4 Thinking that violence was about to erupt he had returned to his home village to open a private school instead. The Meiji Restoration took place in that year (1868), and the battle in Hokuetsu is said to have been one of the fiercest of the entire Boshin War. Members of the Nagaoka fiefdom where Enryō was born fought with the forces of the new government from May through August, but in the end they lost the battle and Nagaoka’s castle town was burned to the ground. The village of Ura that was home to Enryō’s family temple Jikōji was an inland port facing Na-gaoka from across the river Shinanogawa. It acted as a camp for the troops of the new government, meaning that Enryō had a front row seat to the upheavals of the Meiji Restoration. Ishiguro was originally a member of the gentry (samurai) class but later abandoned his status to practice Western (i.e. Dutch) medicine. The impetus for this was his encounter with Japan’s leading scholar of Western studies, SAKUMA Shōzan, who told him that a new era was fast approaching. Ishiguro taught the children of the private school about the reasons behind the Nagaoka battle and spoke in positive terms about the new approaching era. This was one of the many ways that Ishiguro influenced Enryō, as can be seen in this paraphrase of Enryō’s recollection below. Teacher was fond of the Western style and replaced the [tradi-tional Eastern style] desks with chairs and tables. At exam time he would reward the highest performing student with a sheet of Western-style paper, which at the time was an imported product. The privilege we felt receiving that sheet of paper was greater than if it had been a silver watch from the emperor.
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