Indeed lack of combat range seems to have been considered the main strike against the bow...
This is the thing which confuses me. You of course know in particular my looks into the terribly poor accuracy of many muskets pre-rifle period (and indeed into the poor accuracy of rifles without proper training!) and that in many cases you have troops taking very little effective fire inside fifty yards with 1850s era muskets.
With that in mind, this:
Although it was [partly] due to there having been a century of peace and the people not being familiar with warfare that this happened, it was really because the Japanese had the use of muskets that could reach beyond several hundred paces, that always pierced what they struck, that came like the wind and the hail, and with which bows and arrows could not compare.
seems very odd to me. It sounds as though the Japanese in this bows-v-muskets case are using muskets with an accuracy at range which seems incredible, unless that is the muskets in question are very inaccurate but are simply able to
remain deadly out several hundred feet.
Though, in turn, if this is the case it seems as if we should see much more of muskets being used at a long range (for volley) in the Napoleonic era than we actually see in reality.
Perhaps the possibility is that the relation between the weapons was as follows:
A musket ball can reach out 300 yards or so and still be deadly
if it hits.
An individual (smoothbore) musket is doing area fire out past 50-80 yards.
Large groups of (veteran) musketeers doing area fire are able to score some hits at a range bows are not deadly, compelling a retreat.
This form of combat is inside the effective range of cannister, so was not viable in the Napoleonic context.
This form of combat requires good range estimation, something that requires training.
Muskets can be fired straight off the march, unlike bows.
If a formation uses long range
area musket fire against an enemy that is reserving their fire for
aimed musket fire, the result is that they inflict comparatively few casualties and pump out a lot of smoke.
The fire and smoke of the muskets has a morale effect much greater than that of the bow.
The bow generally is not deadly except in a comparatively short range or against an unarmoured target (or both), but is accurate out past the range it is generally deadly.