ic
ability. Tradition has handed down some incidents which illustrate
the ethics of that time as well as the character of the man. It is
stated that Masamune came into possession of a scroll on which were
inscribed a hundred selected poems copied by the celebrated Fujiwara
Ietaka. Of this anthology Masamune was much enamoured, for the sake
alike of its contents and of its calligraphy. But learning
accidentally that the scroll had been pawned to the merchant from
whom he had obtained it, he instituted inquiries as to its owner, and
ultimately restored the scroll to him with the addition of five gold
ryo. The owner was a knight-errant (ronin) named Imagawa Motome, who
thereafter entered Masamune's service and ultimately rose to be a
general of infantry (ashigaru). The sympathy which taught Masamune to
estimate the pain with which the owner of the scroll must have parted
with it was a fine trait of character. Another incident in this
remarkable man's career happened at an entertainment where he
accidentally trod on the robe of one Kanematsu, a vassal of the
Tokugawa. Enraged by an act of carelessness which amounted almost to
a deliberate insult, Kanematsu struck Masamune, A commotion at once
arose, the probable outcome being that Masamune would return the blow
with his sword. But he remained pertly cool, making no remark except
that he had been paid for his want of care, and that, at any rate,
Kanematsu was not an adversary worthy of his resentment.

THE FIVE CENTRES

Among the welter of warring regions glanced at above, five sections
detach themselves as centres of disturbance. The first is the Court
in Kyoto and the Muromachi Bakufu, where the Hosokawa, the Miyoshi,
and the Matsunaga deluged the streets with blood and reduced the city
to ashes. The second is the Hojo of Odawara, who compassed the
destruction of the kubo at Koga and of the two original Uesugi
families. The third is Takeda of Kai, who struggled on one side with
the Uesugi of Echigo and on the other with the Imagawa of Suruga. The
fourth is Oda Nobunaga, who escorted the shogun to the capital. And
the fifth is the great Mori family, who, after crushing the Ouchi and
the Amako, finally came into collision with the armies of Oda under
the leadership of Hideyoshi.

ENGRAVING: "EMA" (Pictures Painted on Wood, Especially of Horses,
Hung up in the Temple as Motive Offerings)

ENGRAVING: ODA NOBUNAGA

CHAPTER XXXIV

NOBUNAGA, HIDEYOSHI, AND IEYASU