of a bereaved parent may not be darkness, perhaps, but a quiet talk from
time to time would do much to bring light. You have done honor to this
house on so many happy occasions, and now circumstances have required
that you come with a sad message. The fates have not been kind. All of
our hopes were on the girl, I must say again, from the day she was born,
and until he died her father did not let me forget that she must go to court,
that his own death, if it came early, should not deter me. I knew that
another sort of life would be happier for a girl without strong backing, but
I could not forget his wishes and sent her to court as I had promised.
Blessed with favors beyond her station, she was the object of insults such
as no one can be asked to endure. Yet endure them she did until finally
the strain and the resentment were too much for her. And so, as I look back
upon them, I know that those favors should never have been. Well, put
these down, if you will, as the mad wanderings of a heart that is dark-
ness." She was unable to go on.
It was late.
"His Majesty says much the same thing," replied Myo~bu. "it was, he
says, an intensity of passion such as to startle the world, and perhaps for
that very reason it was fated to be brief. He cannot think of anything he
has done to arouse such resentment, he says, and so he must live with
resentment which seems without proper cause. Alone and utterly desolate,
he finds it impossible to face the world. He fears that he must seem
dreadfully eccentric. How very great--he has said it over and over again
--how very great his burden of guilt must be. One scarcely ever sees him
that he is not weeping." Myo~bu too was in tears. "It is very late. I must
get back before the night is quite over and tell him what I have seen."
The moon was sinking over the hills, the air was crystal clear, the wind
was cool, and the songs of the insects among the autumn grasses would
by themselves have brought tears. It was a scene from which Myo~bu could
not easily pull herself.
"The autumn night is too short to contain my tears
Though songs of bell cricket weary, fall into silence."
This was her farewell poem. Still she hesitated, on the point of getting
into her carriage.
The old lady sent a reply:
"Sad are the insect songs among the reeds.
More sadly yet falls the dew from above the clouds.
"I seem to be in a complaining mood."
Though gifts would have been out of place, she sent as a trifling
memento of her daughter a set of robes, left for just such an occasion, and
with them an assortment of bodkins and combs.
The young women who had come from court with the little prince still
mourned their lady, but those of them who had acquired a taste for court
life yearned to be back. The memory of the emperor made them join their
own to the royal petitions.
But no--a crone like herself would repel all the fine ladies and gentle-
men, said the grandmother, while on the other hand she could not bear the
thought of having the child out of her sight for even a moment.
Myo~bu was much moved to find the emperor waiting up for her.
Making it seem that his attention was on the small and beautifully plant
garden before him, now in full autumn bloom, he was talking quietly with
four or five women, among the most sensitive of his attendants. He had
become addicted to illustrations by the emperor Uda for "The Song of
Everlasting Sorrow" and to poems by Ise and Tsurayuki on that subject,
and to Chinese poems as well.
He listened attentively as Myo~bu described the scene she had found
so affecting. He took up the letter she had brought from the grandmother.
"I am so awed by this august message that I would run away and hide;
and so violent are the emotions it gives rise to that I scarcely know what
to say.
"The tree that gave them shelter has withered and died.
One fears for the plight of the hagi shoots beneath."
A strange way to put the matter, thought the emperor; but the lady
must still be dazed with grief. He chose to overlook the suggestion that he
himself could not help the child.
He sought to hide his sorrow, not wanting these women to see him
in such poor control of himself. But it was no use. He reviewed his memo-
ries over and over again, from his very earliest days with the dead lady.
He had scarcely been able to bear a moment away from her while she lived.
How strange that he had been able to survive the days and months since
on memories alone. He had hoped to reward the grandmother's sturdy
devotion, and his hopes had come to nothing.
"Well," he sighed, "she may look forward to having her day, if she
will only live to see the boy grow up."
Looking at the keepsakes Myo~bu had brought back, he thought what
a comfort it would be if some wizard were to bring him, like that Chinese
emperor, a comb from the world where his lost love was dwelling. He
whispered:
"And will no wizard search her out for me,
That even he may tell me where she is?"
There are limits to the powers of the most gifted artist. The Chinese
lady in the paintings did not have the luster of life. Yang Kuei-fei was said
to have resembled the lotus of the Sublime Pond, the willows of the
Timeless Hall. No doubt she was very beautiful in her Chinese finery.
When he tried to remember the quiet charm of his lost lady, he found that
there was no color of flower, no song of bird, to summon her up. Morning
and night, over and over again, they had repeated to each other the lines
from "The Song of Everlasting Sorrow" :
"In the sky, as birds that share a wing.
On earth, as trees that share a branch."
It had been their vow, and the shortness of her life had made it an
empty dream.
Everything, the moaning of the wind, the humming of autumn in-
sects, added to the sadness. But in the apartments of the Kokiden lady
matters were different. It had been some time since she had last waited
upon the emperor. The moonlight being so beautiful, she saw no reason
not to have music deep into the night. The emperor muttered something
about the bad taste of such a performance at such a time, and those who
saw his distress agreed that it was an unnecessary injury. Kokiden was of
an arrogant and intractable nature and her behavior suggested that to her
the emperor's grief was of no importance.
The moon set. The wicks in the lamps had been trimmed more than
once and presently the oil was gone. Still he showed no sign of retiring.
His mind on the boy and the old lady, he jotted down a verse:
"Tears dim the moon, even here above the clouds.
Dim must it be in that lodging among the reeds."
Calls outside told him that the guard was being changed. It would be
one or two in the morning. people would think his behavior strange in-
deed. He at length withdrew to his bedchamber. He was awake the whole
night through, and in dark morning, his thoughts on the blinds that would
not open, he was unable to interest himself in business of state. He
scarcely touched his breakfast, and lunch seemed so remote from his
inclinations that his attendants exchanged looks and whispers of alarm.
Not all voices were sympathetic. perhaps, some said, it had all been
foreordained, but he had dismissed the talk and ignored the resentment
and let the affair quite pass the bounds of reason; and now to neglect his
duties so--it was altogether too much. Some even cited the example of the
Chinese emperor who had brought ruin upon himself and his country.
The months passed and the young prince returned to the palace. He
had grown into a lad of such beauty that he hardly seemed meant for this
world--and indeed one almost feared that he might only briefly be a part
of it. When, the following spring, it came time to name a crown prince, the
emperor wanted very much to pass over his first son in favor of the
younger, who, however, had no influential maternal relatives. It did not
seem likely that the designation would pass unchallenged. The boy might,
like his mother, be destroyed by immoderate favors. The emperor told no
one of his wishes. There did after all seem to be a limit to his affections,
people said; and Kokiden regained her confidence.
The boy's grandmother was inconsolable. Finally, because her prayer
to be with her daughter had been answered, perhaps, she breathed her last.
Once more the emperor was desolate. The boy, now six, was old enough
to know grief himself. His grandmother, who had been so good to him over
the years, had more than once told him what pain it would cause her, when
the time came, to leave him behind.
He now lived at court. When he was seven he went through the
ceremonial reading of the Chinese classics, and never before had there been
so fine a performance. Again a tremor of apprehension passed over the
emperor--might it be that such a prodigy was not to be long for this world?
"No one need be angry with him now that his mother is gone." He
took the boy to visit the Kokiden Pavilion. "And now most especially I
hope you will be kind to him."
Admitting the boy to her inner chambers, even Kokiden was pleased.
Not the sternest of warriors or the most unbending of enemies could have
held back a smile. Kokiden was reluctant to let him go. She had two
daughters, but neither could compare with him in beauty. The lesser ladies
crowded about, not in the least ashamed to show their faces, all eager to
amuse him, though aware that he set them off to disadvantage. I need not
speak of his accomplishments in the compulsory subjects, the classics and
the like. When it came to music his flute and koto made the heavens echo
--but to recount all his virtues would, I fear, give rise to a suspicion that
I distort the truth.
An embassy came from Korea. Hearing that among the emissaries was
a skilled physiognomist, the emperor would have liked to summon him for
consultation. He decided, however, that he must defer to the emperor
Uda's injunction against receiving foreigners, and instead sent this favored
son to the Ko~ro mansion, where the party was lodged. The boy was
disguised as the son of the grand moderator, his guardian at court. The wise
Korean cocked his head in astonishment.
"It is the face of one who should ascend to the highest place and be
father to the nation," he said quietly, as if to himself. "But to take it for
such would no doubt be to predict trouble. Yet it is not the face of the
minister, the deputy, who sets about ordering public affairs."
The moderator was a man of considerable learning. There was much
of interest in his exchanges with the Korean. There were also exchanges
of Chinese poetry, and in one of his poems the Korean succeeded most
skillfully in conveying his joy at having been able to observe such a
countenance on this the eve of his return to his own land, and sorrow that
the parting must come so soon. The boy offered a verse that was received
with high praise. The most splendid of gifts were bestowed upon him. The
wise man was in return showered with gifts from the palace.
Somehow news of the sage's remarks leaked out, though the emperor
himself was careful to say nothing. The Minister of the Right, grandfather
of the crown prince and father of the Kokiden lady, was quick to hear, and
again his suspicions were aroused. In the wisdom of his heart, the emperor
had already analyzed the boy's physiognomy after the japanese fashion
and had formed tentative plans. He had thus far refrained from bestowing
imperial rank on his son, and was delighted that the Korean view should
so accord with his own. Lacking the support of maternal relatives, the boy
would be most insecure as a prince without court rank, and the emperor
could not be sure how long his own reign would last. As a commoner he
could be of great service. The emperor therefore encouraged the boy in his
studies, at which he was so proficient that it seemed a waste to reduce him
to common rank. And yet--as a prince he would arouse the hostility of
those who had cause to fear his becoming emperor. Summoning an astrolo-
ger of the Indian school, the emperor was pleased to learn that the Indian
view coincided with the japanese and the Korean; and so he concluded that
the boy should become a commoner with the name Minamoto or Genji.
The months and the years passed and still the emperor could not
forget his lost love. He summoned various women who might console him,
but apparently it was too much to ask in this world for one who even
resembled her. He remained sunk in memories, unable to interest himself
in anything. Then he was told of the Fourth Princess, daughter of a former
emperor, a lady famous for her beauty and reared with the greatest care
by her mother, the empress. A woman now in attendance upon the em-
peror had in the days of his predecessor been most friendly with the
princess, then but a child, and even now saw her from time to time.
"I have been at court through three reigns now," she said, "and never
had I seen anyone who genuinely resembled my lady. But now the daugh-
ter of the empress dowager is growing up, and the resemblance is most
astonishing. One would be hard put to find her equal."
Hoping that she might just possibly be right, the emperor asked most
courteously to have the princess sent to court. Her mother was reluctant
and even fearful, however. One must remember, she said, that the mother
of the crown prince was a most willful lady who had subjected the lady
of the paulownia Court to open insults and presently sent her into a fatal
decline. Before she had made up her mind she followed her husband in
death, and the daughter was alone. The emperor renewed his petition. He
said that he would treat the girl as one of his own daughters.
Her attendants and her maternal relatives and her older brother,
