believe for an instant, as the Japanese do, that it was from them alone that he gained his splendid courage. The soldier who carries a flower into a fight carries already in his heart that which cannot be defeated—faith in his cause, and high resolve; better than a thousand scapularies and charms—the noble faith that, centuries later, defeated Holy Russia.
Another man, a sage, Sugawara-no-Michizana, whose memory is haloed in Plum blossoms, does not thrill me as Kajiwara does, but his name inspires the Japanese schoolboy even more, I fancy; for the twenty-fifth of every month is a holiday in his honour, and on that date in June a great festival is celebrated each year. I cannot quite see his greatness, except through martyrdom, which is an unhappy fruit of virtue that does not appeal to me. This man had been a Minister to the Emperor, and, losing the fickle favour of princes, he was banished, and died. Every one felt sorry, and he was canonized as a saint, and given the name of Tenjin, or ‘Heavenly God.’ A play has been written about him,[1] and every year verses composed in his honour and praise hang, like Orlando’s to Rosalind, from the twigs of Plum trees all over the country.
Another story of the Plum is of the daughter of the poet Kino Tsurayuki, whose best-loved tree was the one chosen to replace that of the
- ↑ Sugawara Tenjin Ki.
