The Ten Foot Square Hut and Tales of the Heike Page 11

  DEPARTURE OF THE EMPEROR FROM THE CAPITAL

  As the Chinese poet says: "The Imperial Capital is a place ever busy with fame and gain; after cockcrow it has no rest." If this is so when it is quietly governed, what must it be when all is confusion. Doubtless they would have liked to flee to the innermost recesses of Mount Yoshino, but their enemies were in possession of all the highroads and all the provinces were hostile, so that they could only find refuge by the sea. As we read in the golden words of the Hokke Sutra; "In the Three Worlds there is no rest; it is even as a house that has taken fire." Not otherwise was the state of the Capital at this time. On the twenty-fourth day at dusk Munemori went to the Ikedono at Rokuhara where the Empress Kenrei-mon-in was staying and said: "Kiso Yoshinaka is coming up to attack the Capital with fifty thousand horsemen, and has already arrived in Higashi-Sakamoto in Ōmi, where the monks of Hieizan have joined him; we must stay here at all events, but as it would be most unfortunate if either yourself or your august mother the Nii Dono came to any harm, we think it best that you, with the Emperor and the Hō-ō, should for a while retire to the Western Provinces." "As affairs now are," replied the Empress, "that will be perhaps the best plan;" and as she spoke her feelings overcame her and she sobbed unrestrainedly into the sleeve of her Imperial Robe. Munemori also moistened the sleeve of his garment with his tears.

  Now when the Hō-ō heard privately of this design of the Heike to take him away to the Western Provinces, he departed secretly from his Palace at midnight, attended only by Uma-no-kami Suketoki, and made an Imperial Progress by himself to some place the whereabouts of which remained augustly unknown. And no one was aware of it.

  When it was known that the Hō-ō was no longer in the city the excitement was extraordinary, and the flurry and confusion of the Heike was such that it seemed that it could have hardly been greater if the enemy had actually been entering the houses of the Capital. As they had thus made preparations to send the Emperor and the Hō-ō to the Western Provinces and then found that their plan was already upset, they felt like one who takes refuge under a tree that does not keep off the rain. However they determined to carry out their design in the case of the Emperor at least, so at the hour of the Hare (6 a.m.) the Imperial Palanquin was made ready, His Majesty being at this time a child of six years old, and knowing nothing of what was taking place.

  His Imperial Mother Kenrei-mon-in rode also in the same Palanquin. Hei-Dainagon Tokitada-no-Kyō had given orders that all the Treasures of the Imperial House should be taken with them, the Sacred Jewel, the Sword, the Mirror, the Imperial Seal and Key, the Tablet for marking the hours, and the Imperial Biwa and Koto, but such was the flurry and excitement that many of them were left behind. His Majesty's own sword was also forgotten in the hurry. Tokitada-no-Kyō and his two sons Kura-no-kami Nobumoto and Sanuki-no-Chūjō Tokizane accompanied the procession in full court robes, while the Imperial Guard of the Konoe-tsukasa and the Mitsuna-no-suke escorted them in armour, carrying their bows and quivers. So they proceeded along the Shichijō to the west and the Shujaku to the south.

  When the Heike fled from the Capital they set fire to all their mansions, and Rokuhara, Ikedono, Komat-sudono, Hachijō Nishi-hachijō and others, in all twenty mansions, beside some forty or fifty thousand houses of their retainers in the city and in Shirakawa, went up in flames.

  Thus the places that the Emperor used to frequent were reduced to ashes, and nought but the foundation-stones was left of his residences; the Imperial Car was his only refuge. Of the gardens of the Princesses but the site remains, and on the place of their elegant chambers the dew falls like tears and the blasts whine mournfully. The splendid apartments where the ladies tired themselves behind the long curtains, the hunting-lodges and fishing-pavilions, the residence of the Regent, the mansions of the Courtiers, the labour of many years made vain in an hour, what now remained of them but charred logs? How much more the lodgings of their retainers and the houses of the common people? In all the area that the fire devoured was a score of cho and more. Not otherwise, when the power of Wu was overthrown, the terraces of Ku Su were suddenly abandoned to the thistles and dew, and when the might of Ts'in was at last laid low, the smoke of the palace of Hien Yang obscured the land. Though the slopes of the pass of Han Ku were made strong, the northern barbarians broke through, and though they relied on the deep waters of the Yellow River the eastern marauders took possession of it.

  DEPARTURE OF TADANORI FROM KYOTO

  Satsuma-no-kami Tadanori, who had already left the Capital, wishing to see Gojō-no-sammi Shunsei once again, rode back again to the city with a small train of five retainers and a page, all, like himself, in full armour. When he came to the gate of the mansion, however, he found it shut fast, and even when he called his name, it was not opened, though there was a sound of people running about within crying out that one of the fugitives had returned.

  Then Satsuma-no-kami hastily dismounted from his horse and himself cried out with a loud voice: "It is I, Tadanori, who have come; I have something to say to Sammi-dono; if you will not open the gate, at least beg him to come forth here that I may speak with him." "If it is indeed Tadanori," replied Shunsei, "you need have no fear, but admit him." Then they opened the gate and he entered, and the meeting between the two was most moving and pathetic. "Ever since I became your pupil in the art of poetry years ago," said Tadanori, "I have never forgotten you, but for the last few years the disorder of the Capital and the risings in the provinces have prevented me from coming to see you.

  "Now the final scene in the fall of our house hurries on apace, and the Emperor has already departed from the Capital. But there is one thing that I very greatly desire. Some time ago I heard that an Anthology of Poems was to be made by the Imperial Command, and I wished to ask if you would condescend to submit one of my poor verses for consideration, that my name may be remembered in time to come; and I felt great regret when the Collection was postponed owing to the unsettled state of the country. If, however, at some time in the future, when peace is restored to the Empire, this Anthology should be made, I would beg your favour for one of the stanzas in this scroll, that my spirit may rejoice under the shade of the long grass, and from that far-off world may come and aid you."

  And with these words he drew out from beneath the sleeve of his armour a scroll containing a hundred verses that he considered to be the best he had so far composed and handed them to Shunsei. "Truly does this memento show that you have not forgotten me," replied Shunsei as he opened and perused it, "and I find it hard to keep back my tears when I think of the manner of your coming. Verily the sadness of it is unutterable and your affection to me most deep."

  "Whether my bones will bleach on the hills or my name be echoed by the billows of the Western Sea, I care not," answered Tadanori, "for I feel no regret for this fleeting world; and so, as it must be, farewell;" and he sprang upon his horse, and, replacing his helmet on his head, rode away to the westward. Sammi-dono stood looking after him a long while until he was out of sight, and as he looked the words of the following Chinese verse were borne back to his ears in the voice, as it seemed, of Tadanori:

  Far is the road I must travel; so do I gallop

  into the evening mists of Yen Shan.

  Overcome by his melancholy thoughts, Shunsei controlled his feelings with difficulty as he slowly returned to his mansion.

  In after days, when the Empire was once more at peace, an Imperial Order was issued to make an Anthology called the Senzai-shū, and Shunsei remembered the request of Tadanori and his conversation, but though there were many verses worthy of immortality in the scroll that he had written, as at that time he and all the Heike had been declared to be rebels against the Throne, all that he could do for the memory of his unhappy disciple was to include one of them under the title of "A flower of my native land," by "An unknown author." The stanza runs thus:

  See the rippling waves

  Lapping ever Omi's strand

  Where once Shiga stood
.

  'Tis no more, but on the hills

  Still the mountain cherry blooms.

  DEPARTURE OF TSUNEMASA FROM KYOTO

  Kōgō-gū-no-suke Tsunemasa, the eldest son of Shōri-no-taiyū Tsunemori, had, as a child, served as page to the Imperial Abbot of the temple of Omuro Ninnaji, and still felt so deeply attached to him that he determined to pay him a farewell visit, even in spite of their great haste; so he took five or six retainers with him, and, riding off thither at great speed, hurriedly alighted from his horse and knocked at the gate.

  "Our Sovereign has already departed from the Capital," he said, "and the doom of our house is at hand but all I regret in this fleeting world is that I must part from my lord. Since I first entered this Palace cloister at the age of eight until my Gempuku at the age of thirteen, except for a slight interval of sickness, never did I leave my lord's side; but to-day, alas, I must go forth to the wild waves of the Western Sea, not knowing when, if ever, I shall return. So I have come, wishing to see his face more, though I feel ashamed to enter his presence in this rough soldier's garb."

  When he heard this, the Imperial Abbot, moved with compassion, replied: "Bid him enter as he is, without changing his dress." Tsunemasa was that day attired in a hitatare of purple brocade and body armour laced with green silk. A gold-mounted sword hung at his side and a quiver of twenty-four arrows with black and white feathers at his back, and under his arm he carried his bow of black lacquer with red binding. Taking off his helmet and hanging it from his shoulder, he reverently entered the little garden before the apartment of the Abbot. His Reverence immediately appeared and bade them raise the curtain before the veranda, on which he invited Tsunemasa to be seated.

  When Tsunemasa had seated himself he beckoned to Tōhyōye-no-Jō Arimori who attended on him, and he brought a bag of red brocade containing his master's lute, which Tsunemasa laid before the Abbot. "I have brought back this famous Biwa 'Seizan,' which Your Reverence presented to me last year, with deep regret, for it is not proper that I should take such a thing, one of the most precious treasures of our land, into the rude wilds of the country. May I then deposit it with Your Reverence, that if a happier day should perchance dawn again for our family, and we should return to the Capital, I may receive it from your hand once more?" At this the Abbot was much moved and replied with the following stanza:

  Since you cannot stay,

  Leave the Biwa here with me

  In its bag apart.

  Untouched by another hand,

  'Twill recall the love you feel.

  Tsunemasa, borrowing his master's inkstone, then wrote the following:

  Though the trickling stream

  That runs from this bamboo spout

  Changes ceaselessly,

  Never changing is my wish

  In these halls to stay with you.

  When he had said farewell and retired from the presence of the Imperial Abbot, all those who were living in the monastery, acolytes, monks, and priests of all ranks, flocked round him, clinging to his sleeves and bedewing them with their tears, so sad were they at parting with him.

  Among them was a certain young priest named Dainagon-no-Hoshi Gyōkei, a son of Hamuro-no-Dainagon Mitsuyori-no-Kyō, who had been much attached to him ever since his boyhood; and he was so loath to part with him that he went to see him off as far as the banks of the Katsuragawa, where he bade him farewell and returned to the monastery. As he parted with him, weeping he composed the following verse:

  Nature too is sad.

  See the mountain cherry-tree,

  Whether old or young,

  Whether late or early bud,

  Cannot keep its blossom long.

  To which Tsunemasa made reply:

  In our traveller's garb,

  As we wend our weary way,

  Each night's bivouac

  Fills our hearts with saddening thoughts

  As we ever farther go.

  Then his samurai, who had been waiting in groups here and there, unfurled their red banners and formed into a company of about a hundred horsemen in all, and as he took his place at their head they all whipped up their horses and galloped on after the Imperial Procession.

  CONCERNING "SEIZAN"

  It was when he was seventeen years old that Tsunemasa was presented with the Biwa "Seizan," and about the same time he was sent as Imperial Envoy to the shrine of Hachiman at Usa. When he arrived there he played certain secret pieces of great beauty on it before the abode of the deity, and all the assembled priests were so touched that the sleeves of their ritual garments were wet with their tears. Even those without any discrimination, who had never had any opportunity of hearing good music, were delighted, thinking it sounded like showers of rain.

  And the story of this Biwa is that, when in the time of Nimmyō Tennō, in the third month of the third year of the period of Ka-shō, Kamon-no-kami Sadatoshi went to China, he learned three styles of playing from Renshō-bu, a very renowned master of the Biwa, and before he came back to Japan he was presented with three Biwas called "Genshō," "Shishi-maru," and "Seizan." But while he was returning over the sea, the Dragon god of the waters was moved by envy to raise a great storm, so they cast Shishi-maru into the waves to appease him, and brought back only two to this country, which were presented to the Emperor.

  Many years after, in the period Ō-wa, the Emperor Murakami Tennō was sitting in the Seiryōden one autumn at midnight, when the moon was shining brightly and a cool breeze was blowing, and was playing on the Biwa called Genshō, when suddenly a shadowy form appeared before him and began to sing in a loud and sonorous voice. On the Emperor asking him who he was and whence he had come, he answered thus.

  "I am Renshō-bu, that master of the Biwa who in China taught the three secret styles of playing to Fuji-wara Sadatoshi; but in my teaching there was one tune that I concealed and did not transmit to him, and for this fault I have been cast into the place of devils. Having this night heard the wondrous beauty of your playing, I have come to ask Your Majesty if I may transmit the one remaining tune to you, and thus be permitted to enter the perfect enlightenment of Buddha." Then, taking Seizan which was standing before His Majesty also, he tuned the strings and taught the melody to the Emperor. And this is that which is called "Jogen" and "Sekijo."

  After this apparition the Emperor and his Ministers feared to play on this Biwa, and it was presented to the Imperial Temple of Ninnaji, and Tsunemasa received it because he was so much beloved by the Imperial Abbot. The front of it was made of a rare wood, and on it was a picture of the moon of dawn coming forth from among the green foliage of summer mountains, hence its name Seizan (Green Mountain).

  THE DEATH OF KISO YOSHINAKA

  Now Kiso had brought with him from Shinano two beautiful girls named Tomoe and Yamabuki, but Yamabuki had fallen sick and stayed behind in the Capital. Tomoe had long black hair and a fair complexion, and her face was very lovely; moreover she was a fearless rider whom neither the fiercest horse nor the roughest ground could dismay, and so dexterously did she handle sword and bow that she was a match for a thousand warriors, and fit to meet either god or devil. Many times had she taken the field, armed at all points, and won matchless renown in encounters with the bravest captains, and so in this last fight, when all the others had been slain or had fled, among the last seven there rode Tomoe.

  At first it was reported that Kiso had escaped to the north either through Nagasaka by the road to Tamba, or by the Ryūge Pass, but actually he had turned back again and ridden off toward Seta, to see if he could hear aught of the fate of Imai Kanehira. Imai had long valiantly held his position at Seta till the continued assaults of the enemy reduced his eight hundred men to but fifty, when he rolled up his banner and rode back to Miyako to ascertain the fate of his lord; and thus it happened that the two fell in with each other by the shore at Ōtsu. Recognizing each other when they were yet more than a hundred yards away, they spurred their horses and came together joyfully.

  Seizing
Imai by the hand, Kiso burst forth: "I was so anxious about you that I did not stop to fight to the death in the Rokujō-kawara, but turned my back on a host of foes and hastened off here to find yon." "How can I express my gratitude for my lord's consideration?" replied Imai; "I too would have died in the defence of Seta, but I feared for my lord's uncertain fate, and thus it was that I fled hither." "Then our ancient pledge will not be broken and we shall die together," said Kiso, "and now unfurl your banner, for a sign to our men who have scattered among these hills."

  So Imai unfurled the banner, and many of their men who had fled from the Capital and from Seta saw it and rallied again, so that they soon had a following of three hundred horse. "With this band our last fight will be a great one," shouted Kiso joyfully, "who leads yon great array?" "Kai-no-Ichijō Jirō, my lord." "And how many has he, do you think?" "About six thousand, it seems." "Well matched!" replied Yoshinaka, "if we must die, what death could be better than to fall outnumbered by valiant enemies? Forward then!"