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fled, because the Japanese law punishes severely those engaged in trading with human beings, and from San Francisco he telegraphed to his Government asking for protection. The Peruvian Government sent a special mission with two men-of-war to Japan, to demand an explanation and indemnity for the release of the coolies. But when the Peruvian representative arrived in the United States he heard of the attitude of the Japanese Government, and foresaw the ridiculous situation in which he would be placed if he were to appear in Yokohama with two men-of-war. He therefore left them at San Francisco, and came to Japan in an American passenger-boat, with only a few attendants. The negotiations then entered into resulted in a reference of the case to the arbitration of the Emperor of Russia, who, on the 14th of June, 1875, pronounced the proceedings of the Japanese Government to have been entirely legal.

This diplomatic victory had important effects. Macao was up to this time a great centre of the Chinese coolie trade, but now the Portuguese Governor of the port notified the Japanese Government that rigorous measures of suppression would be taken for the future. The French Minister in Tokyo applied for the cancelling of the letter addressed to Soyejima, disapproving his measures, and the American Minister, Mr. Delong, became a very great friend of Japan. Also the Government of Great Britain and Ireland issued instructions to the Governors of British possessions in the East that the case of the Maria Luz should serve as precedent for like cases happening in British waters in the future.

The rapprochement made to the Court of Peking through the affair of the Maria Luz was utilized by Soyejima for solving the questions of Corea and Liukiu. The Coreans, elated by their apparent success against the Americans in the summer of 1871, now issued laws prohibiting all intercourse with the Japanese, so that military expedition now seemed more necessary than ever should China only give us freedom of action. Again, in the December of the same year a Liukiu junk was stranded on the eastern coast of Formosa, and fifty-four out of the sixty-six people of Liukiu composing the crew were killed by the Botan savages. The Liukiu Government sought for the protection of Japan, and since then the question of Liukiu was on the order of the day. The next year saw Liukiu reduced to one of the provinces of Japan, as already seen, and for this act it was necessary to obtain China’s official recognition, utilizing, perhaps, the Formosan