Chapter 5

Tomozō had promised Yusai never to speak to any other person—not even to O-Miné—of the strange events that were taking place. But Tomozō was not long suffered by the haunters to rest in peace. Night after night O-Yoné entered into his dwelling, and roused him from his sleep, and asked him to remove the _o-fuda_ placed over one very small window at the back of his master’s house. And Tomozō, out of fear, as often promised her to take away the _o-fuda_ before the next sundown; but never by day could he make up his mind to remove it,—believing that evil was intended to Shinzaburō. At last, in a night of storm, O-Yoné startled him from slumber with a cry of reproach, and stooped above his pillow, and said to him: “Have a care how you trifle with us! If, by to-morrow night, you do not take away that text, you shall learn how I can hate!” And she made her face so frightful as she spoke that Tomozō nearly died of terror.

O-Miné, the wife of Tomozō, had never till then known of these visits: even to her husband they had seemed like bad dreams. But on this particular night it chanced that, waking suddenly, she heard the voice of a woman talking to Tomozō. Almost in the same moment the talk-ing ceased; and when O-Miné looked about her, she saw, by the light of the night-lamp, only her husband,—shuddering and white with fear. The stranger was gone; the doors were fast: it seemed impossible that anybody could have entered. Nevertheless the jealousy of the wife had been aroused; and she began to chide and to question Tomozō in such a manner that he thought himself obliged to betray the secret, and to explain the terrible dilemma in which he had been placed.

Then the passion of O-Miné yielded to wonder and alarm; but she was a subtle woman, and she devised immediately a plan to save her husband by the sacrifice of her master. And she gave Tomozō a cunning counsel,—telling him to make conditions with the dead.

They came again on the following night at the Hour of the Ox; and O-Miné hid herself on hearing the sound of their coming,—_karan-koron, karan-koron!_ But Tomozō went out to meet them in the dark, and even found courage to say to them what his wife had told him to say:—

“It is true that I deserve your blame;—but I had no wish to cause you anger. The reason that the _o-fuda_ has not been taken away is that my wife and I are able to live only by the help of Hagiwara Sama, and that we cannot expose him to any danger without bringing misfortune upon ourselves. But if we could obtain the sum of a hundred _ryō_ in gold, we should be able to please you, because we should then need no help from anybody. Therefore if you will give us a hundred _ryō_, I can take the _o-fuda_ away without being afraid of losing our only means of support.”

When he had uttered these words, O-Yoné and O-Tsuyu looked at each other in silence for a moment. Then O-Yoné said:—

“Mistress, I told you that it was not right to trouble this man, —as we have no just cause of ill will against him. But it is certainly useless to fret yourself about Hagiwara Sama, because his heart has changed towards you. Now once again, my dear young lady, let me beg you not to think any more about him!”

But O-Tsuyu, weeping, made answer:—

“Dear Yone, whatever may happen, I cannot possibly keep myself from thinking about him! You know that you can get a hundred _ryō_ to have the _o-fuda_ taken off…. Only once more, I pray, dear Yone!—only once more bring me face to face with Hagiwara Sama,—I beseech you!” And hiding her face with her sleeve, she thus continued to plead.

“Oh! why will you ask me to do these things?” responded O-Yoné. “You know very well that I have no money. But since you will persist in this whim of yours, in spite of all that I can say, I suppose that I must try to find the money somehow, and to bring it here to-morrow night….” Then, turning to the faithless Tomozō, she said:—“Tomozō, I must tell you that Hagiwara Sama now wears upon his body a _mamori_ called by the name of _Kai-On-Nyōrai_, and that so long as he wears it we cannot approach him. So you will have to get that _mamori_ away from him, by some means or other, as well as to remove the _o-fuda_.”

Tomozō feebly made answer:—

“That also I can do, if you will promise to bring me the hundred _ryō_.”

“Well, mistress,” said O-Yoné, “you will wait,—will you not,—until to-morrow night?”

“Oh, dear Yoné!” sobbed the other,—“have we to go back to-night again without seeing Hagiwara Sama? Ah! it is cruel!”

And the shadow of the mistress, weeping, was led away by the shadow of the maid.

X

Another day went, and another night came, and the dead came with it. But this time no lamentation was heard without the house of Hagiwara; for the faithless servant found his reward at the Hour of the Ox, and removed the _o-fuda_. Moreover he had been able, while his master was at the bath, to steal from its case the golden _mamori_, and to substitute for it an image of copper; and he had buried the _Kai-On-Nyōrai_ in a desolate field. So the visitants found nothing to oppose their entering. Veiling their faces with their sleeves they rose and passed, like a streaming of vapor, into the little window from over which the holy text had been torn away. But what happened thereafter within the house Tomozō never knew.

The sun was high before he ventured again to approach his master’s dwelling, and to knock upon the sliding-doors. For the first time in years he obtained no response; and the silence made him afraid. Repeatedly he called, and received no answer. Then, aided by O-Miné, he succeeded in effecting an entrance and making his way alone to the sleeping-room, where he called again in vain. He rolled back the rumbling shutters to admit the light; but still within the house there was no stir. At last he dared to lift a corner of the mosquito-net. But no sooner had he looked beneath than he fled from the house, with a cry of horror.

Shinzaburō was dead—hideously dead;—and his face was the face of a man who had died in the uttermost agony of fear;—and lying beside him in the bed were the bones of a woman! And the bones of the arms, and the bones of the hands, clung fast about his neck.

XI

Hakuōdō Yusai, the fortune-teller, went to view the corpse at the prayer of the faithless Tomozō. The old man was terrified and astonished at the spectacle, but looked about him with a keen eye. He soon perceived that the _o-fuda_ had been taken from the little window at the back of the house; and on searching the body of Shinzaburō, he discovered that the golden _mamori_ had been taken from its wrapping, and a copper image of Fudō put in place of it. He suspected Tomozō of the theft; but the whole occurrence was so very extraordinary that he thought it prudent to consult with the priest Ryōseki before taking further action. Therefore, after having made a careful examination of the premises, he betook himself to the temple Shin-Banzui-In, as quickly as his aged limbs could bear him.

Ryōseki, without waiting to hear the purpose of the old man’s visit, at once invited him into a private apartment.

“You know that you are always welcome here,” said Ryōseki. “Please seat yourself at ease…. Well, I am sorry to tell you that Hagiwara Sama is dead.”

Yusai wonderingly exclaimed:—“Yes, he is dead;—but how did you learn of it?”

The priest responded:—

“Hagiwara Sama was suffering from the results of an evil karma; and his attendant was a bad man. What happened to Hagiwara Sama was unavoidable;—his destiny had been determined from a time long before his last birth. It will be better for you not to let your mind be troubled by this event.”

Yusai said:—

“I have heard that a priest of pure life may gain power to see into the future for a hundred years; but truly this is the first time in my existence that I have had proof of such power…. Still, there is another matter about which I am very anxious….”

“You mean,” interrupted Ryōseki, “the stealing of the holy _mamori_, the _Kai-On-Nyōrai_. But you must not give yourself any concern about that. The image has been buried in a field; and it will be found there and returned to me during the eighth month of the coming year. So please do not be anxious about it.”

More and more amazed, the old _ninsomi_ ventured to observe:—

“I have studied the _In-Yō_,[17] and the science of divination; and I make my living by telling peoples’ fortunes;—but I cannot possibly understand how you know these things.”

[17] The Male and Female principles of the universe, the Active and Passive forces of Nature. Yusai refers here to the old Chinese nature-philosophy,—better known to Western readers by the name FENG-SHUI.

Ryōseki answered gravely:—

“Never mind how I happen to know them…. I now want to speak to you about Hagiwara’s funeral. The House of Hagiwara has its own family-cemetery, of course; but to bury him there would not be proper. He must be buried beside O-Tsuyu, the Lady Iijima; for his karma-relation to her was a very deep one. And it is but right that you should erect a tomb for him at your own cost, because you have been indebted to him for many favors.”

Thus it came to pass that Shinzaburō was buried beside O-Tsuyu, in the cemetery of Shin-Banzui-In, in Yanaka-no-Sasaki.

—_Here ends the story of the Ghosts in the Romance of the Peony-Lantern._—

My friend asked me whether the story had interested me; and I answered by telling him that I wanted to go to the cemetery of Shin-Banzui-In,—so as to realize more definitely the local color of the author’s studies.

“I shall go with you at once,” he said. “But what did you think of the personages?”

“To Western thinking,” I made answer, “Shinzaburō is a despicable creature. I have been mentally comparing him with the true lovers of our old ballad-literature. They were only too glad to follow a dead sweetheart into the grave; and nevertheless, being Christians, they believed that they had only one human life to enjoy in this world. But Shinzaburō was a Buddhist,—with a million lives behind him and a million lives before him; and he was too selfish to give up even one miserable existence for the sake of the girl that came back to him from the dead. Then he was even more cowardly than selfish. Although a samurai by birth and training, he had to beg a priest to save him from ghosts. In every way he proved himself contemptible; and O-Tsuyu did quite right in choking him to death.”

“From the Japanese point of view, likewise,” my friend responded, “Shinzaburō is rather contemptible. But the use of this weak character helped the author to develop incidents that could not otherwise, perhaps, have been so effectively managed. To my thinking, the only attractive character in the story is that of O-Yoné: type of the old-time loyal and loving servant,—intelligent, shrewd, full of resource,—faithful not only unto death, but beyond death…. Well, let us go to Shin-Banzui-In.”

We found the temple uninteresting, and the cemetery an abomination of desolation. Spaces once occupied by graves had been turned into potato-patches. Between were tombs leaning at all angles out of the perpendicular, tablets made illegible by scurf, empty pedestals, shattered water-tanks, and statues of Buddhas without heads or hands. Recent rains had soaked the black soil,—leaving here and there small pools of slime about which swarms of tiny frogs were hopping. Everything—excepting the potato-patches—seemed to have been neglected for years. In a shed just within the gate, we observed a woman cooking; and my companion presumed to ask her if she knew anything about the tombs described in the Romance of the Peony-Lantern.

“Ah! the tombs of O-Tsuyu and O-Yoné?” she responded, smiling;—“you will find them near the end of the first row at the back of the temple—next to the statue of Jizo.”

Surprises of this kind I had met with elsewhere in Japan.

We picked our way between the rain-pools and between the green ridges of young potatoes,—whose roots were doubtless feeding on the sub-stance of many another O-Tsuyu and O-Yoné;—and we reached at last two lichen-eaten tombs of which the inscriptions seemed almost obliterated. Beside the larger tomb was a statue of Jizo, with a broken nose.

“The characters are not easy to make out,” said my friend—“but wait!”…. He drew from his sleeve a sheet of soft white paper, laid it over the inscription, and began to rub the paper with a lump of clay. As he did so, the characters appeared in white on the blackened surface.

“_Eleventh day, third month—Rat, Elder Brother, Fire—Sixth year of Horéki_ [A. D. 1756].’… This would seem to be the grave of some innkeeper of Nedzu, named Kichibei. Let us see what is on the other monument.”

With a fresh sheet of paper he presently brought out the text of a kaimyō, and read,—

“_En-myō-In, Hō-yō-I-tei-ken-shi, Hō-ni’:—‘Nun-of-the-Law, Illustrious, Pure-of-heart-and-will, Famed-in-the-Law,—inhabiting the Mansion-of-the-Preaching-of-Wonder._’…. The grave of some Buddhist nun.”

“What utter humbug!” I exclaimed. “That woman was only making fun of us.”

“Now,” my friend protested, “you are unjust to the, woman! You came here because you wanted a sensation; and she tried her very best to please you. You did not suppose that ghost-story was true, did you?”

Footprints of the Buddha

I

I was recently surprised to find, in Anderson’s catalogue of Japanese and Chinese paintings in the British Museum, this remarkable statement:—“It is to be noted that in Japan the figure of the Buddha is never represented by the feet, or pedestal alone, as in the Amravati remains, and many other Indian art-relics.” As a matter of fact the representation is not even rare in Japan. It is to be found not only upon stone monuments, but also in religious paintings,—especially certain kakemono suspended in temples. These kakemono usually display the footprints upon a very large scale, with a multitude of mystical symbols and characters. The sculptures may be less common; but in Tōkyō alone there are a number of _Butsu-soku-séki_, or “Buddha-foot stones,” which I have seen,—and probably several which I have not seen. There is one at the temple of Ekō-In, near Ryōgoku-bashi; one at the temple of Denbō-In, in Koishikawa; one at the temple of Denbō-In, in Asakusa; and a beautiful example at Zōjōji in Shiba. These are not cut out of a single block, but are composed of fragments cemented into the irregular traditional shape, and capped with a heavy slab of Nebukawa granite, on the polished surface of which the design is engraved in lines about one-tenth of an inch in depth. I should judge the average height of these pedestals to be about two feet four inches, and their greatest diameter about three feet. Around the footprints there are carved (in most of the examples) twelve little bunches of leaves and buds of the _Bodai-jū_ (“Bodhidruma”), or Bodhi-tree of Buddhist legend. In all cases the footprint design is about the same; but the monuments are different in quality and finish. That of Zōjōji,—with figures of divinities cut in low relief on its sides,—is the most ornate and costly of the four. The specimen at Ekō-In is very poor and plain.

The first _Butsu-soku-séki_ made in Japan was that erected at Tōdaiji, in Nara. It was designed after a similar monument in China, said to be the faithful copy of an Indian original. Concerning this Indian original, the following tradition is given in an old Buddhist book:[1]—“In a temple of the province of Makada [_Maghada_] there is a great stone. The Buddha once trod upon this stone; and the prints of the soles of his feet remain upon its surface. The length of the impressions is one foot and eight inches,[2] and the width of them a little more than six inches. On the sole-part of each footprint there is the impression of a wheel; and upon each of the prints of the ten toes there is a flower-like design, which sometimes radiates light. When the Buddha felt that the time of his Nirvâna was approaching, he went to Kushina [_Kusinârâ_], and there stood upon that stone. He stood with his face to the south. Then he said to his disciple Anan [_Ânanda_]: ‘In this place I leave the impression of my feet, to remain for a last token. Although a king of this country will try to destroy the impression, it can never be entirely destroyed.’ And indeed it has not been destroyed unto this day. Once a king who hated Buddhism caused the top of the stone to be pared off, so as to remove the impression; but after the surface had been removed, the footprints reappeared upon the stone.”

[1] The Chinese title is pronounced by Japanese as _Sei-iki-ki_. “Sei-iki”(the Country of the West) was the old Japanese name for India; and thus the title might be rendered, “The Book about India.” I suppose this is the work known to Western scholars as _Si-yu-ki_.

[2] “One _shaku_ and eight _sun_.” But the Japanese foot and inch are considerably longer than the English.

Concerning the virtue of the representation of the footprints of the Buddha, there is sometimes quoted a text from the _Kwan-butsu-sanmai-kyō_ [“Buddha-dhyâna-samâdhi-sâgara-sûtra”], thus translated for me:—“In that time Shaka [“Sâkyamuni”] lifted up his foot…. When the Buddha lifted up his foot all could perceive upon the sole of it the appearance of a wheel of a thousand spokes…. And Shaka said: ‘Whosoever beholds the sign upon the sole of my foot shall be purified from all his faults. Even he who beholds the sign after my death shall be delivered from all the evil results of all his errors.” Various other texts of Japanese Buddhism affirm that whoever looks upon the footprints of the Buddha “shall be freed from the bonds of error, and conducted upon the Way of Enlightenment.”

An outline of the footprints as engraved on one of the Japanese pedestals[3] should have some interest even for persons familiar with Indian sculptures of the S’rîpâda. The double-page drawing, accompanying this paper, and showing both footprints, has been made after the tracing at Dentsu-In, where the footprints have the full legendary dimension, It will be observed that there are only seven emblems: these are called in Japan the _Shichi-Sō_, or “Seven Appearances.” I got some information about them from the _Shō-Ekō-Hō-Kwan_,—a book used by the Jodo sect. This book also contains rough woodcuts of the footprints; and one of them I reproduce here for the purpose of calling attention to the curious form of the emblems upon the toes. They are said to be modifications of the _manji_, or svastikâ, but I doubt it. In the _Butsu-soku-séki_-tracings, the corresponding figures suggest the “flower-like design” mentioned in the tradition of the Maghada stone; while the symbols in the book-print suggest fire. Indeed their outline so much resembles the conventional flamelet-design of Buddhist decoration, that I cannot help thinking them originally intended to indicate the traditional luminosity of the footprints. Moreover, there is a text in the book called _Hō-Kai-Shidai_ that lends support to this supposition:—“The sole of the foot of the Buddha is flat,—like the base of a toilet-stand…. Upon it are lines forming the appearance of a wheel of a thousand spokes…. The toes are slender, round, long, straight, graceful, _and somewhat luminous_.”

[3] A monument at Nara exhibits the _S’rîpâda_ in a form differing considerably from the design upon the Tōkyō pedestals.

The explanation of the Seven Appearances which is given by the _Shō-Ekō-Hō-Kwan_ cannot be called satisfactory; but it is not without interest in relation to Japanese popular Buddhism. The emblems are considered in the following order:—

I.—_The Svastikâ_. The figure upon each toe is said to be a modification of the _manji_;[4] and although I doubt whether this is always the case, I have observed that on some of the large kakémono representing the footprints, the emblem really _is_ the svastikâ,—not a flamelet nor a flower-shape.[5] The Japanese commentator explains the svastikâ as a symbol of “everlasting bliss.”

[4] Lit.: “The thousand-character” sign.

[5] On some monuments and drawings there is a sort of disk made by a single line in spiral, on each toe,—together with the image of a small wheel.

II.—_The Fish_ (_Gyo_). The fish signifies freedom from all restraints. As in the water a fish moves easily in any direction, so in the Buddha-state the fully-emancipated knows no restraints or obstructions.

III.—_The Diamond-Mace_ (Jap. _Kongō-sho;_—Sansc. “Vadjra”). Explained as signifying the divine force that “strikes and breaks all the lusts (_bonnō_) of the world.”

IV.—_The Conch-Shell_ (Jap. “_Hora_”) or _Trumpet_. Emblem of the preaching of the Law. The book _Shin-zoku-butsu-ji-hen_ calls it the symbol of the voice of the Buddha. The _Dai-hi-kyō_ calls it the token of the preaching and of the power of the Mahayana doctrine. The _Dai-Nichi-Kyō_ says:—” At the sound of the blowing of the shell, all the heavenly deities are filled with delight, and come to hear the Law.”

V.—_The Flower-Vase_ (Jap. “_Hanagamé_”). Emblem of _murō_,—a mystical word which might be literally rendered as “not-leaking,”—signifying that condition of supreme intelligence triumphant over birth and death.

VI.—_The Wheel-of-a-Thousand-Spokes_ (Sansc. “Tchakra “). This emblem, called in Japanese _Senfuku-rin-sō_, is curiously explained by various quotations. The _Hokké-Monku_ says:—“The effect of a wheel is to crush something; and the effect of the Buddha’s preaching is to crush all delusions, errors, doubts, and superstitions. Therefore preaching the doctrine is called, ‘turning the Wheel.’”… The _Sei-Ri-Ron_ says: “Even as the common wheel has its spokes and its hub, so in Buddhism there are many branches of the _Hasshi Shōdo_ (‘Eight-fold Path,’ or eight rules of conduct).”

VII.—_The Crown of Brahmâ_. Under the heel of the Buddha is the Treasure-Crown (_Hō-Kwan_) of Brahmâ (_Bon-Ten-O_),—in symbol of the Buddha’s supremacy above the gods.

But I think that the inscriptions upon any of these _Butsu-soku-séki_ will be found of more significance than the above imperfect attempts at an explanation of the emblems. The inscriptions upon the monument at Dentsu-In are typical. On different sides of the structure,—near the top, and placed by rule so as to face certain points of the compass,—there are engraved five Sanscrit characters which are symbols of the Five Elemental Buddhas, together with scriptural and commemorative texts. These latter have been translated for me as follows:—

The HO-KO-HON-NYO-KYO says:—“In that time, from beneath his feet, the Buddha radiated a light having the appearance of a wheel of a thousand spokes. And all who saw that radiance became strictly upright, and obtained the Supreme Enlightenment.”

The KWAN-BUTSU-SANMAI-KYO says:—“Whosoever looks upon the footprints of the Buddha shall be freed from the results even of innumerable thousands of imperfections.”

The BUTSU-SETSU-MU-RYO-JU-KYO says:—“In the land that the Buddha treads in journeying, there is not even one person in all the multitude of the villages who is not benefited. Then throughout the world there is peace and good will. The sun and the moon shine clear and bright. Wind and rain come only at a suitable time. Calamity and pestilence cease. The country prospers; the people are free from care. Weapons become useless. All men reverence religion, and regulate their conduct in all matters with earnestness and modesty.”

[Commemorative Text.]