by Donald Keene
"When I looked I could see a radiandy beautiful court lady approaching, rustling her silken robes as she walked. She was accompanied by two maids, one of whom walked ahead of her and the other followed with an embroidered case in her arms. They went by my hiding place, apparently without noticing me. I let them pass, then ran after them. The maid walking in front let out a scream and disappeared. The other maid dropped her bundle and ran off, crying for help. The lady, however, seemed unperturbed, and remained where she was without uttering a sound. I rushed up to her with my sword drawn, and cold-bloodedly began to tear off her clothes. 'Give me your underrobe too!' I ordered her. She answered, 'Please spare me that. It is to the everlasting shame of a woman if her underrobe is removed.' She unfastened the amulet bag from her neck and threw it at me. 'Take this instead of my underrobe.' Her perfume was so rich that I was almost overcome. But, in my depravity, I would not grant her even this. I insisted that she give me her underrobe too. 'If my underrobe is removed I have no desire to live any longer. Please take my life,' she said. 'Gladly,' I answered, and stabbed her to death with one thrust of my sword. I hastily stripped off her underrobe before the blood could reach it. Then I picked up the bag that the maid had dropped and hurried home, saying to myself, 'How happy this will make my wife and children.'
"When I knocked at the door, my wife was surprised at how soon I had returned, and asked through the door if I had been unsuccessful again.
"'Open the door quickly!' I said, and threw the bag inside. 'You certainly got it in a hurry,' she cried, and, too impatient to open the mouth of the bag, she cut the drawstrings. There were twelve un-lined costumes, each impregnated with the same fragrance. The scent was so strong that people passing in the alley in front of my house stopped in surprise, and it reached even the houses of our neighbors.
"My wife and children were enraptured. My wife, shameful to say, went so far as to put on the underrobe. 'This is the first time in my life that I have worn such a robe. The lady you took it from must have been quite young. About how old was she?'
"I thought that she was asking out of pity, and answered, 'It was dark and I could not see very well, but she was certainly not as much as twenty-one. I imagine she was about eighteen.'
"'I thought as much,' said my wife, and without a word of explanation rushed outside. I wondered what business could have taken her out in such a frantic manner. After a while she returned, saying, 'You are really much too magnanimous a robber. As long as you are committing a crime you should try to get the most out of it. I just went to cut off her hair. My own is rather thin, but if I twist hers into plaits it will really look beautiful. I wouldn't change it, not even for the robes.' She poured some hot water in a bowl and sprinkled it on the hair, which she hung up to dry. She was so elated that she was dancing about for joy. 'I have all a woman could ask for. Oh, how happy I am!'
"I stared at her. She filled me with disgust and revulsion. It was because of actions in a previous existence that I had been born a human being and, having had the rare fortune to receive a human body, I should at least have been acquainted with human feelings, even if I was not to become a truly virtuous man. I had instead become a man of great wickedness. All I had thought of night and day was killing people. Not a single moment had gone by but was devoted to plans for robbery. I could not escape Fate. In the end, I knew, I should suffer the torments of hell. To go on thus committing grievous sins, dragging out a meaningless existence, not realizing the hollowness and futility of my life, seemed revolting even to me. And now the monstrous behavior of my wife had struck me dumb with horror. I repented bitterly that I had slept with such a woman, that our lives had been joined. Now that I understood the baseness of her nature, I wondered for what purpose I had killed that lady. I could think of nothing but the misery of my deed. I felt as though my entrails were dissolving, but I could not content myself merely with weeping. I decided that I would shave my hair, making what had happened my guide in the way of salvation. That very night I went to see a Buddhist monk, whose disciple I became. Shordy afterward I climbed this mountain.
"I realize how much you must hate me. Kill me in any way you choose. Even though you cut me into a thousand slices, I shall not complain. I should mention, however, that if you kill me it may harm the lady in whatever life she is living now. The Three Treasures are my witness that I do not say this because of any attachment to this life. Now I have said all that I have to say. I leave the rest to you."
The priest Kasuya said, "Even if you had been led to abandon the world by some perfectly commonplace thing, how could I ever hate a fellow priest? But I know now that you abandoned the world because of the same lady, and I feel all the more closely tied to you. It must be that the lady was a manifestation of a bodhisattva who took the form of a woman to save us, who otherwise would have missed the Way. When I realize what compassion she showed in guiding us, I find it all the harder to forget the things of the past. If they had not happened, how would we ever have become priests and forsaken the transient world? To have received this absolute happiness must be our joy within sorrow. From today forward I shall be grateful for that event which led me to seek the Way." So speaking he wetted with tears the sleeve of his dark robes.
TRANSLATED BY DONALD KEENE
Footnotes
1 Also called Kūkai (see page 63). Kōbō Daishi founded a monastery on Mount Kōya and died there.
2 Members of the aristocracy blackened their teeth.
3 Three cups were offered after feasts of the aristocracy.
4 It is a mark of intimacy to offer one's own cup to another person.
5 Sugawara no Michizane (see page 166) has been enshrined as a god under the name of Tenjin. The chief Tenjin shrine is in the northwest part of Kyoto. On the night of the twenty-fourth and the following day of each month there is a special observance.
TOKUGAWA PERIOD
1600-1868
WHAT THE SEASONS BROUGHT TO THE ALMANAC-MAKER
[Kōshoku Gonin Onna, Book III] by Ihara Saikaku
Saikaku's "Five Women Who Loved Love" (1686) is one of the masterpieces of Tokugawa literature. It consists of five independent stories, of which the third is here given. These stories are in turn divided into five chapters, each with a title of its own. The incidents described were based on actual events which took place shortly before Saikaku's novel, and were already familiar to many people in the form of ballads and recitations by professional storytellers.
THE BEAUTY CONTEST
According to the almanac for 1682, New Year's Day was to be devoted to the practice of calligraphy. Then, having started the year auspiciously, men could start making love on January 2.1 In the Age of the Gods this art was taught by the wagtail bird2 and ever since those days it has brought endless mischief between the sexes.
In Kyoto there lived a lady known as the Almanac-maker's Beautiful Spouse, who stirred up a mountain of passion in the capital and figured again and again in notorious romances. Her moon-shaped eyebrows rivaled in beauty the crescent borne aloft in the Gion Festival parade; her figure suggested the cherry buds, not yet blossoms, of Kiyomizu; her lovely lips looked like the topmost leaves of Takao in full autumnal glory. She lived in Muromachi-dori, the style center for women of discriminating taste in clothes, the most fashionable district in all Kyoto.
It was late spring; men felt gay and the wistaria hung like a cloud of purple over Yasui, robbing the pines of their color. People thronged up Higashiyama and turned it into a living mountain of figures.
There was in the capital a band of four inseparable young men who were known for their handsome appearance and riotous living. Thanks to large inheritances they could spend every day in the year seeking their own pleasure. One night, till dawn, they might amuse themselves in Shimabara with China-girl, Fragrance, Flora-point, and Highbridge. Next day they would make love to Take-naka Kichisaburō, Karamatsu Kasen, Fujita Kichisaburō, and Mits-use Sakon in the Shijō-gawara section.3 Night or day, girls or boys, it made no
difference to their pleasure.
After the theatre one evening they were lounging around a tea shop called Matsuya and one of them remarked, "I have never seen so many good-looking local girls as I did today. Do you suppose we could find others who would seem just as beautiful now?" They thought they might, and decided to watch for pretty girls among the people who had gone to see the wistaria blossoms and were now returning to their homes. After a worldly actor in the group had been chosen as chief judge, a "beauty contest" was conducted until the twilight hours, providing a new source of amusement for the jaded gentlemen.
At first they were disappointed to see some maids riding in a carriage which hid them from sight. Then a group of girls strolled by in a rollicking mood—"not bad, not bad at all"—but none of the girls quite satisfied their exacting standards. Paper and ink had been brought to record the entries, and it was agreed that only the best should be put on their list.
Next they spied a lady of thirty-four or thirty-five with a graceful long neck and intelligent-looking eyes, above which could be seen a natural hairline of rare beauty. Her nose, it was true, stood a little high, but that could easily be tolerated. Underneath she wore white satin, over that light blue satin, and outside—reddish-yellow satin. Each of these garments was luxuriously lined with the same material. On her left sleeve was a hand-painted likeness of the Yoshida monk, along with his passage, "To sit alone under a lamp, and read old books. . . ."4 Assuredly, this was a woman of exquisite taste.
Her sash was of folded taffeta bearing a tile design. Around her head she had draped a veil like that worn by court ladies; she wore stockings of pale silk and sandals with triple-braided straps. She walked noiselessly and gracefully, moving her hips with a natural rhythm. "What a prize for some lucky fellow!" a young buck exclaimed. But these words were hardly uttered when the lady, speaking to an attendant, opened her mouth and disclosed that one of her lower teeth was missing, to the complete disillusionment of her admirers.
A little behind her followed a maiden not more than sixteen or seventeen years old. On the girl's left was a woman who appeared to be her mother, on her right a black-robed nun. There were also several women and a footman as escorts, all taking the greatest care of their charge. It seemed at first as if the girl were engaged to be married, but at second glance she proved to be married already, for her teeth were blackened and her eyebrows removed. She was quite pretty with her round face, intelligent eyes, ears delicately draped at the side of her head, and plump fingers, thin-skinned and white. She wore her clothes with matchless elegance; underneath were purple-spotted fawns on a field of pure yellow, outside, the design of a hundred sparrows upon gray satin. Over her rainbow-colored sash she wore a breast-belt which enhanced the charm of her carriage. The tiestrings of her richly lined rainhat were made from a thousand braids of twisted paper. They could easily see under the hat—a delight for the eyes, or so they thought until someone noticed a wide scar, three inches or more, on the side of her face. She could hardly have been born with such a deformity, and they all laughed when one of the playboys remarked, "She must really hate the nurse who is responsible for that I"
Then another girl, perhaps twenty-one or twenty-two, came along wearing a garment of cotton homespun, even the lining of which was so tattered and patched that the wind, blowing it about, exposed her poverty to all. The material of her sash came from an old coat and was pitifully thin. She wore socks of purple leather, apparently the only kind she could afford, and tough, rough Nara sandals. An old cloth headpiece was stuck on the top of her head. It was anybody's guess how long ago the teeth of a comb had run through her hair, which fell in sloppy disarray, relieved hardly at all by her haphazard attempts to tuck it up.
But while she made no pretensions to style or fashion, the girl, walking alone, seemed to be enjoying herself. As far as her facial features were concerned, she certainly left nothing to be desired; indeed, the men were captivated by the sight of her.
"Have you ever seen anyone with so much natural beauty?"
"If she had some fine clothes to wear, that girl would steal men's hearts away. Too bad that she had to be born poor."
They pitied her deeply, and one fellow, seeing that she was on her way home, followed hopefully to learn who she was. "She is the wife of a tobacco-cutter down at the end of Seiganji-dori," someone told him. It was disappointing—another straw of hope gone up in smoke!
Later a woman of twenty-seven or twenty-eight passed that way. Her arms were covered by three layers of sleeves, all of black silk and lined in red. Her crest was done in gold, but discreetly on the inner lining, so as to be faintly visible through the sleeve. She had a broad sash which tied in front and was made from dark striped cloth woven in China. Her hair was rolled up in a bun, set further back on the head than the type worn by unmarried ladies, and done up with a thick hair ribbon and two combs. Covering it was a hand-painted scarf and a rainhat in the style of Kichiya,5 also set jauntily back on her head so as not to hide the good looks in which she obviously took pride. Her figure twisted sinuously as she stepped lightly along.
"That's the one, that's the one!"
"Quiet down! Let's get a better look at her."
Sure enough, on closer inspection they found that the lady was accompanied by three servants, each carrying a baby.
"Must have had three kids in three years."
Behind her the babies kept calling out "Mama, mama" while the lady walked on, pretending not to hear them. "They may be her children, but she would just as soon not be seen with them. 'Charm fades with childbirth!' people say." Thus the men shouted and laughed and ridiculed her until she almost died of chagrin.
Next, with a litter borne luxuriously beside her, came a thirteen- or fourteen-year-old girl whose hair was combed out smooth, curled a bit at the ends, and tied down with a red ribbon. In front her hair was parted like a young boy's and held in place by five immaculate combs and a gold hair-clasp. Her face was perfecdy beautiful, and I shall not tire you with needless details. A black inkslab pattern adorned her white satin chemise; a peacock design could be perceived in the iridescent satin of her outer garment. Over this hung lace made from Chinese thread and sleeves which were beautifully designed. A folded sash of twelve colors completed her ensemble. Her bare feet nestled in paper-strap clogs, and one of the litter-bearers carried a stylish rainhat for her.
The girl was holding a bunch of wistaria blossoms over her head, as if to attract the attention of someone who could not find her. Observed in this pose, she was clearly the most beautiful girl of all they had seen that day. "What is the name of this fine lady?" they asked politely of an attendant. "A girl from Muromachi," was the reply. "She is called the Modern Komachi."6
Yes, she had all the beauty of a flower. Only later did they learn how much deviltry was hid beneath it.
THE SLEEPER WHO SLIPPED UP
The life of a bachelor has its attractions, but nights get rather lonely for a man without a wife. So it seemed to a certain maker of almanacs who had lived alone for many years. There were many elegant ladies in the capital, but his heart was set on finding a woman of exceptional beauty and distinction, and such a desire was not easily satisfied. Finally in despair because of his solitary existence, he asked some relatives to find him a suitable mate, and it was arranged for him to meet the girl known as the Modern Komachi, that delicate beauty whom our playboys had seen in the theatre section last spring holding wistaria blossoms over her head.
The almanac-maker was completely charmed with her. "She's the one," he told himself, and without more ado rushed out, ludicrously enough, to arrange an immediate marriage. He found an old woman, a professional go-between, who was widely known as a very fast talker, and thanks to her the negotiations were conducted successfully. A keg of sake was sent to confirm the contract, and on the appointed day Osan was welcomed into her new home.
Deeply attached to his wife and absorbed in the intimacies of their life together, the almanac-maker was blind to ev
erything else—to the flower-fragrant nights of spring and to the rising of the autumn moon. Night and day for three years his wife diligently performed the many tasks which married life required of her, carefully spinning pongee thread by hand, supervising the weaving of cloth by her servant women, looking after her husband's personal appearance, burning as little fuel as possible for economy's sake, and keeping her expense accounts accurate and up to date. In fact she was just the sort of woman any townsman would want in his home.
Their house was prospering and their companionship seemed to hold a store of endless bliss, when it became necessary for the almanac-maker to travel to Edo for business reasons. The parting was sad, but there was nothing to be gained by grieving over it. When he was ready to leave, he paid a visit to Osan's father in Muromachi to tell him about the trip, and the old man was quite concerned about his daughter's welfare during the period of her husband's absence, when she would be left to manage all of his affairs. He wondered if there were not some capable person who could take over the master's business and also assist Osan in running the household. Deciding on a young man named Mōemon, who had served him faithfully for many years, he sent the fellow to his son-in-law's place.
This Mōemon was honest and extremely frugal, so much so that he completely neglected his personal appearance, even economizing on his coat-sleeves, which measured only two and one half inches at the wrist. His forehead was narrow, and when his hair grew out after he reached manhood, Mōemon never bothered to buy a hat to cover it. Moreover, he went about without the protection of a short sword, and slept with his abacus under his head, the better perhaps to reckon how great a fortune he could amass in a night spent dreaming of money-making.
