So, having said his say
for once, he was led forth and executed, thirty-one years
old.
A military engineer, a bold traveller (at least in wish), a
poet, a patriot, a schoolmaster, a friend to learning, a
martyr to reform, - there are not many men, dying at seventy,
who have served their country in such various characters. He
was not only wise and provident in thought, but surely one of
the fieriest of heroes in execution. It is hard to say which
is most remarkable - his capacity for command, which subdued
his very jailors; his hot, unflagging zeal; or his stubborn
superiority to defeat. He failed in each particular
enterprise that he attempted; and yet we have only to look at
his country to see how complete has been his general success.
His friends and pupils made the majority of leaders in that
final Revolution, now some twelve years old; and many of them
are, or were until the other day, high placed among the
rulers of Japan. And when we see all round us these brisk
intelligent students, with their strange foreign air, we
should never forget how Yoshida marched afoot from Choshu to
Yeddo, and from Yeddo to Nangasaki, and from Nangasaki back
again to Yeddo; how he boarded the American ship, his dress
stuffed with writing material; nor how he languished in
prison, and finally gave his death, as he had formerly given
all his life and strength and leisure, to gain for his native
land that very benefit which she now enjoys so largely.
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