At this stage the residents of the Capital had become somewhat accustomed to see the Emperor riding or driving through the streets of the metropolis, for he periodically reviewed his troops on the Hibiya parade ground, and not infrequently was to be seen visiting places at some distance from his capital. The greatest concern was manifested by all classes when, late one night in the spring of 1873, the signal guns were heard to announce that a fire had broken out within the castle. There was a prompt muster of the forces forming the Tokio garrison and for a while the utmost consternation prevailed. The damage done was immense, and the actual source of the outbreak was discovered to have been in such dangerous proximity to the imperial apartments as to suggest for the moment that there had again been a preconcerted arrangement to seize the person of his Majesty, in the confusion which might well have been expected to arise on the warning guns being fired. Happily the monarch was efficiently guarded, and whatever may have been the true cause of the conflagration there was no difficulty in removing the Court to another palace at Akasaka, in the suburbs, wherein his Majesty dwelt during the rebuilding on a modern design of the imperial residence within the Honmaru. In the thoroughfares of Tokio were at this time to be seen scores of Satsuma samurai, retainers of the feudal chieftain Shimadzu Saburo, who was occupying the position in the new Government of Sa-dai-jin, or Vice-president of the Left, as already mentioned, and these ardent spirits of the warlike clan of the south found much in the changes that were then taking place to be displeased with. They persisted in wearing their two swords in their belts, and had their hair dressed in the old-fashioned queue. Their retention of the old style of costume, too, with its loose trousers, sandals for the feet, and lacquered helmet tied with cords for the chin, among a population that was already beginning to adopt foreign fashions to a notable extent, made them conspicuous and provoked the ridicule of the lower classes. This the Satsuma clansmen were quick to resent, and here and there slight skirmishes were recorded, the general effect being to create a feeling of uneasiness which lasted for many weeks until the Satsuma chieftain, as elsewhere explained, resigned his office and returned to his stronghold of Kagoshima in the summer of 1873.