Interpreter in the final days of the Tokugawa regime. Born into a family of Dutch-Japanese interpreters and became an assistant interpreter. In 1852, he studied English from the American Ranald MacDonald, who had been shipwrecked in Japan. He compiled an English-Japanese dictionary starting in 1855. When Perry and Putiatin visited Japan, he served as an interpreter. He accompanied a mission to Europe in 1861. He opened a private school for the study of English where he taught Tsuda Sen, Fukuchi Genichiro, and others.