Japan and the Japanese

LETTERS FROM THE POPE. 93
proposed new seminary at Fucheo with an annual dotation of four
thousand Roman crowns.
* but his successor, Sixtus
Gregory XIII. died a few days after ;
V., who, as cardinal of Monte Alto, had taken greatly to the
Japanese, was not less favorable to them as Pope. They assisted,
among the other ambassadors of kings, at his coronation, bearing
the canopy and holding the basin for his Holiness to wash in when
he said mass. They had the same honors when the pontiff was
enthroned at Saint John Lateran. The holy father afterwards
invited them to visit his country-house, where they were splendidly
entertained and regaled on his behalf by his steward and four-and-
twenty prelates.
Finally, on the eve of the Ascension, in the presence of all the
Koman nobility, they were dubbed knights of the
gilded spurs.
The Pope himself girded on their swords, while the spurs of the
two princes were buckled on by the ambassadors of France and
Venice, and those of the two others by the Marquis Altemps ; after
which the Pope placed about their necks chains of gold, to which
his medal was attached, and kissed and embraced them. The next
day his Holiness said mass in person, and they communicated from
his hand. He dismissed them with briefs, addressed to their
princes,
of which the following may serve as a sample :
" BRIEF OF POPE SIXTUS V. TO THE KING OF ARIMA.
" JVoble prince and our well-beloved son, salvation and apostolical bene-
diction.
" Our well-beloved son Dom Michael, your ambassador to this court, deliv-
ered to Pope Gregory XIII., our predecessor, of holy and happy memory, now,
as we must presume, in glory, the letters with which your majesty had
charged him ; and after these letters had been publicly read, he rendered to
that pontiff the obedience due to the vicar of Jesus Christ, and which all
Catholic kings are accustomed to render to him. This was done in presence
of all the cardinals of the holy church, then assembled at Rome, of which
number we were. A greater concourse of persons of all conditions, and a
greater public joy, had never been seen. Shortly after, it having pleased God
to charge us, without our having in the least merited it, with the government
of his church, we have also received with entirely paternal tenderness the
* His reception of the Japanese and his reformation of the calendar are
both recorded together in his epitaph.