The brilliant and successful foreign policy of President Andrew Jackson in Europe, has been already noted. Even Asia felt his influence. Mr. Edmund Roberts[21], a sea captain of Portsmouth, N. H., was named by President Jackson, his “agent” for the purpose of “examining in the Indian ocean the means of extending the commerce of the United States by commercial arrangements with the Powers whose dominions border on those seas.” He was ordered, January 27, 1832, to embark on the United States Sloop-of-war, _Peacock_, in which he was rated as captain’s clerk. On the 23rd of July, he was ordered “to be very careful in obtaining information respecting Japan, the means of opening a communication with it, and the value of its trade with the Dutch and Chinese.” Arriving at Canton, he might receive further instructions. He had with him blanks. On the 28th of October, 1832, Edward Livingstone, the United States Secretary of State, instructed him that the United States had it in contemplation to institute a separate mission to Japan. If, however, a favorable opportunity presented, he might fill up a letter and present it to the “Emperor” for the purpose of opening trade. Roberts was successful in inaugurating diplomatic and commercial relations with Muscat and Siam, but, on account of his premature death, nothing came of his mission to Japan. He died June 12, 1836, at Macao, where his tomb duly inscribed, is in the Protestant cemetery. Commodore Kennedy in the _Peacock_, with the schooner _Enterprise_, visited the Bonin Islands in August 1837, an account of which was written by Doctor Ruschenberger,[22] the fleet surgeon. The sight of the flowery flag of “Bé-koku” or the United States, became more and more familiar to the Japanese coasting and ship population, as the riches of the whaling waters became better known in America. The American whalers were so numerous in the Japan seas by the year 1850, that eighty-six of the “black ships” were counted as passing Matsumaé in twelve months. Perry found that no fewer than ten thousand of our people were engaged in this business. Furthermore, the Japanese waifs blown out to sea were drifted into the Black Current and to the Kurile and Aleutian islands, to Russian and British America, to Oregon and California, and even to Hawaii.