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ADDREIS OF
CHARLES S. HAMLIN

AT THT DIN'ER TENDTRED BY TH-T JAPAN SOCI7TY TO HIS 7XCELL7NCY
YR. HANIHARA
AMBASSADOR OF JAPAN TO TH2 UNITED "TAT7S
HOTEL .CTOR, N.Y., MARCH 10, 1924.

MR. PRZFIDENT, YOUR TACELLENCY, LADI7S AND C7NTLW:TN:-

I -Nant, at thl outset, to thank you for your invitl.tion to
attend this recJi,ticn and limner to cur oaest, His Excellency,
Mr. Hanihara, Ambassador of Japan to th

United States.

When your

invit tion reached ma, I feared at first that my official duties In
Washington, as a member of the Federal Rescrve Bo:1rd, muld preclude
my acceptance, but then I re_lized what an oportunity was afforded
M9 of p4yin

a tribute of respect and affection not only to an old

vallied friend, but, as well, to the gre.At ccuntry which he Ti.o worthily
renresents, I felt that the invitation from your

ocity C3M9 as a

command, but indeed a command which it as a - enuine pl?asure VO obey.
Our gust has had a distinruished diplawAtic career.
knew him as Secretary of Jie Legation, an
Washinr,ton, in 1901.

later of tha Eabasy. at

He held an iri4ortant position at th,?. Peace

ConiThrence at Portsmouth, N. H. in 1907.
San Francl—co in 1916.

I first

He was Consul Gem:ral at

In 1917 he cae to thL, ccuntry as a member

of the Mission headed by Viscount Ishii.
of Foreign Affairs at Tokio.

In 1919, he was Vice Minister

In 1921 he was cne cf Ale principal

delegAtez; to th-) Wachinjtcn Conf7)ranc:: on Liwitaticn of Arm:.-11Lants, and




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in 1922 he came to us fAs Ambassador of Jaan.
As

I have

atd, I hava known him inttvitely for many ye -xs. I

remeMber zo well delieltful visite paid by him to me in Boston over
twenty years ago, and I hav3 followed his c,J.reer since t]mln with the
greatest intera t and admiration.
For the D.,4st thirty ye.i.rs it haa boon my -,00d fortune to know
intimtaly mo:.t of the repr3enttiven of Japan to the United States.
I ram:nib-3r so well the n'Imo3, - Tateno, KurLno„ T6kahlra, Uchitia,
Komur, ainda, Sato, Ishii ..1nL Shidelra.

They ;r

first r„nk, ';orthy repre3entativeb of their

ll len of the

country.

Our gue,it

of the evening fittingly mAntains their high -1,1ndard; in fact, I can
say with confidence thz.t

we

hsve nev3r had a reprentative from Japan

who inspired in us such 104e :ma affection as does cur prewent Amba:ador.
men.

When I first came to Lnox him,

Ha was molA companionable, bright

a reputation for Lood fellowship.

W3

w3re comp-rativ3ly young

nd theerful,and quickly attained

On the other hand, he .as a most

serLous and thoughtful- student und v]=tav-ir task was given to him to
work out, he worked upon it assiduously and when he h.,d finished, the
sUbject had been thought through and exhmeted.

We all At that time

predicted for him a brilliant career Lad our predictionBhase been more
than verified.
The Eyo..-,t nation ha repre-;entls so Nall hut; :llown to the world a
marvellous vrocrehs.

The Elievouls disaster .he It.ts just :one tlirough

has c.aled forth a 3pontanecus expression of sympathy from cur people.
I predict, however, that those ruined cities wil-1 0ring from their
ashes .nd quickly rise to iven highlr plans




of power -,eld influence.

-3.
44.




I haYe als,ys had a deep interlst in Japan, - an inter
2, .1nd I will poin
shared also by ray wlf,

out, vary briefly, acme of

the ecurcee from which that inter st has sprung.
My eifele great grandfather ''.as Captain Edaund Roberts of
Portsmouth,

Piam -shire, who, in 1833, •eas sent by PreAdent Jackson,

in the eloop of war "Peacock," to necr,otiate treaties of tr .de and
commerce wi th some of the La* Eastern powers.
ha relate

In his autobiography

some vIry interlstin„., exDeriencep in the course of his

dillomatic negotiations.

ATcng others, he describes his experiences

in negotiating a tratti with Cochin China.

One of the powerful

iftuadarins of the country came on board, and, ..-Ster a few minutes
eonversr.lt ion, expressed grave doubt Ihether Ca t ,in Roberts was of
sufficiently high rank to tr1,At

Ni th

him, as ho understood that in

the United State:. there -yore no titles. of hence' or nobility.

The

other menben-, of Captain Roberte, party ecndered how he could remove
tha doubt:: of th , Mandarin but tha Captain rose to the occasion end
asked the tfaehLexin to take down a list of his titles which he weuld
El vo to him thrcugh Vh) interpreter.
hi

Chlinoce pencil

Roberts

nct sat

Thn landar in thereupon prepared

on with a eingle sheet of pl%p r. Captain

eAd it emuld not be poseible to put doem hie title- on such

a email sheet of paper.

The Mandarin expressed gre,A nuiprite seying

that his ti ties would nct occupy onl-fcurth of this sheet.
lerve scroll efaft produced :ma Caetain Robert:, began: - "Edmund Roberts,
pecial 'envoy from the United States,
the &tato of New Ham - nhir et."

1,1 a citizen of ?ortemouth in

•

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H3

then proceeded to state tha counties of Rodkingham,

Stafford, Merrimack zInd the other counties of tha 5tate, which the
Mandarin painfully rend:rad into Chinese, !,:‘sking aomewhat impatiently
if there le3re anymore titlev..

Captain Roberts then resumod and

enuI erated the various towns of New Hampshire.

Thase were finally

done into Chinese, %then the Mandarin, completely exh&usted, his bmi
beaded nith perspirtion, asked plaintively if there wore .14yr.are.
Captain Rctarts replied th,t he h..4d. hardly begun.

The Mandarin sb.id it

was unneoent:ary to record tha r!st, flat 11) had a headache and that
tha rolling of the ohip had made him sea sidk.

Captain Roberts then

said 42 wcmld consent to an adjourrramt 5nt,11 the n)xt movninj when
he mould con-olote the liest, as 113 considered it absolutely necestYiry
to give all of his titls. The Captain intended the next morning to
enumerate the mount.tins, rivers and lake

of NeN Haw,shire, to be

followed by the iiame information with recIrd to the other statas of
thl Union.

The next morning, the Mandarin returned and the Captain

::.tarted to go on Ath his enumaratim, but the Mandarin begged him to
detAst, saying thel tha titles already enumerated far exceeded thoel
Sf any Prince of the Empire!

The nepotiations thareunon prodeaded,

Ath this initial difficulty removed.
The next yaar CaptLn Robert

made 'Se-rourne

to th

vith a letter from President Jadkson to the Empsror of Japan.
died on the

East
Ha

homaver, at Macao, where his body noN lia.

I shall always feel that if he had lived to reach Japan, the
splC ndid S3rVie3S rendered later by Commodore Parry would bawl been




•

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anticipated. by him.
It mriy interest you :lso to 1rn that my %vire was e.. cousin
of Robert Pruyn, the first Minister to Ja:?a.n ;lent from the United
Stat r, m.cceeding Townnend Harris.
On my

side, I have deep inter

in this

,,cnkierful ccuntry.

My gre_tt grat r -indfather, Major Eleazer llamlin, of Pe- broke,
Ms.ssachusett, had twelve children, four of wham he mimai for the
',:ontinents, Europe, Asia, Africa ,3n1 krierica, ro:Tectively. /sly great
grandfather 'eyask Asia Thlin

nd my friends 11411M always '.:•.cri'oed my

by, for the far E.tst nd o )ecially for Jar'ian, to this inter .:t-tinc
f GO,
In 1897, President tIcKinl y ild !re the honor to
. Conni:nioner of the United

pctnt me a

in connectirn with the controversy

os to the proper protecti cn of the Mr seals of Berim: Sea ,a-zi
',voters of tne Pacific Oce.an,

ijaent

thich not cnly the United States,

but dec Japan, Great Britain, ,:lnd Rus.lia were interested.

I was

instructed to proceed to Japan to ask for the appoin:ment of delegates
from that country to a convent:on to be held later in Washincton, to
take

and to fiettle this que,!tion.
On the voyage over, I raet Prince Ito, the Japanciie stItesman

who we,. e returning from the queen of Ens.71.:Lzdis jubilee.

Ile was then

well along in r‘.1rs ,knd I was ri young man but he was very kind to me
arri 'e had many inter - sting talks together.

One day, learnin.cf, thtLt

my birthday fell on the following Sunday, hie told rie that he wi::hed
.
to

1V3 me a birthday 1,,u7::T.--'er en that evieing, zin:i you can well imagine

.sith what avidity I accepted.




But alazt difficulties arose which I

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he.d not anticipated.

On Saturday )vonln, precisely at midnight,

our ship, at if with malicious intent, crossed the 180th meridian.
connequenco, there was nc Sunday!

As

On the contrary, it becAme

irmiediately Mondv, ;7md I lost my birthday!

Th5 next year, ho5v ;- !r, I

happened to be in Russia will:re I had tao birthdays, ona accordin

to

th Russian calendar, ;11.1 on5 3ccordinr to our can, - so the bal,Ince of
power .;;ais

1)art reF,torld!

When finally I landed In Japan, the firnt three days wer

indeed

lxciting, - on th5 firat day wa had an erthquako, on the slcond, a
tyrhoon, and on the third, a flood.
apprehnsion to the fourth :Lay.

I lodked forward with :some

On the fuurth day came an avalanch,-

but it was an avalanch of ,murtet,4, kindness, .:nd hospitality which
faArly .,1wept ma off my feet And which I never can forget were I to live
a thousand
Nor Lhall I ever forvt my first mleting with th4 venerable
statesman, Count Okuma, then Minist3r of Foreirn Aff4irs.

After some

discwsion of fur neal rxecblems he asked ule if I had evr been in Japan.
I Fiaid No.

He then expressed the hope thil.t I mlght sea the country

befdre I sailed bilck. I replied

t it war my fondest ho,
::o that I mijit

dc this, but that an ha hld jut told me thrA hI7, country would send
dllegAtes to the TAshinton Convention and tLat they ,ould ,t1.11 in a
very few 4ays, I shculd nct be

to have my hope gratified.

He then held a convlrsAtion with hit Secretary

who at once left

the room, ,ind ha turned to me ctnd eaid that he had ci4-11 instructions
to hia Sacret_trj to c:,
115 Washington that his delegaten could not







-7-

possibly sail until a month la.ter.

liad it bn consistent with

diplam.A.tic propriety I shoull. have =brace1 him on t1ii.4 sboti
I wish, I could tell you of the courtesy and kinine.la vinited
upon m

turirv th.t mcnth.

I was almert overwhelmed with hospitality.

The only fly In the ointment lias that tto Government officials who
entertaine(i mq, vlry naturally aupposed that, being so interested in
fur s3.....13,I must be a distinp,u1shed Ichthyologist, and, as a result,
I was taken to :cuntless fishorie3 exhibitl,ons, (1m-fi1ming est-Ty
41(1. fish hoks,-tti1e my heart all the

:7pecien of beam,

time -man yrning forMiYalloshitit and. Nricko.
There is y-ot another c,).use for my deep interest in Ja 7AM
An interim-A lonal commission of ecientistt -wassappointed to study the
:ur seal guetion, and durinc their obServations off th-, Coast of
Japan they discovired a nay specie:, of fish, argi later the coarni
i.ecided to n,..rna that fish for me, senling

1115

a photograph of it
That to me

inscribed with its L.I.tin name, - "Polothecus Ilamlini.*
as the greatest honor of my lifet

/ used to show the picture to

my friend::„ who all :Agreed, perhaps scraeNhat ironically, that the
photoi:raph ,',as

good

likeness of me.

One day, horst?

• there came

::.nti-climatc, for a .iistinguished •scienti&t, .1ter examining it,
turned to r:-.41 and quietly remarked that I had bettsltr not feel too
proucl as the fish %vas really only a specie:; of sculpint
no sculpin, howlv3r, I

cling to that fish

Sculpin or

‘v honeyar

I glance

at the photograph there come to my mind. those -Aortas of Shake:.!.pere:

-8-

"It i

rich in 1 iving such z.).

I

my o'm

:Jean, if all t;h3ir sand

their

were

waterr. neetar, And their roc1-..,.. pure i,old."

.People livino; near Belz:%.rds

in ...azeitchuset
m
,7• ,;$

also intervilly inter

I liv.3,
Whitfield,

in J:Kryin.

In 1841 Car.)tt..-tin .
litay, re-cued

livins7. at

four or fiv -3 youiv:

,..vhom

founi on

rocky 1.11.3nd in the

Western Paoif ic °clan, where th:,:y hid been wrecked.
but on3 at

..
Saniv:Ich Island.;,

That cne was naated

begued Captain Whitfield to keep him.
decided to grant hie. requez.t

He li...nded all
And he

The kind. hNarted Captain
1-.1ra back with him to Fairhaven

where he, lived in hig houtle for 31:: cr neve.n years, study ine in tho
s..11.1cols of the town.

Fin:Illy likaharma returned to Japan and

one of the interpretert,

later

Perry and thl Japaxie3e offic

thF! ritootine:

.

,en Covioctore

torwards bc." c

Prof,7ts!,or

in the Imperial UnivIrRity, And whin h.o died he Aar, one of the eminent
men of Jallan.

On July* 4, 1g18, Visqcrant Ishii, the then Ambassador of

pro Anted to the town of Fairhaven a Samaria.. sword In the naae
of Doctor ITalahalr.a, the son of the boy whom Captain Whitfield had
rescued.

Ov-.1r ten thousand people attended the ceremony.

-lla,ts placed in

sablic library

Fairhaven,

token of affection between the people of
the sanurai ..word typifyinz




It ml.ty b3

surpri 30

an

The sworci

,,tand.,--) an: ris. perpetual
tho United Slate,-,

chiv4.4.1r,y and patriotism.
tO 301MC Of 113

when we aZ3 told that Ja1.4.1n

-g-

has a dynasty 7xtenlin7, back over two Caor:and five hundred ye.Ars.
It mas a cultured, highly civilized nation at a time when many of
our ance..,torc:., in .vmet,414t scanty attire, ware wanderim. Around among
the wood!: of Germ.my.
For two hundred

fifty ye:Ars prior to the cominE of

Commodore Perry, Ja-an had cut herself off from other nations and lived
in a ft,.te of almost complete isolation.

She had a hir.hly Ir:erfected

civilizaticn And her poo-le were contented and halpy. Subsistence
was difficult indeed to obtUn, but povrty was a mark of distinction.
The chroniclei3 of that time tell us that an exaltel -:.atriotism prevailed amow; all class-s, and that it .vas comidered a )rivilege rather
!Ilan a burden to contribute to ths expense of maintaining the Govlrnment.
I notice that this statement brini7

3

-mile to mmy of your faces. 1111

the chronicler of our history a hundred ylars hence lodk back and say
that our people considered it a privilege rather than a burden to
contribute to the expense

of our Government long aftcr the occasion

for the swollen expensec has ceased?

During the terrible world war

our people shooed an exalted patriotism equal to that of any nation on
earth, but noy,, that the wiz hal..

ended. they demand itumediate retrench-

m7;nt.
Jacan finilly stopped forth from tor isolation and boo
active member of the Society of Nations.

t-tn

That phrase 'the Society of

Nations; la to me a prcrnAnt phree. /t implies the interdependence of
mitions, one ulon the othIr.




Two hundred years ago, there were two 2nclish phllosophrr.,

-10-

HObbea and Uandeville, who preached a nov4 Joctrine of isolation
both for indiviAuals

n,Aians.

They looked upon m.,11 qn wild
cnly
baastt fichtinc for existence, the fittest/to survive.
They -Aid that
in this struule, both 1.1 to indivituals and nations, the
aLin of
one was the precise meamaro of the lo:F to the other.
Their ithilosophy
reilser.onted crude, extreme views, - individual=
Al! isol:Ition in it5
mott extreme form.
away.

Those di3torttd views, however, were soon twept

It was quickly realized thAt not the indivitlal, but
the clan was

the real unit, that the individual mails only a part
of society, claA that
the real lasting prooperity of the individual gow
cut of the prosperity
of society.
So also in dealings between naticns it was rococnized
that each
may z7,in
frau intarccuree and trade with the other; that the
real,
lasting. ;rosperity of a singll nation can best be Elcur
ed out of the
prosg)rity of all mankind; that no nation cnn have
when other nntions 4.0 suffering under alvorgity.

proeperity
This IF. a .lesson

Which aur poople should tie to heart, and to
which I um

lara they aro

keenly alive today.
I am loCkin: forward tmptiently to the tie
when I can again
visit Jw!an.

I want a&An to see its pedele.

It has been va1l cald

that to study the birth and devllopment of
relicion you zilLt turn to
Judea; to trce cut the dev,
,loment of art :icy, must turn to Greece;
to reek the :icurcc
howeve4

of law ycu must study the history

Rome.

If,

you wish ;se exanino into the love of
be!:,uty, the reverence for

ancestors wid patriotism in itg most subli
nu form, you should turn to




/1
•

t

the history of Japan, for thee virtues represent the inmost soul of
that country.
On July 4, 1918, Viscount Ishii, in his presentation adlress at
Fairhaven, eloquently pictured the attitude of Japan towards the
people
of the United States.

He

"We trust yell.

We lovl you.

If you wIll lot us,

we will valk at your stie in loyal i;ood fellowship,
down all
the coming years."

What should be the response of oar people to these sentiments?
Let

Us

take the hand Japan has thus extendod tc us ,Ind let us walk

together down thl

pledged to protect civilization :1.1d. to re3Intain

thl plaza of the .7:or1d.

It will then follow,

the day follows thl

night, that our children wact our children's children
mA.1 rise up and
cAll clir memories blessod.