The Encyclopedia Americana (1920)/Soyeshima, Tanéomi

SOYESHIMA, Tanéomi, Japanese statesman: b. Saga, Province of Hizen. At Nagasaki in 1866 he studied under Guido F. Verbeck, an American missionary, giving especial attention to the United States Constitution and the New Testament. In 1868 he became a commissioner for formulating laws and subsequently an imperial councillor. In 1871 he was sent to Siberia to adjust boundary questions relating to the island of Sakhalin. Returning to Japan he resigned his place in the Cabinet, but was later asked to return to it. On a visit to China in 1876 he was received with high honors by the mandarins by reason of his scholarship and he became private adviser of the emperor.