._

Several minor but noteworthy steps in reform were taken. The ancient
disqualifications of the _eta_ and _heimin_ were removed in 1871, and
these pariahs placed on the same legal footing as the rest of the
population. The first railway in Japan was opened between Yokohama and
Tokyo in 1872. The European calendar, so far as it regarded the beginning
of the year and the beginning of the months, was adopted in 1873. The year
was still counted from Jimmu Tenno, 1873 of the Christian era
corresponding to 2533 of the Japanese era, and also by the _Meiji_
year-period, the commencement of which was from 1868.

Several international events deserve notice here. A number of Ryukyu
islanders (vassals of Japan) had been shipwrecked on Formosa and some
killed by the semi-savage inhabitants. To punish this cruelty, and to
insure a more humane treatment in the future, the Japanese government sent
an expedition under General Saigo Tsugumichi. They made short work of the
inhuman tribes and enforced upon them the lesson of civility. China, who
claimed a sovereignty over this island, acknowledged the service Japan had
rendered, and agreed to pay an indemnity for the expenses of the
expedition.

The long-pending dispute between Russia and Japan concerning the boundary
in Saghalien was settled in 1875 by a treaty(335) which exchanged the
Japanese claims in Saghalien for the Kurile islands (Chishima).

An unexpected attack by the Koreans upon a Japanese steamer asking coal
and provisions awakened an intense excitement in Japan. An expedition
after the pattern of Commodore Perry's, under the command of General
Kuroda Kiyotaka, was despatched in January, 1876, to come to an
understanding with the Koreans. The negotiations were entirely successful,
and a treaty(336) of amity and commerce was concluded, and thus another of
the secluded kingdoms of the East had been brought into the comity of
nations. Then outbreaks of this kind in Saga, in Higo, in Akizuki, and in
Choshu occurred, but they were all put down without difficulty or delay.
The promptness with which the government dealt with these factions boded
no good to the reactionary movements that were ready to break out in other
places.

Although the Satsuma clan had taken the most prominent part in the
destruction of the shogunate and in the restoration of an imperial
government, there was in it a greater amount of conservatism and
opposition to modern innovations than was to be found