The Romance of the Milky Way Part 5

Me wa kagami, Kuchi wa tarai no Hodo ni aku: Gama mo kesh[=o] no Mono to kos[=o] shire.

[_The eye of it, widely open, like a (round) mirror; the mouth of it opening like a wash-basin--by these things you may know that the Toad is a goblin-thing (or, that the Toad is a toilet article)._[32]]

[Footnote 32: There are two j.a.panese words, _kesh[=o]_, which in _kana_ are written alike and p.r.o.nounced alike, though represented by very different Chinese characters. As written in _kana_, the term _kesh[=o]-no-mono_ may signify either "toilet articles" or "a monstrous being," "a goblin."]

IV. SHINKIR[=O]

The term _Shinkir[=o]_ is used in the meaning of "mirage," and also as another name for H[=o]rai, the Elf-land of Far Eastern fable. Various beings in j.a.panese myth are credited with power to delude mortals by creating a mirage of H[=o]rai. In old pictures one may see a toad represented in the act of exhaling from its mouth a vapor that shapes the apparition of H[=o]rai.

But the creature especially wont to produce this illusion is the _Hamaguri_,--a j.a.panese mollusk much resembling a clam. Opening its sh.e.l.l, it sends into the air a purplish misty breath; and that mist takes form and defines, in tints of mother-of-pearl, the luminous vision of H[=o]rai and the palace of the Dragon-King.

Hamaguri no Kuchi aku toki ya, Shinkir[=o]!

Yo ni shirare ken Tatsu-no-miya-hime!

[_When the hamaguri opens its mouth--lo! Shinkir[=o]

appears!... Then all can clearly see the Maiden-Princess of the Dragon-Palace._]

Shinkir[=o]-- Tatsu no miyako no Hinagata[33] wo Shio-hi no oki ni Misuru hamaguri!

[_Lo! in the offing at ebb-tide, the hamaguri makes visible the miniature image of Shinkir[=o]--the Dragon-Capital!_]

[Footnote 33: _Hinagata_ means especially "a model," "a miniature copy," "a drawn plan," etc.]

V. ROKURO-KUBI

The etymological meaning of _Rokuro-Kubi_ can scarcely be indicated by any English rendering. The term _rokuro_ is indifferently used to designate many revolving objects--objects as dissimilar as a pulley, a capstan, a windla.s.s, a turning lathe, and a potter's wheel. Such renderings of Rokuro-Kubi as "Whirling-Neck" and "Rotating-Neck" are unsatisfactory;--for the idea which the term suggests to j.a.panese fancy is that of a neck which revolves, _and lengthens or retracts according to the direction of the revolution_.... As for the ghostly meaning of the expression, a Rokuro-Kubi is either (1) a person whose neck lengthens prodigiously during sleep, so that the head can wander about in all directions, seeking what it may devour, or (2) a person able to detach his or her head completely from the body, and to rejoin it to the neck afterwards. (About this last mentioned variety of _Rokuro-Kubi_ there is a curious story in my "Kwaidan," translated from the j.a.panese.) In Chinese mythology the being whose neck is so constructed as to allow of the head being completely detached belongs to a special cla.s.s; but in j.a.panese folk-tale this distinction is not always maintained. One of the bad habits attributed to the Rokuro-Kubi is that of drinking the oil in night-lamps. In j.a.panese pictures the Rokuro-Kubi is usually depicted as a woman; and old books tell us that a woman might become a Rokuro-Kubi without knowing it,--much as a somnambulist walks about while asleep, without being aware of the fact.... The following verses about the Rokuro-Kubi have been selected from a group of twenty in the _Ky[=o]ka Hyaku-Monogatari_:--

Nemidare no Nagaki kami woba Furi-wakete, Chi hiro ni n.o.basu Rokuro-Kubi kana!

[_Oh!... Shaking loose her long hair disheveled by sleep, the Rokuro-Kubi stretches her neck to the length of a thousand fathoms!_]

"Atama naki Bakemono nari"--to Rokuro-Kubi, Mite odorokan Onoga karada we.

[_Will not the Rokuro-Kubi, viewing with_ _astonishment her own body (left behind) cry out, "Oh, what a headless goblin have you become!_"]

Tsuka-no-ma ni Hari we tsutawaru, Rokuro-Kubi Keta-keta warau-- Kao no kowasa yo!

[_Swiftly gliding along the roof-beam (and among the props of the roof), the Rokuro-Kubi laughs with the sound of "keta-keta"--oh! the fearfulness of her face!_[34]]

[Footnote 34: It is not possible to render all the double meanings in this composition. _Tsuka-no-ma_ signifies "in a moment" or "quickly"; but it may also mean "in the s.p.a.ce [_ma_] between the roof-props"

[_tsuka_]. "_Keta_" means a cross-beam, but _keta-keta warau_ means to chuckle or laugh in a mocking way. Ghosts are said to laugh with the sound of keta-keta.]

Roku shaku no By[=o]bu ni n.o.biru Rokuro-Kubi Mite wa, go shaku no Mi wo chijimi-keri!

[_Beholding the Rokuro-Kubi rise up above the six-foot screen, any five-foot person would have become shortened by fear (or, "the stature of any person five feet high would have been diminished")._[35]]

[Footnote 35: The ordinary height of a full screen is six j.a.panese feet.]

VI. YUKI-ONNA

The Snow-Woman, or Snow-Spectre, a.s.sumes various forms; but in most of the old folk-tales she appears as a beautiful phantom, whose embrace is death. (A very curious story about her can be found in my "Kwaidan.")

Yuki-Onna-- Yos[=o] kushi mo Atsu k[=o]ri; Sasu-k[=o]gai ya K[=o]ri naruran.

[_As for the Snow-Woman,--even her best comb, if I mistake not, is made of thick ice; and her hair-pin[36], too, is probably made of ice._]

[Footnote 36: _K[=o]gai_ is the name now given to a quadrangular bar of tortoise-sh.e.l.l pa.s.sed under the coiffure, which leaves only the ends of the bar exposed. The true hair-pin is called _kanzashi_.]

Honrai wa K[=u] naru mono ka, Yuki-Onna?

Yoku-yoku mireba Ichi-butsu mo nashi!

[_Was she, then, a delusion from the very first, that Snow-Woman,--a thing that vanishes into empty s.p.a.ce? When I look carefully all about me, not one trace of her is to be seen!_]

Yo-akereba Kiete yuku e wa Shirayuki[37] no Onna to mishi mo Yanagi nari-keri!

[_Having vanished at daybreak (that Snow-Woman), none could say whither she had gone. But what had seemed to be a snow-white woman became indeed a willow-tree!_]

[Footnote 37: The term _shirayuki_, as here used, offers an example of what j.a.panese poets call _Keny[=o]gen_, or "double-purpose words."

Joined to the words immediately following, it makes the phrase "white-snow woman" (_shirayuki no onna_);--united with the words immediately preceding, it suggests the reading, "whither-gone not-knowing" (_yuku e wa shira[zu]_).]

Yuki-Onna Mite wa yasathiku, Matsu wo ori Nama-dake hishigu Chikara ari-keri!

[_Though the Snow-Woman appears to sight slender and gentle, yet, to snap the pine-trees asunder and to crush the live bamboos, she must have had strength._]

Samukesa ni Zotto[38] wa suredo Yuki-Onna,-- Yuki ore no naki Yanagi-goshi ka mo!

[_Though the Snow-Woman makes one shiver by her coldness,--ah, the willowy grace of her form cannot be broken by the snow (i.e. charms us in spite of the cold)._]

[Footnote 38: _Zotto_ is a difficult word to render literally: perhaps the nearest English equivalent is "thrilling." _Zotto suru_ signifies "to cause a thrill" or "to give a shock," or "to make shiver;"

and of a very beautiful person it is said "_Zotto-suru hodo no bijin_,"--meaning! "She is so pretty that it gives one a shock merely to look at her." The term _yanagi-goshi_ ("willow-loins") in the last line is a common expression designating a slender and graceful figure; and the reader should observe that the first half of the term is ingeniously made to do double duty here,--suggesting, with the context, not only the grace of willow branches weighed down by snow, but also the grace of a human figure that one must stop to admire, in spite of the cold.]

VII. FUNA-Y[=U]Re

The spirits of the drowned are said to follow after ships, calling for a bucket or a water-dipper (_hishaku_). To refuse the bucket or the dipper is dangerous; but the bottom of the utensil should be knocked out before the request is complied with, and the spectres must not be allowed to see this operation performed. If an undamaged bucket or dipper be thrown to the ghosts, it will be used to fill and to sink the ship. These phantoms are commonly called _Funa-Y[=u]re_ ("Ship-Ghosts").

The spirits of those warriors of the Heke clan who perished in the great sea-fight at Dan-no-ura, in the year 1185, are famous among Funa-Y[=u]re. Tara no Tomomori, one of the chiefs of the clan, is celebrated in this weird role: old pictures represent him, followed by the ghosts of his warriors, running over the waves to attack pa.s.sing ships. Once he menaced a vessel in which Benke, the celebrated retainer of Yos.h.i.tsune, was voyaging; and Benke was able to save the ship only by means of his Buddhist rosary, which frightened the spectres away....

Tomomori is frequently pictured as walking upon the sea, carrying a ship's anchor on his back. He and his fellow-ghosts are said to have been in the habit of uprooting and making off with the anchors of vessels imprudently moored in their particular domain,--the neighborhood of Shimonoseki.

Erimoto ye Mizu kakeraruru Kokochi seri, "Hishaku kase" ch[=o]

Fune no kowane ni.

[_As if the nape of our necks had been sprinkled with cold water,--so we felt while listening_ _to the voice of the ship-ghost, saying:--"Lend me a dipper!"_[39]]