The Romance of the Milky Way Part 13

But the most remarkable novelty of this sort yet produced is a kind of _toko-niwa_ recently on display at a famous shop in Ginza. A label bearing the inscription, _Ka-te no Ikken_ (View of the Ocean-Bed) sufficiently explained the design. The _subon_, or "water-tray,"

containing the display was half filled with rocks and sand so as to resemble a sea-bottom; and little fishes appeared swarming in the fore-ground. A little farther back, upon an elevation, stood Otohime, the Dragon-King's daughter, surrounded by her maiden attendants, and gazing, with just the shadow of a smile, at two men in naval uniform who were shaking hands,--dead heroes of the war: Admiral Makaroff and Commander Hirose!... These had esteemed each other in life; and it was a happy thought thus to represent their friendly meeting in the world of Spirits.

Though his name is perhaps unfamiliar to English readers, Commander Takeo Hirose has become, deservedly, one of j.a.pan's national heroes.

On the 27th of March, during the second attempt made to block the entrance to Port Arthur, he was killed while endeavoring to help a comrade,--a comrade who had formerly saved him from death. For five years Hirose had been a naval attache at St. Petersburg, and had made many friends in Russian naval and military circles. From boyhood his life had been devoted to study and duty; and it was commonly said of him that he had no particle of selfishness in his nature. Unlike most of his brother officers, he remained unmarried,--holding that no man who might be called on at any moment to lay down his life for his country had a moral right to marry. The only amus.e.m.e.nts in which he was ever known to indulge were physical exercises; and he was acknowledged one of the best _j[=u]jutsu_ (wrestlers) in the empire.

The heroism of his death, at the age of thirty-six, had much less to do with the honors paid to his memory than the self-denying heroism of his life.

Now his picture is in thousands of homes, and his name is celebrated in every village. It is celebrated also by the manufacture of various souvenirs, which are sold by myriads. For example, there is a new fashion in sleeve-b.u.t.tons, called _Kinen-botan_, or "Commemoration-b.u.t.tons." Each b.u.t.ton bears a miniature portrait of the commander, with the inscription, _Shichi-sh[=o] h[=o]koku_, "Even in seven successive lives--for love of country." It is recorded that Hirose often cited, to friends who criticised his ascetic devotion to duty, the famous utterance of Kusunoki Masashige, who declared, ere laying down his life for the Emperor Go-Daigo, that he desired to die for his sovereign in seven successive existences.

But the highest honor paid to the memory of Hirose is of a sort now possible only in the East, though once possible also in the West, when the Greek or Roman patriot-hero might be raised, by the common love of his people, to the place of the Immortals.... Wine-cups of porcelain have been made, decorated with his portrait; and beneath the portrait appears, in ideographs of gold, the inscription, _Gunshin Hirose Ch[=u]sa_. The character "gun" signifies war; the character "_shin_"

a G.o.d,--either in the sense of _divus_ or _deus_, according to circ.u.mstances; and the Chinese text, read in the j.a.panese way, is _Ikusa no Kami_. Whether that stern and valiant spirit is really invoked by the millions who believe that no brave soul is doomed to extinction, no well-spent life laid down in vain, no heroism cast away, I do not know. But, in any event, human affection and grat.i.tude can go no farther than this; and it must be confessed that Old j.a.pan is still able to confer honors worth dying for.

Boys and girls in all the children's schools are now singing the Song of Hirose Ch[=u]sa, which is a marching song. The words and the music are published in a little booklet, with a portrait of the late commander upon the cover. Everywhere, and at all hours of the day, one hears this song being sung:--

_He whose every word and deed gave to men an example of what the war-folk of the_ _Empire of Nippon should be,--Commander Hirose: is he really dead?_

_Though the body die, the spirit dies not. He who wished to be reborn seven times into this world, for the sake of serving his country, for the sake of requiting the Imperial favor,--Commander Hirose: has he really died?_

_"Since I am a son of the Country of the G.o.ds, the fire of the evil-hearted Russians cannot touch me!"--The st.u.r.dy Takeo who spoke thus: can he really be dead?..._

_Nay! that glorious war-death meant undying fame;--beyond a thousand years the valiant heart shall live;--as to a G.o.d of war shall reverence be paid to him...._

Observing the playful confidence of this wonderful people in their struggle for existence against the mightiest power of the West,--their perfect trust in the wisdom of their leaders and the valor of their armies,--the good humor of their irony when mocking the enemy's blunders,--their strange capacity to find, in the world-stirring events of the hour, the same amus.e.m.e.nt that they would find in watching a melodrama,--one is tempted to ask: "What would be the moral consequence of a national defeat?"... It would depend, I think, upon circ.u.mstances. Were Kuropatkin able to fulfill his rash threat of invading j.a.pan, the nation would probably rise as one man. But otherwise the knowledge of any great disaster would be bravely borne.

From time unknown j.a.pan has been a land of cataclysms,--earth-quakes that ruin cities in the s.p.a.ce of a moment; tidal waves, two hundred miles long, sweeping whole coast populations out of existence; floods submerging hundreds of leagues of well-tilled fields; eruptions burying provinces. Calamities like this have disciplined the race in resignation and in patience; and it has been well trained also to bear with courage all the misfortunes of war. Even by the foreign peoples that have been most closely in contact with her, the capacities of j.a.pan remained unguessed. Perhaps her power to resist aggression is far surpa.s.sed by her power to endure.