already stated that Nobunaga's sons, Nobutaka and
Nobukatsu, were bitter enemies and that Nobutaka had the support of
Takigawa Kazumasu as well as of Shibata Katsuiye. Thus, Hideyoshi was
virtually compelled to espouse the cause of Nobukatsu. In January,
1583, he took the field at the head of seventy-five thousand men, and
marched into Ise to attack Kazumasu, whom he besieged in his castle
at Kuwana. The castle fell, but Kazumasu managed to effect his
escape, and in the mean while Katsuiye entered Omi in command of a
great body of troops, said to number sixty-five thousand. At the last
moment, however, he had failed to secure the co-operation of Maeda
Toshiiye, an important ally, and his campaign therefore assumed a
defensive character. Hideyoshi himself, on reconnoitring the
position, concluded that he had neither numerical preponderance nor
strategical superiority sufficient to warrant immediate assumption of
the offensive along the whole front. He therefore distributed his
army on a line of thirteen redoubts, keeping a reserve of fifteen
thousand men under his own direct command, his object being to hold
the enemy's forces in check while he attacked Gifu, which place he
assaulted with such vigour that the garrison made urgent appeals to
Katsuiye for succour.

In this situation it was imperative that some attempt should be made
to break the line of redoubts, but it was equally imperative that
this attempt should not furnish to the enemy a point of
concentration. Accordingly, having ascertained that the weakest point
in the line was at Shizugatake, where only fifteen hundred men were
posted, Katsuiye instructed his principal general, Sakuma Morimasa,
to lead the reserve force of fifteen thousand men against that
position, but instructed him at the same time to be content with any
success, however partial, and not to be betrayed into pushing an
advantage, since by so doing he would certainly furnish a fatal
opportunity to the enemy. Morimasa neglected this caution. Having
successfully surprised the detachment at Shizugatake, and having
inflicted heavy carnage on the defenders of the redoubt, who lost
virtually all their officers, he not only sat down to besiege the
redoubt, whose decimated garrison held out bravely, but he also
allowed his movements to be hampered by a small body of only two
score men under Niwa Nagahide, who took up a position in the
immediate neighbourhood, and displaying their leader's flag, deceive