Japan and the Japanese

478 JAPAN. A. D. 18111813.
form to Japanese ideas of etiquette for him to land on the same
day with his sailors. He confessed to Rikord that he had been
greatly wounded by the threat to carry him to Okhotsk. It was not
consistent with Japanese ideas, that a man of his
position should
remain a prisoner
in a
foreign country, and he had therefore made
He had accord-
up his mind to prevent it by cutting himself open.
ingly cut off the tuft of hair from his head, and he showed that
it was gone, and had laid it in the box with his picture ; it being
customary with those about to die honorably, by their own hands, in
a distant place, to send this token to their friends, who bury the
tuft of hair with all the ceremonies which they would have bestowed
upon the body. And he even intimated that previous to doing this
execution on himself, he might first have stabbed Rikord and the
next in command.
Kachi exerted himself with the greatest energy in the matter of
the negotiation, and he soon was able to produce a letter, in the
hand-writing of Golownin, and signed by him and Moor, but which
the jealousy of their keepers had limited to the simple announce-
ment that they were alive and well at Matsmai. Afterwards one
of the imprisoned Russian sailors was brought on board the
ship,
allowed to
being sent from Matsmai for that purpose ; but, though
spend his days on board the Diana, he was required to return to the
fort every night. In spite, however, of all the watchfulness of the
Japanese, he had brought sewed up in his jacket a letter from
Golownin, in which he recommended prudence, civility, candor, and
especially patience, and entreated that no letters nor anything else
should be sent him which might cause him to be tormented with
questions and translations.
The Japanese would not deliver up their till
prisoners
the Diara
first sailed to Okhotsk, and brought from the authorities there a
formal written disavowal of the hostilities of Chwostoff. At Okhotsk
was found the letter from the governor of Irkutsk, previously sent
for at Kachi's suggestion, and with this document and another
letter from the commander at Okhotsk, the Diana reached Hokodade
towards the end of October.
" As we approached the town," says Rikord, " we observed that
cloth was hung out only at a few places on the hill, or near it, and
not over the whole buildings, as at Kunashir. With the assistance