Still more lavish was a party organized four years later to visit the
cherry blossoms at Daigo in the suburbs of Kyoto. This involved the
rebuilding of a large Buddhist temple (Sambo-in) to accommodate
Hideyoshi and his party as a temporary resting-place, and involved
also the complete enclosing of the roads from Momo-yama to Daigo, as
well as of a wide space surrounding the slopes of the cherry-clad
hills, with fences festooned in silk curtains. Numerous tea pavilions
were erected, and Hideyoshi, having sent home all his male guests and
attendants, remained himself among a multitude of gorgeously
apparelled ladies, and passed from pavilion to pavilion, listening to
music, witnessing dancing, and viewing works of art.

HIDEYOSHI'S FAMILY

A conspicuous figure at the Daigo fete was Hideyori, the
five-year-old son of Hideyoshi. Fate treated Hideyoshi harshly in the
matter of a successor. His younger brother, Hidenaga, perished on the
threshold of a career that promised to be illustrious; his infant
son, Tsurumatsu, passed away in September, 1591, and Hideyoshi, being
then in his fifty-fourth year, saw little prospect of becoming again
a father. He therefore adopted his nephew, Hidetsugu, ceding to him
the office of regent (kwampaku), and thus himself taking the title of
Taiko, which by usage attached to an ex-regent.* Hidetsugu, then in
his twenty-fourth year, had literary gifts and polite accomplishments
much above the average. But traditions--of somewhat doubtful
veracity, it must be admitted--attributed to him an inhuman love of
taking life, and tell of the indulgence of that mood in shocking
ways. On the other hand, if credence be due to these tales, it seems
strange that they were not included in the accusations preferred
finally against Hidetsugu by the Taiko, when the former's overthrow
became advisable in the latter's eyes. For it did so become. Within
less than two years of Hidetsugu's elevation to the post of regent,
another son was born to Hideyoshi by the same lady, Yodo, the demise
of whose child, Tsurumatsu, had caused Hideyoshi to despair of being
succeeded by an heir of his own lineage. A niece of Oda Nobunaga,
this lady was the eldest of three daughters whose mother shared the
suicide of her husband, the great general, Shibata Katsuiye.
Hideyoshi placed her among his consorts, bestowing upon her the
castle of Yodo, hence her name, Yodogimi. Her rare beauty captivated
the veteran statesman and soldier,