MANNERS AND CUSTOMS
sent, saying that the task would require much labour, and that an embankment could never protect him if the bravery of his comrades did not suffice. To such an extent was this spirit of austere simplicity carried that great military chiefs, who possessed wide estates and commanded many soldiers, might be found sleeping in a veranda, their guards in the open places-of-arms beside the middle gate, and their servants on the floor of the stable; an arrangement typical of absolute readiness for any emergency. By and by the Zen sect of Buddhism began to flourish. It inculcated the doctrine of abstraction which was supposed to render the devotee superior to all his surroundings, and to educate a heart that defied fate. This creed immediately attracted the samurai. The mood it produced seemed to him an ideal temper for displays of military valour and sublime fortitude; the austere discipline it prescribed for developing that mood appealed to his conception of a soldier's practice. Even the construction of his dwelling reflected this new faith. He fitted up a room for purposes of reading and abstraction, calling it a "study" (sho-in), and to the inner gate of the enclosure he gave the name gen-kwan, or "the hall of the origin," in allusion to the saying of Laotsze, "the origin of the origin, the gate of all truth." A different meaning afterwards came to be attached to the gen-kwan, as will be seen presently. The "study" was, in fact, a modified form of the old "bedroom." The latter had
