Page:Eminent Authors of Contemporary Japan.pdf/140

124 Tzuchun was about to make answer, when he remembered the caution of Tiehkuantzu: “Never speak one word!”

He therefore hung his head, and remained dumb. Yama became very angry, and rising on his feet, and raising his sceptre, he again roared like thunder:

“Do you know where you are? Answer this instant, or you shall feel the torture of the Inferno!”

But Tu Tzuchun never moved a muscle. Yama seeing this, turned to the devils and harshly gave them some order. The devils prostrated themselves, and then, rising again, they seized him, and flew with him up into the sky.

Now, everyone knows that, besides the Mountains of Swords and the Pond of Blood, there is also the Valley of Flames and the Sea of Ice, which lie side by side under the dark sky of Jigoku. In turn the devils hurled Tu Tzuchun into each of these, so that his heart was pierced by the cruel swords, his face scourged by the flames, his tongue was wrenched from his throat, his body was skinned and beaten with an iron-pounder, and he was then hurled into a pan of boiling oil. His brain was sucked by venomous serpents, and his eyes were picked out savagely by crested eagles, … but, if we are to describe all the horrible things which befell him, we should never come to the end of our story. But he went through every kind of infernal torture that is too terrible to relate.

Tu Tzuchun, nevertheless, was patient, and with teeth set he bore all these horrible tortures without