Anthology of Japanese Literature/The Captain of Naruto
The Captain of Naruto
[Naruto Chūjō Monogatari]
This tale, which was probably written in the late thirteenth century, ostensibly relates an actual event at the court of the Emperor Gosaga, who reigned from 1242 to 1246. It was intended to edify, but the modern reader may find that it affords instead a rather sardonic insight into the court life of the time.
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One year, in the spring, when the cherry blossoms were at their peak, there took place in a courtyard within the palace grounds a football match in which distinguished members of the court took part. Among the spectators were a number of ladies, one of whom attracted the Emperor’s interest. His attention was diverted from the game, and he allowed his glance to wander repeatedly in the direction of this lady, who was so distressed by his gaze that she slipped away toward the Left Gate. The Emperor summoned a secretary, instructing him to follow and report the lady’s destination. When the secretary had overtaken her, the lady who understood and meant to mislead him somehow, beckoned him to draw near, and with a smile said, “Tell His Majesty, ‘Of the young bamboo.’ I will wait here, I promise, until I receive his reply.” The secretary, never dreaming that she might deceive him, assumed that she merely wished to arrange a rendezvous and hurried away. The Emperor, on receiving this report, felt certain that she had quoted a line from a poem and inquired what it might be. None of those in attendance, however, were familiar with it, and Lord Tameie[1] was sent for. “It is an old poem,” he said without hesitation.
“Tall though it be, what can one do with the useless lengths of the young bamboo with its one or two joints?”[2]
On hearing this, the Emperor became more and more intrigued, and without composing a reply he ordered the secretary to find out where the lady lived. When the secretary returned to the Gate, however, he found that she had quite vanished. He reported this to the Emperor, who with a terrible look told him that unless he discovered her whereabouts he would be held guilty of a crime. The secretary paled and withdrew. The Emperor, as a result of this, lost all interest in the football match and retired.
For some time afterward he wore a bitter scowl and caused everyone concern. One day Lord Konoe and others were in attendance at an Imperial entertainment. The Emperor was not his usual self. He seemed preoccupied and gazed listlessly about him. Lord Konoe had the wine cup presented and remarked, “Is it true that Your Majesty was not long ago ‘singed by a smudge-fire at a house in some unknown quarter?’ If it were looked for it wouldn’t remain hidden long, I daresay. In China the search was carried as far as Paradise.[3] Her house is within the capital; finding it should be a simple matter.” He offered the cup to the Emperor who, though he smiled faintly, was not amused and, drawing himself up, retired.
Meanwhile, the secretary was searching in every imaginable quarter, hoping to encounter the lady, and even offered prayers to the gods and to Buddha, but without avail. He was in despair when he remembered a certain diviner, named Fumpira, who was famed for his effortless predictions and who would be able to divine her whereabouts. The secretary called upon this man and asked his aid. “Word has reached me privately about this. A very grave matter,” said the diviner. “Now let us see what Fumpira’s divining can do about it. We have come under Mars. Today’s sign is the Serpent. From this I take it that she is in hiding only temporarily. You will find her in good time. Now, Mars in the summer term is very lucky, and being governed by the Serpent she will appear from the same hole she went into. You are sure to find her this summer at the spot where she disappeared.” The secretary, though he did not put too much stock in the words of the diviner, who after all was but an ordinary mortal, was still sufficiently impressed by what he had heard, and from this time, instead of going about in a daze as before, stationed himself by the Left Gate.
It was on the thirteenth day of the fifth month, at the opening of the lectures on the Suvarna-prabhāsa Sutra, that he suddenly came upon the lady, this time in company with five others. He was so overjoyed that he scarcely knew whether to believe his eyes. In order to avoid arousing her suspicions, he mingled with the throng and saw her sitting among those in the west gallery of the Chamberlain’s pavilion, listening to the sermon. Fearful lest he lose sight of her in the scramble at the end of the lecture, he asked Lord Tsunetoshi, who happened to be at the entrance to the Imperial loge, to report his discovery to the Emperor. “His Majesty is with the Empress listening to the sermon. It is out of the question,” replied Tsunetoshi. He looked about for a herald who might deliver the message, but saw no one. Finally he approached a lady-in-waiting. “Forgive the interruption,” he said apologetically, “but it is His Majesty’s wish,” and asked her to convey his message quickly to the Emperor. She had prior knowledge of the affair and promptly obeyed. The Emperor replied, through the lady-in-waiting, “Admirable. This time find out for certain where she goes, and tell me.”
By the time the sermon was over it was dusk. The lady and her party seemed about to set off in a single coach. The secretary, fearing that she might be suspicious of him a second time, sent a certain resourceful woman to observe her in his stead. The lady’s destination proved to be the house of a certain Junior Captain in Sanjō Shirakawa. No sooner had the Emperor been informed of this than he sent the following letter. “Was it an empty dream or did I really see the young bamboo, that morning and night I yearn for with a love that is torment? Tonight without fail.”
This was all. The secretary went to her house with the letter. The lady, being a married woman, was much upset, and lamented her lot. The messenger pressed her heartlessly for a reply, and, deciding that concealment was out of the question, she told her husband just what had happened. The Captain was understandably disturbed. “As a man I have an abhorrence of sending you,” he said, “but there is no point in presuming to admonish the Emperor. Things are not the same for one man as for another in this world, and in a way it is an honor. Let tongues wag if they will. Hurry and go,” he urged. She broke into tears, however, and protested repeatedly that it would never do. “These past three years,” he went on, “we have spent in the deepest love, as though we were made for each other, but for you to have been summoned in this way shows his attachment is not superficial. If you fail to go, out of pride, it is sure to look very bad, and who can say what will become of me? People will not think the worse of us for it. Hurry and go,” he insisted. Sobbing, the lady opened the letter, and beneath the words “Tonight without fail,” wrote in thick black ink the single word “wo,” and refolding the letter sent it by the messenger.
The Emperor, seeing the letter returned, and no different in appearance than before, was about to conclude reluctantly that it had been without effect, when he noticed that the knot was carelessly tied. He undid it and beheld the word “wo.” Ponder over it as he would, he could make nothing of it. He summoned several ladies-in-waiting who would be likely to know and asked them about the word. One of them said, “Long ago a certain prime minister wrote the word ‘moon’ and sent it to the daughter of Izumi Shikibu, a lady well versed in such matters. She may have spoken of it to her mother, for she readily understood and wrote beneath ‘moon’ the single word ‘wo.’ That is the allusion, I imagine. ‘Moon’ meant that he would be waiting that night for her to come. And in answer to a summons from above, men should reply ‘yo’, while women say ‘wo.’ The lady went to him, and he was more in love with her than ever. This lady too will surely come.”
The Emperor was much pleased at this and was filled with anticipation. The night grew later and later, but still he delayed retiring to his bedchamber. Just as he heard the watchmen’s cry—could it be the hour of the Ox[4] already, he wondered in despair—the secretary announced the lady’s secret arrival. Overjoyed, the Emperor had her conducted in immediately. Not even Han Wu’s meeting with the Lady Li or Hsüan Tsung’s winning of Yang Kuei-fei could surpass this moment, he felt. The night was far too short for him to tell her all that was in his heart. As daybreak neared she explained to him that her position, unkind as it was for her to say it, was distasteful to her, and so, for the while, he allowed her to be escorted home. His desire for her, however, was boundless, and he considered installing her among his consorts, with her own apartments inside the palace, but to this proposal she responded with unaffected sorrow that were he to do that, it would be to show her no mercy at all; that she would feel like someone unable to escape from a deep pool. As long as things remained as they were, and no one knew about her, she would always be at his command. At length he agreed that she might remain in her own home, and thence from time to time he would summon her secretly.
The Captain, her husband, who had been living in retirement, was summoned to court on some pretext and had conferred upon him untold marks of the Emperor’s favor. He was included in the ranks of the Imperial retinue and shortly afterward was promoted to Middle Captain. The promotion was kept quiet, but news of it got about, and he came to be known on the vulgar tongues of the day as “the Captain of Naruto.” He received this sobriquet, it is to be supposed, because Naruto is the place from which the seaweed called “maiden of Naruto” is sent up to the capital.
A prince is to his subjects as water is to fish. However high the prince, he should not be guilty of arrogance or contemptuousness; however low his subjects, they should not be disordered by envy. Emperor Gosaga’s gracious feelings and the Captain’s generous sacrifice in the present story deserve to be remembered as examples of truly noble conduct. It is indeed natural that from the earliest times it has ever been said that between the prince and his subjects there should be no estrangement, but bonds of deep sympathy.
- ↑ Fujiwara no Tameie (1198–1275), famous as a poet and compiler of anthologies.
- ↑ Puns in the poem give it the additional meaning of “Exalted though you are what would be the good of one or two nights of idle love-making with the ‘young bamboo’?”
- ↑ Reference to the search for the soul of the Emperor Hsüan Tsung’s favorite Yang Kuei-fei (718–756), discovered in the Taoist paradise.
- ↑ 2 A.M. to 4 A.M.