Earnestly desirous of impressing the Japanese with American resources and inventions, the Commodore on March 27th, 1851, had notified the Department of his intention to obtain specimens of every sort of mechanical products, arms and machinery, with statistical and other volumes illustrating the advance of the useful arts. In addition to this, he notified manufacturers of his wish to obtain samples of every description. Armed with letters from his friends, the Appletons of New York, he visited Albany, Boston, New Bedford and Providence to obtain what he desired, and to inquire into personal details and statistics of the American whalers engaged in Japanese and Chinese waters. An unexpectedly great interest was arising from all quarters concerning Japan and the expedition thither. All with whom he had interviews were enthusiastic and liberal in aiding him. At New Bedford he learned that American capital to the amount of seventeen millions was invested in the whaling industry in the seas of Japan and China. Thousands of our sailors manned the ships thus employed. This was before the days of petroleum and the electric light. It explained also why American shipwrecked sailors were so often found in Japan. There were reciprocal additions to the populations on both sides of the Pacific. While the Kuro Shiwo, or Black Current, was sweeping Japanese junks out to sea and lining the west coast of North America with wrecks and waifs, the rocky shores of the Sunrise Kingdom were liberally strewn with castaways, to whom the American flag was the sign of home. The cause of this remarkable development of American enterprise in distant seas lay in the liberal policy of Russia toward our people. Our first treaty of 1824 declared the navigation and fisheries of the Pacific free to both nations. The second convention of 1838, signed by James Buchanan and Count Nesselrode, guaranteed to citizens of the United States freedom to enter all ports, places and rivers on the Alaskan coast under Russian protection. Already the northern Pacific was virtually an American possession. There was great eagerness on the part of scientific men and learned societies to be represented in the proposed expedition. Much pressure was brought to bear upon the Commodore to organize a corps of experts in the sciences, or to allow favored individual civilians to enter the fleet. Perry firmly declined all such offers. He proposed to duplicate none of his predecessor’s blunders, nor to imperil his personal reputation or the success of a costly expedition by the presence of landsmen of any sort on board. He sent his son to China at his own private expense. The expedition was saved the previous tribulations of Aulick, or the later afflictions of De Long in the _Jeannette_.