strains of "The Misty Hermitage." There were a few flakes of snow but
spring had "come next door." The plums smiled with their first blossoms.
Genji watched through blinds with only Prince Hyo~bu and Higekuro
beside him. The lesser courtiers were on the veranda. Since it was an
informal affair there was only a light supper.
Higekuro's fourth son, Yu~giri's third son, and two of Prince Hotaru's
sons danced "Myriad Years." They were very pretty and even now they
carried themselves like little aristocrats. Graceful and beautifully fitted out,
they were (was a part of it in the eye of the observer?) elegance incarnate.
Yu~giri's second son, by the daughter of Koremitsu, and a grandson of
<P 634>
Prince Hyo~bu, son of the guards officer called the Minamoto councillor,
danced "The Royal Deer." Higekuro's third son did a masked dance about
a handsome Chinese general and Yu~giri's oldest son the Korean dragon
dance. And then the several dancers, all of them close relatives, did "Peace"
and "Joy of Spring" and numbers of other dances. As evening came on,
Genji had the blinds raised, and as the festivities reached a climax his little
grandchildren showed most remarkable grace and skill in several plain,
unmasked dances. Their innate talents had been honed to the last delicate
edge by their masters. Genji was glad that he did not have to say which
was the most charming. His aging friends were all weeping copiously and
Prince Hyo~bu's nose had been polished to a fine, high red.
"An old man does find it harder and harder to hold back drunken
tears," said Genji. He looked at Kashiwagi. "And just see our young
guardsman here, smiling a superior smile to make us feel uncomfortable.
Well, he has only to wait a little longer. The current of the years runs only
in one direction, and old age lies downstream."
Pretending to be drunker than he was, Genji had singled out the
soberest of his guests. Kashiwagi was genuinely ill and quite indifferent
to the festivities. Though Genji's manner was jocular each of his words
seemed to Kashiwagi a sharper blow than the one before. His head was
aching. Genji saw that he was only pretending to drink and made him
empty the wine cup under his own careful supervision each time it came
around. Kashiwagi was the handsomest of them even in his hour of dis-
tress. So ill that he left early, he was feeling much worse when he reached
home. He could not understand himself. He had in spite of everything
remained fairly sober--and he sometimes drank himself senseless. Had his
frayed nerves caused his blood to rise? But he was not such a weakling.
It had all been a lamentable and most unbecoming performance in any
case.
The aftereffects were not of a sort to disappear in a day. He was
seriously ill. His parents, in great alarm, insisted that he come home. The
Second Princess was very reluctant to let him go. Through the dull days
she had told herself that their relations must surely improve, and though
it could not have been said that they were a devoted couple she could not
bear to say goodbye. She feared that she would not see him again. He was
very sorry, and thought himself guilty of very great disrespect to leave a
royal princess in forlorn solitude.
Her mother, one of the Suzaku emperor's lesser ladies, was more
vocally grieved. "Parent should not come between husband and wife, I do
not care what sort of crisis it might be. I cannot even think of having you
away for such a long time. Until you have recovered, they say--but sup-
pose you have a try at recovering here." She addressed him through only
a curtain.
<P 635>
"There is much in what you say. I am not an important man and I
received august permission to marry far beyond my station. I had hoped
to show my gratitude by living a long life and reaching a position at least
a little more worthy of the honor. And now this has happened, and per-
haps I will in the end not be able to show even the smallest part of my
true feelings. I fear that I am not long for this world. The thought suddenly
makes the way into the next world seem very dark and difficult."
They were both in tears. He was persuaded that he really could not
leave.
But his mother, desperately worried, sent for him again. "Why do you
refuse to let me even see your face? When I am feeling a little unhappy
or indisposed it is you among them all that I want to see first. This is too
much."
And of course this position too was thoroughly tenable.
"Maybe it is because I am the oldest that I have always been her
favorite. Even now I am her special pet. She says that she is not herself
when I am away for even a little while. And now I am ill, it may be
critically, and I fear it would be a very grave offense to stay away. Come
to me quietly, please, if you hear that the worst is at hand. I know that
we will meet again. I am a stupid, indecisive sort, and no doubt you have
found me most unsatisfactory. I had not expected to die quite so soon. I
had thought that we had many years ahead of us."
He was in tears as he left the house. The princess, now alone, was
speechless with grief and unrequited affection.
In To~ no Chu~jo~'s house there was a great stir to receive him. The
illness was not sudden and it had not seemed serious. He had gradually
lost his appetite and now he was eating almost nothing. It was as if some
mysterious force were pulling him in. That so erudite and discriminating
a young man should have fallen into such a decline was cause for lament-
ing all through the court. Virtually the whole court came around to inquire
after him and there were repeated messages from the emperor and the
retired emperors, whose concern compounded the worries of his parents.
Genji too was surprised and upset and sent many earnest messages to To~
no Chu~jo~. Yu~giri, perhaps Kashiwagi's closest friend, was constantly at his
side.
The visit to the Suzaku emperor was set for the twenty-fifth. With
such a worthy young man so seriously ill and the whole eminent clan in
a turmoil, the timing seemed far from happy. The visit had already been
postponed too long and too often, however, and to cancel it at this late date
seemed out of the question. Genji felt very sorry indeed for the Third
Princess.
As is the custom on such occasions, sutras were read in fifty temples.
At the temple in which the Suzaku emperor was living, the sutra to Great
Vairocana.
<W Murasaki Shikibu>{Translated by Edward G.Seidensticker}
<T The Tale of Genji>
<K 4>
<C 36>{The Oak Tree}
<N 1>
<P 636>
The New Year came and Kashiwagi's condition had not improved. He
knew how troubled his parents were and he knew that suicide was no
solution, for he would be guilty of the grievous sin of having left them
behind. He had no wish to live on. Since his very early years he had had
high standards and ambitions and had striven in private matters and public
to outdo his rivals by even a little. His wishes had once or twice been
thwarted, however, and he had so lost confidence in himself that the world
had come to seem unrelieved gloom. A longing to prepare for the next
world had succeeded his ambitions, but the opposition of his pare
kept him from following the mendicant way through the mountains an
over the moors. He had delayed, and time had gone by. Then had come
events, and for them he had only himself to blame, which had made it
impossible for him to show his face in public. He did not blame the gods.
His own deeds were working themselves out. A man does not have the
thousand years of the pine, and he wanted to go now, while there were
still those who might mourn for him a little, and perhaps even a sigh from
her would be the reward for his burning passion. To die now and perhaps
win the forgiveness of the man who must feel so aggrieved would be far
preferable to living on and bringing sorrow and dishonor upon the lady
and upon himself. In his last moments everything must disappear. Perhaps,
because he had no other sins to atone for, a part of the affection with which
Genji had once honored him might return.
<N 2>
<P 637>
The same thoughts, over and over, ran uselessly through his mind.
And why, he asked himself in growing despair, had he so deprived himself
of alternatives? His pillow threatened to float away on the river of his
woes.
He took advantage of a slight turn for the better, when his parents and
the others had withdrawn from his bedside, to get off a letter to the Third
Princess.
"You may have heard that I am near death. It is natural that you
should not care very much, and yet I am sad." His hand was so uncertain
that he gave up any thought of saying all that he would have wished to
say.
"My thoughts of you: will they stay when I am gone
Like smoke that lingers over the funeral pyre?
"One word of pity will quiet the turmoil and light the dark road I am
taking by my own choice."
Unchastened, he wrote to Kojiju~ of his sufferings, at considerable
length. He longed, he said, to see her lady one last time. She had from
childhood been close to his house, in which she had near relatives. Al-
though she had strongly disapproved of his designs upon a royal princess
who should have been far beyond his reach, she was extremely sorry for
him in what might be his last illness.
"Do answer him, please, my lady," she said, in tears. "You must, just
this once. It may be your last chance."
"I am sorry for him, in a general sort of way. I am sorry for myself
too. Any one of us could be dead tomorrow. But what happened was too
awful. I cannot bear to think of it. I could not possibly write to him."
She was not by nature a very careful sort of lady, but the great man
to whom she was married had terrorized her with hints, always guarded,
that he was displeased with her.
Kojiju~ insisted and pushed an inkstone towards her, and finally, very
hesitantly, she set down an answer which Kojiju~ delivered under cover of
evening.
To~ no Chu~jo~ had sent to Mount Katsuragi for an ascetic famous as a
worker of cures, and the spells and incantations in which he immersed
himself might almost have seemed overdone. Other holy men were recom-
mended and To~ no Chu~jo~'s sons would go off to seek in mountain recesses
men scarcely known in the city. Mendicants quite devoid of grace came
crowding into the house. The symptoms did not point to any specific
illness, but Kashiwagi would sometimes weep in great, racking sobs. The
soothsayers were agreed that a jealous woman had taken possession of
him. They might possibly be right, thought To~ no Chu~jo~. But whoever she
was she refused to withdraw, and so it was that the search for healers
reached into these obscure corners. The ascetic from Katsuragi, an impos-
<P 638>
ing man with cold, forbidding eyes, intoned mystic spells in a somewhat
threatening voice.
"I cannot stand a moment more of it," said Kashiwagi. "I must have
sinned grievously. These voices terrify me and seem to bring death even
nearer."
Slipping from bed, he instructed the women to tell his father that he
was asleep and went to talk with Kojiju~. To~ no Chu~jo~ and the ascetic were
conferring in subdued tones. To~ no Chu~jo~ was robust and youthful for his
years and in ordinary times much given to laughter. He told the holy man
how it had all begun and how a respite always seemed to be followed by
a relapse.
"Do please make her go away, whoever she might be," he said en-
treatingly.
A hollow shell of his old self, Kashiwagi was meanwhile addressing
Kojiju~ in a faltering voice sometimes interrupted by a suggestion of a
laugh.
"Listen to them. They seem to have no notion that I might be ill
because I misbehaved. If, as these wise men say, some angry lady has taken
possession of me, then I would expect her presence to make me hate myself
a little less. I can say that others have done much the same thing, made
mistakes in their longing for ladies beyond their reach, and ruined their
prospects. I can tell myself all this, but the torment goes on. I cannot face
the world knowing that he knows. His radiance dazzles and blinds me. I
would not have thought the misdeed so appalling, but since the evening
when he set upon me I have so lost control of myself that it has been as
if my soul were wandering loose. If it is still around the house somewhere,
please lay a trap for it."
She told him of the Third Princess, lost in sad thoughts and afraid of
prying eyes. He could almost see the forlorn little figure. Did unhappy
spirits indeed go wandering forth disembodied?
"I shall say no more of your lady. It has all passed as if it had never
happened at all. Yet I would be very sorry indeed if it were to stand in the
way of her salvation. I have only one wish left, to know that the conse-
quences of the sad affair have been disposed of safely. I have my own
interpretation of the dream I had that night and have had very great
trouble keeping it to myself."
Kojiju~ was frightened at the inhuman tenacity which these thoughts
suggested. Yet she had to feel sorry for him. She was weeping bitterly.
He sent for a lamp and read the princess's note. Though fragile and
uncertain, the hand was interesting. "Your letter made me very sad, but
I cannot see you. I can only think of you. You speak of the smoke that
lingers on, and yet
<P 639>
"I wish to go with you, that we may see
Whose smoldering thoughts last longer, yours or mine."
That was all, but he was grateful for it.
"The smoke--it will follow me from this world. What a useless,
insubstantial affair it was!"
