PRUYN, Minister Resident of the United States in Japan to Mes, March 14, 1865

Mr. Pruyn to Mr. Winchester and Mr. Van Polsbroek

Gentlemen: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your joint letter of the 11th instant, with its enclosures, consisting of a minute of what took place at your recent conference with the Gorogio, and of a memorandum which on that occasion you presented to them.

The rumors to which you therein refer had not escaped my notice, but the project which they indicated was so manifestly in violation of existing treaties, and so incapable of execution, as to have failed to induce me to seek a conference with my colleagues, much less make it the subject of a formal note. I understood you, however, to say, when you verbally communicated to me the result of your conference, that they had assumed such shape and consistency as not to permit you to pass them by unnoticed. I should not have been indisposed, therefore, in conjunction with my colleagues, to have made them the subject of a joint memorandum, in which we should have declared to the Japanese government that the treaties contemplated only trade between the citizens and subjects of the different powers, and that any governmental interference, either by a purchase of the surplus products of the country or any part of them, or by preventing their reaching the open ports, or by sending them beyond those ports, would be justly regarded as an infraction of those treaties.

The signal success which has attended the cordial co-operation of the representatives of the four powers in matters of common interest induces me to regret that there should have been an interruption of joint action, which I am disposed, however, to attribute rather to the suddenness of your determination while in Yedo to seek the interview, than to any want of courtesy to your colleagues, or of desire to obtain their concurrence. Apart from the necessity of manifesting to the Japanese government the continuance of this purpose of concerted action, I regret it the more as it deprives me of an opportunity of suggesting an important modification of your memorandum, to which I directed your attention at our interview immediately on your return from Yedo. I cannot admit “that there is no objection to the Japanese government sending abroad silk to pay for stores, ships, and munitions.” The Japanese government would necessarily be the sole judge of the extent to which such right should be exercised. My objection extends 10 the principle, and any violation of it should meet with immediate and strong remonstrance. I was not aware till after the receipt of your letter that you had made the convention of October last the subject of any remark at that interview. In the absence of any despatches from my government since the receipt of the convention in the United States, I am unable to say what its decision or preference will be if the alternative of some eligible port shall be offered for the acceptance of the four powers. I cannot doubt, however, that our governments, when the proper time arrives, will act in concert after full consultation. While disposed to interpret your remarks at the recent conference to be such as it was declared to be by the convention—the establishment of better relations with Japan, and not the receipt of money—I would have suggested and counselled, had opportunity been afforded, that no communication should have been made in reference thereto, in the absence of positive instructions, until the representatives of the four powers were able to unite therein.

I embrace this opportunity to renew the assurance of my desire to cultivate and maintain unimpaired that perfect accord on the part of the representatives of the treaty powers which has been so happily established, and which has been productive of so much good, as most agreeable to my own wishes and the instructions of the President of the United States, and as the best security for the preservation of our common treaty rights.

I have the honor to be, gentlemen, your most obedient servant,