D E Long to Minister for Foreign Affairs, January 15, 1871

Mr. DeLong to Minister for Foreign Affairs

Your excellency’s dispatch of yesterday, conveying to me the startling information of the assault made upon Messrs. Dallas and King, was received by me to-day. Thanking you for it, and complimenting you and all of the authorities of your government for the remarkable degree, of activity manifested in the attempts to arrest the perpetrators, I beg leave to assure you of my great regret for this most important affair.

Such occurrences as these, I beg leave to assure you do more to impair the credit of the Empire abroad than years of effort on the part of your well-disposed people can do to build it up.

These acts discourage your friends, and will develop a disposition in the foreign mind for retaliation which may one day assume form and involve your government in the gravest consequences.

I beg leave to assure you that I am convinced of the utter insecurity of foreigners, even within the treaty limits of the open ports of your Empire.

Something should at once be done, not merely to avenge this or similar atrocities, but to prevent their recurrence.

I can see but one way of effecting the result desired, and that is for your government to prohibit by law the carrying of arms by your people within the treaty limits where foreigners are allowed to go, excepting, of course, your officials, soldiery, and officers on duty. This is a simple, and will prove an efficacious remedy, and I can see no other.

Outrages of this kind must be expected so long as one-half of the Japanese people in these cities are allowed constantly to carry two swords about with them.

I beg leave to urge upon you and your government the expediency of at once adopting a law of this nature for the government of the treaty ports.

With respect,