Tales Grotesque and Curious

Tobacco did not grow in Japan in the beginning. And the records do not agree as to when it was introduced. Some put it in the Keichō Period (1596–1615) and some in the Tembun Period (1532–55). But the plant seems to have been already widely under cultivation by about the tenth year of Keichō. And in the Bunroku Period (1592–96), smoking was so widespread as to give rise to the pasquinade,

Things without effect On men are the smoking law, The counterfeit law, The imperial voice secluded And Gentaku the physician.

To the question, “By whom was tobacco introduced?” any historian would answer that it was by the Portuguese or the Spaniards. But these are not necessarily the only answers. There is, besides, one more in the form of a tradition. According to it, tobacco was brought here from somewhere by the Devil. And the Devil was brought all the way over to Japan by a Catholic Padre, perhaps St. Francis.

When I say this, Catholic believers may find fault with me for slandering their Padres. But for myself, I cannot but believe it probable. For it is most natural that when the god of the “Southern barbarians” came to us from across the sea, their devil should come with him,—⁠that is, when the good of the West was brought in, the evil should be brought in too.

Then one day (St. Francis had gone off on a preaching tour for several days and was absent) a cattle dealer passed by the field leading a yellow cow. There across the fence in the field full of purple flowers stood a southern barbarian Brother in his black priest’s robe and broad-brimmed hat busily picking worms off the leaves. The flowers were so curious that the cattle dealer involuntarily stopped, took off his mushroom hat and called to the Brother politely,

“I say, holy one, what are those flowers?”

The Brother looked round. He had a flat nose and small eyes and was an altogether good-natured looking “red-head.”

“These?”

“Yes.”

The “red-head,” leaning on the fence, shook his head. Then he said in awkward Japanese,

“I’m sorry, but I can’t tell that one thing to anybody.”

“Oh, then did Francis Sama say that you shouldn’t tell?”

“No, not that.”

“Then won’t you just tell me once, for I’ve recently been instructed by Francis Sama and become a believer in your religion, as you see.”

The cattle dealer pointed proudly to his breast. The Devil looked, and sure enough, there was a little brass cross hanging from his neck and shining in the sun. Then, perhaps dazzled by it, the Brother screwed up his face a little and dropped his eyes to the ground, but quickly in a more familiar tone than before and so that you could not tell whether he was joking or not, he said,

There was nobody at Ike-no-O who did not know about the nose of Zenchi Naigu. It was five or six inches long and hung down from above his upper lip to below his chin. As for its shape, it was equally thick at base and tip. A long and slender sausage, so to speak, dangled from the middle of his face.

The Naigu, who was over fifty, had always grieved in secret at this nose of his from the far-off days when he was an acolyte to the present, when he had reached the position of an attendant at the palace chapel. Of course outwardly he even now wore an expression that proclaimed his lack of any particular concern about it. This was not merely because he thought it wrong for a priest who ought to devote his whole heart to the adoration of the anticipated Western Paradise to trouble himself about his nose. Rather it was because he hated to have people know that he was fretting to himself about it. In ordinary daily conversations, he feared above all else the appearance of the word “nose.”

It was evening. A solitary lackey sat under Rashōmon waiting for the rain to clear.

Beneath the broad gate, there was not another soul. Only, on a big round pillar, from which the vermilion lacquer had peeled off here and there, sat one lone cricket. Since Rashōmon was in the great thoroughfare Sujaku Ōji, it would seem that there should also have been two or three tradeswomen in wide straw hats and men in citizen’s caps sheltering there from the rain. All the same, besides this single man, there was no one.

This was because for the past two or three years in Kyōto one calamity after another—⁠earthquakes, cyclones, fires and famines—⁠had followed each other in rapid succession. Wherefore, throughout the capital the desolation was extraordinary. According to the old records, things had come to such a pass that Buddhist images and temple furniture were broken up and, with their red lacquer and gold and silver foil clinging to them, were heaped along the streets and sold for fire wood. With the whole town in such a state, of course no one took the least thought for the upkeep of Rashōmon. So turning its abandonment to their profit, foxes and badgers found habitation there. Thieves abode there. And finally it even became a custom with men to bring unclaimed bodies there and leave them in the gate. Whence, when day had closed his eye, the place was abhorred of all, and no man would set foot in the neighborhood.

One day the Buddha was sauntering alone on the brink of the lotus pond of Paradise.

The lotus flowers in bloom in the pond were all as white as pearls, and the golden pistils and stamens in their centers ceaselessly filled all the air with ineffable fragrance.

It was morning in Paradise.

Presently the Buddha stood still on the brink of the pond, and through an opening among the leaves which covered the face of the water, suddenly beheld the scene below.

As the floor of Hell lay directly beneath the lotus pond of Paradise, the Sanzu-no-Kawa and Hari-no-Yama were distinctly visible through the crystal water, as through a sterioptiscope.

Then his eye fell on a man named Kandata, who was squirming with the other sinners in the bottom of Hell.

This Kandata was a great robber who had done many evil things, murdering and setting fire to houses, but he had to his credit one good action. Once while on his way through a deep forest, he had noticed a little spider creeping along beside the road.

So quickly lifting his foot, he was about to trample it to death, when he suddenly thought, “No, no, as small as this thing is, it, too, has a soul: it would be rather a shame to recklessly kill it,” and spared the spider’s life.