Kokoro: Hints and Echoes of Japanese Inner Life Part 18

Shuntoku asked: "Why do you laugh? I am the son of a rich and well-famed man, n.o.buyos.h.i.+ of Kawachi. But because of a malediction invoked upon me by my wicked stepmother, I have become as you see me."

Then Otohime, a daughter of that family, hearing the voices, came out, and asked the maid: "Why did you laugh?"

The servant answered: "Oh, my lady, there was a blind man from Kawachi, who seemed about twenty years old, clinging to the pillar of the gate, and loudly crying, 'Alms! alms.'

"So I tried to give him some clean rice upon a tray; but when I held out the tray toward his right hand, he advanced his left; and when I held out the tray toward his left hand, he advanced his right: that was the reason I could not help laughing."

Hearing the maid explaining thus to the young lady, the blind man became angry, and said: "You have no right to despise strangers.

I am the son of a rich and well-famed man in Kawachi, and I am called Shuntoku-maru."

Then the daughter of that house, Otohime, suddenly remembering him, also became quite angry, and said to the servant: "You must not laugh rudely. Laughing at others to-day, you might be laughed at yourself to-morrow."

But Otohime had been so startled that she could not help trembling a little, and, retiring to her room, she suddenly fainted away.

Then in the house all was confusion, and a doctor was summoned in great baste. But the girl, being quite unable to take any medicine, only became weaker and weaker.

Then many famous physicians were sent for; and they consulted together about Otohime; and they decided at last that her sickness had been caused only by some sudden sorrow.

So the mother said to her sick daughter "Tell me, without concealment, if you have any secret grief; and if there be anything you want, whatever it be, I will try to get it for you."

Otohime replied: "I am very much ashamed; but I shall tell you what I wish.

"The blind man who came here the other day was the son of a rich and well-famed citizen of Kawachi, called n.o.buyos.h.i.+.

"At the time of the festival of Tenjin at Kitano in Kyoto, I met that young man there, on my way to the temple; and we then exchanged letters of love, pledging ourselves to each other.

"And therefore I very much wish that I may be allowed to travel in search of him, until I find him, wherever he may be."

The mother kindly made answer: "That, indeed, will be well. If you wish for a kago, you may have one; or if you would like to have a horse, you can have one.

"You can choose any servant you like to accompany you, and I can let you have as many koban as you desire."

Otohime answered: "Neither horse nor kago do I need, nor any servant; I need only the dress of a pilgrim,--leggings and gown,--and a mendicant's wallet."

For Otohime held it her duty to set out by herself all alone, just as Shuntoku had done.

So she left home, saying farewell to her parents, with eyes full of tears: scarcely could she find voice to utter the word "good-by."

Over mountains and mountains she pa.s.sed, and again over mountains; hearing only the cries of wild deer and the sound of torrent-water.

Sometimes she would lose her way; sometimes she would pursue alone a steep and difficult path; always she journeyed sorrowing.

At last she saw before her--far, far away--the pine-tree called Kawama-matsu, and the two rocks called Ota(1); and when she saw those rocks, she thought of Shuntoku with love and hope.

Hastening on, she met five or six persona going to k.u.mano; and she asked them: "Have you not met on your way a blind youth, about sixteen years old?"

They made answer: "No, not yet; but should we meet him anywhere, we will tell him whatever you wish."

This reply greatly disappointed Otohime; and she began to think that all her efforts to find her lover might be in vain; and she became very sad.

At last she became so end that she resolved not to try to find him in this world anymore, but to drown herself at once in the pool of Sawara, that she might be able to meet him in a future state.

She hurried there as fast as she could. And when she reached the pond, she fixed her pilgrim's staff in the ground, and hung her outer robe on a pine-tree, and threw away her wallet, and, loosening her hair, arranged it in the style called s.h.i.+mada(2).

Then, having filled her sleeves with stones, she was about to leap into the water, when there appeared suddenly before her a venerable man of seemingly not less than eighty years, robed all in white, and bearing a tablet in his hand.

And the aged man said to her: "Be not thus in haste to die, Otohime! Shuntoku whom you seek is at Kiyomidzu San: go thither and meet him."

These were, indeed, the happiest tidings she could have desired, and she became at once very happy. And she knew she had thus been saved by the august favor of her guardian deity, and that it was the G.o.d himself who had spoken to her those words.

So she cast away the stones she had put into her sleeves, and donned again the outer robe she had taken off, and rearranged her hair, and took her way in all haste to the temple of Kiyomidzu.

(1) One meaning of "Ota" in j.a.panese is "has met" or "have met."

(2) The simple style in which the hair of dead woman is arranged.

See chapter "Of Women's Hair," in Glimpses of Unfamiliar j.a.pan, vol. ii.

At last she reached the temple. She ascended the three lower steps, and glancing beneath a porch she saw her lover, Shuntoku, lying there asleep, covered with a straw mat; and she called to him, "Mos.h.i.+! Mos.h.i.+!(1)"

Shuntoku, thus being suddenly awakened, seized his staff, which was lying by his side, and cried out, "Every day the children of this neighborhood come here and annoy me, because I am blind!"

Otohime hearing these words, and feeling great sorrow, approached and laid her hands on her poor lover, and said to him:--

"I am not one of those bad, mischievous children; I am the daughter of the wealthy Hagiyama. And because I promised myself to you at the festival of Kitano Tenjin in Kyoto, I have come here to see you."

Astonished at hearing the voice of his sweet-heart, Shuntoku rose up quickly, and cried out: "Oh! are you really Otohime? It is a long time since we last met--but this is so strange! Is it not all a lie?"

And then, stroking each other, they could only cry, instead of speaking.

But presently Shuntoku, giving way to the excitement of his grief, cried out to Otohime: "A malediction has been laid upon me by my stepmother, and my appearance has been changed, as you see.

"Therefore never can I be united to you as your husband. Even as I now am, so must I remain until I fester to death.

"And so you must go beck home at once, and live in happiness and splendor."

But she answered in great sorrow: "Never! Are you really in earnest? Are you truly in your right senses?

"No, no! I have disguised myself thus only because I loved you enough even to give my life for you.

"And now I will never leave yea, no matter what may become of me in the future."

Shuntoku was comforted by these words; but he was also filled with pity for her, so that he wept, without being able to speak a word.

Then she said to him: "Since your wicked stepmother bewitched you only because you were rich, I am not afraid to revenge you by bewitching her also; for I, too, am the child of a rich man."

And then, with her whole heart, she spoke thus to the divinity within the temple:--"For the s.p.a.ce of seven days and seven nights I shall remain fasting in this temple, to prove my vow; and if you have any truth and pity, I beseech you to save us.