In October 1886, the British ship Normanton sank off the coast of Kishu. While all British crew members escaped, all 23 Japanese passengers drowned. The captain was held responsible for the death of a Japanese passenger, but a trial by the British consul acquitted the defendant. Hearing the news from his attendant, Emperor Meiji was filled with anger and frustration, and that night he could not sleep well. When I finally fell asleep, I had a dream.

When he came to, Emperor Meiji was on the beach of a small island. He walked around the island for an hour, but nothing happened. When I was just walking along the beach, I came across an old white woman in mourning clothes sitting on a red sofa. The old woman didn't seem to understand why she was on this beach either, but they introduced themselves to each other. The old woman was Queen Victoria of England. Emperor Meiji asked Victoria why she wore mourning clothes. Victoria replied that she had been in mourning every day since her husband died. Emperor Meiji, who thought he was in mourning for the Japanese passengers on the Normanton, was disappointed. I explained the news I heard earlier to Victoria. Victoria just said, "I'm sorry about that," and seemed uninterested. It was the first time for Queen Victoria to have such a face-to-face conversation with an Asian. Victoria, who had no interest in Japanese people, was fond of Emperor Meiji, who wore Western clothes and carried a fine Japanese sword at his waist. The two discussed international politics and became interested in each other's depth of knowledge. Then they discovered they had a common hobby. Emperor Meiji liked to write tanka, and Queen Victoria liked to write sonnets. They read each other's poems on the beach. Before long, they both realized they were hungry. I didn't find anything that looked like food on the island, but when we were walking on the beach together, we found a single banana tree. There was a bunch of bananas on the tree. The two of them wanted to eat bananas, but since meals were usually prepared by attendants, they both felt uncomfortable with the act of climbing a tree to get food. The Emperor and the Queen of England simply stood in silence in front of a banana tree. Shortly after, a monkey came and climbed a tree and ate a banana. They thought they were screwed. As I watched the monkey eating bananas with bated breath, two half-eaten bananas fell from the tree. Their hunger had reached its limit, but the two nobles could not afford to eat the half-eaten banana that had fallen. The two were silent in front of the banana, but they noticed that a ship was heading for the island from across the sea. They thought it was helpful. The two of them waited on the beach, watching the ship come slowly through the mist. However, I noticed that the ship was approaching. On the hull of the ship was written "Normanton". It seemed that the only way for the two of them to survive from this uninhabited island was to board this ship. Emperor Meiji and Queen Victoria awoke from their dreams when they decided to board this ghost ship. Thinking that they had a strange dream, Emperor Meiji and Queen Victoria urged their servants to promote exchanges between Japan and Britain.

In 1894, the Anglo-Japanese Treaty of Commerce and Navigation was signed. It was the first treaty to amend an unequal treaty in Japan. In commemoration of the treaty, a picture drawn by William Turner was sent from England to Japan. It looked just like the Normanton, which they had seen that day, slowly coming to the island while being blown by the wind.