A PORTRAIT OF SHUNKIN

Shunkin (born as Mozuya Koto, but better known by her professional name) was the daughter of an Osaka drug merchant. She died on the fourteenth of October in 1886—the nineteenth year of the Meiji era—and was buried in the grounds of a certain Buddhist temple of the Pure Land sect in the Shitadera district of Osaka.

Some days ago I happened to pass the temple, and stopped in to visit her grave. When I asked the caretaker how to find the Mozuya plot, he said "It's over this way, sir" and led me around the main hall. There, in the shade of a cluster of old camellias, stood the gravestones of generation after generation of the Mozuya family—but none of them seemed to belong to Shunkin.

I told the caretaker about her, and suggested that she must have a grave somewhere. He considered this for a moment. "Well," he said at last, "maybe it's the one on the hill." And he took me to a flight of steps leading up a steep slope on the eastern side of the grounds.

As you may know, the Ikutama Shrine stands on a height overlooking Shitadera: the slope I mentioned rises from the temple grounds toward the shrine and is densely wooded, quite unusual for Osaka. We found Shunkin's gravestone in a little clearing about halfway up. It bore this inscription:

MOZUYA KOTO, also called SHUNKIN
Died October fourteenth
In the nineteenth year of Meiji
At the age of fifty-seven

On one side were carved the words: "Erected by her pupil, Nukui Sasuke." Perhaps the reason why Shunkin was buried apart from her family was that, although never legally married, she had lived with her "pupil," the celebrated samisen master Nukui Sasuke, as man and wife.

According to the caretaker, the Mozuya family was ruined long ago. The relatives hardly ever came to visit the graves any more, certainly not to Shunkin's. "I didn't think she belonged to the same family," he told me.

"So the grave is neglected, is it?" I asked.

"No," he said, "not really. An old lady from Haginochaya who looks to be about seventy comes here once or twice a year. She prays and offers flowers and incense, and then—" He paused, pointing to another grave at the left of Shunkin's. "You see that little stone next to it? As soon as she's finished she goes over and does the same thing there. She pays the temple to look after both graves, too."

I went to examine the other stone. It was about half the size of Shunkin's, and had this inscription:

NUKUI SASUKE, also called KINDAI
Pupil of Mozuya Shunkin
Died October fourteenth in the fortieth year of Meiji
At the age of eighty-two

So this was the grave of the famous virtuoso. The fact that his monument is smaller than Shunkin's and that he is described on it as her pupil shows that he wished to remain humble toward her even in death. As I stood there on the hillside, near the two stones glowing in the late-afternoon sun, I looked down at the city spread out below me. No doubt this hilly terrain, which stretches westward as far as the Tenno Temple, has had the same contour throughout the long history of Osaka. Today the grass and foliage are soot-stained, dead-looking; the great trees are withered and dusty, giving an air of drabness to the scene. But when these graves were dug it must have been a luxuriant setting; even now this is surely the most tranquil burial place in Osaka, and the one with the finest view. Here, high over the busiest industrial city of the Orient, over the innumerable tall buildings that pierce the evening haze, teacher and pupil lie together in their eternal sleep, bound by a mysterious fate. Osaka has changed almost beyond recognition since Sasuke's day, but these two stones still testify to his love for Shunkin.

The Nukui family belonged to the Nichiren sect of Buddhism, and all of the family tombs except Sasuke's are at a temple in Hino, his own birthplace, in the province of Omi. Yet because of his ardent wish to be buried beside Shunkin, Sasuke abandoned the faith of his ancestors and joined the Pure Land sect. They say that all arrangements for the two graves—including the size and position of the stones—were made while Shunkin was still alive. Shunkin's gravestone appeared to be about six feet high, and Sasuke's less than four. The two were side by side on low flagstone-covered bases, and a pine tree, planted to the right of Shunkin, stretched its green limbs protectingly over her. Sasuke's gravestone stood a few feet to the left of hers, like a humble servant, just beyond the tip of the pine branches. As I looked, I was reminded how faithfully Sasuke had served his teacher, following her like a shadow and attending to all her needs. It seemed to me as if the stones had souls, and even now he took pleasure in her happiness.

After kneeling at Shunkin's grave for a moment, I ran my hand affectionately along the top of Sasuke's stone. Then I wandered about on the hill until the sun had dropped out of sight beyond the city.

Not long ago I acquired a slim volume called The Life of Mozuya Shunkin, which awakened my interest in her. The book has sixty pages, bound in the Japanese style, and is printed in large characters on pure handmade paper. I gathered that Sasuke had asked someone to compile his teacher's biography for private distribution on the second anniversary of her death. Although the text is written in the old-fashioned literary style and Sasuke himself is referred to in the third person, he undoubtedly supplied all the material and may well be regarded as the real author.

To quote from the Life:

For generations the Mozuya family has kept a pharmaceutical house in Dosho-machi in Osaka, under the name of Mozuya Yasuzaemon. Shunkin's father was the seventh in that line. Her mother, Shige, came from the Atobé family of Kyoto, and bore her husband two sons and four daughters. Shunkin was the second daughter, and was born on the twenty-fourth of May, 1829, the twelfth year of the Bunsei era. . . . Even as a child, Shunkin was not only remarkably intelligent but gifted with an aristocratic grace and beauty quite beyond comparison. When she began learning to dance at about the age of three the correct movements seemed to come to her effortlessly; her gestures were more charming than those of any young professional dancing girl. They say that her teacher was astonished at her skill. "What a marvelous child!" he would murmur. "With her looks and ability she could become one of the most famous geisha in the country. It's a pity she was born into a respectable family!" Shunkin began to read and write at an early age too, and her progress was so extraordinary that she soon surpassed her older brothers.

Supposing that the source of this information was Sasuke, who seems to have idolized her, one hardly knows how much of it to believe. Still, there is a good deal of other evidence to suggest that she was indeed blessed with "aristocratic grace and beauty."

In those days most women were short in stature, and Shunkin is said to have been less than five feet tall, exquisitely formed, with very fine features and slender wrists and ankles. There is a photograph of her at thirty-six which shows a face of classic oval outline and features so delicately modeled that they seem almost ethereal. However, since it dates from the eighteen-sixties, the picture is speckled with age and as faded as an old memory. Possibly that is why it makes such a faint impression on me. In that misty photograph I can detect nothing more than the usual refinement of a lady from a well-to-do Osaka merchant family—beautiful, to be sure, but without any real individuality. She looks as if she might be thirty-six—or then again she might be ten years younger.

Although this picture was taken more than two decades after Shunkin lost her sight, she merely looks like a woman who has closed her eyes. It has been said that the deaf look like fools and the blind like sages: the deaf, in their effort to catch what others are saying, knit their brows, gape their mouths, and goggle their eyes, or cock their heads this way and that, all of which gives them an air of stupidity; while the blind, because they sit calmly with their heads bowed a trifle as if in meditation, appear to be extremely thoughtful. However that may be, we are so accustomed to seeing the half-closed "merciful eyes" with which Buddha and the Bodhisattvas gaze on all living things that closed eyes seem more benevolent to us than open ones—may even seem awe-inspiring. And Shunkin is such a meek, gentle-looking woman that one feels a sense of compassion in her veiled eyes, as one would in those of the merciful goddess Kannon.

As far as I know, this is the only photograph ever made of Shunkin. When she was younger the art had not yet been introduced to Japan, and in the same year that this one was made she suffered a calamity, after which she would certainly not have allowed herself to be photographed. Thus we have only one dim reflection of her to help us imagine her appearance. No doubt I have given a vague, inadequate impression of how she looked. Yet the photograph itself is perhaps even vaguer than the impression which my words convey.

It occurs to me that in the year Shunkin's picture was taken—when she was thirty-six—Sasuke himself became blind; the last time he saw her she must have looked rather like this. Was the picture of her which he carried in his memory in old age as faded as this photograph? Or did his imagination make up for a gradually failing memory? Did he create an image of another lovely woman, of one altogether different from the woman in the photograph?

The Life of Shunkin goes on with this passage:

Consequently, her parents regarded her as their precious jewel, and favored her over all of her five brothers and sisters. However, when Shunkin was eight years old she had the misfortune of contracting an eye disease; soon she lost her sight completely. Her parents were heartbroken: her mother seemed almost insane with grief, full of bitterness toward the whole world because of the misery of her child. From that time on Shunkin gave up dancing and devoted all her energy to the study of the koto and the samisen, and the allied art of singing. She dedicated her life to music.

It is not clear what sort of eye disease Shunkin had, and there is no further mention of it in the Life. But Sasuke once made this remark: "A tall tree is envied by the wind, as the saying goes. Just because she was more beautiful and more talented than the others, my teacher was the victim of jealousy twice in her life. All her troubles came from those two attacks." His words suggest that peculiar circumstances lay behind Shunkin's affliction.

Another time, Sasuke said that his teacher was blinded by purulent ophthalmia. Now, Shunkin had been more than a little spoiled by her pampered upbringing, but as a child she was so gay and charming and vivacious, so considerate to those who served her, that she got along very well with people. She was on the best of terms with her brothers and sisters, and seemed to be the darling of the household. However, her youngest sister's nurse is said to have secretly hated her out of resentment at the favoritism shown by her parents. Since purulent ophthalmia is a venereal infection of the mucous membranes of the eyes, Sasuke must have been hinting—whether or not he had any better grounds for thinking so—that the nurse had somehow managed to rob Shunkin of her sight. The later violence of Shunkin's temper does make one wonder if some such incident helped to shape her character; still, Sasuke's opinions are by no means to be trusted implicitly —this was not the only time that his grief over Shunkin seemed to poison his mind toward others. His suspicion of the nurse was probably quite unfounded.

In any case, rather than attempting to solve that problem, I need only record here that she lost her sight at the age of eight. And then: "From that time on Shunkin gave up dancing and devoted all her energy to the study of the koto and the samisen, and the allied art of singing. She dedicated her life to music." In other words, it was because of blindness that Shunkin turned to music. Sasuke said that she often told him her real talent was for dancing: those who praised her voice or her ability at the koto and samisen didn't know her true self—if only she could see, she would be a dancer. This sounds a little arrogant, as if she is pointing out how much she has achieved even in an art to which she is not really suited. But perhaps Sasuke exaggerated her words. At least, it seems possible that a chance remark of hers, uttered on a momentary impulse, made such a strong impression on him that he kept harking back to it as evidence of what a superior person she was.

The old woman from Haginochaya who still comes to tend the two graves is Shigizawa Teru, a high-ranking member of the Ikuta school of koto players. To Shunkin in her late years, and then to Sasuke, she had given devoted service. "I've heard that my teacher was good at dancing," she told me, referring to Shunkin; "but she began studying the koto and samisen when she was only four or five, and practiced regularly from then on. She didn't just take up music because she went blind. In those days all proper young ladies started music lessons early. They say that when she was nine years old she memorized a long koto piece at a single hearing, and picked it out on the samisen all by herself. You can see she was a born genius—no ordinary person could do a thing like that! Once she was blind, I expect she studied harder than ever. She must have really put heart and soul into it."

Probably Teru is right, and Shunkin's true talent was for music. I am inclined to be dubious about her ability as a dancer.

Even if Shunkin "put heart and soul into it," she may not have intended to become a professional musician; there was no need for her to worry about making a living. It was for a different reason that she later opened her own establishment as a music teacher, and teaching was never her sole means of support. Her monthly allowance from her parents, though not enough to satisfy her luxurious tastes, was far greater than the income which she herself earned.

In the beginning, then, she must have practiced as hard as she did simply for her own pleasure, with no thought of the future, developing her natural talent by this passion for music. It is probably true, as the Life tells us, that "by the time Shunkin was fourteen she had made such great progress that not one of her fellow pupils could compare with her."

According to Shigizawa Teru: "My teacher used to boast that her master Shunsho, who was very strict with his pupils, never gave her a real scolding. In fact, he often praised her. She told me he took a personal interest in her work, and was wonderfully kind and gentle—she couldn't imagine why people were afraid of him. I expect it was on account of her talent that he treated her so well. She didn't have to suffer for her training the way you usually do."

Since Shunkin was a daughter of the wealthy Mozuya family, no teacher, however strict, would have been as severe with her as with the children of professional musicians; besides, Shunsho must have felt a desire to protect the pitiful little girl whose happy childhood had so unexpectedly ended in blindness. Yet I suppose it was her ability, more than anything else, that won his admiration and his affection.

He worried about her more than about his own children: whenever she happened to miss a lesson because of illness he immediately sent someone to her house to ask how she was, or else set out to call on her himself. It was no secret that he took great pride in having Shunkin as his pupil. To the others he taught, the children of professionals, he would say: "Model yourselves after the little Mozuya girl, all of you! Soon you'll be making your living at it—and yet you're no match for the child." (He always spoke of Shunkin in intimate terms, possibly because he had also taught her elder sister and was a friend of the family.)

Once, when he was criticized for being entirely too kind to Shunkin, he told his pupils to stop talking nonsense. "The stricter a teacher is, the better," he said. "I'd have been kindest to that child if I'd scolded her. But she's so brilliant, she has so much natural ability, that she'd go right on learning even without any help from me. If I really drubbed it into her, she'd be so amazingly good that the rest of you would hang your heads in shame. But her family is well off, she'll never have to earn a living; so instead of giving her a thorough training I put all my energy into trying to make decent performers out of a bunch of blockheads. What are you complaining about?"

Shunsho's house was in Utsubo, over half a mile from the Mozuya establishment in Dosho-machi, but Shunkin went there for a lesson every day, led by the hand by her father's shopboy. The boy was Sasuke, and that was how his relationship with Shunkin began.

As I mentioned earlier, Sasuke was born in the village of Hino, in Omi. His parents kept a drugstore there, and both his father and his grandfather had learned their trade by working at the Mozuya house in Osaka. To Sasuke, therefore, serving the Mozuya family meant serving his hereditary master.

Since he began his apprenticeship at twelve, and was four years older than Shunkin, Sasuke came to the Mozuya house when she was eight—the age at which she lost her sight. By the time he arrived Shunkin's lovely eyes had been dimmed forever. Yet as long as he lived Sasuke considered himself fortunate that he had not once seen the light of her eyes. Had he known her before her blindness, her face might later have seemed imperfect to him, but happily he was never conscious of the least flaw in her beauty. From the very first her features seemed ideal.

Today, Osaka families of means are eagerly moving to the suburbs, and their sports-loving daughters are used to sunshine and open air. The old-fashioned sort of sheltered beauty, the girl brought up in hothouse seclusion, has quite disappeared. But even now, city children are usually pale and delicate, compared with boys and girls who grow up in the country. They are more refined—or, if you like, more sickly. In particular, Osaka and Kyoto people have traditionally prized a fair complexion and have been noted for the whiteness of their skins. The sons of old Osaka families are as slender and girlish-looking as their counterparts on the stage; only when they are about thirty do their faces become ruddy, their bodies plump, as they suddenly acquire the portly dignity befitting a prosperous gentleman. Until then they are as fair-skinned as women, and their taste in dress is rather effeminate too. And how much more extraordinary the gleaming whiteness, the translucent purity of the complexion of girls born into well-to-do merchant families before the Meiji era, girls brought up in the shadows of dark inner rooms! What strange, fascinating creatures they must have seemed to a boy like Sasuke!

At that time Shunkin's elder sister was eleven, and the next-younger was five. To Sasuke, fresh from the country, the little Mozuya girls seemed incredibly lovely. Most of all, he was struck by the mysterious charm of the blind Shunkin. Her closed eyes seemed to him more alive and beautiful than the open ones of her sisters; he felt that her face was perfectly natural, that it ought not to be any different.

Even if Shunkin was indeed the most beautiful of the four sisters, as everyone said, it may well be that pity had something to do with the general admiration for her. But Sasuke would have denied that. In later years, nothing offended him more than being told that his love for Shunkin sprang from pity. "That's ridiculous!" he would answer roughly. "When I look into my teacher's face I never dream of feeling sorry for her, or thinking of her as pitiful. We ordinary people are the wretched ones. Why would a lady so beautiful and so talented need anybody's sympathy? The fact is, she pities me, and calls me her 'poor Sasuke.' You and I have all our faculties, but she's far superior to us in every other way. We're the handicapped ones, in my opinion."

But that was later. At the beginning Sasuke was merely her faithful servant, though no doubt a secret flame of devotion was already burning in his heart. Perhaps he had not yet realized that he was in love with her—this innocent young girl who was the daughter of his hereditary master. He must have been overjoyed to become her companion, and to be able to go walking with her every day. It seems odd that a new shopboy was given the task of guiding the Mozuyas' precious daughter, but at first he was not the only one to be so entrusted. Sometimes one of the maidservants went along with her, and sometimes an older apprentice. But one day Shunkin said: "Let Sasuke take me," and thereafter it was his duty alone. He was thirteen at the time.

Beaming with pride at this great honor, Sasuke would walk along beside her, the palm of her little hand nestled in his, all the way to Shunsho's house. Then, after waiting until she had finished her lesson, he would escort her home again. Shunkin hardly ever spoke to him, and Sasuke kept silent as long as she did, devoting all his attention to guiding her safely along the street. Once, when Shunkin was asked why she had chosen him, she replied: "Because he's so well-behaved, and doesn't keep chattering away."

It is true, as I have said, that Shunkin originally had a great deal of charm and got along very well with people. But after losing her sight she became moody: she seemed almost taciturn, and seldom laughed. So perhaps what pleased her about Sasuke was that he fulfilled his duty faithfully and unobtrusively, without superfluous talk. (They say that Sasuke disliked seeing her laugh. I suppose he found it painful, since there is something poignant about a blind person's laughter.)

But was it really because Sasuke never bothered her that Shunkin chose him? Had she not become vaguely aware of his adoration and, young as she was, taken pleasure in it? Such a thing may seem out of the question in a little girl of nine; but when you consider that Shunkin, besides being such a clever, precocious child, had developed a kind of sixth sense as a result of her blindness, you cannot dismiss it as inconceivable. Even later, when Shunkin knew that she was in love, she was too proud to confess her feelings: it was a long time before she gave herself to him. Thus there is some doubt as to what she actually thought of him at the beginning. In any case she behaved as if she scarcely knew he existed—or so at least it seemed to Sasuke.

To guide her, Sasuke would raise his left hand as high as her shoulder, and Shunkin would rest the palm of her right hand in his upturned palm. He seemed to be no more than a hand to her. When she wanted him to do something she never told him plainly what it was; instead, she indicated it by a gesture, or by frowning, or by murmuring a hint as if she were talking to herself. Should one of these subtle hints escape his notice, she was certain to be very annoyed, and so Sasuke had to keep alert for her every movement and expression. He felt that she was testing him to see how attentive he was. Spoiled from infancy and warped by blindness, Shunkin never gave him a moment's rest.

Once, at her teacher's house, while they were waiting for her turn to take a lesson, Sasuke suddenly noticed that Shunkin had disappeared. Much alarmed, he began looking everywhere for her—and found that she had slipped out to the lavatory. Whenever she wanted to go there she would silently rise and leave the room, and Sasuke would hurry after her to lead her to the door of the lavatory; when she had finished, he would pour water over her hands at the washbasin. That day, however, Sasuke had been caught off guard and she had groped her way there alone. He came running up to her just as she was reaching for the ladle at the washbasin. "I'm awfully sorry!" he said, his voice trembling.

"Never mind," said Shunkin, shaking her head. But Sasuke knew that if he let her have her way it would be so much the worse for him later. Under the circumstances the best thing was to take the ladle from her, no matter how much she objected, and pour the water over her hands.

Again, one summer afternoon when they were awaiting her turn, with Sasuke sitting in his usual respectful attitude a little behind her, Shunkin murmured to herself: "It's hot."

"Yes, isn't it?" he agreed politely.

She was silent a few moments, and then repeated: "It's hot." Realizing what she wanted, Sasuke picked up a fan and began fanning her back. That seemed to satisfy her, but as soon as his fanning became a little less vigorous she repeated: "It's hot."

But it was chiefly to Sasuke, rather than to the other servants, that Shunkin displayed her stubbornness and willfulness. Since he did his best to cater to these tendencies in her, it was only with him that she could give full vent to such inclinations. That is one reason why she found him so useful. Sasuke, for his part, far from thinking himself abused, was pleased by the demands she made on him. Perhaps he took her extraordinary waywardness as a form of coquetry, interpreting it as a special favor.

The room in which Shunsho taught his pupils was on a mezzanine floor at the rear of the house up a short flight of stairs; when Shunkin's turn, came, Sasuke would guide her up the steps and into the room to a seat facing her teacher. Then he would place her koto or samisen before her and go back downstairs to wait until the lesson was over. But while waiting he would remain alert, straining his ears to follow the music so that he could hurry back to get her as soon as the lesson ended. Naturally he became familiar with the pieces which Shunkin was learning to play and sing, and it was in this way that his own musical tastes were formed.

Of course Sasuke must have been born with a gift for music, since he eventually became a leading virtuoso. Still, except for his opportunity to serve Shunkin, except for the passionate love that made him share all her interests, he would no doubt have spent the rest of his life as an ordinary druggist. Even in his later years, when he was officially recognized as a master, he always maintained that his skill did not begin to compare with Shunkin's. "She taught me everything I know," he used to say. Such remarks cannot be taken at face value, since he was accustomed to humbling himself while praising her to the skies. But whatever their relative merits as artists, it seems undeniable that Shunkin had a touch of genius, and Sasuke a capacity for hard work.

Before the end of the year, while he was still thirteen, Sasuke secretly made up his mind to buy a samisen and began to save the small allowance his master gave him as well as the tips he got when he was out on errands. By the next summer he was at last able to buy a cheap practice-instrument, which he took apart, smuggling the neck and body separately up to his attic bedroom in order to escape the notice of the head clerk. Night after night, when the other apprentices were fast asleep, he practiced on his samisen.

At the beginning he had no confidence in his ability, nor did he intend to become a professional musician: it was only that he felt drawn to anything Shunkin liked, out of sheer loyalty. The fact that he did his best to conceal his interest in music from her shows that he was not learning to play the samisen as a means to win her love.

Sasuke shared a cramped, low-ceilinged attic room with five or six other clerks and apprentices; he asked them not to tell anyone about his practicing, and promised not to disturb them by it. They were all young enough to fall asleep as soon as their heads touched the pillow, and none of them ever complained. Even so, Sasuke would wait until he was sure they were sound asleep, then get up and practice in the closet where the bedding was kept. The attic room itself must have been hot and stuffy, and the heat inside that closet on a summer night almost unbearable. But by shutting himself up in it he could muffle the twang of the strings and at the same time avoid the distraction of outside noises, such as the snoring of his roommates. Of course he had to sing the vocal parts softly and pluck the strings with his fingers, instead of with a plectrum: sitting there in the pitch-dark closet, he played by his sense of touch alone.

But Sasuke never felt inconvenienced by the darkness. Blind people live in the dark like this all the time, he thought, and Shunkin has to play the samisen the same way. He was delighted to have found a place for himself in that dark world of hers. Even afterward, when he could practice freely, he was in the habit of closing his eyes whenever he took up the instrument, explaining that he felt he had to do exactly as Shunkin did. In short, he wanted to suffer the same handicap as Shunkin, to share all he could of the life of the blind. At times he obviously envied them. And these attitudes in which he persisted since boyhood help to account for his own later blindness. It was something that had to happen.

I suppose that all musical instruments are equally difficult when it comes to mastering their most profound secrets. However, the violin and the samisen offer special problems to the beginner, since they lack frets and must always be tuned before playing. They are the least suitable of instruments for self-teaching—and in those days there was no musical notation for the samisen. People say that with a good teacher it takes three months to learn to play the koto and three years for the samisen. But Sasuke could not afford to buy an instrument as expensive as a koto, nor could he possibly have smuggled in such a bulky object. He had to begin with the samisen. From the very first, though, he was able to tune it by himself, which not only suggests what a good ear for music he had, but how assiduously he listened while waiting at Shunsho's house. Everything he learned—the various modes, the words and melodies of the songs, the phrasing —he had to learn by remembering what he heard. There was no other way.

He went on practicing in secret for about half a year, managing to conceal it from everyone except his fellow roommates. Then early one winter morning (it was around four and as black as midnight) Shunkin's mother happened to get up to go to the lavatory, and heard the faint sound of a samisen filtering in from somewhere. In those days it was the custom for musicians to perform "midwinter exercises": that is, to get up before dawn during the cold season, bare themselves to the icy wind, and practice. But Dosho-machi was a commercial quarter, with staid business establishments lined up side by side, not the sort of place where you would find professional musicians or entertainers, or hear any gaiety at such an hour. In fact, it was still really night, much too early even for midwinter exercises; and the samisen was being played very softly, with the fingers, instead of loudly and energetically with a plectrum as one might have expected. And yet whoever it was seemed to be repeating the same passage over and over again, as if to perfect it. She could tell that he was a zealous student.

Shunkin's mother, though surprised to hear the music, paid no great attention to it and went back to bed. But she heard it again several times after that when she got up in the night; and others in the family said they had heard it too, and wondered where the sound could be coming from—surely this was no ghost! Thus the discussion went on, quite unknown to the clerks and apprentices.

All would have been well if Sasuke had continued to practice in the closet, but the fact that no one seemed to know what he was doing had made him bolder. Since he stole the night hours for his music he was bothered by loss of sleep, and being shut up in that airless closet soon made him drowsy. Toward the end of autumn, therefore, he had begun slipping out to the rooftop drying-platform to do his nightly practice in the open air. He always went to bed at ten o'clock along with the other shop employees, and would wake up at about three a.m., tuck his samisen under his arm, and go out on the platform, where, in the exhilarating cold, he would play on and on until the eastern sky began turning gray. It was during these hours of practice that Shunkin's mother heard him. Since the drying-platform was on the shop roof, directly over the attic where the apprentices slept, the sound carried over to the family quarters across the inner garden.

All the employees were questioned, and at last Sasuke's secret was out. The head clerk summoned him, scolded him severely, warning him never to do such a thing again, and took away his samisen. But then a helping hand was extended to him, most unexpectedly: Shunkin suggested that it might be interesting to hear what he could do.

Sasuke had felt sure that Shunkin would be offended if she learned of his practicing. She would think it presumptuous of him, a mere apprentice who ought to be contented fulfilling his duty as her guide. Whether she pitied or scorned him, he would be in for trouble. And he became all the more alarmed when he was told that she wished to hear him perform. I'd be so happy if she really cared, he thought. But he could only suppose that she was trying to make a laughingstock of him. Besides, he lacked the confidence to play and sing for others.

However, Shunkin insisted on hearing him, and by now her mother and sisters were curious too. Finally Sasuke was summoned to the family's private quarters and had to demonstrate how much he had managed to teach himself. It was a painfully formal debut.

By that time he could get through five or six pieces fairly well. Asked to play everything he knew, he screwed up his courage and did what he was told, playing and singing as if his life depended on it. Of course he had picked up all the tunes by ear, from the elementary "Black Hair" to the difficult "Teapickers' Song," and had learned his jumbled repertoire in a completely unsystematic way. Perhaps Shunkin and her family intended to make a laughingstock of him, as he suspected; but when they heard him perform they realized that for someone who had studied without a teacher, and only such a short time, both his instrumental technique and his voice were excellent. All of them were filled with admiration.

The Life of Shunkin says:

Thereupon, Shunkin began to sympathize with Sasuke in his ambition, and said to him: "In reward for your hard work I shall teach you myself from now on. Regard me as your teacher, and practice all you can in your spare time." At length Shunkin's father, Yasuzaemon, gave his consent to this arrangement, and Sasuke felt as if he had soared up to Heaven. Every day a fixed time was set aside during which he was freed from his duties as an apprentice and allowed to receive instruction. Thus there was the happy result that the ten-year-old girl and fourteen-year-old boy, besides being mistress and servant, formed the new and closer relationship of teacher and pupil.

But why did a difficult, temperamental girl like Shunkin suddenly begin to show such consideration for Sasuke? Some said that it was not really her idea, that those around her had persuaded her to act as she did. I suppose the blind little girl was often so lonely and melancholy, in spite of her happy home life, that even the maidservants (to say nothing of her parents) were at their wits' end, racking their brains to think of some way to amuse or divert her. And then they learned that Sasuke shared her taste for music. No doubt the servants, who had suffered bitterly from Shunkin's waywardness, wanted to lighten their own duties by having Sasuke spend more time with her. Might they not have appealed to her vanity by praising Sasuke and saying how wonderful it would be if she went to the trouble of teaching him, how gratefully he would receive such a favor? But since clumsy flattery only annoyed Shunkin it is not at all certain that she was responding to the influence of others. Perhaps she had at last begun to care for him, and to feel a strange new emotion stirring in her heart.

In any case, everyone was delighted when she proposed to take Sasuke as her pupil. No one asked whether a ten-year-old girl, however great a prodigy, was actually qualified to teach: it was enough that her boredom could be relieved in this way, and those around her spared. And so she was given this new game of "playing school," and Sasuke was ordered to be her pupil. Thus, the plan was intended for Shunkin's benefit, rather than Sasuke's; but as things turned out it was he who profited most.

According to the Life: "Every day a fixed time was set aside during which he was freed from his duties as an apprentice." But he was already spending at least several hours a day as her guide, so that being called regularly to her room for music lessons must have left him scarcely time to think of his work in the shop. Probably Yasuzaemon felt guilty toward Sasuke's parents for having made their son, whom he was supposed to be training to become a merchant, into a companion for his daughter. But keeping Shunkin in a good humor would have meant more to him than the future of one of his apprentices, and Sasuke himself was eager to do it. Apparently Yasuzaemon gave his tacit approval to the arrangement, feeling that it would do no harm to let matters take their course for the present.

This was when Sasuke began to call Shunkin "Madam," one of the formalities which she required of him during his lessons. She began to speak to him more brusquely, treating him precisely as her master Shunsho treated his own pupils and exacting the strictest obedience and respect. Thus they went on with their innocent "playing school," just as the adults had planned, and Shunkin found it highly diverting. But as the months went by the two showed no sign of abandoning their game. After two or three years had passed, both teacher and pupil had become so serious about it that there was no question of its being merely an amusement.

It was Shunkin's daily routine to set out for her teacher's house in Utsubo at about two o'clock in the afternoon, take a lesson which lasted half an hour to an hour, and then go home to spend the rest of the day practicing. After supper, if she happened to feel so inclined, she would summon Sasuke up to her room and give him a lesson. Eventually she taught him every day, without fail, sometimes not excusing him until nine or ten o'clock at night. Often the servants below were startled to hear the violent scoldings she would give him: "Sasuke! Is that what I taught you?" or "No, that won't do! Go over it till you can play it, even if it takes all night!" It was not unusual for the little girl to drive her pupil to tears, rapping him on the head with her plectrum and shouting: "Idiot! Why can't you learn?"

As is well known, teachers of the arts used to drill their pupils with brutal harshness, often inflicting physical punishment on them. For example, the famous chanter of puppet dramas Koshiji-dayu II had a large crescent-shaped scar between his eyebrows—a memento, so they say, of the time when his teacher cried "When will you ever learn?" and knocked him down with a blow of his heavy plectrum. Then there is the case of Yoshida Tamajiro of the Bunraku Theater. Once, during his apprenticeship, while he was helping his master Tamazo manipulate a puppet hero in rehearsing a climactic capture scene, he was unable to perfect a certain movement of the legs for which he was responsible. Suddenly his angry teacher shouted "Fool!" and, snatching up a puppet sword (one with a real blade), gave him a sharp blow on the back of the head. To this day he bears the scar of it. And Tamazo himself, who struck Tamajiro, once had his head split open when his own teacher struck him with a puppet. He begged his teacher for the broken-off, splintered legs of the puppet, which were crimson with his blood, and then wrapped them in silk floss and stored them away in a plain wooden box, such as is used for the ashes of the dead. Now and then he took the legs out and paid obeisance to them, as if he were worshipping the spirit of his dead mother. "Except for that beating," he would say with tears in his eyes, "I might have spent my whole life as a run-of-the-mill performer."

In his youth the late Osumi-dayu used to be called a plodder, since he often seemed slow to learn. His teacher was Toyozawa Dambei, known as "the Great Dambei." One sweltering night in midsummer while Osumi was taking a lesson at Dambei's house he stumbled over a few lines in the scene he was chanting. Again and again he repeated the passage, but as hard as he tried he could not satisfy Dambei, who prudently put up a mosquito net and retired within it to listen. While the mosquitoes fed on him, Osumi went on repeating it, hundreds and hundreds of times, till the early summer dawn began to light up the room, and even his teacher seemed to have tired and fallen asleep. Nevertheless, with the persistence of a true plodder, Osumi kept on chanting the passage as vigorously as ever, determined not to stop until it had been approved. Finally Dambei's voice came from the mosquito net: "You have it." He had listened intently all night long.

Anecdotes of this kind are not uncommon, nor are they confined to stories of puppet-theater chanters and manipulators. Similar incidents occurred in the teaching of the samisen and the koto. Moreover, these masters were usually blind men, many of whom had the stubbornness —and the streak of cruelty—so often found among persons with a physical handicap. Shunkin's master Shunsho was such a man.

Shunsho had long been known for the severity of his teaching methods. He often shouted curses at his pupils (many of whom were also blind) or even laid hands on them: whenever he scolded or lashed out at them they would back away a little—until sometimes a blind child, still clutching his samisen, would tumble over backward and fall clattering down the stairs. In later years, when Shunkin became a professional teacher, she was notorious for her strictness, which of course reflected Shunsho's influence. But she was already behaving that way as a child. What began as a little girl's game with Sasuke had gradually developed into the real thing.

One often hears of cruel teachers, but there can have been few women like Shunkin who went so far as to strike their male pupils. It has been suggested that she had sadistic tendencies, and that her teaching was only a pretext for enjoying a kind of perverse sexual pleasure. After all these years, we can hardly say whether that was true or not. Still, when children play house they always imitate grownups. Though Shunkin was her master's favorite and was never punished, she was aware of his usual method, and must have felt in her childish mind that that was how a master ought to behave. Inevitably she began to imitate him when she was playing with Sasuke. And the habit grew on her, until it became second nature.

Perhaps Sasuke cried easily, but they say that whenever Shunkin struck him he began to sob. And he sounded so wretched that everyone who heard him frowned, thinking: Shunkin is punishing him again! Her parents, who had only wanted to provide her with a new diversion, were extremely troubled by this state of affairs. Disturbing as it was to hear the samisen or the koto until far into the night, it was still worse when Shunkin gave him an angry scolding, as she often did, and when Sasuke's crying rang painfully in one's ears. Sometimes the maids felt so sorry for him—and so worried about the effect on Shunkin herself—that they would rush in to interrupt the lesson.

"What on earth are you doing?" they would say, trying to pacify Shunkin. "You're being terribly hard on the poor boy, and not at all ladylike!"

But Shunkin would draw herself up haughtily and retort: "Go away! You don't know anything about this. I'm not just playing a game. I'm really teaching him— it's all for his own good. Teaching is teaching, no matter how mad I get or how hard I treat him. Can't you understand that?"

This is how the Life of Shunkin puts it:

"Do you look down on me because of my youth?" Shunkin would ask. "And do you dare to violate the sanctity of art? Young or old, anyone who sets out to teach ought to behave like a teacher. Giving lessons to Sasuke has never been merely a game with me. I think it is too bad that in spite of his love of music he has no chance to study under an expert; that is why I am doing my best to substitute for a teacher. I want to do all I can to help him fulfill his ambition. You couldn't possibly understand. Leave the room at once!" This firm declaration was delivered with such startling eloquence and such an awesome air of dignity that the intruders, much chastened, would make a hasty retreat.

One can easily imagine how spirited Shunkin's manner must have been. Although Sasuke was often brought to tears by her, he felt immense gratitude whenever he heard her talk like that. His tears were in part tears of gratitude for being spurred on so vehemently by the girl who was at once his mistress and his teacher. That is why he never fled from her maltreatment: even while weeping, he kept on with his lesson until she told him he could stop.

Shunkin's moods varied dramatically from day to day. When she burst out with a noisy scolding she was in one of her relatively good moods; but sometimes she only frowned and gave the third string of her samisen a loud twang, or had Sasuke go on playing as she sat listening without a word of criticism. It was on her silent days that he cried most.

One evening, when he was working on a samisen interlude from the "Teapickers' Song," Sasuke was being unusually dull-witted. Time and again he repeated the same mistake. Losing patience with him, Shunkin put her own instrument down and began beating time by slapping her knee briskly with her right hand as she sang out the notes: Chiri-chiri-gan, chiri-gan . . . . Finally she gave up and sat there in stony silence.

Sasuke was helpless. Yet he had to go on somehow or other, doing his best to get through it. But as hard as he tried, Shunkin would not relent. Flushed and dizzy, he began making more mistakes than ever; his whole body was bathed in a cold sweat as he played on and on, quite at random. Shunkin remained silent, only tightening her lips a little more and deepening her frown. After some two hours of this Shunkin's mother came upstairs in her night kimono and stopped the lesson. "You mustn't be too eager," she told her daughter soothingly. "Going to extremes is bad for your health."

The next day Shunkin was summoned by her parents. "It's good of you to want to teach Sasuke how to play," they told her; "but shouting at pupils, or striking them, is only for an acknowledged master. After all, you're still taking lessons yourself. If you go on behaving like this it's bound to make you conceited—and conceited people don't become great artists. Furthermore, it's unladylike to hit a boy, or call him an idiot. Please don't do anything of that sort again! And from now on, set a time and stop at a decent hour. Sasuke's wailing gets on our nerves and none of us can sleep."

All this was put in such a gentle, kindly way by her parents, who had never been known to scold her, that even Shunkin seemed ready to listen to reason. But that was only on the surface. Actually, their words had no real effect on her.

"You're such a weakling!" she told Sasuke scornfully. "You're a boy, and yet you can't stand the least thing. It's all because of your crying that they blame me and think I'm being cruel to you. If you really want to become an artist you've got to grit your teeth and bear it, no matter how much it hurts. If you can't, I won't be your teacher."

After that, however badly she abused him, Sasuke never cried.

It seems to have worried Shunkin's parents that their daughter, whose blindness had already warped her character, had come to behave quite rudely now that she was teaching Sasuke. Having him as her companion was a mixed blessing. As grateful as they were to him for keeping her in a good humor, it distressed them to think that his habit of yielding to her every whim might gradually make her even more of a problem.

When Sasuke was seventeen his master arranged for him to take lessons from Shunsho himself, instead of from Shunkin; no doubt her parents felt that imitating her teacher had had an unhealthy influence on her. And the change decided Sasuke's future career. From then on he was freed from all his shop duties and went to Shunsho's house regularly both as Shunkin's guide and as a fellow pupil.

Nothing could have pleased Sasuke more; and it may be gathered that Yasuzaemon, on his part, worked very hard to persuade Sasuke's parents to consent to the arrangement, assuring them that, having caused their son to abandon his trade, he would guarantee the boy's future. I suppose Yasuzaemon and his wife were already beginning to think that Sasuke would make a good husband for Shunkin. In view of her handicap, they could scarcely hope to marry her to someone of equal social position. Sasuke might be the best possible match for her.

Two years later (when Shunkin was fifteen and Sasuke nineteen) her parents suggested that she consider such a marriage. To their surprise, she flatly refused. "I don't intend to marry as long as I live," she announced, looking much displeased; "and I wouldn't dream of having a man like Sasuke."

However, about another year later her mother noticed a curious change in Shunkin's figure. Surely not! she told herself; but the longer she watched, the more her suspicions seemed to be confirmed. The servants will begin to talk, she thought; we must act quickly if we are to save the situation. But when she asked her daughter about it one day as discreetly as possible, the girl told her she hadn't the faintest idea what she was talking about. Finding it awkward to pursue the matter further, Shunkin's mother let it go for a month or two. By then her daughter's condition was obvious.

Now, Shunkin frankly admitted to her parents that she was pregnant, but refused to name her lover. Pressed for an answer, she declared: "We promised each other to keep it a secret."

When they asked if the man was Sasuke she denied it indignantly. "Don't be absurd!" she said. "An apprentice like that?"

Naturally anyone would have suspected Sasuke, but Shunkin's parents, remembering what she had said last year, thought it most unlikely. Then too, a relationship of that kind could scarcely have been such a well-kept secret: an inexperienced boy and girl would have given themselves away. Furthermore, ever since Sasuke began studying under her teacher he had no reason to stay up late with her as he used to. Sometimes Shunkin would help him review his lessons; except for that, she was always the haughty young lady, treating him merely as her guide. None of the employees had the slightest suspicion of any misconduct between them—indeed, they felt that Shunkin was too distant, too cold toward him.

But surely Sasuke will know something about it, her parents thought. The man must have been one of the other pupils. Sasuke, however, denied any knowledge of the matter. "I can't imagine who it could be," he said. Still, he seemed so nervous and guilty-looking that they became increasingly suspicious. As they questioned him more closely he began to contradict himself. At last he said: "If I tell you, she'll be angry with me!" And he burst into tears.

"No, no!" they insisted. "It's kind of you to want to protect her, but why do you disobey our orders? If you keep it secret you'll only make things worse. Do tell us the man's name!" Despite their urging, he refused to answer. Finally they realized that the man in question was Sasuke. He talked as if he had promised Shunkin never to confess, and yet wanted them to know that he was guilty.

Troubled as they were, Shunkin's parents felt relieved. What's done is done, they thought; at least we can be glad that it's Sasuke. But in that case why had she tried to deceive them last year, when they were encouraging her to marry him? Young girls were certainly unpredictable! Now that things had gone this far it would be best for her to marry as soon as possible, before people began to talk. But when they brought the subject up with Shunkin once more, she again refused. "I don't want to hear another word about it," she said, coloring. "As I told you last year, I wouldn't have a man like Sasuke. I'm grateful to you for taking pity on me, but even if I am handicapped I won't stoop so low as to marry a servant. Besides, it would be an insult to the father of my child."

"Well then, who is the father?"

"Please don't ask me that," she replied. "Anyway, I don't intend to marry him."

By now Sasuke's words seemed more baffling than ever. What were they to believe? Still, they could hardly think that she had been involved with anyone else; she must have denied it out of sheer embarrassment. Feeling sure that she would confess before long, Shunkin's parents decided to give up any further attempt at questioning her and sent her off immediately to the hot-spring resort at Arima to have her baby.

That was in May of Shunkin's sixteenth year. Sasuke stayed behind in Osaka; and she left with two maids for Arima, where she remained until her safe delivery of a baby boy in October. Since the baby's face was the very image of Sasuke's, it seemed that at last the mystery had been solved. But still Shunkin refused to listen to any talk of marriage—and denied that Sasuke was the father. When the two were forced to confront each other before her parents, she drew herself up stiffly and demanded: "Sasuke, what have you said to create suspicion? It's causing me a lot of trouble, and I wish you'd make it perfectly clear that you're innocent."

At this warning, Sasuke shrank back in alarm, and exclaimed: "How could I be involved with my master's daughter? From the time I was a child I've owed everything to the Mozuya family—I wouldn't dream of behaving so ungratefully! It's really absurd!" Thus he joined Shunkin in wholehearted denial. The matter seemed as far from a solution as ever.

"But don't you have any feeling for your own baby?" her parents asked Shunkin. "After all, we can hardly rear a fatherless child. If you positively refuse to marry we have no choice but to give the child away."

Shunkin was unmoved by this appeal to her maternal instincts. "Please do give it to anyone you like," she replied calmly. "Since I shall never marry, it would only be a burden to me."

Soon the baby was sent out for adoption. (That was in 1845, and nothing is known of its later life; presumably Shunkin's parents made suitable arrangements for the child's welfare.) Thus Shunkin managed to have her own way and hush up the whole incident of her illegitimate child. Before long she was nonchalantly going to her lessons again, with Sasuke as her guide. By then, however, it seems that their relations were an open secret. Yet whenever a formal union was suggested they both denied that there was anything between them. Knowing their daughter's temperament, Shunkin's parents were obliged to ignore what was going on.

This ambiguous state of affairs—they were at once mistress and servant, fellow pupils, and lovers—continued for two or three years, until Shunkin was nineteen. Then her master Shunsho died, and she herself became a teacher. Leaving her parents, she set up a household in Yodoyabashi, and Sasuke went along with her.

Of course her ability had long been recognized by Shunsho, and before he died he had licensed her to teach. It was he who had given her the very name of Shunkin, which incorporated part of his own name; and he did all he could to further her career, often playing duets with her in public recitals and having her perform the leading parts. So perhaps it was only natural that she opened a studio of her own. Still, considering her age and circumstances, I find it odd that she made herself independent so soon. Probably her relations with Sasuke had something to do with it. Her parents may have decided that if this unsavory and by now quite open relationship was to continue, setting a bad example for the other employees, it would be best to have the two of them go and live elsewhere. Shunkin could scarcely object to that.

Yet she behaved as coldly toward Sasuke as ever. Even when they were living together at Yodoyabashi he was treated as her servant. Also, now that their teacher had died, he began to receive instruction from her again— and this time they maintained the roles of teacher and pupil in the presence of others. Shunkin intensely disliked any appearance of being Sasuke's wife. She was very strict in requiring him to observe proper decorum both as a pupil and as a servant; she made a point of prescribing the correct forms of speech for him, down to the most trivial niceties of usage. When he happened to violate one of these rules, she upbraided him relentlessly for his rudeness, and would not easily accept his apologies, however abject. As a result, Shunkin's new pupils were slow to realize that the two were lovers. And it seems that the servants would gossip among themselves, saying: "How do you suppose she acts when they're in bed together? I'd like to spy on them sometime!"

Why did Shunkin treat Sasuke in this fashion? To be sure, Osaka people have always been more concerned about questions of family background, property, and status, when it comes to marriage, than those of Tokyo: Osaka is famous for its proud old merchant families—and how much prouder they must have been in the feudal days before Meiji! A girl like Shunkin would doubtless have regarded Sasuke, whose family had served hers for generations, as someone immeasurably beneath her. Then too, with the typically embittered attitude of a blind person, she must have been determined not to show any weakness, or let anyone make a fool of her.

I suppose she felt that she would be insulting herself irreparably by taking Sasuke as her husband. Probably she was ashamed of sleeping with an inferior, and reacted by behaving coldly toward him. Then did she consider him nothing more than a physiological necessity? As far as she was aware of her own feelings, I dare say she did.

To quote again from the Life:

Shunkin was a woman of fastidious habits and immaculate dress. She changed into fresh undergarments daily, and insisted on having her rooms thoroughly cleaned morning and evening: before sitting down she would run her fingertips carefully over the cushions and the floor matting—she loathed even the least speck of dust. They say that a pupil of hers who suffered from indigestion once came for his lesson on a day when his breath was bad. Shunkin gave the third string of her samisen an ominous twang, laid the instrument down before her, and sat there frowning without a word. The embarrassed pupil timidly asked if anything was the matter. When he asked a second time, she replied: "I may be blind, but there is nothing wrong with my nose. Go wash out your mouth!"

Perhaps it was because of her lack of sight that Shunkin had a morbid love of cleanliness, but when a fastidious woman happens also to be blind the difficulties of those who take care of her are endless. The task of being her guide was not confined to leading her here and there by the hand; one had to see to all the little details of her daily life—eating and drinking, getting up and going to bed, taking baths, going to the lavatory, and the like. And because Sasuke had been responsible for these duties ever since her childhood, and understood all her idiosyncrasies, no one else could manage them to suit her. It was in this sense, rather than the physiological, that Sasuke was indispensable.

Moreover, at home in Dosho-machi Shunkin had been subject to the restraining influence of her parents and her brothers and sisters, but as the head of her own household her fastidiousness and waywardness went from bad to worse. Sasuke's duties became still more demanding.

For certain further details, which were naturally omitted from the Life, I am indebted to Shigizawa Teru. "Even in the lavatory my mistress never washed her own hands," she told me. "Shunkin was not in the habit of doing things like that for herself—they were all done by Sasuke. He even bathed her. They say great ladies think nothing of having themselves washed from head to toe by their servants, and don't feel a bit of shame about it; my teacher's attitude toward Sasuke was like that. Maybe it's because she was blind, but I expect she was so used to being cared for, after all those years, that she didn't give it a second thought. She was a very stylish woman too. Even if she hadn't seen herself in a mirror since she was a little girl, she didn't have the faintest doubt of her own beauty. She spent as much time choosing her clothes, or doing her hair and making up, as any woman."

I imagine that Shunkin's powerful memory retained for many years the picture of her own good looks when she was a child of eight. Besides, after constantly receiving compliments and hearing herself praised, she knew very well that she was beautiful. As a result, she devoted an extraordinary amount of time to cultivating her appearance.

Shunkin always kept a number of nightingales, and would mix their droppings with rice bran to use as a sort of pumice for the skin; she also set great store by the juice of the snake gourd as a cosmetic. Unless her face and body were satin-smooth, she felt quite uncomfortable—a rough skin was her chief aversion. People who play stringed instruments keep their left-hand fingernails short, since the strings are pressed with those fingers; but Shunkin had the nails of both her hands (and both feet as well) trimmed and filed regularly every three days. Of course they hardly seemed to have grown in that time, but she insisted that they must always look the same. Afterwards, she would carefully feel each of her fingernails and toenails, and would never permit the slightest variation from their proper size and shape. All such services as manicuring her nails were performed by Sasuke alone. During what time he had left, he received lessons from her, and even, occasionally, took her place in teaching one of the younger pupils.

Sexual relations are infinite in their variety. Sasuke, for example, knew Shunkin's body in the most exhaustive detail: he was bound up with her in an intimacy beyond the dreams of any ordinary husband and wife or pair of lovers. It is not surprising that in his later years when he himself was blind he still cared for her personal needs with no great difficulty. To the end of his long life (he died at eighty-two) Sasuke never married or formed a second liaison, or indeed had any experience with a woman other than Shunkin. Though scarcely qualified to make critical comparisons, he took to boasting about her in his old age, the years after her death, and he would never tire of telling his friends about her incredibly smooth skin, her soft, pliant legs and arms. It was the one topic on which he rambled as interminably as any garrulous old man. Sometimes he would hold out his hand and say: "Her dainty little foot was just big enough to nestle into my palm." Or again, stroking his cheek: "Even her heel was softer and smoother than this."

I have mentioned that Shunkin was small in stature. But she was not so slender as she appeared to be when dressed: in the nude, her body was unexpectedly voluptuous. And she was dazzlingly fair—her skin kept its youthful gloss and freshness throughout her life. Perhaps that was because of her epicurean tastes, so remarkable for a lady of those days. They say that she was fond of chicken and fish, particularly fillets of sea bream, and that she enjoyed saké too, never failing to have a few cups of it with her evening meal.

(There is something painful about watching a blind person eat, especially a beautiful young woman. Whether Shunkin was aware of this or not, she disliked eating in the presence of anyone but Sasuke. When invited out to dinner she seemed excessively refined, barely touching her food; but the truth was that she had luxurious tastes. Not that she ate heavily: only a scant two bowls of rice, together with a morsel from each of the various other dishes. But because she took so little there had to be a number of different courses. She seemed to be deliberately trying to make work for Sasuke. He became very skillful at boning sea bream or shelling crabs and lobsters, and could extract the bones neatly through the tail of a small fish without altering its shape.)

Shunkin had a mass of soft, silky hair. Her hands were slender and supple, with a strength that must have come from years of practice on the koto and samisen—one of her slaps left a real sting. Though subject to fits of feverish dizziness, she was also highly sensitive to cold: even in midsummer her feet were icy and she never perspired. All the year round she slept in a thickly quilted robe of satin or silk crepe, with her feet wrapped securely in its long, trailing skirt; and she lay so still that it was never disarranged. Fearing that die blood might rush to her head, she avoided using hot-water bottles and other warming devices: when her feet were too cold Sasuke would lie down and clasp them against his bosom, the chief effect of which was to chill him to the bone. When she took a bath she had the windows of the bathroom thrown wide open (even in winter) to disperse the steam. She got in and out of the tub repeatedly, staying only a few minutes, though the water was never more than lukewarm. Since a long soaking caused her heart to palpitate and the steam made her dizzy, she had to warm herself by spending as little time as possible in the water, and then have her body washed with the utmost haste. As one learns more and more about Shunkin, one begins to realize how much trouble she gave Sasuke.

Yet his material compensation was very small. As to wages, he received only an occasional allowance, so little that he often lacked tobacco money; and he had no new clothing except that provided by his mistress at the midsummer Bon Festival and the end of the year, in the traditional feudal manner. Although he sometimes gave lessons in place of Shunkin, he was not accorded any special status. Pupils and maidservants were ordered to address him as one of themselves, and whenever he accompanied Shunkin to a pupil's house he had to wait for her at the door.

One day Sasuke had such a bad toothache that his right cheek was greatly swollen. By nightfall the pain was almost unbearable, but he forced himself to hide his suffering. Now and then he would stealthily rinse his mouth, and he was careful to keep his breath away from Shunkin as he served her. At last she retired, and told him to massage her shoulders and back. After a while she said: "That's enough. Now you can warm my feet." Obediently he lay down, opened his kimono, and pressed the soles of her ice-cold feet against his chest. But his face, smothered in the bedclothes, was flaming hot—and his toothache worse than ever. Finally, in desperation, he put his swollen cheek against one of her feet.

Suddenly Shunkin gave the cheek a sharp kick, and Sasuke leaped up with a cry of pain. "You needn't bother any more!" she said witheringly. "I told you to warm my feet—not cool your face! Do you think you can trick me just because I'm blind? I knew you had a toothache all day. Even with the sole of my foot I can tell that your right cheek is puffed and feverish. If it hurts so much you ought to say so—I'm not a tyrant who mistreats servants. But you pretend to be so devoted, and then have the impudence to use me for your own comfort. I suppose you think that's clever. You ought to be ashamed of yourself!"

This was not unusual behavior for her. But what particularly annoyed Shunkin was for Sasuke to pay any attention whatever to the young girls among her pupils, to be kind to them, or help them with their lessons. The more she tried to conceal her jealousy, the more cruelly she treated him. It was at such times that he suffered worst of all.

When a woman is blind and never marries, there are limits to her extravagance. Even if she has expensive tastes in food and clothing, and indulges them, the sums involved are not likely to be very great. However, Shunkin's household included half a dozen servants, and the monthly expenses were substantial. As to why she spent so much money and kept such a large establishment, it was chiefly because she was a bird fancier, with a weakness for nightingales.

Today, a nightingale that sings beautifully will cost up to ten thousand yen; no doubt that was true even in Shunkin's time. Meanwhile, bird fanciers seem to have changed their tastes somewhat; but in current practice the most valuable nightingales are those which, apart from their natural call of hōhokekyō, can sing both the "valley-flying call" of kekkyo-kekkyo and the "high notes" of hōkiibekakon. Wild nightingales cannot produce these two melodies. At best, they may achieve an unpleasant hōkiibecha—to become capable of the lovely, lingering bell-like note of kon they require intensive training. Baby nightingales must be caught before their tail feathers are grown, and then trained by another nightingale, a "teaching bird." If their tails are already grown out, they will have learned the unmelodious calls of their parents, and nothing more can be done.

Teaching birds are trained from the beginning in this artificial way, and famous ones have names, such as Phoenix or Eternal Companion. So when it is learned that a certain gentleman has a marvelous nightingale, other nightingale fanciers come from far and wide, bringing their own birds to be "given a voice" by it. This training usually occurs early in the morning, and goes on day after day. Sometimes a teaching bird is taken out to a special place, and its pupils gather around it, like any singing class. Of course each nightingale has its own unique qualities, its own kind of song: there are infinite degrees of skill at turning a melody, or holding a long, trailing note, even when it comes to producing the same call. First-rate nightingales are hard to find, and, in view of the profit from training fees, command a high price.

Shunkin gave the finest of her nightingales the name Tenko, or Drum of Heaven, and loved to listen to it from morning till night. Tenko's voice was really superb. Its clear, ringing high notes made one think of some exquisite musical instrument: it was a voice of steady, sustained power, as well as of great charm and sweetness. And so, Tenko was handled with meticulous care, every precaution being taken as to its diet. Now, a nightingale's feed is prepared by parching soy beans and unpolished rice, grinding them together, and adding rice bran to make a "white meal," after which a "carp meal" is made, by grinding up dried carp or dace or other fresh-water fish; then the two are mixed (in equal parts) and thoroughly blended with the juice of grated radish leaves. And besides all this, which is trouble enough, the bird must be given a few insects every day—the insects living in the stem of the wild grape vine are the only ones that will do—in order to improve its song. Shunkin had about half a dozen birds that required this sort of care, and one or two of her servants were kept busy looking after them.

Since nightingales never sing while people are watching, they are housed in special cages of paulownia wood, closely fitted with sliding paper screens which admit only a faint glow of light. These screens have decorative panels of rosewood, ebony, or the like, elaborately carved, or worked in gold lacquer and inlaid with mother of pearl. Some of the cages have considerable artistic value—even now people often pay large sums of money for them. Tenko's cage was fitted with handsome panels, said to have come from China: the frames were rosewood and the lower part was set with jade plaques of landscapes and palaces in delicate relief. It was a very elegant piece.

Shunkin kept this cage in the window beside the alcove in her sitting room, where she could listen to Tenko whenever it sang. Since Tenko's lovely voice always put her in a good humor, the servants would do their best (even dashing water over it) to get the bird to sing. It sang best on sunny days, so that Shunkin's mood brightened with the weather. Tenko's voice was heard most frequently from late winter through spring; by summer its silences began to lengthen, and Shunkin became more and more gloomy.

Nightingales are often long-lived if properly cared for, but they require constant attention. Left to an inexperienced person they soon die. As pampered as it was, Tenko died at the age of seven, and Shunkin, like most owners who lose their birds, tried to find a worthy successor. After several years she managed to train another splendid nightingale, which she also called Tenko and prized as highly.

Tenko the Second, too, had a voice of such marvelous beauty that it might have sung in Paradise. Shunkin loved the bird dearly and kept its cage by her side night and day. She used to make her pupils be quiet when it sang, and then admonish them in this fashion: "Listen to Tenko, all of you! It was only an ordinary fledgling at first, but you can see what long training has done for it. No wild nightingale has a voice as beautiful as that. Some people may say that it is merely an artificial beauty; nothing is more lovely, they will tell you, than the song of the wild nightingale bursting suddenly out of the mist over a stream, as you wander through deep valleys looking for the flowers of spring. I cannot agree with them. It is only the time and place that make the call of the wild nightingale so moving; if you stop to listen, you realize that its voice is far from beautiful. But when you hear a bird as accomplished as Tenko, on the other hand, you are reminded of the tranquil charm of a secluded ravine—a rushing stream murmurs to you, clouds of cherry blossoms float up before your eyes. Blossoms and mist alike are within that song, and we forget that we are still in the dusty city. This is where art rivals nature. And here too is the secret of music."

Often she would make the slower pupils feel ashamed, asking derisively if even the little birds had not penetrated the mysteries of art. "You are really no match for them," she would say.

To be sure, there was a degree of truth in what Shunkin said. Still, Sasuke and the other pupils must have found it trying to be so often—and so unflatteringly—held up for comparison with a bird.

Next to her nightingales, Shunkin was fondest of her larks. It is the instinct of this bird to soar up to the heavens; even within its cage it always flies as high as it can. That is why lark's cages are built tall and narrow, as much as four or five feet high.

For the true appreciation of the lark's song, however, one must release it from its cage, let it fly up out of sight, and listen to it sing as it soars among the clouds. That is what is called its "cloud-piercing" virtuosity. Usually a lark will come back to its cage after remaining in the air for a certain fixed length of time, between ten minutes and half an hour; the longer it stays aloft, the better the lark. Hence, when contests are held, the cages are lined up in a row, their doors opened simultaneously, and the birds released. The last one to return to its cage is the winner. Inferior birds sometimes fly back to the wrong cage, and the worst of them alight as far as one or two hundred yards away. But larks seldom make mistakes of that kind: no doubt it is because they fly vertically up into the sky, hover in one place, and then descend vertically again, that they naturally return to their own cage. In spite of the term "cloud-piercing," larks do not actually fly into clouds—they only seem to because the clouds drift past them.

On a beautiful spring day those who lived near Shunkin's house in Yodoyabashi often saw the blind music teacher go out on her rooftop drying-platform and send one of her larks up into the sky. Sasuke would always be standing there beside her, along with a maid who took care of the cage. When Shunkin gave the order, her maid would open the cage door and the lark would rush out joyously, singing tsun-tsun as it climbed higher and higher, until it vanished into the spring haze. Shunkin would lift her head to follow the bird's path with her blind eyes, and then listen in ecstasy as the long, wailing melody came down through the clouds. Sometimes other bird lovers would join them, each with his favorite lark, and they would amuse themselves by having a contest.

On such occasions the people of the neighborhood would go up to their own rooftops and enjoy the singing of the larks. But some of them were not so much interested in the birds as in the good-looking music teacher. Although the young men who lived nearby must have seen her the year round, there were the inevitable libertines among them, who, as soon as they heard the larks, would hurry up to the roof, thinking: There she is! Perhaps it was her blindness that fascinated them, stimulating their lecherous curiosity. Or perhaps she seemed especially beautiful when she was flying her larks, since she was then so animated and smiling, instead of glum and silent as when Sasuke led her out to give a lesson.

Besides larks and nightingales, Shunkin often kept robins, white-eyes, buntings, and other birds, sometimes half a dozen each of a number of different species. All of this entailed a good deal of expense.

Shunkin was the sort of person whose bad temper is reserved for home. Away, she was surprisingly pleasant; when invited to dinner, for instance, her whole manner was so gracious and appealing that no one would have taken her for the woman who, in her own home, tormented Sasuke or scolded and slapped her pupils. When it came to her social obligations she tended to be ostentatious. Her gift-giving at the Bon Festival or at the New Year, or on any occasion whatever, displayed all the generosity that one might have expected from the daughter of a prosperous family. Even her tips to teahouse maids, palanquin bearers, and ricksha men were astonishingly liberal.

Yet it should not be supposed that Shunkin was a reckless spendthrift. Osaka people have frugal habits. Their apparent love of luxury is unlike the out-and-out extravagance of people in Tokyo: they maintain a tight control over their affairs, and economize whenever they can do it unobtrusively. And Shunkin too, as the daughter of an old merchant family of Dosho-machi, had her wits about her. Her fondness for luxury was combined with miserliness and greed. It was because of her naturally competitive spirit that she vied with others in extravagance; she never squandered her money unless it served that purpose. Rather than wasting money, or frittering it away on a moment's impulse, she planned her expenditures carefully. In that respect, she was cool and calculating. But sometimes her competitiveness turned into sheer rapacity. The fees which she charged her pupils, for example, were quite out of keeping with those of other women teachers; she demanded to be paid every bit as much as a master of the first rank.

Moreover, Shunkin let it be known to her pupils by persistent hinting that she expected the traditional midsummer and year-end presents to be as substantial as possible. Once she had a blind pupil whose family was so poor that he often fell behind in paying his monthly fees. At midsummer, because a suitable gift was entirely beyond his means, he brought a box of rice cakes as a token of gratitude. Appealing to Sasuke to intercede for him, he said: "Please ask my teacher to accept this insignificant present."

Sasuke felt sorry for him, and timidly apologized to Shunkin on the boy's behalf. But she paled with anger, and declared: "Perhaps you think I am being greedy when I insist on having the proper fees and gifts, but that is quite wrong. The money itself means nothing to me: it is only that unless standards of some kind are set, the correct relationship between teacher and pupil cannot be established. That boy even neglects to pay his monthly fees, and now he has the insolence to bring me a miserable box of rice cakes! I can hardly be blamed for thinking that he lacks respect for his teacher. It's too bad, but if he is as poor as all that, he really has no hope of accomplishing anything in music. Of course if he had exceptional talent I might even teach him without charge. But he would have to be a prodigy with a brilliant future in store for him. Very few are able to overcome poverty and win success in the arts—you can't do it by hard work alone. The only thing outstanding about that boy is his impudence, I can't believe he shows any special promise. How presumptuous of him to ask for sympathy! Instead of shaming himself and troubling others, he should quit the field. If he still wants to keep on studying there are plenty of good teachers in Osaka —let him go elsewhere. But this is the end as far as I'm concerned. I don't want to have any more to do with him." And Shunkin was as good as her word. Further apologies were of no avail.

However, when someone brought her a particularly expensive present, Shunkin relaxed her usual strictness. All that day she would smile at him, and flatter him, until the favored pupil began to feel distinctly uneasy. "Madam's compliments" became something to dread.

Shunkin took care to examine every one of her presents personally, even opening and inspecting the smallest box of cakes. Similarly, she would check the settlement of all the monthly accounts, sending for Sasuke and having him run the figures off on the abacus for her. She was clever at arithmetic, and once she heard a figure it stuck in her mind: two or three months later she would remember the precise amount of a rice dealer's or a saké dealer's bill. Her extravagances were purely selfish ones, and the money she spent satisfying her own tastes had to be made up by economies elsewhere— specifically, by victimizing the servants. In Shunkin's household, she alone lived royally; Sasuke and the others had to live like mice in order to cut expenses. Even their daily rice allotment would vary, often dwindling to the point where they left the table hungry. Behind her back, the servants would criticize their mistress. "She tells us her larks and nightingales are more devoted to her than we are. But is it any wonder? Think how much better she treats them!"

As long as her father was alive Shunkin received all the money she wanted; but after his death, when her elder brother succeeded him as head of the family, she was put on a limited allowance. Today, self-indulgent ladies of leisure are hardly rare, but in former times even aristocratic gentlemen were accustomed to refrain from luxury. Members of fine old families, however affluent, lived in modest fashion, disliking to be classed with the newly rich or thought ostentatious. Shunkin's parents were generous with her out of natural sympathy, since her blindness cut her off from so many pleasures; but once her brother became responsible there was family criticism of her conduct, and a sum was fixed as the maximum for her monthly allowance. Demands for greater amounts were simply turned down. No doubt this helps to account for Shunkin's miserliness.

Yet her allowance must have been large enough to live on without eking it out by teaching. She could afford to be arrogant toward her pupils. In fact, few came to study under her, and she led a lonely, secluded life, which is why she had so much time to devote to her birds. But Shunkin was not merely being conceited when she regarded herself as one of the leading musicians in Osaka, both on the samisen and on the koto. No one could fairly deny that. Even those who detested her arrogance were secretly envious of her skill, or stood in awe of it. One of my friends is an old musician who, in his youth, often heard her perform on the samisen. Although his own specialty was theatrical music, rather than the lyrical kind that Shunkin played, he told me there was no one alive who could rival her subtlety of tone. And he said that Dambei, who once heard her, lamented that she was not a man, saying: "What a master she would have been on the large samisen!" Did Dambei regret that Shunkin, with all her talent, lacked the strength to play the large theatrical samisen, the noblest of these instruments? Was he, rather, expressing admiration for the masculine vigor of her playing? According to my friend, her tone had the brilliant clarity of a man's. "But it wasn't just a beautiful tone," he said. "It was so expressive that sometimes she made you want to cry." She does seem to have been a remarkable performer.

If Shunkin had been a little more tactful and modest in professional circles she would probably have become a great success. But having been brought up in luxury, ignorant of the problems of earning a living, she behaved so selfishly that other musicians shunned her; her very talent only made more enemies. It was indeed a misfortune, though one largely brought on by herself, that she spent her whole life in obscurity.

And so Shunkin's pupils were those who were already won over by her artistry, who were obsessed with the idea that she was the only teacher for them, and who came prepared to submit to the most rigorous discipline —even to verbal or physical abuse—for the privilege of studying under her. At that, few put up with it for long. Usually they found that her methods were more than they could bear; the dilettantes among them would quit within a month.

I suppose that Shunkin's awareness of being a master artist had something to do with the malicious, if not sadistic, punishment she administered. That is to say, because she was known for her cruelty she must have felt that the more she mistreated her pupils, the more she proved her high standing as an artist. Gradually becoming more and more vain, she ended by losing all self-control.

Shigizawa Teru told me that Shunkin had only a small number of pupils. "Some of them came just because of her good looks," she said. "That's what drew most of the ones who didn't intend to make a career of it."

Beautiful, unmarried, and the daughter of a wealthy family—it is not surprising that she attracted men who were scarcely motivated by a love of music. They say that her severity was partly a means of driving off these pursuers. Ironically enough, her very cruelty seems to have had its attraction. I suspect that even among her serious pupils there were those who found the most intriguing part of their studies to be the strangely pleasurable sensation of being punished by the beautiful blind woman.

Now that I come to the second great calamity that befell Shunkin, I regret that, since the Life avoids giving a clear account of it, I cannot be sure why she was injured or who her attacker was. But it seems reasonable to think that she had made an enemy of one of her pupils, and that he retaliated by harming her.

One incident of possible relevance concerns a young man named Ritaro, the son of a well-to-do grain merchant of Tosabori. Ritaro had long prided himself on his musical ability, and had been taking lessons on the koto and the samisen from Shunkin for some time. Boastful of his father's fortune and accustomed to lord it over others wherever he went, he regarded his fellow pupils with contempt, treating them as if they were his father's shop clerks. Although Shunkin privately disliked him, he gave her such lavish presents that she did her best to be agreeable.

However, Ritaro began telling everyone that their stern teacher had a weakness for him; and he showed particular scorn for Sasuke, refusing to accept his instruction in Shunkin's place. He became so bold and presumptuous that Shunkin found it hard to put up with him. Early one spring, just as matters were coming to a head, he invited her to a blossom-viewing party in Tengajaya, where his father had built a rustic cottage, set among lovely old plum trees in a quiet garden.

The whole affair had been arranged by young Ritaro, who was surrounded by a swarm of geisha and other entertainers. As usual, Shunkin was accompanied by Sasuke. That day Ritaro and his friends were so hospitable that Sasuke felt quite embarrassed. He was not much of a drinker: lately he had become accustomed to having a little saké at supper with Shunkin, but he was forbidden to touch a drop of it elsewhere without her express permission. Since getting drunk would make him unfit for his duties as her guide, he was only pretending to sip from his cup.

But Ritaro saw through his trick, and called out to Shunkin in a thick, insinuating voice: "Madam, Sasuke won't drink unless you say it's all right. But this is a party—let him have die day off! If he can't hold it, there are two or three other fellows who wouldn't mind being your guide!"

"I suppose a little won't hurt," said Shunkin politely, forcing a smile. "Only please don't make him drink too much."

When they heard this, Ritaro and the others cried: "Come on! She says it's all right!" and began pressing cups of wine on him from all sides. Still, Sasuke kept himself under control, and managed to empty most of them into a nearby vase.

It seems that all the attending gay-quarter jesters and geisha were astonished at the voluptuous charm of the samisen teacher of whom they had heard so much. They saw with their own eyes that rumor had not exaggerated her beauty, and they were full of praise for her. Perhaps some flattered her in order to curry favor with Ritaro, but there is no doubt of her fascination. At thirty-six, as she then was, Shunkin looked a full ten years younger; her complexion was extraordinarily fair, and a glimpse of her neck and shoulders gave the onlooker a sudden shiver of pleasure. As she sat there modestly, her exquisite hands resting in her lap, her head tilted slightly forward, the loveliness of Shunkin's blind face captivated everyone.

That afternoon while they were all out strolling in the garden Sasuke led Shunkin among the plum blossoms, guiding her slowly from tree to tree and stopping before each of them. "Here is another!" he would say, as he held her hand out to stroke the trunk. Like all blind people, Shunkin depended on her sense of touch to make sure that something was really there; it was also her way of enjoying the beauty of flowers and trees. But when one of the jesters saw her eagerly caressing the rough bark of an old plum tree with her delicate hands, he cried out in a queer, shrill voice: "Ooh, I envy that tree!" Then another jester ran up in front of Shunkin, threw himself into a grotesque pose, arms and legs aslant, and announced: "I'm a plum tree too!" Everyone burst out laughing.

All this was meant as a compliment, there was no intention of making fun of her. However, not being used to the boisterous pranks of the gay quarter, Shunkin was offended. Since she always wanted to be treated as if she were normal a joke of this sort annoyed her intensely.

Finally it began to get dark and they went inside to carry on with the party. "You must be tired, Sasuke," Ritaro told him. "I'll look after Shunkin for you. Your supper is ready in the other room—go in and have another drink too!"

Thinking it best to fortify himself with a good meal, Sasuke did as he was told and retired to the next room to have his own supper before the others. Though he asked for rice immediately, an old geisha stayed close at his side and insisted on pouring saké for him, one cup after another. Thus he spent more time at his meal than he had expected, but even after finishing it he had to wait to be summoned. Meanwhile, something happened in the other room: perhaps Shunkin got up to go to the lavatory and asked for Sasuke, only to have Ritaro block her way and tell her that if that's what she wanted, he'd take her himself. And perhaps he was trying to lead her forcibly out into the corridor. In any case, Shunkin was heard to cry: "No! Please call Sasuke!" She had shaken herself free from Ritaro and was standing there cowering when Sasuke came hurrying to her. With one glance at her face, he understood the situation.

After that, Shunkin felt relieved to think that she would be spared any further trouble with Ritaro. But apparently he could not accept such a blow to his reputation for being irresistible to women. He had the impudence to come for a lesson the very next day, as nonchalantly as ever. This led to a sudden change of attitude on Shunkin's part. If that's what he wants, I'll drum it into him, she thought; let's see if he can stand real discipline. From then on she was merciless.

Day after day, the bewildered Ritaro found himself working till the sweat ran and he had to gasp for breath. Having supposed himself to be an expert, he had thrived on flattery; but when he was sharply reprimanded for every slip, it became evident that his playing was riddled with errors. Now that Shunkin heaped abuse on him he began to lose heart for his lessons—which, in the first place, had been a mere pretext for seeking to fulfill a quite different aspiration. When she drove him even harder he deliberately played in a dull, listless manner. At last Shunkin cried: "You idiot!" and struck out at him with her plectrum, wounding him between his eyebrows. Ritaro gave a howl of pain, daubed at the blood trickling down from his forehead, and, as he left the room, muttered angrily: "You'll pay for this!" He never appeared again.

According to one opinion, the person who injured Shunkin was the father of a girl who was in training to become a geisha, and who put up with Shunkin's severity in order to benefit from the thoroughness of her teaching. But one day Shunkin struck her on the head with a plectrum, and the girl ran home crying. Because the wound left a visible scar, her father took the matter very seriously indeed. Furious with anger, he went to Shunkin to demand satisfaction. "You can talk all you want about discipline, but you have no right to torture people!" he told her roughly. "This child's face is her fortune, and now you've scarred her! You won't get away with that. What are you going to do about it?"

His strong language immediately aroused Shunkin's stubbornness. "People come to me because I'm strict," she retorted. "If you don't like it, why did you send her here?"

But the girl's father refused to let it go at that. "It's bad enough for a teacher to hit a pupil, but when she can't see what she's doing it's positively criminal! A blind person ought to behave like one!"

Because the man seemed on the point of violence, Sasuke intervened and, after a good deal of talking, persuaded him to go home. Meanwhile, Shunkin sat there in silence, pale and trembling; she never uttered a word of apology. Some say that this man took revenge by disfiguring her.

However, the girl's scar was probably only a tiny one on the forehead or behind the ear. To ruin Shunkin's looks for life on that account would have been incredibly vengeful, even for an agitated doting father. And Shunkin was unable to see her own face, so that if the aim had been to punish her alone, spoiling her beauty would hardly have seemed the best way to accomplish it.

I wonder if the aim of the attacker might not also have been to cause grief to Sasuke, which would presumably make Shunkin suffer even more. If we follow this line of reasoning, perhaps our heaviest suspicion must fall on Ritaro after all. We have no way of telling how passionately he desired her, but young men are likely to be attracted to the ripe beauty of women older than themselves. No doubt the beautiful blind woman had a peculiar glamor for him, whetting an appetite jaded by long dissipation. Even if he had begun with a casual attempt to seduce her, the fact that he had not only been snubbed by her but slashed across his manly brow might well have made him seek a really vicious revenge.

Still, Shunkin had so many other enemies that it is hard to say who had the worst grudge against her, or why. We cannot safely conclude that Ritaro was the guilty one. Nor was it necessarily the usual affair of passion: perhaps money was at the root of it, since more than one pupil had been heartlessly rejected because of his poverty. Then there were said to be others who, though not so brazen about it as Ritaro, were jealous of Sasuke. The fact that Sasuke was a "guide" who occupied an equivocal position in Shunkin's household could not be concealed for long. All the pupils eventually found out what was going on, and those who had fallen in love with Shunkin secretly envied Sasuke's happiness—some of them even resented his devotion in serving her. If he had been her legal husband, or at least her accepted lover, they would have had no reason to object. But to all appearances he was merely her guide, her servant: he took care of her every need, even massaging and bathing her, like a faithful slave. To those who knew what went on in private between them, his humility must have seemed ridiculous. Some remarked sarcastically: "It might be a little taxing, but I wouldn't mind being that kind of a companion! There's nothing self-sacrificing about him." And so one of the other pupils may have hated Sasuke, and said to himself: "How do you suppose he'd take it if her pretty face turned hideous over night? I wonder if he'd still be the perfect servant, and go to all that trouble for her. That's something I'd like to see!" Quite possibly the real motive was a desire to strike at Sasuke.

Indeed, there are so many theories about the crime that it is hard to choose among them. Some think the attacker was not one of Shunkin's pupils at all, but one of her professional rivals. Although there is no particular evidence for such a view, it may yet be the most perceptive. Shunkin's customary arrogance and high regard for her own ability—a regard which the more discriminating members of the public tended to accept —may have wounded the self-esteem of other artists, even seemed to menace their position. Among blind musicians, some of the men held official rank as "Master," a title which was still granted by the Court in those days and which permitted them to enjoy special privileges as well as public acclaim far beyond that of ordinary performers. When the rumor began to circulate that these favored artists were less gifted than Shunkin, they must have felt deeply resentful, not least because of their own blindness. Perhaps they tried to think of some devious way to finish her career once and for all. Jealous artists have been known to poison their rivals with mercury; but since Shunkin was a singer as well as an instrumentalist, and extremely proud of her good looks, an enemy may have decided to disfigure her so that she would never dare perform in public again. If her enemy was another woman teacher, she must have hated the very sight of the vain, lovely Shunkin, and taken all the more pleasure in destroying her beauty.

When we consider how many people had reasons for hating Shunkin, we can see that sooner or later someone was sure to injure her. Without realizing it, she had sown the seeds of her own misfortune.

It happened around three o'clock one morning at the end of April, six weeks after the plum-viewing party at Tengajaya:

Startled awake by Shunkin's moaning, Sasuke ran in from the next room and hastily lighted a lamp. Apparently someone had forced open the shutters and entered her bedroom, but, hearing Sasuke, fled without taking anything. By the time Sasuke arrived it was already too late to catch a glimpse of him.

Meanwhile, the frightened thief had snatched up a nearby kettle and dashed it at Shunkin's head, splashing her lovely snow-white cheek with a few drops of scalding water. Regrettably, they left a scar. Of course it was only a tiny flaw; her face was actually as beautiful as ever. But from then on Shunkin was acutely embarrassed by that trifling scar, and always concealed it by wearing a silken hood. She would spend the whole day shut up in her room, never venturing out into company, so that even pupils and close relatives hardly saw her face. As a result, there were all sorts of rumors and speculation about it.

That is how the incident is described in the Life of Shunkin, which goes on to say:

After all, it was only an insignificant blemish, but because of her extreme concern for her appearance she disliked having it seen. Perhaps, with the morbid sensitivity of the blind, she thought of it as a cause for shame.

And then:

By some strange turn of fate, within a few weeks Sasuke began to suffer from cataracts, and soon lost his sight altogether. At a time when his eyes were beginning to fail and everything around seemed to be getting hazy, he groped his way to Shunkin, and declared exultantly: "Madam, I am going blind too! Now I shall never see your scar as long as I live—how lucky that my blindness comes just at this time! It must be the will of Heaven!"

For a long while afterward Shunkin seemed depressed.

Much as one may sympathize with Sasuke's wish to conceal the truth, there is no denying that this account has been deliberately falsified. I cannot believe that he merely happened to develop cataracts, or that Shunkin— however great her concern for her appearance or her morbid sensitivity—would hide her face and shrink from the sight of others because of a minor scar. The fact is that her beautiful face had suffered a tragic change.

According to Shigizawa Teru (as well as several other sources), the intruder went immediately to the kitchen, made a fire, and boiled a kettleful of water, which he then took into Shunkin's bedroom and with deliberate care poured full in her face. That was what he had come to do—he was no ordinary thief, nor did he act out of desperation. The wound was a severe one: Shunkin lost consciousness until the next morning, and it took more than two months for the skin to heal. That explains why there were so many rumors about a hideous change in her looks; perhaps there is even some truth to the report that her hair fell out, leaving one side of her head completely bald. Sasuke's own blindness may have kept him from seeing Shunkin in her disfigurement; but how could it be true that "even pupils and close relatives hardly saw her face"? Surely someone like Shigizawa Teru must have seen it. But even Teru, out of respect for Sasuke's feelings, never revealed the secret of Shunkin's looks. Once I asked her point-blank, but she only said: "Sasuke always thought of her as a very beautiful lady, so that's the way I thought of her too."

It was more than ten years after Shunkin's death when Sasuke finally told a few people closest to him a more detailed—and more trustworthy—story of how he lost his sight.

On the night that Shunkin was attacked he was sleeping in the little room next to her bedroom, as usual. Awakened by a noise, he noticed that the night light had gone out. Then he heard a groan coming from her pitch-dark room. Startled, he jumped up, relit the lamp, and hurried with it over to Shunkin's bed, which was behind a folding screen. The room itself seemed undisturbed, as he glanced around it in the weak lamplight reflected from the gold ground of the screen. The only thing out of place was a teakettle near her pillow. Shunkin was lying on her back, under the covers, but for some reason she was moaning. At first Sasuke thought she was having a nightmare, and tried to rouse her by asking what was wrong. Just as he was about to shake her, he cried out in sudden horror and clapped his hands over his eyes.

"Sasuke, Sasuke!" Shunkin gasped. "I'm hideous! Don't look at me!" Writhing in pain, she frantically tried to cover her face with her hands.

"Please don't worry," he said, moving the lamp away. "I won't look at you—my eyes are shut." When she heard this Shunkin seemed to relax and slip into unconsciousness.

But she kept on murmuring deliriously: "Don't let anyone see my face! . . . Don't tell anyone. . . ."

And Sasuke would try to comfort her. "You mustn't worry. As soon as the blistering heals you'll look the same as ever."

But after she regained consciousness, she became more and more vehement. "How can I be the same after such an awful burn?" she would exclaim. "Stop trying to console me—just don't look at my face!" She refused to let anyone but the doctor see her condition: when the dressing had to be changed, she allowed no one else— not even Sasuke—to stay in the room.

Thus, it seems that although Sasuke did have a glimpse of her red, scalded face when he rushed to her bedside that night, what he saw was so appalling that he instantly shut his eyes, leaving in his mind nothing more than a hazy memory of some weird hallucination there in the flickering lamplight. After that her whole face was bandaged, except for her mouth and nostrils. I suppose that Sasuke was as afraid of seeing her as Shunkin was of being seen. Whenever he approached her bed he closed his eyes or looked away, so determined was he to remain unaware of her changed appearance.

But one day, when Shunkin's convalescence was well along and the wound almost healed, she suddenly turned to him as he was sitting alone at her bedside. "Sasuke," she asked, in a voice charged with feeling, "did you see my face?"

"No, of course not!" he replied quickly. "I wouldn't disobey you by looking, when you told me not to."

But even the strong-willed Shunkin seemed to have lost all her spirit. "It won't be long till the bandages have to be taken off," she said. "The doctor won't come any more either. So I'll have to let you see this face of mine, even if you're the only one who does." She began to cry—something almost unheard-of for her—and dabbed at the tears through her bandages.

Sasuke was speechless with grief, and the two wept together. At last he spoke up in a firm voice, as if he had come to a decision. "Please don't worry," he told her. "It'll be all right—I'll make sure that I never see your face."

A few days later Shunkin was able to leave her bed: the time had come to remove the bandages. Early that morning Sasuke stealthily took a mirror and a sewing needle from the maids' room, went back to his bed, and there, sitting bolt upright and peering into the mirror, tried to thrust the needle into the pupil of his left eye. He had no real knowledge that pricking his eyes with a needle would make him blind, but he thought that this might be the easiest and least painful method. Difficult as it was to aim such a thrust into the pupil, the white of the eye was too tough to be readily pierced; and after a few attempts he succeeded in puncturing the soft pupil to a depth of about a quarter of an inch. Instantly the whole surface of the eyeball clouded, and he realized that he was losing his sight. There was neither bleeding nor fever; he scarcely felt any pain. No doubt he had ruptured the crystalline lens tissue, causing a traumatic cataract. Next, Sasuke used the same method on his right eye—within a few moments he had destroyed both eyes. To be sure, he could still see dim outlines for about a week afterward. Then he was totally blind.

Later that morning, when Shunkin was up, he groped his way to her room. Bowing humbly before her, he said: "I have gone blind. I shall never see your face again as long as I live."

All Shunkin replied was: "Really, Sasuke?" She sat there a long while, sunk in thought. Never before or since did Sasuke experience such happiness as during those moments of silence.

Centuries ago, it is said, the warrior Kagekiyo was so touched by the magnanimity of his arch-enemy Yoritomo that he gave up his desire for revenge, swore never to look on Yoritomo again, and gouged out his own eyes. Though its motive was different, Sasuke's deed was equally heroic. But was that what Shunkin wanted of him? Had her tearful appeal a few days before meant: "Now that I've suffered this calamity, I want you to be blind too"? That is hard to say; yet the words "Really, Sasuke?" had seemed to him to have a quaver of joy.

As they sat facing each other in silence, Sasuke began to feel the quickening of that sixth sense which only the blind possess, and he could tell that there was nothing but the deepest gratitude in Shunkin's heart. Always before, even while they were making love, they had been separated by the gulf between teacher and pupil. But now Sasuke felt that they were truly united, locked in a tight embrace. Youthful memories of the dark world of the closet where he used to practice came flooding into his mind, but the darkness in which he now found himself seemed completely different. Most blind people can sense the direction from which light is coming; they live in a faintly luminous world, not one of unrelieved blackness. Now Sasuke knew that he had found an inner vision in place of the vision he had lost. Ah, he thought, this is the world my teacher lives in— at last I have reached it! He could no longer clearly distinguish the objects around him, or the way Shunkin herself looked; all he could detect was the pale, blurred image of her bandage-swathed face. But he had no thought of the bandages. It was Shunkin's exquisite white face—as it had looked until only two months ago —that hovered before him in a circle of dim light, like the radiant halo of the Buddha.

"Did it hurt much, Sasuke?" she asked him.

"No," he said, turning his blinded eyes toward the pale, glowing disk that was Shunkin's face. "It was nothing, compared with what you have suffered. I couldn't forgive myself for being asleep when that evil person stole in. It's my duty to stay in the next room every night so that I can protect you—and yet I went unharmed, even though it was my fault that you suffered such pain. I felt I ought to be punished. Day and night I prayed to the spirits of my ancestors, begging for some affliction, since there was no other way for me to atone for my negligence. When I woke up this morning the gods had taken pity on me and I was going blind. Dear Madam! I shall never see how you have changed! All I can see now is the image of your beautiful face—that lovely image that has haunted me for the past thirty years. Please let me go on serving you as I always have. Since I'm not used to blindness I'm afraid I won't be able to get around very well, and I'll be unsteady when I wait on you; but still I want to be the one who cares for all your needs."

"I admire your courage," Shunkin replied. "You have made me very happy. I don't know who hated me enough to do this to me, but I must confess that I couldn't stand to have you, of all people, see me as I am now. I am grateful to you for realizing it."

"Ah," Sasuke cried, "blindness is a small price for the joy of hearing you say that! I don't know who could have been so cruel to us, and caused us so much grief; but if he meant to attack me by disfiguring you his wicked scheme has failed. Now that I'm blind, it's as if nothing happened to you. Actually, it's anything but a misfortune for me—I've never had such a stroke of good luck. My heart leaps when I think how I've triumphed over that coward!"

"Sasuke!"

And the blind lovers embraced, weeping.

Shigizawa Teru is the only person who has an intimate knowledge of their life together after they turned their misfortune into a blessing. This year she is seventy, and it was in 1874, when she was only eleven, that she went to live at Shunkin's house as a servant and pupil. Besides studying the samisen under Sasuke, Teru helped the blind couple in many ways, both as a guide and as a kind of link between them. No doubt they needed some third person to assist them in this way, since one was recently blind and the other, though blind since childhood, was a lady accustomed to luxury, who never lifted her hand to the slightest task. They had decided to hire a little girl, with whom they would feel at ease; and from the time she came to them, Teru's honesty and trustworthiness won their confidence completely. She remained in their service for many years. After Shunkin's death Sasuke had her stay on with him until 1890, the year in which he received official rank as a master.

When Teru first came to Shunkin's house in 1874 Shunkin was already forty-five, on the verge of old age. Nine years had passed since her disfigurement. Teru was told that, for certain reasons, her mistress never showed her face to others, and that she must never try to see it. Shunkin's entire head, except for a little of her nose, was covered by a bluish-gray crepe silk hood.

Sasuke was forty when he pierced his eyes with the needle. To become blind in middle age must have been difficult enough, and yet he was touchingly solicitous in caring for Shunkin—anticipating her wishes and sparing her every possible inconvenience. Shunkin disliked having anyone else serve her. "Ordinary people are quite unable to take care of me," she would say. "Sasuke does it best, since he's been with me for years." She still depended on him to dress, bathe, and massage her, and to escort her to the lavatory.

As a result, Teru's duties were mainly on behalf of Sasuke; she seldom had occasion to come into physical contact with her mistress. Only at mealtime were her services indispensable. For the rest, she would merely fetch and carry things for Shunkin, or be of indirect use by helping Sasuke. When Shunkin took a bath Teru went with her and Sasuke as far as the bathroom door, then left them alone until she heard Sasuke clap his hands to summon her, by which time Shunkin would already be out of the tub, and wearing her light bath-gown and hood. Meanwhile everything had been done by Sasuke. How would he have gone about it? He must have touched her as sensitively as Shunkin had caressed the trunks of the old plum trees—certainly it was no easy task for him. People wondered how he could put up with all the trouble she caused him, how the two could get along so well. But Sasuke and Shunkin seemed to enjoy the very difficulties, expressing their unspoken love in this way. I suppose we cannot imagine how much pleasure the two sightless lovers took in the world revealed to them by their sense of touch. Perhaps it is no wonder that Sasuke served Shunkin with such devotion, that she delighted in having him serve her, and that they never tired of each other's company.

In addition, Sasuke taught a great many pupils during the time he could be away from Shunkin, who spent the whole day shut up in her room. She gave him the professional name of Kindai, and turned over all instruction to him: his new name was added (in smaller characters) beside her own on the sign in front of the house. Sasuke's loyalty and gentleness had long since earned him the sympathy of the neighborhood, and more pupils came to him than had ever come to Shunkin. While Sasuke was teaching, Shunkin would stay in her inner room, listening to her nightingales. But whenever she needed his help, even if he was in the midst of a lesson, she would call out: "Sasuke!" and he would stop at once and hurry to her side. For that reason he was anxious to be near her, and insisted on doing all his teaching at home.

Here I should mention that around this time the fortunes of the Mozuya establishment in Dosho-machi were declining, and Shunkin's monthly allowance often failed to arrive. Except for this, would Sasuke have chosen to teach? Whenever he had a moment free he went to her, and even while busy teaching he must have felt impatient to be at her side. Perhaps Shunkin herself felt lost without him.

Now that Sasuke had taken over all the teaching and was in effect supporting the household, why did he not become Shunkin's legal husband? Was her pride still the obstacle? According to Teru, Sasuke told her that Shunkin had become quite dejected, and that it grieved him— he could not bear to think of her as pitiable, someone to feel sorry for. Apparently the blind Sasuke had given himself up to his imperishable ideal. To him, there was only the world of his old memories. If Shunkin had actually changed in character because of her misfortune she would no longer have been Shunkin. He wanted to think of her as the proud, haughty girl of the past; otherwise, the beautiful Shunkin of his imagination would have been destroyed. And so it seems that it was he who had the stronger reason for not wishing to marry.

Because Sasuke used the real Shunkin to call to mind the Shunkin of his memories, he was careful to observe the proper etiquette between servant and mistress. Indeed, he humbled himself more than ever, serving her with the utmost devotion so that she might soon forget her misery and regain her old self-confidence. Contented with the same bare pittance, with the same coarse food and clothing, he gave all he earned to Shunkin. In addition, among many other economies, he reduced the number of servants who helped him. Yet he saw to it that nothing was lacking for Shunkin's comfort, though he now had to work twice as hard as before his blindness.

Teru says that some of his pupils felt sorry for him because he looked so shabby, and hinted that he ought to be a little more concerned about his appearance. But Sasuke paid no attention. Also, he insisted that they go on calling him Sasuke, rather than "Master"; but this embarrassed them so much that they tried not to address him at all. Teru, however, with her numerous household duties, could not be so discreet. She always called Sasuke by his name, and called Shunkin "Mistress."

It was because of her special relation to them that Sasuke, after Shunkin's death, began to confide in Teru. Occasionally he reminisced about Shunkin with her. Later, when his talent was officially recognized and everyone called him "Master," he still wanted Teru to use his ordinary name. He would not allow her to be more formal with him.

Once he said to her: "I suppose people consider blindness a terrible misfortune, but I've never felt that way. On the contrary, it made this world into a paradise, where my mistress and I were alone together. When you lose your sight you become aware of all sorts of things you never noticed before. It was only after I went blind that I realized how beautiful she was. At last I could fully appreciate the softness of her body, the fine texture of her skin, her exquisite voice. . . . Why had I never before been so moved by her loveliness? But most of all I was amazed by the sudden revelation of her artistry on the samisen. I'd always said she was a genius, far above my own modest level, but the true measure of her superiority astonished me. How stupid of me not to have realized it earlier, I thought. Even if the gods had offered to give me back my sight, I believe I would have refused. It was because both of us were blind that we experienced a happiness ordinary people never know."

Of course one hesitates to take Sasuke too literally. But as far as Shunkin's music is concerned, might not her second calamity have been a turning point in her development? However blessed with talent, she could scarcely have attained the ultimate mastery of her art without tasting the bitterness of life. Shunkin had always been coddled. Though severe in her demands on others, she herself had never known hardship or humiliation. There had been no one to humble her. But then Heaven had subjected her to a cruel ordeal, endangering her life and smashing her stubborn pride.

I am inclined to think that the destruction of her beauty had its compensations for Shunkin in various ways. Both in love and in art she must have discovered undreamed-of ecstasies. Teru says that Shunkin used to play the samisen for hours on end, while Sasuke sat beside her, his head bowed, listening in rapture. Often the pupils marveled at the subtle tones that filtered to their ears from the inner room, whispering among themselves that this must be no ordinary instrument.

In those days Shunkin not only played the samisen but spent a great deal of time composing for it. Even at night she would quietly pick out new melodies with her fingertips. Teru remembers two of her songs: "A Nightingale in Spring" and "Snowflakes." The other day I had her play them for me. They were full of originality, and left no doubt of Shunkin's talent as a composer.

Shunkin fell ill early in June of 1886. A few days before, she and Sasuke had gone out to the garden and opened the cage of her prized lark, letting it soar up into the sky. While Teru watched, the blind couple stood hand in hand, their faces lifted toward the lark's song that came down to them from far above. Still singing vigorously, the lark soared higher and higher until it was lost in the clouds. It was out of sight for such a long time that Sasuke and Shunkin began to worry. They waited more than an hour, but the lark never returned.

From that day Shunkin was despondent. Soon she contracted beriberi, and by autumn her condition was serious. She died of a heart attack on the fourteenth of October.

Besides her lark, Shunkin had been keeping a nightingale which she called Tenko the Third. For years afterward, Sasuke wept when he heard Tenko sing. Often he burned incense before Shunkin's memorial tablet, and took up his koto or samisen to play "A Nightingale in Spring."

The song begins with the phrase: "A singing nightingale alights in the hills." Probably it is Shunkin's finest work, one she put herself into heart and soul. Though not long, it has some very complicated instrumental passages—Shunkin conceived the idea for it while she was listening to Tenko. The melodies of these passages suggest all the poetic associations of the bird's song, as it flies from valley to valley, from branch to branch, tempting one out to enjoy the varied charms of spring. There is the first faint warmth, when the snow deep in the hills—"the frozen tears of nightingales"—begins to melt, and then the rippling of swollen mountain streams, the soughing of pines in the east wind, mists over hill and field, the fragrance of the plum blossom, clouds of cherry trees in bloom. . . . Whenever Shunkin played it Tenko sang out joyously, straining its voice to rival the beauty of her samisen.

Perhaps the song made Tenko yearn for the sunlight and freedom of its native valley. But what memories did it evoke for Sasuke while he played it? For years he had known his ideal Shunkin through sound and touch— did he now fill the void in his life with music? As long as we remember them, we can see the dead in dreams; but for Sasuke, who saw his lover only in dreams even while she was still alive, it may have been hard to realize when the separation came.

Two boys and a girl were born to Sasuke and Shunkin, besides the child mentioned earlier. The girl died soon after her birth, and both of the boys were adopted in infancy by a farmer in Kawachi. Even after Shun-kin's death Sasuke seemed to feel no attachment to them, and made no effort to get them back; nor did his sons want to return to their blind father.

Thus Sasuke spent his later years without wife or children, and died, attended only by his pupils, on the fourteenth of October (the anniversary of Shunkin's death) in 1907, at the advanced age of eighty-two. I suppose that during the two decades in which he lived alone he created a Shunkin quite remote from the actual woman, yet more and more vivid in his mind.

It seems that when the priest Gazan of the Tenryu Temple heard the story of Sasuke's self-immolation, he praised him for the Zen spirit with which he changed his whole life in an instant, turning the ugly into the beautiful, and said that it was very nearly the act of a saint. I wonder how many of us would agree with him.