Ancient Tales and Folk-Lore of Japan by Richard Gordon Smith (best novels ever txt) 📕

Fujieda led the four countrymen into the next room, and ate with them at the meal, during which time Kinokuniya the contractor arrived, and was promptly ushered into their presence. The meal was nearly at an end.

Fujieda introduced the contractor, who in his turn said:

‘Gentlemen, we cannot discuss these matters here in the house of Lord Fujieda the Shogun’s agent. Now that we know one another, let me invite you to supper; at that I can explain to you exactly what I want in the way of trees out of your district. Of course, you know my family are subjects of your feudal lords, and that we are therefore all the same.’

The four countrymen were delighted at so much hospitality. Two meals in an evening was an extraordinary dissipation for them, and that in Yedo! My word, what would they not be able to tell their wives on their return to the villages?

Kinokuniya led the four countrymen off to a restaurant called Kampanaro, in Ryogoku, where he treated them with the greatest hospitality. After the meal he said:

‘Gentlemen, I hope you will allow me to hew timber from the forest in your village, for it is impossible for me otherwise to attempt any further building on a large scale.’

‘Very well, you may hew,’ said Mosuke, who was the senior of the four. ‘Since the cutting of the trees in Nekoma-myojin forest is as it were a necessity for our lord, they must be cut; it is, in fact, I take it, an order from our lord that the trees shall be cut; but I must remind you that there is one tree in the grove which cannot be cut amid any circumstances whatever, and that is an enormous and sacred camphor tree which is very much revered in our district, and to which a shrine is erected. That tree we cannot consent to have cut.’

‘Very well,’ said the contractor. ‘Just write me a little permit, giving me permission to cut any trees except the big camphor, and our business will be finished.’

Kinokuniya had by this time in the evening taken his measure of the countrymen—so shrewdly as to know that they were probably unable to write.

‘Certainly,’ said Mosuke. ‘Just you write out a little agreement, Jinyemon.’

‘No: I would rather you wrote it, Mago,’ said Jinyemon.

‘And I should like Yohei to write it,’ said Mago.

‘But I can’t write at all,’ said Yohei, turning to Jinyemon again.

‘Well, never mind, never mind,’ said Kinokuniya. ‘Will you gentlemen sign the document if I write it?’

Why, of course, they all assented. That was the best way of all. They would put their stamps to the document. This they did, and after a lively evening departed pleased with themselves generally.

Kinokuniya, on the other hand, went home fully contented with his evening’s business. Had he not in his pocket the permit to cut the trees, and had he not written it himself, so as to suit his own purpose? He chuckled at the thought of how neatly he had managed the business.

Next morning Kinokuniya sent off his foreman, Chogoro, accompanied by ten or a dozen men. It took them three days to reach the village called Yabukimura, near the Nekoma-myojin grove; they arrived on the morning of the fourth day, and proceeded to erect a scaffold round the camphor tree, so that they might the better use their axes. As they began chopping off the lower branches, Hamada Tsushima, the keeper of the shrine, came running to them.

‘Here, here! What are you doing? Cutting down the sacred camphor? Curse you! Stop, I tell you! Do you hear me? Stop at once!’

Chogoro answered:

‘You need not stop my men in their work. They are doing what they have been ordered to do, and with a full right to do it. I am cutting down the tree at the order of my master Kinokuniya, the timber contractor, who has permission to cut the tree from the four head-men sent to Yedo from this district.’

‘I know all that,’ said the caretaker; ‘but your permission is to cut down any tree except the sacred camphor.’

‘There you are wrong, as this letter will show you,’ said Chogoro; ‘read it yourself.’ And the caretaker, in great dismay, read as follows:—

To Kinokuniya Bunzaemon,

Timber Contractor, Yedo.

In hewing trees to build a new mansion for our lord, all the camphor trees must be spared except the large one said to be sacred in the Nekoma-myojin grove. In witness whereof we set our names.

JINYEMON; MAGOZAEMON; MOSUKE; YOHEI.

Representing the local County Officials.

The caretaker, beside himself with grief and astonishment, sent for the four men mentioned. On their arrival each declared that he had given permission to cut anything except the big camphor; but Chogoro said that he could not believe them, and in any case he would go by the written document. Then he ordered his men to continue their work on the big camphor.

Hamada Tsushima, the caretaker, did harakiri, disembowelling himself there and then; but not before telling Chogoro that his spirit would go into the camphor tree, to take care of it, and to wreak vengeance on the wicked Kinokuniya.

At last the efforts of the men brought the stately tree down with a crash; but then they found themselves unable to move it. Pull as they might, it would not budge. Each time they tried the branches seemed to become alive; faces and eyes became painful with the hits they got from them. Pluckily they continued their efforts; but it was no use. Things got worse. Several of the men were caught and nearly crushed to death between the branches; four had broken limbs from blows given in the same way. At this moment a horseman rode up and shouted:

‘My name is Matsumaye Tetsunosuke. I am one of the Lord of Sendai’s retainers. The board of councillors in Sendai have refused to allow this camphor tree to be touched. You have cut it, unfortunately. It must now remain where it is. Our feudal lord of Sendai, Lord Date Tsunamune, will be furious. Kinokuniya the contractor planned an evil scheme, and will be duly punished; while as for the Shogun’s agent, Fujieda Geki, he also must be reported. You yourselves return to Yedo. We cannot blame you for obeying orders. But first give me that forged permit signed by the four local fools, who, it is trusted, will destroy themselves.’

Chogoro and his men returned to Yedo. A few days later the contractor was taken ill, and a shampooer was sent to his room. A little later Kinokuniya was found dead; the shampooer had disappeared, though it was impossible for him to have got away without being seen! It is said that the spirit of Hamada Tsushima, the caretaker, had taken the form of the shampooer, in order to kill the contractor. Chogoro became so uneasy in his mind that he returned to the camphor tree, where he spent all his savings in erecting a new shrine and putting in a caretaker. This is known as the Kusunoki Dzuka (The Camphor Tree Tomb). The tree lies there, my story-teller tells me, at the present day.

THE END

Footnotes

354:1 Shelves.

354:2 Kakumono corner-post.