This list of exports and imports furnishes some clue to the industries and customs of the Japanese of that era. Foreign trade flourished greatly, and a spirit of enterprise prevailed throughout the country. Date Masamune, feudal chief of Sendai, sent an envoy to Rome who came back eventually to Japan, having devoted seven years to studying the state of affairs in Rome, where he was received in audience by the Pope. Early in the seventeenth century one Yamada Nagamasa (or Nizayemon), a native of Suruga, crossed to Siam, and organizing a force with the Japanese settlers in that country--who had already become sufficiently numerous to people a village, hence called _Nippon-machi_--rendered material assistance to the king of the country, twice quelling a rebellion that prevailed at the time. This same Yamada, fighting always for Siam, led his troops against an invading army of Spaniards and defeated them, an exploit regarded with the greatest admiration at that era when the prestige of the Spanish arms was at its height. The king rewarded Yamada by adopting him into the royal family and giving him his own daughter in marriage, so that the Japanese adventurer's name became widely renowned. Another example of the adventurous spirit of the age was afforded by Hamada Yahei, who led a considerable force to Formosa, to avenge the plunder of a Japanese ship by the natives, and having overrun the island, brought back the son of the chief as a hostage to Nagasaki. Unfortunately, however, unexpected religious squabbles fatally interrupted the course of the country's foreign trade. The Dutch settlers made a discovery, real or pretended, that the Portuguese and Spanish missionaries, leaguing themselves with the native Christians, were plotting to overthrow the Japanese government. Many proofs of the truth of this accusation were submitted to the shōgun by the Dutch, and color was lent to the charge by evidence that the missionaries themselves or their converts behaved with much intolerance and arrogance. The Edo government was moved by these accusations and by the doings of the missionaries to take active steps against them. Several of the principal were put to death and the rest were expelled. Shortly afterward an order was issued against the voyages of the _shuin-bune_ and it was further declared unlawful to construct ships of more than a certain size, while, at the same time, the method of construction was so modified that distant voyages became impossible. Travel to foreign countries was also strictly interdicted, and as a necessary consequence the arts of ship-building and navigation sensibly declined. It was at this epoch, too, that the Christian rebellion of Shimabara occurred, culminating in the battle of Amakusa in 1637-1638, which had a decisive influence upon the foreign policy of the Tokugawa.