Page:Eminent Authors of Contemporary Japan.pdf/114

98 The din of fighting men and horses, and the clash of swords were now hushed. The autumn sunshine in Liaotung was serene and peaceful. It was like an autumn afternoon in Japan.

Poor Khashoji was groaning with the pain of his wound, which was emphasised by the rocking movement of his horse. But there was a deeper meaning in the moans which broke through his grinding teeth. He was not only struggling against bodily pain, but he was being tormented with an agony that was spiritual—he was crying out against the sudden terror of death which he felt was upon him. To say farewell to life filled him with an unspeakable sorrow. A deep resentment against all men and their worldly affairs for causing him to be mortally wounded surged in his heated brain. He was angered at having to leave the world. Thoughts of this kind flashed one by one through his brain, inflicting endless sorrow upon him, and as these feelings came and went, he cried out in a heart-rending groan, “I’m dying! I’m dying!”

He cursed the Japanese cavalry, and then in gentler tones he muttered the loved names of his parents. But already he was so exhausted that as soon as these cries rose to his lips, they changed into senseless, hoarse moans.

“Oh, how unhappy I am! What a misery it is to have been brought here in the very prime of my life, to fight and be killed like a dog! What a hateful beast is that Japanese who tried to kill me! What fools those officers were to have sent me on that