, the immense fleet hoisted sail and, under a fresh breeze, bore away to the west.