ABSTRACT
The pigtail stuffed into the hood came dangling loosely down his back. Now he could see before him a rope ladder hanging from the ship's deck. There, in the open sea before Bonotsu in the domain of Satsuma, Lian boarded his vessel bound for Nagasaki. The year was 1849, second year of the Kaei reign in Japan. In that year, the Qing government in China sent eight trading ships to Nagasaki, though Number Seven had been shipwrecked at Amakusa. Lian was boarding Number Four in Satsuma bay. The monopoly agency that saw to the trade for the shogunal authorities was known as the Nagasaki Hall. When the instruments of celebration quieted down, an inspector and the interpreters from the office of the Nagasaki Administrator boarded the Chinese vessel. The intimacy between Chinese men and Nagasaki prostitutes actually seemed rather exaggerated to him. During the golden age of Nagasaki, copper was Japan's principal export item.
