To return to the Tycoon and the governors of the early middle ages, with its suzerain and feudatories, its fiefs and a phantom king, with hereditary mayors of the palace and chiefs with 10,000 retainers, each one holding himself as good as the Tycoon, who must live in constant dread of open revolt or secret assassination, what a pleasant state of existence for all parties it reveals! Each of these territorial magnates or great Daimios is practically independent of the Tycoon when within his own territory, with power of life and death over all his subjects and dependants; ... even an imperial passport will not secure an intruder's life....
Power has passed in no small degree from the Tycoon's hands, as it formerly did from the Mikado's, and now remains chiefly in an executive Council of State, consisting of five Ministers, and these again held in no small check, if not in subservience, by the Daimios and feudal chiefs of the higher order, amounting to some 360. Although these do not actually form a Chamber of Lords nor assemble in a body at stated periods, nothing legislative, it is said, can be done without their assent obtained.... They hold themselves too high to demean themselves by taking part in the administration, or holding office, under the Tycoon. But neither the Tycoon nor the Ministers, separately or collectively, can venture upon a change in their laws and customs without their sanction and a further confirmation by the phantom sovereign of Miaco....
In the mean time, between the Mikado who nominally wields the sceptre--the Tycoon, a youth who no less nominally governs the kingdom, and is but fourth in rank in the Japan red-book, for three of the Mikado's officers take precedence--and the Daimios great and small, ... the administrative machinery of the realm seems to be kept in order.
Another incident of the year was Sir Rutherford Alcock's second marriage to a friend of the earlier Shanghai days, the widow of the Rev. T. Lowder, first consular chaplain of that settlement. They had been both widowed about the same time. They were about the same age too, and the union, based on a deep-rooted and matured affection, proved an exceptionally happy one during thirty-five years, till death divided them. Lady Alcock accompanied her husband on his return to Japan, where they arrived in March 1864.