Japanese Tales

by Royall Tyler

  “You mustn’t look at me,” replied the Dragon King. “Leave the cave and I’ll meet you three hundred yards beyond it.”

  Nittai obeyed and went to wait. The Dragon King rose from the earth before him, fully adorned and crowned, till Nittai could see his whole body down to the waist. After Nittai had contemplated him for a while, the Dragon King disappeared.

  Nittai built a shrine on the spot and made a statue of the dragon. They say it is still there. When the monks of Murōji, the temple nearby, pray for rain, they chant sutras at this shrine. When their prayers work, a black cloud rises over the Dragon Cave and soon covers the whole sky. Then it rains.

  184.

  GOLD FROM THE DRAGON PALACE

  A poor young man of the Capital was so unable to make a decent living that every moon on Kannon’s day, the eighteenth, he worshipped Kannon and visited as many temples as he could to pray for help. This had been his custom for years.

  One year, in the ninth moon, he was going from temple to temple as usual when he passed through southern Yamashina, which was little inhabited in those days. In a deserted stretch of hills he met an older man carrying a foot-long spotted snake on the end of a pole. As the young man walked by, the little snake moved.

  “Where are you going?” the young man asked. The older man replied that he was on his way to the Capital and asked the same question back. The young man explained his pilgrimage and inquired about the snake.

  “I’ve a purpose for it,” the older man answered.

  “Won’t you let me have it? Killing’s a sin. Give it to me, for love of Kannon. This is Kannon’s day, after all.”

  “You may talk of Kannon, but Kannon protects people as well as snakes. I need this snake. I don’t particularly want to kill it, but I have to live somehow.”

  “What do you want it for?”

  “Well, you see, I make the nyoi wands that monks carry when they preside at a rite. The head of a nyoi is curled like a fern shoot and made of ox horn. I need the oil from this little snake to work the horn into the right shape.”

  “What do you do with your nyoi then?”

  “What a question! I sell it to a monk! That’s my trade!”

  “I see. You need the snake, and I certainly can’t ask you to give it to me for nothing. Would you take my coat for it?”

  The man agreed and the exchange was made.

  “Where’d you get the snake?” the young man asked, and learned that it was from a pond nearby. After the older man had gone on, he took the snake to the pond, scraped the sand of the bank down a little to where it was cool, and let the snake go. The snake went right into the water. With his mind now at rest, he continued his pilgrimage.

  A few hundred yards further on, a pretty twelve-year-old girl, very nicely dressed, came toward him. He could not imagine what she was doing in so lonely a place.

  “You’re so kind!” she said. “I’ve come to thank you.”

  “Kind? What do you mean?”

  “Why, you saved my life! When I told my parents they said I should go straight to thank you and tell you how grateful they are. That’s why I’m here.”

  He realized this must be the snake, and though touched he was also afraid. “Where are your parents, then?” he asked.

  “Over there. I’ll take you to see them!” She led him toward the pond.

  He was so frightened that he would gladly have run away, but when she promised that no one would hurt him he instead followed her reluctantly to the water’s edge. She asked him to wait while she announced he was coming, then vanished. His mind reeled.

  “I’ll take you now,” said the girl, suddenly back. “Please close your eyes.”

  He did so and was just feeling himself drifting off when she told him to open them again. A magnificent gate, far finer than any palace gate in our land, stood before him. Having let her parents know he was there, she came out again and asked him to follow her.

  He obeyed timidly. Inside the gate rose a dazzling palace made of every precious metal and stone. She led him to a central pavilion built all of shining multicolored jade, with the most beautiful floors and curtains. The place seemed like paradise.

  Out came a gentleman in his early sixties, so distinguished that the young man was quite overawed. “Please come in,” he said.

  For a moment the young man wondered who he was talking to. “You’re too kind, sir,” he finally replied. “May I?”

  “Of course you may! I didn’t come to greet you for nothing! Come in!”

  With great hesitation the young man did so. His host told him what a joy it was to welcome him, in view of the outstanding kindness of what he had done.

  “But I’ve done nothing, sir!” the young man protested.

  “The world knows well enough how parents love their children,” the gentleman went on. “I’ve a good many children myself, and the youngest is this girl. Today she wanted to play in the pond. Oh, I tried to stop her, but she wouldn’t listen! Then she came back and told me how she’d been caught and was going to be killed when you came along and saved her. I can’t tell you how grateful I am!”

  Finally the young man grasped that this was the girl’s father.

  Next, the gentleman had some overpoweringly splendid servants serve a feast. As he ate, he pressed his guest so insistently to do so too that the nervous young man let himself be persuaded. It was a delicious meal.

  “I’m a Dragon King,” the gentleman began when the dishes were finally cleared away, “and I’ve lived here since time out of mind. What I’d really like to give you in thanks is a Wishing Jewel, but I’m afraid the people of Japan are too evil at heart and can’t be trusted with one. I’ve something else for you instead, though.” He had a servant fetch a box from which he took a rice cake three inches thick, made of pure gold.

  He broke the cake in two and gave the young man half. “Don’t use this up all at once,” he warned. “If you break off a little as you need it, you’ll be quite comfortable the rest of your life.”

  The young man put the cake in the fold of his robe. At the appropriate moment he excused himself, and the girl took him back to the gate. Again she told him to close his eyes. When he opened them, they were both standing by the pond. The girl said she would have to go now and promised him she would never forget his kindness. Then she disappeared.

  When he got home, his family clamored about how long he had been gone. What he had thought an hour or two had actually been several days!

  He told no one about his golden cake but quietly broke off bits and exchanged them for what he needed. Since the cake always grew back to its old size, no matter how much he broke off, he became very rich. All his life he served Kannon faithfully, and after he died the golden cake disappeared. It did not pass on to his children.

  185.

  THE POND GOD TAKES A WIFE

  A woman in Shimōsa province often took her stepdaughter, a girl of twelve or so, to the edge of a large pond and announced to the god of the pond that the girl was his to marry. She did this once when a gale was blowing and the pond was very rough. The girl was so frightened that her hair stood on end; and what with the wind and waves, and the ominous darkness of the day, she fled home again as fast as she could go with the awful feeling that something was behind her.

  Dashing panic-stricken into the house, she clutched at her father and began telling him what had happened. Next, her stepmother ran in just ahead of a huge snake. The snake stared at the girl, the tongue in its huge head flickering.

  The father was no great lord, but he was still quick-witted. “She’s my daughter,” he told the snake. “This woman here is just her stepmother and she’s got no right to give her away. I’m the only one who can do that and I refuse. No, a wife’s bound to do as her husband says, and as far as I’m concerned she’s the one who’s yours, if you want her. Go ahead, take her!”

  While father and daughter made their escape, the snake slithered toward the stepmother instead and coiled around her. They
say she went mad and began turning into a snake herself.

  The story was going around one summer ten years or so ago, which would be about 1270. Rumor had it that on a certain day that fall, both snakes would rise from the pond during a tremendous storm. There really was a storm on that day too, but I never heard whether or not the snakes appeared.

  186.

  THE ISLE OF MAN AND MAID

  A poor farmer once lived in Hata county of Tosa province, along the southern coast of Shikoku. His rice field was in the neighboring province, not in his own, but he raised the seedlings at home and when planting time came he prepared to take them to his field by boat. He also loaded aboard everything else he needed: a plow, a hoe, a spade, cooking pots, and food to feed himself, his wife and children, and the laborer he meant to hire.

  When the boat was ready to sail, he and his wife went to find a willing laborer, leaving their little son and daughter fast asleep on board. They never bothered to make the boat fast, since they planned not to be gone long, but only pulled it up a bit on the shore.

  The boat floated on the rising tide. Then a breeze sprang up and blew it, as the tide ebbed, far out to where the wind was strong. Now the boat ran as though under sail. When the children woke up and saw how far they had drifted from land they began to cry, but they could not stop the wind taking them wherever it wanted to blow.

  The parents brought their laborer to the shore only to find the boat gone. Thinking it might have caught in the lee somewhere, they called and called, and searched every inlet and cove when they got no answer. In the end, though, they had to give up.

  The boat was blown onto an island far away to the south. Still crying, the children disembarked and tied it up. There was no one on the island. “We’ll just have to do the best we can,” they told each other. “We can eat a little food every day for as long as it lasts, then we’ll just see. Anyway, let’s plant these seedlings before they die.”

  They found a nice place for a field, with a brook nearby, and made good use of the spade and hoe that had come with them. Next, they cut wood and built a shelter. Since one kind of tree or another was always in fruit they easily survived till fall, when their luck brought them a much richer harvest than they could have hoped to get in Japan. They carefully laid this harvest by.

  Once the two had grown up, they saw they really had no choice but to marry. Their many children married each other in turn till despite its generous size the island was dotted with fields. In fact, that first pair had so many descendants that their island can scarcely hold them any more, or so people say.

  Imose-jime, the Isle of Man and Maid, is supposed to be out in the ocean south of Tosa.

  187.

  THE SNAKE AND THE CENTIPEDE

  A band of seven men in Kaga province chose to live by fishing on the sea, rowing together in the same boat. Although fishermen, they always went well armed with bows and arrows.

  They had rowed out of sight of land one day when a sudden gale hit them and blew them farther still. All they could do was pull in their oars, groaning that they would die, and let the wind take them where it would. Eventually they sighted a large island ahead. “An island!” they cried. “If we can reach it we can at least survive!” They succeeded with a tremendous effort, disembarked, and drew their boat safely up on the shore. There was a stream, and apparently plenty of fruit on the trees. They had just started looking for something to eat when they saw a handsome man coming toward them. It was a surprise and a relief to find the island inhabited.

  “Do you realize I brought you here?” the man asked.

  “I don’t know what you mean,” one of the fishermen answered. “A gale blew up while we were fishing and swept us out to sea. We were very glad to find this island, I can tell you!”

  “Yes, you see, I’m the one who made the wind blow.”

  The fishermen realized this was no ordinary human.

  “But you must be tired,” said the man and shouted toward the woods, “Come! Bring it all down!”

  With a clatter of footsteps, bearers arrived carrying a wine jar and two large chests full of delicious food. The exhausted fishermen ate hungrily and drank their fill of wine. When they had finished, the leftovers were put back in the chests and set aside for the next day.

  “Now,” said the man of the island when the bearers had left, “I’ll tell you why I brought you here. There’s another island beyond this one, and the fellow who lives there is always attacking me. He wants to kill me and take over this island too. I’ve fought him off so far, but tomorrow he’s coming again and our battle will be decisive. One of us will live and the other will die. I brought you here to ask for your help.”

  “How much of an army does he have?” the fisherman asked. “How many ships has he got? We’ll fight for you to the death if need be, since we’re here.”

  The man was pleased. “My enemy doesn’t have human form,” he explained, “and I won’t either when I fight him. You’ll see tomorrow. Every time he’s attacked here before, I’ve come down this slope to keep him below the waterfall over there. I’ve alway tried to turn him from the beach. But tomorrow I’m counting on you, so I’m going to let him up. He’ll be only too eager to climb, since he gets stronger as he gets higher. Just watch us fight at first. When I can’t take any more I’ll signal to you with my eyes. Then shoot all your arrows into him, and please don’t miss! Be ready tomorrow morning. The battle will start about midday. Make sure you get plenty to eat! And stand on this outcrop of rock because he’ll be coming from up here.” Having given these careful instructions, the man withdrew into the depths of the island.

  The fishermen cut saplings and built themselves a shelter, then sharpened their arrows and readied their bowstrings. They spent the night talking around a fire. Dawn came, and after a good breakfast they looked toward where the enemy was supposed to come from. A steady gale was blowing, and the strangely menacing sea now began to glow. Inside the light they saw two large masses of fire. The mountain behind them looked just as ghastly. The grasses were bending low, the trees were whistling in the wind, and on the mountainside as well they saw twin masses of fire.

  A centipede a hundred feet long came swimming in, shining blue on its back and red along its sides. Above them an equally huge snake was beginning to descend, its tongue flickering. The snake let his enemy climb, as he had said he would, and watched with his head alertly raised as the centipede seized his chance. Then the two frightful monsters paused, fixing each other with a furious glare.

  The seven fishermen on the rocky outcrop fitted arrows to their bowstrings and waited, their eyes on the snake.

  The centipede charged. Both creatues tore at each other till they were covered with blood, but the centipede, with all its legs, always seemed to be winning. After several hours the exhausted snake finally gave a look that clearly meant “Now!” The seven shot their arrows deep into the centipede, from its head to its tail, then they hacked at its legs with their swords till the monster was helpless. Once the snake had disengaged itself, the fishermen attacked still more savagely and killed it. The snake meanwhile slithered away.

  Shortly their host returned in a sad condition, limping, bleeding, and wounded all over; but he brought them food and thanked them again and again. They cut up the centipede’s body, felled trees for a huge bonfire, and after burning the grisly remains threw the ashes and bones far away.

  When the job was done, the man thanked them again. “There’s no one now to dispute my ownership of the island,” he said, “and that makes me very happy. Plenty of places on the island would make good rice paddies, and even more would do for dry fields. And there are so many fruit trees! Yes, it’s a fine island. Come and live here!”

  “That’s a good idea,” the fishermen answered, “but what about our wives and children?”

  “Bring them too!”

  “How can we get them here?”

  “When you cross to the mainland I’ll send you a following wind. And when you c
ome back, well, the Kumata Shrine in Kaga province is my sanctuary too, and if you worship there before you set out you’ll get back here quite safely.”

  He sent them off with enough food for the trip. As they cast off, a wind blew down from the island and in no time they had crossed to the mainland.

  They all went home and told their families where they were going now and why. Then in secret they got themselves ready, each party preparing a boat loaded with seeds for all the crops that would grow. Finally they visited the Kumata Shrine to report their journey to the god. As soon as they had boarded their boats a following wind arose, and all the boats crossed straight over to the island.

  On the island they cultivated paddies and dry fields, and multiplied till it was hardly possible to count them any more. The island is called Nekono-shima, Cat Island. Once a year, they say, the islanders sail to the mainland and worship at the Kumata Shrine. The villagers there know they are coming and why, and would gladly visit with them; but they never actually meet the islanders because the islanders come in during the night. The villagers find only their offerings the next morning, by which time the islanders have left again. These annual visits still occur regularly. You can see the island, rising green on the western horizon, from Omiya in Noto province.

  Once a Noto boatman was blown out to the island. Although the islanders would not let him land, they allowed him to tie up on the shore and brought him food. A week or so later a favorable wind brought him back to Noto. From what he had been able to see, there were a lot of houses on the island, with streets between them just as in the Capital, and many people coming and going in the streets.

  For that matter, lately Chinese sailors have been putting in to this island first, on their way to Japan. The islanders bring them food, and they stock up on fish and abalone before going on to Tsuruga in Kaga province. Apparently the islanders forbid them even to tell other people the island is there.