TAIKO: AN EPIC NOVEL OF WAR AND GLORY IN FEUDAL JAPAN

by Eiji Yoshikawa

  Glaring at the retreating Ukita, the defenders were carried away with the desire to crush them underfoot. They started to pursue them with cries of "Strike them down!" and "All the way to their banners!"

  Too late, the mounted commander of the castle vanguard spotted the Ukita trench ahead. Seeing the trap, he tried to stop his men, but they stumbled forward, unable to see danger. A volley of gunfire and thick gunpowder smoke instantly rose from the trench. The attackers staggered and fell.

  "It's a trap! Don't fall into the enemy's trap! Lie down! Lie down!" the commander shouted. "Let them fire! Wait for them to reload, then jump on them!"

  With fearful war cries, several men sacrificed themselves; they leaped up to draw enemy fire and were bathed in bullets. Judging the interval before the next round, others toward the trench and jumped in, filling the earth with fighting and blood. That night it began to rain. The banners and the curtained enclosures of Mount Ryuo were drenched. Hideyoshi took cover in a hut and watched the melancholy clouds of the rainy season. He did not look very cheerful.

  He looked around and called to a retainer, "Toranosuke, is that the sound of rain or someone's footsteps? Go see what it is."

  Toranosuke went out but quickly returned and reported, "Lord Kanbei has just now returned from the battlefield. On the way back, one of the men carrying his litter slipped on the steep path, and Lord Kanbei took a hard fall. Lord Kanbei just laughed as though he were amused."

  Why was Kanbei out at the front lines in this rain? As usual, Hideyoshi was impressed with Kanbei's untiring spirit.

  Toranosuke withdrew to the next room and put firewood on the hearth. With the rain, the mosquitoes had begun to hatch, and they were especially troublesome that evening. The fire heated up the already muggy atmosphere, but at least it also smoked out the mosquitoes.

  "It's smoky in here," Kanbei said, coughing. He limped past the pages and entered Hideyoshi's room unannounced.

  He and Hideyoshi were soon talking happily. Their voices almost seemed to compete with each other.

  "I think it's going to be difficult," Hideyoshi said.

  Hideyoshi and Kanbei fell silent for a moment and listened to the dreary sound of the early summer rain pouring off the eaves of the makeshift hut.

  "It's just a question of time," Kanbei began. "A second all-out offensive would be a gamble. On the other hand, we could resign ourselves to a long campaign and besiege the castle at our leisure, but there are great dangers in that, too. The forty thousand troops from the Mori's home province might arrive and attack us from the rear, and then we would be caught between them and the men in Takamatsu Castie."

  "That's why I'm so depressed this rainy season. Don't you have any good ideas, Kanbei?"

  "I've been walking around the front lines for the last two days, looking carefully at the position of the enemy castle and the surrounding geographical features. At this point I have only one plan on which we could stake everything."

  "Takamatsu's fall is not just a question of taking a single enemy castle," Hideyoshi said. "If it falls, Yoshida Castle will soon be ours. But if we stumble here, that one defeat will cost us five years of work. We need a plan, Kanbei. I've asked the people in the next room to withdraw so you can speak without reserve. I want to know what you'n thinking."

  "It's rude of me to say so, but I suspect you have a plan too, my lord."

  "I won't deny it."

  "May I ask what yours is first?"

  "Let's both write our ideas down," Hideyoshi suggested, bringing out paper, brush, and ink.

  When they had finished writing, the two men exchanged sheets of paper. Hideyoshi had written one word, "water," and Kanbei had written two: "water attack."

  Laughing out loud, the two men crumpled the sheets of paper and put them in their sleeves.

  "Man's wisdom obviously doesn't exceed certain limits," Hideyoshi said.

  "That's true," Kanbei agreed. "Takamatsu Castle stands on a plain conveniently surrounded by mountains. Not only that, but the Ashimori and seven other rivers run through the plain. It should not be difficult to divert the water of these rivers and flood the castle. It's a bold plan that most generals would not even think of. I can't help but admire how quickly you grasped the situation, my lord. But why do you hesitate to put it into action?"

  "Well, since ancient times, there have been plenty of examples of successful attacks on castles using fire, but almost none with water."

  "I think I've seen it mentioned in the military chronicles of the Later Han Dynasty and the period of the Three Kingdoms. In one of the chronicles I read something about our own country during the reign of Emperor Tenchi. When the Chinese invaded, our soldiers built dikes to store water. When the Chinese attacked, the Japanese soldiers were going to cut through the dikes and wash them all away."

  "Yes, but they didn't actually have to put the plan into operation because the Chinese withdrew. If this plan is carried out, I'll be using a strategy that has no precedent. So I'm going to have to order some officials who have detailed knowledge of geography to determine what will be necessary in terms of time, expenses, and men for the engineering work."

  What Hideyoshi wanted was not just a rough estimate, but concrete figures and a flawless plan.

  "Absolutely. One of my retainers is very clever with such things, and if you order him to come here now, I think he'll have a clear answer for you right away. In fact, the strategy I had in mind is based on this man's ideas."

  "Who is he?" Hideyoshi asked.

  "Yoshida Rokuro," Kanbei replied.

  "Well, call him right away." Then Hideyoshi added, "I also have someone at hand who is conversant with construction and land conditions. What would you think about calling him here at the same time and having him talk with Rokuro?"

  "That would be good. Who is he?"

  "He's not one of my retainers but a samurai from Bitchu. He's called Senbara Kyuemon. He's here in camp right now, and I have him working exclusively on making charts of the area."

  Hideyoshi clapped his hands to summon a page, but all of his personal attendants and pages had withdrawn to some distance, and the sound of his clapping did not reach them. The din of the rain compounded the problem. Hideyoshi got up and stepped into next room himself, and yelled out in a voice that would have been more proper on a battlefield, "Hey! Isn't anybody here?"

  Once the decision had been taken to proceed with the water attack, the main camp on Mount Ryuo was found to be inconvenient. On the seventh day of the Fifth Month, Hideyoshi moved to Mount Ishii, which had been chosen because it overlooked Takamatsu Castle.

  On the following day Hideyoshi said, "Let's start to measure the distances."

  Hideyoshi, accompanied by half-a-dozen generals, rode to the west of Takamatsu Castle, to Monzen, on the banks of the Ashimori River. All the while he kept an eye on the castle to his right. Wiping the sweat from his face, Hideyoshi summoned Kyuemon. "What's the distance from the ridge of Mount Ishii to Monzen?" he asked.

  "Under a league, my lord," Kyuemon answered.

  "Lend me your map."

  Taking the map from Kyuemon, Hideyoshi compared the construction of the pro­posed dike to the lay of the land. There were mountains on three sides, creating a natural baylike formation, extending in the west from Kibi to the mountainous area of the upper reaches of the Ashimori River; in the north from Mount Ryuo to the mountains along the border of Okayama; in the east to the edge of Mount Ishii and Kawazugahana. Takamatsu Castle was situated right in the middle of this open plain.

  In Hideyoshi's eyes the fields, rice paddies, riding grounds, and villages on this flat plain were already submerged. The way he saw it, the mountainous banks on three sides could be viewed as a winding line of capes and beaches and Takamatsu Castle itself as a solitary man-made island.

  Hideyoshi gave the map back to Kyuemon, reassured about the feasibility of the project, and once again mounted his horse. "Let's go!" he called out to his attendants, then said to Rokuro and Kyue
mon, "I'm going to ride from here to Mount Ishii. Take the measurements for the dike by following the hoofmarks of my horse."

  Hideyoshi turned his horse due east and galloped off, riding straight from Monzen to Harakozai, and then describing an arc from there to Mount Ishii. Kyuemon and Rokuro chased behind him, leaving a trail of powdered rice meal. After them followed laborers who drove in stakes to mark the line of the dike.

  When the line that had been drawn became an embankment and the waters of the seven rivers were diverted to flow inside it, the entire area would become a huge lake shaped like a half-open lotus leaf. When the men looked carefully at the lay of the land that formed the border between Bizen and Bitchu, they realized that it must have been part of the sea in the distant past. The battle had commenced. It was not to be a battle of blood, but a war waged against the earth.

  The length of the dike was to be one league; its width was to be thirty feet at the top and sixty feet at the base. The problem was its height, which had to be proportional to the height of the walls of Takamatsu Castle.

  In fact, the primary factor assuring the success of the water attack was the fact that the castle's outer stone walls were only twelve feet high. Thus the height of the dike of twenty-four feet was figured from a base of twelve feet. It was calculated that if the water level rose to that height, it would not only submerge the castle's outer stone walls but also flood the castle itself under six feet of water.

  It is only rarely, however, that a project is completed ahead of schedule. And the problem that so troubled Kanbei was one of human resources. For the most part, he would have to rely on the local farmers. The population of the neighboring villages, how­ever, was rather sparse, because Muneharu had taken more than five hundred farming families into the castle before the siege, and many others had fled to the mountains.

  The farmers who had taken refuge in the castle were ready to live or die with their lord. They were good, simple folk who had served Muneharu for years. Many of those who remained in the villages were people of bad character, or opportunists who were willing to work on a battlefield.

  Hideyoshi could count on the cooperation of Ukita Naoie, and Kanbei was able to muster several thousand men from Okayama. But what troubled him was not getting this number of men together; his problem was how to use those human resources with the greatest efficiency.

  On a tour of inspection, he called over Rokuro and asked for a progress report.

  "I'm sorry to say that we may not meet His Lordship's schedule," Rokuro replied sadly.

  Even the mathematical brain of this man could not figure out how to extract hard rk from the mixed group of laborers and ruffians. For this reason a series of guardhouses had been set up every ninety yards along the dike, and soldiers were stationed at each of these surveillance points to encourage the laborers. Because the soldiers were simply there as passive observers, however, the thousands of men who swung their mattocks and shouldered dirt like ants were hardly spurred on at all.

  Moreover, the timetable that Hideyoshi had imposed was extremely tight. Urgent messages reached him night and day. The forty thousand troops of the Mori had split into three armies under Kikkawa, Kobayakawa, and Terumoto, and they were getting closer to the provincial border by the hour.

  Kanbei watched the laborers. Exhausted by working all hours of the day and night, some hardly moved at all. They had only two weeks to complete the project.

  Two days. Three days. Five days passed.

  Kanbei thought, Progress is so slow that we won't be able to complete the dike in fifty or even in a hundred days, much less in two weeks.

  Rokuro and Kyuemon were going without sleep, supervising the workers. But no matter what they did, the men were disgruntled and insolent. To make matters worse, some laborers intentionally sabotaged the schedule by persuading even the comparatively submissive workers to hinder the project with deliberate slowness.

  Kanbei was unable to watch passively. He finally began to visit the construction site himself, staff in hand. Standing on a hill of fresh earth at a section of the dike that had finally been completed, he looked down, with eyes aflame, at the thousands of workers. When he discovered someone showing the least bit of sloth, he would dash up to the laborer with a speed hardly befitting a cripple, and beat him with his staff.

  "Get to work! Why are you being lazy?"

  The laborers would tremble and work frantically, but only while Kanbei was watching them.

  "The crippled demon warrior is looking!"

  Kanbei finally made a report to Hideyoshi: "It's going to be impossible to finish on time. Just to make sure we are prepared, I'd like to request that you decide on some strategy beforehand in case the Mori reinforcements arrive while the construction is only half done. By the gods, it's more difficult getting these laborers to work than it is getting troops to maneuver."

  Uncharacteristically nervous, Hideyoshi counted silently on his fingers. He was being informed hourly of the approach of a large Mori army, and he received the dispatches just as he might watch the clouds of an evening squall approach the mountains.

  "Don't be discouraged, Kanbei. We still have another seven days."

  "The construction is less than a third finished. How are we going to complete the dike in the few days we have left?"

  "We can do it." This was the first time Hideyoshi had contradicted Kanbei so strongly. "We can finish it. But it won't be done if we only get the strength of three thousand men from our three thousand workers. Now if one man works like three or even five men, our three thousand workers will have the strength of ten thousand. If the samurai supervising them act in the same way, one man will be able to muster the spirit of ten men, and we should be able to accomplish anything we want. Kanbei, I'm coming to the construction site myself."

  The following morning, a yellow-robed messenger ran around the construction site, ordering the laborers to stop their work and gather around a banner set up on the dike.

  The workers from the night shift who were on their way home, and the men just now coming on, all followed their bosses. When the three thousand workers were assembled, it was difficult to differentiate the color of the earth from the color of the men themselves.

  Prompted partly by uneasiness, the wave of blackened men moved forward. They had not lost their false show of courage, however, and continued to joke and banter. Suddenly the crowd became hushed as Hideyoshi moved toward the stool set up next to the banner. His pages and retainers were to his right and left, and stood back solemnly. The demon warrior, Kuroda Kanbei, who was the target of their daily malice, stood off to the side, resting on his staff. He addressed them from the top of the dike.

  "Today it is Lord Hideyoshi's wish that you tell him your thoughts. As you all know, the time allotted for building the dike is more than halfway through, but the construction is going slowly. Lord Hideyoshi says that one of the reasons for this is that you have not been making a real effort. He has commanded you to gather here so that you can frankly explain why you are dissatisfied or unhappy, and what it is that you want."

  Kanbei stopped for a moment and looked at the laborers. Here and there, men were whispering.

  "The bosses of the various groups must understand the feelings of their men well. Don't miss this opportunity to tell His Lordship exactly what you want. Five or six men should come up here as representatives and speak out about your dissatisfactions and de­sires. If they are legitimate, they will be addressed."

  With that, a tall man, stripped to the waist and with an insubordinate expression, came forward. Looking as if he were trying to gain favor with the herd of men, he climbed aggressively to the top of the dike. When they saw this, three or four more la­borers swaggered up after him.

  "Are these the only representatives?" Kanbei asked.

  As they approached Hideyoshi's camp stool, each of them knelt down on the earth.

  "It's not necessary to kneel," Kanbei told them. "Today His Lordship has cordially asked you to explain y
our discontent. You've come up here before him representing all of the laborers, so speak your minds freely. Whether or not we finish this construction on

  time depends on you. We want you to tell us the reasons for the resentment and dissatisfaction you have hidden inside yourselves until now. Let's start with the man who came up here first, on the right. Speak up now." Kanbei's tone was conciliatory.

  When Kanbei urged them to speak a second time, one of the five men representing the laborers spoke up.

  "Well then, I'll take you at your word and speak, but don't get mad, all right? For one thing… well, all right… please listen to this…."

  "Speak."

  "Well, you're paying us one sho of rice and a hundred mon for every sandbag we haul, and the fact is that all of us—a couple of thousand poor folks—are real happy to be employed. But, well, we all think—and me, too—you might go back on your word because we're all just laborers, anyway."

  "Well now," Kanbei said, "why should a man with Lord Hideyoshi's reputation go back on his word? Every time you carry a sandbag, you receive a branded strip of bambooo that you can exchange for pay in the evening, don't you?"

  "Yes, Your Honor, we get the bamboo strips, but we only get paid one sho of brown rice and a hundred mon even if we've carried ten or twenty sacks in one day. The rest is military stubs and rice tickets to cash in later."

  "That's right."

  "So it troubles us, Your Honor. What we've earned would be fine in either rice or money, but without the real thing, a poor day-laborer like me can't feed his wife and children."

  "Isn't one sho of rice and a hundred mon a living far better than what you usually earn?"

  "You shouldn't joke, Your Honor. We're not horses or cows, and if we worked like this all year, we'd be done for. But, well, we've agreed to it, following His Lordship's orders, and we've been working day and night. Now, we can do unreasonable work if we get our wants filled along the way, and thinking that afterward we can drink sake, pay back our debts, and buy some new clothes for the wife. But if we get paid in promises, we just can't continue putting our hearts into the work."