Part 12
[51] This incident has for some reason become very famous and artists have used it as a subject for pictures. One of these is now hanging in the Imperial Museum in Tokyo.
[52] Poems were written on oblongs of crimson, yellow, gold, or other paper according to the feeling of the writer. Nowadays oblong poem papers can be bought anywhere, but they are generally white or gray with gold decoration.
[53] The King's visit was made October 16, 1008.
[54] It was _de rigueur_ for ladies to conceal their faces with fans.
[55] The left side is the more honourable position, but this time the King sat at the right side because perhaps they could not move the Queen's dais.
[56] A special effect of brilliant shining produced by beating the silk.
[57] A special effect of brilliant shining produced by beating the silk.
[58] These garments were evidently made of very thin material, colours underneath being intended to modify the outer ones, hence the art of dressing became very subtle.
[59] Doubtless this office was highly important and held in honour. In those days poison and inferior foods were to be guarded against. Throughout the journal it may be noticed that all directly serving the King and Queen in any way are persons of high rank.
[60] In this curiously delicate operation the actual leaf or flower from which the colour was obtained was rubbed onto the silk to make the desired pattern.
[61] Light blue and some kinds of yellow are colours relegated to the elderly in Japan. Babies and young people are dressed in bright colours and showy patterns. The old wear plain stuffs and pale or dull colours.
[62] This dance was performed by court nobles at the coronation of the present Emperor at Kioto, 1915.
[63] Artificial hills in Japanese gardens are intended to bring mountain scenery to mind, whether large or small. They are sometimes of considerable size.
[64] Reigned 970 to 984. This lady may have been his mistress or had interesting reminiscences to relate.
[65] The feuds of the Fujiwara family. Fujiwara Fuhito had four sons who became the founders of the four great Fujiwara families--Minami, Kyo, Kita, and Shiki. They were all aspiring to the King's favour and at enmity with each other, the present Prime Minister Michinaga far outstripping the others in power.
[66] Mochi: a cake made of beaten rice flour paste.
[67] These dainty white wooden boxes of food arranged in a way pleasing to the eye are still a feature of Japanese life. They are distributed, with varying contents, at weddings and funerals, sold at railway stations, and carried on picnics.
[68] At banquets a great cup was used which could contain one or two quarts of liquor. When this was circulated among the guests each was expected to empty the cup, and it was the pride of the drinker to toss it off in one draught.
[69] The hero of Genji Monogatari.
[70] The Queen desired a literary Court to rival that of the first Queen. See note on p. 131.
[71] A special kind of wild duck called oshidori which is always seen in couples.
[72] Kokiden: residence of the first Queen.
[73] The World; i.e. matrimonial affairs.
[74] Three anthologies, of Ancient and Modern Poems, Later Selections of Poems, and Miscellaneous Poems, respectively.
[75] These men were famous calligraphers.
[76] This famous dance, whose origin is given below, was performed at the present Emperor's coronation at Kioto in 1915, by five daughters of ancient noble families selected for their beauty. It is said that these young ladies immediately thereafter received a great many offers of marriage.
Gosetchi was a great holiday succeeded by two days of feasting. The dancing girls (of the diary) were all daughters of persons of high rank, three being daughters of courtiers and two daughters of province governors. Tradition says that when King Tenmu was at his palace of Yoshino, heavenly maidens came down and danced before him fluttering the long celestial sleeves of their feathery dresses five times. This was the origin of the dance.
[77] Each dancer was attended by helpers who were sometimes persons of degree. Their duties were to arrange trains and costumes in the postures of the dance.
[78] Her father was Keeper of the Seal. Her aunt was one of the queens.
[79] See signs of the zodiac, of Old Japan.
[80] The name of a detached hall in the Imperial Palace.
[81] Like the knights' tents in the tournaments each girl's apartment was distinguished by special devices of cloths or banners hung before it.
[82] Horai: an island of eternal life and felicity supposed to exist in the eastern ocean. Horai symbolizes changelessness, and it must have been intended as a hint at the impropriety of Sakyō's changed position.
[83] Festival of the ancient gods, for which preparation was made the day before by fasting.
[84] This incident was very well known and is mentioned in several of the writings of the period. The mirror is the symbol of the soul of a Japanese woman. With the mirror Sakyō sent a poem:
_Alas! the waving moss deceived your vision._ _The clear mirror is never tarnished:_ _Therefore look deep._
[85] Mochi: it is still the custom in Japan to serve a cake made of beaten rice on New Year's Day, the great festival of the year. The sound of this beating is heard from house to house throughout the country, and gives everybody a holiday feeling. The ceremonies last three days.
[86] These colour combinations were very subtle because the effect was produced by the play of one or perhaps two colours showing through one another.
[87] One of the young women who had danced the Gosetchi.
[88] Fujiwara Michitaka, the Prime Minister's brother.
[89] This lady was one of the greatest poets Japan has ever produced. See her diary, which is the record of her liaison with a young prince.
[90] A daughter of the famous court lady, poet, and historian Akazomé Emon, to whom the court history of the time is traditionally ascribed.
[91] Seishonagon. A lady famous for her learning and wit and with a little reputation for daring. Pretty and vivacious, learned and witty, she was allowed liberties unrebuked--one may call her the New Woman of the day. She served in the court of the first Queen Sadako, daughter of the Prime Minister's brother. The two Queens were in rivalry. Seishonagon was the literary light of that court, as Murasaki Shikibu and Izumi Shikibu were of this.
[92] Because one may be bewitched; ancient belief dating from long before her day.
[93] A koto is called a horizontal harp, but it consists of a number of strings stretched the length of the instrument, the scale made by an arrangement of bridges placed under the strings, and played upon by four ivory keys worn on the four fingers of the right hand.
[94] Her husband who was a scholar in Chinese literature. He died in 1001. It is now 1008.
95 : Large and learned volumes by the Chinese scholar Seŭ-ma Ch'ien.
[96] The Merciful Buddha of the West Paradise.
[97] It is believed that this Buddha comes to welcome the departing soul of the believer mounted on a rainbow-coloured cloud.
[98] The great Enryakuji on Mount Hiyé, northeast of Kioto.
[99] A line from an old Chinese poem about Jofuku and Bunsei, seekers of the herb of eternal life. When they entered the boat they were young men, but were very old when they returned.
[100] The Japanese New Year ceremonies extend over three days.
[101] Both these little princes, grandsons of the Prime Minister, eventually came to the throne.
[102] Toso: New Year's drink of spiced saké supposed to prolong life.
[103] The names of these colours are translated in modern terms. The Japanese names of colours for dresses were all of colours in combination, which often were called after flowers or plants. These names could not convey the right idea. For instance, what is here translated _old rose and white_, would be in those days called _cherry_, intended to convey to the mind the thought of the cherry-tree in bloom.
[104] Paper doors.
III
THE DIARY OF IZUMI SHIKIBU
A.D. 1002-1003
Many months had passed in lamenting the World,[1] more shadowy than a dream. Already the tenth day of the Deutzia month was over. A deeper shade lay under the trees and the grass on the embankment was greener.[2] These changes, unnoticed by any, seemed beautiful to her, and while musing upon them a man stepped lightly along behind the hedge. She was idly curious, but when he came towards her she recognized the page of the late prince.[3] He came at a sorrowful moment, so she said, "Is your coming not long delayed? To talk over the past was inclined." "Would it not have been presuming?--Forgive me--In mountain temples have been worshipping. To be without ties is sad, so wishing to take service again I went to Prince Sochino-miya."
"Excellent! that Prince is very elegant and is known to me. He cannot be as of yore?" [i.e. unmarried.] So she said, and he replied, "No, but he is very gracious. He asked me whether I ever visit you nowadays--'Yes, I do,' said I; then, breaking off this branch of tachibana[4] flowers, His Highness replied, 'Give this to her, [see] how she will take it.' The Prince had in mind the old poem:
_The scent of tachibana flowers in May_ _Recalls the perfumed sleeves of him who is no longer here._
So I have come--what shall I say to him?"
It was embarrassing to return an oral message through the page, and the Prince had not written; discontented, yet wishing to make some response, she wrote a poem and gave it to the page:
_That scent, indeed, brings memories_ _But rather, to be reminded of that other,_ _Would hear the cuckoo's[5] voice._
The Prince was on the veranda of his palace, and as the page approached him with important face, he led him into an inner room saying, "What is it?" The page presented the poem.
The Prince read it and wrote this answer:
_The cuckoo sings on the same branch_ _With voice unchanged,_ _That shall you know._
His Highness gave this to the page and walked away, saying, "Tell it to no one, I might be thought amorous." The page brought the poem to the lady. Lovely it was, but it seemed wiser not to write too often [so did not answer].
On the day following his first letter this poem was sent:
_To you I betrayed my heart--_ _Alas! Confessing_ _Brings deeper grief,_ _Lamenting days._
Feeling was rootless, but being unlearned in loneliness, and attracted, she wrote an answer:
_If you lament to-day_ _At this moment your heart_ _May feel for mine--_ _For in sorrow_ _Months and days have worn away._
He wrote often and she answered--sometimes--and felt her loneliness a little assuaged. Again she received a letter. After expressing feelings of great delicacy:
_[I would] solace [you] with consoling words_ _If spoken in vain_ _No longer could be exchanged._
To talk with you about the departed one; how would it be [for you] to come in the evening unobtrusively?
Her answer:
As I hear of comfort I wish to talk with you, but being an uprooted person there is no hope of my standing upright. I am footless [meaning, I cannot go to you].
Thus she wrote, and His Highness decided to come as a private person.
It was still daylight, and he secretly called his servant Ukon-no-zo, who had usually been the medium by which the letters had reached the Prince, and said,
"I am going somewhere," The man understood and made preparations.
His Highness came in an humble palanquin and made his page announce him. It was embarrassing. She did not know what to do; she could not pretend to be absent after having written him an answer that very day. It seemed too heartless to make him go back at once without entering. Thinking, "I will only talk to him," she placed a cushion by the west door on the veranda, and invited the Prince there. Was it because he was so much admired by the world that he seemed to her unusually fascinating? But this only increased her caution. While they were talking the moon shone out and it became uncomfortably bright.
He: "As I have been out of society and living in the shade, I am not used to such a bright place as this "--It was too embarrassing!--"Let me come in where you are sitting; I will not be rude as others are. You are not one to receive me often, are you?" "No indeed! What a strange idea! Only to-night we shall talk together I think; never again!" Thus lightly talking, the night advanced--"Shall we spend the night in this way?" he asked:
_The night passes,_ _We dream no faintest dream--_ _What shall remain to me of this summer night?_
She:
_Thinking of the world_ _Sleeves wet with tears are my bed-fellows._ _Calmly to dream sweet dreams--_ _There is no night for that._
[Illustration: "HIS HIGHNESS CAME IN A HUMBLE PALANQUIN"]
He: "I am not a person who can leave my house easily. You may think me rude, but my feeling for you grows ardent." And he crept into the room. Felt horribly embarrassed, but conversed together and at daybreak he returned.
Next day's letter:
In what way are you thinking about me? I feel anxiety--
_To you it may be a commonplace to speak of love,_ _But my feeling this morning--_ _To nothing can it be compared!_
She answered:
_Whether commonplace or not--_ _Thoughts do not dwell upon it_ _For the first time [I] am caught in the toils._
O what a person! What has she done! So tenderly the late Prince spoke to her! She felt regret and her mind was not tranquil. Just then the page came. Awaited a letter, but there was none. It disappointed her; how much in love! When the page returned, a letter was given.
The letter:
_Were my heart permitted even to feel the pain of waiting!_ _It may be to wait is lesser pain--_ _To-night--not even to wait for--_
The Prince read it, and felt deep pity, yet there must be reserve [in going out at night]. His affection for his Princess is unusually light, but he may be thinking it would seem odd to leave home every night. Perhaps he will reserve himself until the mourning for the late Prince is over;[6] it is a sign that his love is not deep. An answer came after nightfall.
_Had she said she was waiting for me with all her heart,_ _Without rest towards the house of my beloved_ _Should I have been impelled!_
When I think how lightly you may regard me!
Her answer:
Why should I think lightly of you?
_I am a drop of dew_ _Hanging from a leaf_ _Yet I am not unrestful_ _For on this branch I seem to have existed_ _From before the birth of the world._
Please think of me as like the unstable dew which cannot even remain unless the leaf supports it.
His Highness received this letter. He wanted to come, but days passed without realizing his wish. On the moon-hidden day [last day of month] she wrote:
_If to-day passes_ _Your muffled voice of April, O cuckoo_ _When can I hear?_
She sent this poem, but as the Prince had many callers it could only reach him the next morning.
His answer:
_The cuckoo's song in spring is full of pain._ _Listen and you will hear his song of summer_ _Full-throated from to-day._[7]
And so he came at last, avoiding public attention. The lady was preparing herself for temple-going, and in the act of religious purification. Thinking that the rare visits of the Prince betrayed his indifference, and supposing that he had come only to show that he was not without sympathy, she continued the night absorbed in religious services, talking little with him.
In the morning the Prince said: "I have passed an extraordinary night"--
_New is such feeling for me_ _We have been near,_ _Yet the night passed and our souls have not met._
And he added, "I am wretched."
She could feel his distress and was sorry for him; and said:
_With endless sorrow my heart is weighted_ _And night after night is passed_ _Even without meeting of the eyelids._
For me this is not new.
May 2. The Prince wrote to her: "Are you going to the temple to-day? When shall you be at home again:
Answer:
_In its season the time of gently falling rain will be over._ _To-night I will drag from its bed the root of ayame._[8]
Went to the temple and came back after two or three days to find a letter [from him]:
My heart yearns for thee, and I wish to see thee, yet I am discouraged by the treatment of the other night. I am sad and ashamed. Do not suppose that I remain at home because my feeling is shallow.
_She is cold-hearted, yet I cannot forget her._ _Time wipes out bitterness, but deepens longings_ _Which to-day have overcome me._
Not slight is my feeling, although--
Her reply:
_Are you coming? Scarcely believable are your words,_ _For not even a shadow_ _Passes before my unfrequented dwelling._
The Prince came as usual unannounced. The lady did not believe that he would come at all, and being tired out with the religious observances of several days, fell asleep. No one noticed the gentle knocking at the gate. He, on the other hand, had heard some rumours, and suspecting the presence of another lover, quietly retired. A letter came on the morning of the next day:
_I stood before your closed door_ _Never to be opened._ _Seeing, it became the symbol of your pitiless heart!_
I tasted the bitterness of love, and pitied myself.
Then she knew that he had come the night before--carelessly fallen asleep!--and wrote back:
_How can you write the thought?_ _The door of precious wood was closely shut,_ _No way to read that heart._
All is thy suspicion--O that I could lay bare my heart [to you]!
The next night he wanted to come again, yet he was advised against it. He feared the criticism of the Chamberlain and Crown Prince, so his visits became more and more infrequent. In the continuous rains the lady gazed at the clouds and thought how the court would be talking about them. She had had many friends; now there was only the Prince. Though people invented various tales about her, she thought the truth could never be known to any. The Prince wrote a letter about the tedious rain:
_You are thinking only of the long rains_ _Forever falling everywhere._ _Into my heart also the rain falls--_ _Long melancholy days._
It was smile-giving to see that he seized upon every occasion to write her a poem, and she also felt as he did that this was a time for sentiment.
The reply:
_Unaware of the sadness in your heart,_ _Knowing only of the rain in mine._
And on another paper she wrote another poem:
_It passes, the very sorrowful life of the world--_ _By to-day's long_ { _rains_ { _meditation it can be known_ _The_ { _high-water mark_ { _flood will be exceeded._
Is it still long? [before you come].
The Prince read this letter and the messenger came back with his answer:
_Helpless man,_ _I am weary even of life._ _Not to you alone beneath the sky_ _Is rain and dulness._
For us both it is a stupid world.
It was the sixth day of the Fifth month--rain not yet stopped. The Prince had been much more touched by her answer of the day before, which was deeper in feeling, and on that morning of heavy rain he sent with much kindness to inquire after her.
_Very terrible was the sound of rain ..._ _Of what was I thinking_ _All the long night through_ _Listening to the rain against the window?_
I was sheltered, but the storm was in my heart.
The lady wrote thus to the Prince, and he thought, "Not hopeless."
His poem:
_All the night through, it was of you I thought--_ _How is it in a house where is no other_ _To make rain forgotten?_
At noon people were talking about the flooding of the Kamo River, and many went to see it, the Prince among them. He wrote:
How are you at present? I have just come back from flood-seeing.
_The feeling of my heart, like the overflowing waters of the flood,_ _But deeper my heart's feeling._
Do you know this?
She wrote:
_Toward me the waters do not overflow._ _No depth lies there_ _Though the meadow is flooded._
Words are not enough.
In these words she replied to him; and his Highness made up his mind to come, and ordered perfumery for himself. Just then his old nurse, Jiju-no-Menoto, came up: "Where are you going?" she said,
"People are talking about it. She is no lady of high birth. If you wish her to serve you, you may summon her here as a servant. Your undignified goings-out are very painful for us. Many men go to her, and some awkward thing may happen. All these improper things are suggested by Ukon-no-Zo.[9] He accompanied the late Prince also. If you wander out in the depths of night no good can come of it. I will tell the Prime Minister[10] of the persons who accompany you in these night visits. In the world there may be changes. No one can tell what will happen to-morrow. The late Minister loved you much and asked the present one to show you favour. You must keep yourself from these indiscretions till worldly affairs are quite settled."
The Prince said: "Where shall I go? I am so bored, and am seeking temporary recreation. People are foolish to make much of it."
He said this, although much hurt by the necessity for it. Besides that, he thought her not unworthy of him and even wished to bring her to the palace [as a concubine]. On the other hand, he reflected that in that case things even more painful to hear would be said, and in his trouble of mind days were passed.
At last he visited her. "I could not come in spite of my desires. Please do not think that I neglect you. The fault is in you; I have heard that there are many friends of yours who are jealous of me. That makes me more reserved, and so many days have gone by."
The Prince talked gently, and said: "Now come for this night only. There is a hidden place no one sees; there I can talk with tranquil mind." The palanquin was brought near the veranda. She was forced to enter it and went, without her own volition, with unsteady mind. She kept thinking that people would know about it, but as the night was far advanced no one found them out. The conveyance was quietly brought to a corridor where no one was and he got out.
He whispered, "As the moon is very bright, get down quickly." She was afraid, but hurriedly obeyed him. "Here there is no one to see us; from this time we will meet here. At your honourable dwelling I am always anxious about other men. I can never be at ease there." His words were gentle, and when it was dawn he made her get into the palanquin and said, "I wish to go with you, but as it is broad daylight I fear people may think I have passed the night outside the Court."