LIFE AND LETTERS OF JOSEPH HARDY NEESIMA

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LOCAL AUTHORITIES OVERRULED. 217 the city. "This," he writes, "is the gravest matter we have ever experienced. V\T e will bear it with all the grace we have got, but if the despotic governor does not cease to ill-treat us we will burst out and ap­peal to the supreme power." On consultation with the American minister and the .J apauese minister of foreign affairs he found the chief cause of complaint to be the fact that while the Dosllisha was nominally a Japanese company, its funds were derived from for­eign sources, and that in the name of education its real object was the extension of Christianity. The growth and prosperity of the school and the establish­ment of the Kyoto Home for gids had arousecl the enmity of the local governor; the authorities at Tokyo declined to interfere; Dr. Taylor had been forbidden to practice medicine even in his own house, and was finally ordered out of the city; the outlook was dis­couragmg, and Mr. Neesima wrote a strong appeal to America for a permanent fund. "If we have such a fund," he said, "although coming from a foreign source and managed by foreigners, yet we can say that we support our teachers with our own money." The refusal of the Kyoto governor to permit the entrance of the lady teachers was, after four months' delay, overruled by Count Inouye. "I conveyed to him," writes Mr. Neesima, "my idea, that it is impos­sible to check Christianity, because it is a li,uing prin­ciple. If crushed in one city it will surely burst forth in another. The best way is to leave it alone, else Japan will lose her best patriots. The decision of the central government was in our favor and the plan of the local authorities was utterly defeated. Glory to our living God! " Mr. Neesima was exceedingly tried at this time.

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