HANZŌ: Sir . . . sir? You’ll catch cold like that! A Fifth-Month breeze is still a bit chilly, sir. Sir? Looks like you’ve had a bit too much to drink.
Shinzaburō suddenly looked up and noticed that they were in the neighborhood of the Iijima villa.
SHINZABURŌ: Hanzō, where are we?
HANZŌ: Oh, somewhere near Yokogawa.
And as he said this, Shinzaburō noticed a bamboo fence on the near riverbank woven in the style of the Kennin Temple. “This must be the villa!” he thought.
SHINZABURŌ: Hanzō, could you stop here for a bit? I’ve got a little errand to run . . .
HANZŌ: What’re you going to do in a place like this? Here, I’ll go with you.
SHINZABURŌ: No, you wait right here.
HANZŌ: But isn’t that what I came along for? Let’s go together.
SHINZABURŌ: Do I have to explain everything? There’s no room in love for a third party!
HANZŌ: Ohhhh . . . I see. Sorry . . . ha ha ha. You old devil, you!
With this, Hanzō landed the craft against the bank; Shinzaburō jumped out and made his way up to the fence. He moved this way and that, trembling as he tried to peek through. He noticed that the gate was ajar, and when he gave it a slight push it opened wide. He quickly slipped inside. He remembered the layout from his previous visit and quickly made his way through the garden to the spring where the red pine grew. Then he slipped around the hedge to Tsuyu’s small tatami-mat room. Like Shinzaburō, Tsuyu had been pining away since they’d parted. From the Third Month onward she had longed for him until she got sick, so when Shinzaburō peeked through the folding screen, her thoughts were on him alone, and she was in the habit of mistaking everyone she saw for him. When she finally realized it was the real Shinzaburō, she gasped.
TSUYU: Shinzaburō? Is it really you?
SHINZABURŌ: Shhh . . . not so loud! Oh, it’s been so long since we were together! I really wanted to come by again, but Yamamoto Shijō never came to visit me, and it wouldn’t do for me to come alone, you see.
TSUYU: But you’re here . . . at last!
Forgetting propriety, and everything else as well, she took Shinzaburō’s hand and invited him to come in under the mosquito net. Tsuyu was so happy she could not speak but just clasped her hands at Shinzaburō’s knees and cried, the tears dropping at his feet. These were tears of true joy, very different from the tears we shed, say, when we attend someone’s funeral. Shinzaburō also was overjoyed, and throwing caution to the wind, he entered the mosquito net. The two shared a passionate embrace.
TSUYU: Shinzaburō, this is an incense box my mother gave to me. Please . . . take it to remember me by.
He looked at it as she held it out in her hands, seeing that it was decorated with a gilded design of an insect on the autumn grass. She passed the lid to Shinzaburō and kept the box for herself. They began to speak to each other when the paper screen suddenly opened with a whoosh, and into the room stepped her father, Heizaemon. When the two saw him standing in the room, they gasped in horrified surprise. There was no escape; they could only sit there, fidgeting. Heizaemon thrust out a paper lantern, and his voice was full of anger.
HEIZAEMON: Tsuyu! Come out of there now. And who are you?
SHINZABURŌ: Well, sir, my name is Hagiwara Shinzaburō. I’m a masterless samurai. Please forgive me for this intrusion. . . .
HEIZAEMON: Tsuyu! There you were complaining about Kuni doing this and that and then bothering your father about moving you to a quieter place! So I finally agreed to let you stay here in this secluded villa because you kept on pestering me. Then you settle in here to turn around and stab me in the back by seeing the likes of him. You probably had this all planned from the beginning! Why . . . should word of this get out—the daughter of a high-ranking retainer carrying on a liaison like this—we’d be dissolved as a family and all our possessions would be confiscated. And just think of the shame that would fall on our ancestors! A crime like this must be punished by the sword. That’s the law.
SHINZABURŌ: Wait . . . wait a moment. Of course you must be upset, but your daughter had nothing to do with luring me in here. I met your daughter only once, a few months ago, so I’m the one who’s to blame for this. She’s completely innocent; it’s all my fault.
TSUYU: No, Daddy. It was my fault. Take my life, but spare Shinzaburō.
And they vied with each other to take the blame, drawing closer and closer to Heizaemon. He slid his sword out of its sheath.
HEIZAEMON: You’re both to blame; the crime involves two parties, not one. And Tsuyu, you’re the first to go. Please forgive me.
And with a single, one-armed stroke of his blade, her elaborately coiffured head fell to the floor. Shinzaburō gasped in shock and tumbled forward as he felt the sword slash across his face from cheek to jaw. “Uhnnn,” he muttered and fell to the ground.
HANZŌ: Sir! Sir! You must have had quite a nightmare there! Cried out in a frightening voice and everything! Scared me to death. Now, take care not to catch cold.
Shinzaburō awoke with a start and gasped a sigh of relief.
HANZŌ: Are you all right?
SHINZABURŌ: Hanzō, didn’t my head fall off ?
HANZŌ: Hate to tell you, sir, but it did. You’ve got to be careful with those things. If you lay your pipe down on the edge of the boat, the head will fall right off into the water!
SHINZABURŌ: No, not that. My head! Is it still attached? No wounds or anything?
HANZŌ: I don’t get the joke. . . . Not a scratch . . . nothing!
Earlier, Shinzaburō had wanted only to see Tsuyu; but this terrible dream made him break out in a cold sweat, and he saw it as an evil omen and wanted to return home.
SHINZABURŌ: Hanzō, let’s go back.
He hurried the poor man along until they reached the dock. Shinzaburō prepared to climb out of the boat.
HANZŌ: Sir, this must have fallen out here or something.
Shinzaburō reached out to take what Hanzō was offering him—the lid from the scent box! It was the same one Tsuyu had given him in his dream, down to the design of the insect on the autumn grass. He gasped at the mystery of it all and wondered how in the world this lid had come into his hands.
TŌKAI SANSHI
In his writings, Tōkai Sanshi (pen name of Shiba Shirō, 1852–1922) provides a telling example of the need by young writers to express their political concerns and social criticism, an ideal that remained unrealized (and largely unarticulated) during the earlier Tokugawa regime. The son of a samurai, Shiba fought in battles at the time of the Meiji Restoration, and his idealistic attempts to inform—indeed, teach—his readers about the political situation around the world and to announce his own patriotism led to the composition of his didactic novel Strange Encounters with Beautiful Women (Kajin no kigū), published in irregular installments between 1885 and 1897, excerpts of which are presented here. It was published under his pen name, Tōkai Sanshi, meaning “wanderer of the Eastern Seas.” While few people would find much lasting literary merit in his text itself, the writer’s idealism and commitment inspired many others in the next decades.
STRANGE ENCOUNTERS WITH BEAUTIFUL WOMEN (KAJIN NO KIGŪ)
Translated by Guohe Zheng
One day Tōkai Sanshi climbed Independence Hall in Philadelphia. Looking up, he could see the cracked Liberty Bell; looking down, he could read the Declaration of Independence. He reminisced about the noble characters of the American people at the time when, raising the banner of righteousness, they had rid themselves of the tyrannical rule of the British king and eventually succeeded in becoming a people of independence and self-determination. Looking up, looking down, he was overcome with emotion. With a deep sigh, he leaned against a window and gazed outside. It happened that just then two young women appeared coming up the spiral staircase.
Veils of light green covered their faces, and their hats, with white feathers on top, conveyed a faint fragrance. Wearing short light silk blouses and graceful lon
g skirts, they glowed with elegant beauty that was truly breathtaking.
Pointing at Carpenter Hall, they were heard saying to each other: “That is the place where in 1774, statesmen from the thirteen states met for the first time and deliberated on the future of the country.”
At the time, the tyrannical British king ignored the Constitution and imposed unbearably heavy taxes on the American people, whose freedom was denied. The American people wanted to speak of their misery, but there was no one who would listen to them; they wished to appeal, but there was nowhere to turn. The minds of the people were therefore upset, and an armed conflict was on the verge of erupting. Gravely concerned about the situation, well-known statesmen from the thirteen states met in this hall to find ways to spare the people this misery and to eliminate the cause for the imminent disaster. It is here that the indignant Patrick Henry delivered his powerful and stirring speech declaring: “The king of Britain must be executed, and a republic must be established.” Carpenter Hall still stands today with no changes in its old appearance and, along with Independence Hall, is a historical attraction in Philadelphia.
Then, pointing at the faraway hills and rivers, the two women continued: “That hill is called Val1ey Forge, and that river is called the Delaware River. Oh—yes—Bunker Hill.”
Bunker Hill is located about two and a half miles northeast of Boston. Of truly strategic importance, it faces Boston Bay to its left and joins a row of hills on its right. One day in 1775, patriotic American soldiers secretly occupied Bunker Hill to stop the advance of the British army. The next morning, the enemy launched a fierce attack from both land and sea. The American soldiers responded vigorously and repeatedly repulsed the enemy’s attacks. However, as the battle continued, the tide turned against the Americans. The enemy received as many as three groups of reinforcements, but the American soldiers fighting on Bunker Hill ran out of ammunition and did not receive any reinforcements. Eventually, when General Joseph Warren was killed, the American resistance collapsed, and Bunker Hill fell to the enemy. Later generations built a monument on Bunker Hill in honor of the heroes who gave their lives in the Battle of Bunker Hill.
Sanshi visited Bunker Hill in the late spring of 1881. While reminiscing about the heroic battles fought in the American Revolution, Sanshi could not help but think about world affairs today. While doing so, he found emotions burning in himself, the emotions felt by Lu You, a patriotic poet of the Southern Song dynasty of China. Then he composed a kanshi reflecting his feelings:
A lonely traveler up on top of Bunker Hill,
How many springs and autumns have you seen, the monument in honor of the heroes
The heroes who fought to eliminate the tyranny under the banner of righteousness
And who swore to kill the wolves in revenge for the country?
When horses were pastured on the southern slope of Mount Huashan,
Triumphant songs reverberated throughout the thirteen states,
Public opinion is highly respected here by the government,
The ways of protecting national interests dictate its policies.
—Freedom is not valued in Eastern Seas,
And patriots worry in vain about the motherland. . . .
Thinking of Japan from a foreign land,
The falling flowers only intensify my loneliness. . . .
After the Battle of Bunker Hill, the Declaration of Independence was drafted in this hall, and the fundamental principles of freedom were proclaimed to the entire world. At the time, the Americans, including those from far corners of the land, left their plows and gathered together. They took up arms and decided to fight for independence. Seamstresses cut their cloth to make banners; white-haired fathers brought food and drink for the soldiers; loving mothers, while shedding tears, sent their sons to the battle; chaste wives urged their husbands to report to their units lest they might be late. The Americans would not yield even when they were stabbed by shining bayonets or blown up by cannon fire. They would have no regrets even if they were wounded or died on the battlefields. Swearing they would rather die for the sake of freedom, the Continental army fought for seven years the British army of a million wolves and tigers. During these seven years, Boston was first to be lost to the enemy; then New York fell, and finally Philadelphia, the capital, also was occupied by the enemy. It was then that General George Washington, leading his weary soldiers, decided to retreat to Valley Forge and have his troops set up camp there. This was during a cold winter. Snow covered the ground for a thousand miles around, and ice blocked all the roads. With no reinforcements coming or food or supplies, the soldiers were pale and emaciated, and their morale was low. The generals talked over the matter and concluded: “Unless we start a battle to boost our morale, this righteous and loyal army of ours is bound to dissolve or disperse.”
That night, unbeknownst to the British, the American troops left Valley Forge and crossed the Delaware River. They then launched a surprise attack on the arrogant British army and won a marvelous victory. Thereafter, the morale of the army of freedom rose once again. In this battle, however, the officers and soldiers of the American army were poorly equipped. They had no shoes to wear on their feet and no clothes to protect their bodies from the fury of winter. They marched in the snow barefoot. Their broken shins and feet were dripping with blood, turning red the miles and miles of snow on the ground. Many in the Continental army died of cold. Oh, as human beings, who would prefer death to life? But inspired by their patriotic enthusiasm, the American people were concerned only about the difficulties of their country and, in serving their country, put aside considerations for themselves.
It is only fitting that after turning the tide in their favor and singing songs of triumph, the Americans raised horses on the southern slope of Mount Huashan and cows in the Peach Tree Forest and started to build their own nation. Outside their borders, Americans resisted European expansionism against their neighbors by adhering to the common princip1e of confronting powerful aggressors and protecting the weak and the bullied. Within their country, they built schools, replaced swords with farm tools, promoted industry and trade, imposed taxes on agriculture and sericulture, and in this way built this country. It is a country that is rich and strong, a country where people can enjoy freedom and peace. As the saying goes, a song of triumph can change the color of the clouds, and the morale of soldiers can turn into the light of the sun and the moon.
At the end of their talk, the two women released a long sigh: “When can we see days of such peace and prosperity in our own countries?”
When Sanshi heard this, he could not help but feel perplexed. He wondered, “Why should fair ladies such as they are, living in the land of freedom and bathed in the radiant virtue of civilization, be so sorrowful? In ancient China, when the emperor of the Jin dynasty was forced to move to the south and established the East Jin dynasty, its Prime Minister Wang Dao once met some friends of his at Xinting Pavilion near the new capital of Nanjing. These friends, gazing at the unfamiliar landscape of the south, all shed tears of homesickness for their country in the north—these ladies sound just like them.”
By then it was turning late. Weary birds had returned to the forests, and all the sightseers at Independence Hall had left. Tōkai Sanshi, too, walked out of the city gate and went home to west Philadelphia. . . .
Turning to Kōren, Sanshi asked: “Are you also a Spaniard?”
“No, I am from Ireland.” Kōren answered.
Sanshi asked again: “Come to think of it, there must be some reason that you and Ms. Yūran live in seclusion here. I wonder whether you could tell me all about it.”
And thus Kōren began to give the following account:
“My father was a successful businessman. He exported goods to East Asia and also traveled to America to sell his goods. Because he was good at calculating the market, his goods fulfilled the needs of the world, and the fortune he accumulated was one of the largest in the world.
“From the very be
ginning, the monarch of England cheated our king and our people. Although the English promised to help us, in reality, they annexed Ireland. Although our union is called the United Kingdom, in reality Ireland is nothing more than a subordinate. Since then, England and Scotland, grouped together and jealous of Ireland’s wealth and prosperity, have tried every means at their disposal to slow the development of our industry, our manufacturing and foreign trade. They banned our right of association, deprived us of our freedom of speech and religious belief. As a result, our industry has declined; our foreign trade is in ruins; and the common people of Ireland are adrift in a desperate plight. On top of that, government officials took advantage of the situation, seized the land from the people, and imposed heavy taxes on them. The landowners, most of whom are English aristocrats, also imposed taxes on the people, giving no heed to how impoverished the people had already become. Even though the blood of the people has already been drained, the heartless landowners still keep sucking. Their greed is more poisonous than vipers and more ferocious than tigers. When the crops fail, the bodies of those who have died of hunger are piled along the roads. . . .
“I’ve heard a saying that if an animal kills the young of its species, then a kirin1 would not come close to its territory; if a bird breaks the nests and destroys the eggs of other birds, then a phoenix would not fly to its neighborhood. This saying teaches us how horrendous it is to harm one’s own species. If even birds and animals know enough to avoid harming their own species, then human beings should know much better! But the English people look at what is happening to us and make no effort to help. What is more, they even created a theory that all of Ireland’s problems originate from overpopulation and that unless Ireland is beset by disaster and the Irish people die one after another, it can never hope to become rich and strong. A proverb says that whenever false reasoning becomes prevalent, truth is the sacrificed victim. That is well put indeed. Since the false reasoning of the English began to spread, countless old and young of the Irish have perished in the ditches and gutters along the roads, and countless able-bodied Irish have left Ireland. The number reaches the tens of thousands every year. As the population of Ireland dwindles, the binding force among the people becomes more tenuous, and life becomes more difficult for the people each year and each day. This fact should be proof enough that the English theory is false reasoning indeed, that ‘overpopulation is at the root of trouble for Ireland.’
The Columbia Anthology of Modern Japanese Literature: From Restoration to Occupation, 1868-1945: vol. 1 (Modern Asian Literature Series) Page 6