20 large guns. After this visit orders were given to the Kiusiu Daimios to have always in readiness a force of 55,000 men and 997 guard-boats for the protection of the coasts. In the year 1666 another edict was issued against the Roman Catholics, so that it would appear that some sparks of the faith were still lingering here and there, which the government feared might at any moment be fanned into flame. In the year 1709, Abbé Sidotti, an Italian priest of good family, determined to devote himself to the cause, and to make another attempt to regain Japan to the Church of Rome. With difficulty he found a captain of a vessel trading at Manila, who agreed to put him ashore on some point of the coast, and there to leave him to his own resources. When off the coast of Satsuma a boat was lowered, and the abbé, with a few small coins in his pocket, was put on shore. The boat returned, and the ship sailed away. After a long interval, a report reached the Dutch factory, through Chinese, that the abbé had been taken and immured between two walls, and allowed to perish of hunger. But this has lately been disproved by the discovery of a full account of his arrest and examination, and detention about Yedo until his death, which does not appear to have taken place for many years. This was the last effort made by the Church of Rome to regain the footing she had lost. Hidetada, the son and successor of Iyeyas, would seem not to have possessed the talents or firmness of his father, but he had the advantage of his father’s advice and assistance during the greater part of his rule. His son, Iyaymitz, when he was capable of ruling, and had come to the office of Shiogoon, found that the spirit of the Daimios had been softened by the long peace. The yoke of the Tokungawa family did not gall their necks, and they preferred peace and ease in the assured possession of their estates, to the risk and violence of wars and constant disturbance in the empire. Iyaymitz on more than one occasion visited the Emperor in Miako with great pomp, but a real or suspected attempt to assassinate him seems to have put a stop to these visits.