It is always believed in Japan that it was on Okubo’s advice that the sovereign, then only sixteen years of age, resolved to appear in public, a departure from established custom which foreshadowed the vast changes that his subjects were to witness within the ensuing few years. Okubo strenuously urged the advisability of assembling the territorial lords to hear from the monarch’s own lips the plans that had been formed in council for the future administration of the empire, and at the memorable meeting which took place in April 1869, with this object in view the Emperor declared himself in favour of the establishment of a deliberative representative body empowered to discuss the management of national affairs, and he also pronounced his intention of providing adequately for the defence of the country by land and sea, and of doing away with all pernicious customs while securing to the individual perfect freedom and liberty of conscience. The hand of Okubo was seen in the regulations for the conduct of debates in the Kogisho, or first deliberative assembly, and he was ever a trusted adviser of the sovereign on matters of both internal and external policy. In the Ko-mon, or advisers of the So-Sai, whose office was almost identical with that in later years of Prime Minister, Okubo found able and willing coadjutors, and it was in no slight measure due to his personal capabilities that the new administration was firmly established at Tokio in 1868. A memorable mission was that undertaken by Okubo to Peking in 1874. The savages of Formosa had been guilty of most inhuman conduct to some shipwrecked Japanese fishermen, and China, at that time claiming the island as part of her empire, had been appealed to in vain with regard to their punishment or as regards the needful security against cruel practices in the future. Failing redress in any other shape, Japan had despatched an expedition on her own account to the island, and though the Japanese troops had encountered many and great difficulties, owing to the savages retreating to their mountain fastnesses whither it was extraordinarily hard work to pursue them, in the end they had been severely handled by General Saigo Tsukumichi,—afterwards Marquis—and some sort of guarantee exacted for their better behaviour towards shipwrecked persons of whatever nationality in the days to come. China, however, had become not a little alarmed at the progress that the Japanese forces were making with the subjugation of the barbarians, a task that she had not herself thought it worth while to essay, and made proposals for the prompt withdrawal of the invading army. Okubo went to Peking armed with plenary powers to arrange terms, and he arrived there in September 1874. The Chinese wanted to treat with him on the basis of reimbursing Japan for the outlay she had incurred in the expedition, which was what Japan herself desired, and of guaranteeing that there should be