Ridgeback Press, 2001, $29.95, ISBN 0-9667401-8-1, 236 pages

Settings
A jail cell in Kochi Castletown, July 1864
Courthouse garden near the jail, May 1865

Players
Takechi Zuizan (L): A Tosa samurai, master swordsman, and the revolutionary leader of the Tosa Loyalists
Yamanouchi Yodo (L): Lord of Tosa

"A Truly Despicable World"

That Takechi Zuizan was the founder of an outlawed revolutionary party, a meticulous planner of cold-blooded murder, a master manipulator of admirers and enemies alike, a weaver of terror in the hearts of men who was excessively concerned with his own worth are historical facts. From these facts arises a question: Was Master Zuizan a megalomaniac? 4fter close scrutiny, let us venture the opinion that he was not. Rather, we should say that he suffered from delusions of grandeur and that these delusions were the genesis of his overwhelming will to power, wherein lay his greatness and the seed of his ultimate destruction.

Lord Yodo had recently been released from nearly three years of forced confinement at his villa in Edo. The strong willed daimyo would now crush the renegade Tosa Loyalist Party, which during the term of his confinement had transformed into a monster, threatening his rule over Tosa. Lord Yodo knew that to crush the Loyalists, he must destroy their leader. As long as Takechi Zuizan was alive, the danger of rebellion throughout the seven districts of Tosa remained very real. To regain complete control of his domain, he must sever the head of the rebellious monster.

But Lord Yodo had another, even darker reason to eliminate Master Zuizan. Since returning from Kyoto to Kochi Castletown in the spring of 1863, Zuizan had very brazenly attempted to convince the daimyo to abandon his duty to the Tokugawa and unite Tosa behind Imperial Loyalism. Upon one occasion, he had even dared utter to Yodo, "My Lord, to dwell so fervently on the favor your august ancestors received from the Tokugawa two and a half centuries ago, particularly now when the very future of Japan is at stake, could be likened to the idle fancy of a fool." It was this outrage that Lord Yodo would never forgive.

But Master Zuizan's lust for power had grown so intense, his ego so enormous, that he refused to believe Lord Yodo would not see things his way, insisting to himself and his followers that the Tosa daimyo secretly embraced Imperial Loyalism.

Master Zuizan was tragically mistaken. He was arrested in Kochi in September 1863. On the morning of his arrest, he had risen at dawn, as was his custom. He washed his face in a basin of cool well water, donned his riding clothes - black pleated trousers, a black jacket and a short-rimmed military helmet then told his wife that he was going for a ride. When he returned to his home an hour later, he found one of his men waiting in the front garden.

The police were after him, the man informed hastily. He entreated the Loyalist leader to flee Tosa immediately in order to avoid arrest. Master Zuizan would hear nothing of it. Even now he refused to believe that the Lord of Tosa would not abide by his will. He was convinced that Lord Yodo's support for a Union of Court and Camp was mere ostentation, designed to appease the authorities in Edo. While it was true that Zuizan had ordered the assassination of the lord's regent, the murder was unavoidable if he was to unite Tosa under Imperial Loyalism. And certainly, Master Zuizan believed, Lord Yodo would eventually embrace his noble cause.

The afternoon of July 14, 1864 was exceptionally hot in the southern climes of Kochi Castletown. Zuizan sat alone in his jail cell, staring at his own reflection in the dim, still water of a small basin. The body was emaciated, the cheeks hollow, the bearded face haggard and the long black hair tattered after nearly a year of languishing in jail. But from the eyes, set in deep dark sockets of disgust at the world and the petty ways of men, radiated a spiritual strength unknown to the likes of all but a select few. Zuizan picked up a brush which his wife had sent him, along with ink, paper and other implements of his art. He began painting his own image, not as it appeared in the dim basin, but as he painfully perceived it in the clarity of his mind's eye. Zuizan completed his self-portrait and sent it to his wife, along with the words "if I should die, keep this in the house" as a remembrance, because he now felt certain that death was near.

Although the bitter cold of the previous winter had made him ill, summer was the most unbearable time of year to be locked up. The wooden floor of his cell afforded barely enough space for him to lie down; and although his wife sent his favorite foods to him daily, often he was unable to eat for the sickening stench of the latrine intensified by the stifling heat. Not even in sleep could he find relief, for the jail was infested with rats, mosquitoes, lice and ticks.

The interrogation had started in the previous May. Lord Yodo had ordered the chief interrogators, both former devoted followers of Yoshida Toyo, to uncover evidence linking Zuizan to the regent's assassination. After a year of interrogation, Zuizan wrote in a letter to his wife, "They don't listen to a thing I say, but rather continue to insist that I'm guilty." Summing up his feelings, he lamented, "Ah, what a truly despicable world this is."

The interrogation and investigation lasted for over a year and a half, but Yodo's men were still unable to find conclusive evidence of Zuizan's guilt. Lord Yodo was at his wit's end, and on the morning of intercalary May fifteenth, having concluded that "impudence toward the daimyo" was sufficient reason for his indomitable vassal to die, issued an order for Zuizan to commit seppuku. When Zuizan was informed soon after that he must die that very evening, he was overcome, however briefly, with tears of joy. Since his arrest, his greatest fear had been that he might be put to the ignominy of the executioner's sword. Of this he would now be spared, and permitted to die as honorably as he had lived. And though his body was sick and depleted of its once formidable strength, he was determined to die as a samurai. He would achieve beauty in death, the culmination of a life given to practice in the way of the sword and the noble code of the warrior.

In preparation for his seppuku, Zuizan bathed, because, as he told his guards, "it would be unsightly to have dirt on the dead body." Next he shaved his face and pate, oiled and combed his hair, and tied his topknot. He dressed himself in special attire sent him by his wife: a thin kimono of pale blue hempen cloth adorned with the Takechi family crest, and a stiff ceremonial robe bound by a silken sash. Thus prepared, he returned to his dark, dank cell to wait to be called upon to die.

At dusk he was brought to the nearby courthouse garden, where he had been interrogated in the past. The scene this evening, however, was different from that which he had known. The ground was specially covered with sand to absorb Zuizan's blood. Several men in formal dress were seated in a semicircle, facing an area on the north side of the garden furnished with two tatami mats. Two candles burning in two tall stands cast a dim pallor over the grim scene, and Zuizan recognized among the witnesses the two chief interrogators. Suppressing a sudden desire to throw himself upon them, he calmly seated himself upon the tatami.

Set directly in front of him was an untreated, pale wooden stand, on top of which had been placed a piece of clean white cotton cloth and a dagger in a plain wooden sheath. Earlier in the day he had chosen his two seconds, both former kenjutsu students and adept swordsmen, who now sat at either side of him. One of them was the younger brother of his wife, the other Zuizan's nephew. One of the chief interrogators now read in a loud clear voice the death sentence, after which Master Zuizan bowed deeply. "Thank you for your troubles," he said to his seconds, taking the dagger in his hand and drawing the blade.

Master Zuizan would now perform his seppuku with meticulous precision. He believed that there were only three proper ways to cut - one straight horizontal line, two intersecting lines, or three horizontal lines. He chose the latter, which was the least common, because it was the most difficult to perform properly. But so weak was his physical condition after one and a half years in jail, that it had been a struggle for him to even walk to the courthouse garden. Over these past several days he had continuously suffered from chronic diarrhea, abdominal pain, fever, and a palsy that numbed his entire body. He worried that he would not have the physical strength to slice through the resilient abdominal tissue three separate times. He feared that if he should fail to perform his seppuku beautifully his name would be slandered in death, and his enemies would laugh and call him a coward who was unable to die like a samurai. He had therefore informed one of his guards of the cutting method he had chosen, making him swear to publicize his noble intent in the case that his physical strength should fail him.

"Don't cut me until I give the cornmand," he told his seconds. He stared hard at the blade, then gently replaced the dagger on the stand. He cast a steely gaze at the several witnesses, who, in spite of their exalted positions, were daunted by the superior strength radiating from the eyes of the man with the emaciated body. Master Zuizan now removed both arms from his kimono, baring his pale shoulders, then loosened the sash around his waist, exposing his lower abdomen. He tightened his mind as he summoned all of his mental power into his hands, again took up the bare dagger, wrapped the hilt with the piece of white cloth, and plunged the blade into the left side of his abdomen. Blood gushed from the wound, but without uttering a sound he sliced across to the right side, pulled out the blade for an instant, and plunged it in again, repeating the process in the opposite direction. With the third slice, he released a guttural wail, his only means to summon a final burst of strength. But his seppuku was not complete until he deliberately placed the bloody dagger at his right side, and fell forward with both hands extended directly in front of him. The next instant the seconds drew their long swords, piercing the heart of their beloved sword master. Takechi Zuizan was dead at age thirty-six; and so nobly did he perform his seppuku, displaying his inner purity, that his enemies were left speechless.

Book Review: Samurai Sketches

Published by Ridgeback Press. © Romulus Hillsborough and Ridgeback Press. All rights reserved. Reproduced on MagWeb.com with permission of the publisher.

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