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Japanese · Botchan

十

Chapter 10

228 sentences · 15 notes

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  1. 1

    School was closed for the victory celebration.

    祝勝victory celebration祝勝 · nouncompound with 会
    会event会 · nounoblique complement of 休み
    でbecause ofで · particleparticle marking 会
    学校school学校 · nounsubject of 休み
    はtopic markerは · particletopic particle marking 学校
    お(honorific)お · nounhonorific prefix on 休み
    休みclosed休み · nounpredicate of the sentence
    だisだ · auxiliary verbcopula, predicate marker for 休み

  2. Since there was to be a ceremony at the drill ground, the Badger had to lead the students there and attend.

  3. I had to tag along too, as one of the staff.

  4. Out in the town it was covered in Japanese flags, dazzling enough to blind you.

  5. The school had as many as eight hundred students, so the gym teacher lined them up in ranks, leaving a small gap between each group, and into each gap one or two staff members were wedged as overseers.

  6. The scheme itself was clever enough, but in practice it was a thorough mess.

  7. The students were children to begin with, and cocky ones at that, the kind who think breaking the rules is a matter of pride, so what good did it do to have any number of staff walking alongside them?

  8. Without anyone giving the order they'd break into war songs of their own accord, and the moment they stopped singing they'd let out a battle cry for no reason at all — it was exactly like a band of masterless samurai roaming the streets.

  9. And when they weren't singing war songs or shouting battle cries, they were jabbering away about something.

  10. You'd think they could walk perfectly well without talking, but the Japanese are all born mouth-first, so no amount of scolding was ever going to make them listen.

  11. And it wasn't just idle chatter either — they were bad-mouthing the teachers, which made it low.

  12. After the night-duty incident I had made the students apologize, and I'd thought, well, that should settle it.

  13. But in fact I was way off.

  14. To borrow my landlady's phrase, it was truly 'way off, Kangorō'.

  15. The students hadn't apologized out of any real remorse.

  16. They had simply been ordered by the principal and bowed their heads as a formality.

  17. It was just like a merchant who bows and bows but never gives up his sharp practices — the students apologize, sure enough, but they never actually give up their mischief.

  18. Come to think of it, the whole world might well be made up of people just like these students.

  19. Taking someone's apology seriously and actually forgiving them, I suppose, is what they call being a fool who's too honest.

  20. As long as you understand that the apology is only a pretend apology, and the forgiveness only a pretend forgiveness, there's no harm done.

  21. If you really mean to make someone apologize, you have to knock them down until they truly feel sorry.

  22. 2

    When I walked in between the ranks, voices kept muttering 'tempura' and 'dumplings.'

  23. And since there were so many of them, there was no telling who was saying it.

  24. Even if I did find out, they'd only say, 'We never called you tempura, we never said dumplings — you're neurasthenic, sir, and your suspicious mind only makes you hear it that way,' or some such thing, that's for certain.

  25. Such a low, cowardly streak is a habit this region has cultivated ever since feudal times, so no amount of telling them, no amount of teaching, was ever going to cure it.

  26. Stay a full year in a place like this, and even a clean-living man like me might end up having to ape their ways.

  27. There's not one chance in a thousand I'd sit still and let my face be smeared by some trick they could talk their way out of.

  28. If they're human, so am I.

  29. Students they may be, children they may be, but their bodies are bigger than mine.

  30. So it would be a plain dereliction of duty not to pay them back somehow, as punishment.

  31. But the moment I try to pay them back by ordinary means, they twist it right back around on me.

  32. Tell them it's their own fault, and since they've already built themselves an escape route from the start, they'll launch into a torrent of excuses.

  33. Having argued their case, they make themselves look fine on the surface and then turn around and attack my faults.

  34. Since the whole thing started as my retaliation to begin with, my own defense counts for nothing unless their wrongdoing is proven first.

  35. In the end, they're the ones who started it, yet to all appearances it looks as if I picked the fight.

  36. A tremendous disadvantage.

  37. But if I just let them do as they please and play the perfect simpleton, they'll only grow more insolent, and broadly speaking it won't do the world any good either.

  38. So there's nothing for it but to use their own methods against them, and pay them back in some way so slippery no one can lay a hand on it.

  39. But once it comes to that, even being an Edokko is no good.

  40. No good, but if I'm going to be treated like this for a whole year, then being only human, no good or not, I'll have to become that way or there'll be no end to it.

  41. No matter what, the best thing is to hurry back to Tokyo and be with Kiyo again.

  42. Staying in a backwater like this is like coming here on purpose to go to the bad.

  43. Even delivering newspapers would be better than sinking this low.

  44. 3

    Thinking this over, trudging along unwillingly, I noticed the students at the head of the line suddenly break out in an uproar.

  45. At the same moment the whole line came to a dead stop.

  46. Since something seemed wrong, I stepped out of the line to the right, and looking ahead I saw that at the corner where Ōtemachi runs into the turn for Yakushimachi, everyone had jammed up and was shoving back and forth in a scuffle.

  47. I asked the gym teacher, who came from up front hoarse with shouting 'quiet, quiet,' what was going on, and he said the middle school and the normal school had collided at the corner.

  48. 4

    The middle school and the normal school, it seems, are on bad terms like dog and monkey in every prefecture.

  49. I don't know why, but their temperaments simply don't mix.

  50. The moment anything happens, they fight.

  51. Most likely it's just something to do to kill the boredom of a cramped little backwater.

  52. I'm rather fond of a good fight myself, so hearing there'd been a collision, I ran off half for the fun of it.

  53. The crowd up front kept bawling things like, 'What, you're only local-tax students, back off!'

  54. From behind, others were shouting 'push, push!' at the top of their lungs.

  55. I ducked through the students who were in my way, and just as I was about to reach the corner, 'Forward!'

  56. No sooner had I heard the high, sharp command than the normal-school students began marching off in perfect solemn order.

  57. The clash over who'd go first had certainly been settled, but in short it was the middle school that had given ground.

  58. In terms of rank, they say, the normal school outranks the middle school.

  59. 5

    The victory ceremony itself was an extremely simple affair.

  60. The brigade commander read out a congratulatory address, the governor read one too, and those attending shouted banzai.

  61. And that was the end of it.

  62. Since word was the entertainments wouldn't start until afternoon, I went back to my lodgings for the time being and set about writing the reply to Kiyo that had been on my mind for days.

  63. Her request this time was for me to write in more detail, so I had to set it down as carefully as I could.

  64. But once it actually came to it and I picked up the writing paper, though I had plenty to write about, I had no idea where to begin.

  65. Should I write about that? No, that's too much trouble.

  66. This, then? No, this is too dull.

  67. Was there nothing that would come out smoothly, without any effort, and still amuse Kiyo — when I thought it over, there didn't seem to be a single incident that fit the bill.

  68. I ground the ink, wetted the brush, glared at the scroll of paper — glared at the paper, wetted the brush, ground the ink again — and after repeating the same motions the same way over and over, I gave up, deciding I simply wasn't cut out to write letters, and put the lid back on the inkstone.

  69. Writing letters of any kind is a nuisance.

  70. It really would be simpler just to go all the way to Tokyo, meet her, and talk.

  71. It's not that I don't understand Kiyo's worry, but writing a letter exactly to her order is harder than a twenty-one-day fast.

  72. 6

    I flung down the brush and paper, rolled over, propped my head on my elbow, and looked out at the garden, but Kiyo was still on my mind.

  73. It was then that this thought came to me.

  74. As long as I go on worrying about Kiyo's welfare even from this far away, my true feeling is sure to reach her.

  75. And as long as it reaches her, there's no need to send letters at all.

  76. If I don't write, she'll simply assume I'm getting along fine.

  77. News from me only needs to go out if I die, or fall ill, or something else happens — that's really all there is to it.

  78. 7

    The garden is a flat little plot of some ten tsubo, with nothing you could call a planted tree.

  79. There's just the one mandarin-orange tree, tall enough to serve as a landmark even from outside the wall.

  80. Whenever I come home, I always end up looking at this mikan tree.

  81. To someone who's never left Tokyo, the sight of mikan actually growing is a tremendous curiosity.

  82. Those green fruits will gradually ripen and turn yellow, I imagine, and it must be a fine sight.

  83. Even now there are some that have already turned half-color.

  84. When I asked the old landlady about it, she said they were an extremely juicy, delicious kind of mikan.

  85. She told me that once they ripened I should help myself to plenty, so I'll oblige her by eating a little every day.

  86. In another three weeks or so, they ought to be quite ready to eat.

  87. Surely I won't be leaving this place within three weeks.

  88. 8

    Just as I was thinking about the mikan, Porcupine happened to come by for a chat.

  89. 'Since it's the victory celebration today, I thought I'd have a feast with you,' he said, dragging a bamboo-leaf parcel out of his sleeve and flinging it down in the middle of the room; he'd gone and bought beef.

  90. Since I was being tortured with a steady diet of potatoes and tofu at my lodgings, on top of being forbidden to go to the noodle shop or the dumpling shop, I said that suited me fine, and at once borrowed a pot and some sugar from the landlady and got to work cooking it.

  91. 9

    Porcupine, stuffing his mouth with beef without ceremony, asked me if I knew that Red Shirt had a regular geisha, and when I said of course I knew — that one of the geisha who'd come to Uranari's farewell party the other day must be her — he said, 'That's the one; I've only just caught on myself, but you're pretty quick,' and praised me to the skies.

  92. 10

    'That fellow, every other word out of his mouth is character this, spiritual amusement that, and yet behind everyone's back he's carrying on with a geisha — an outrageous scoundrel.'

  93. 'And if he were at least tolerant of other people's amusements it would be one thing, but he went and had the principal warn you that even going to a noodle shop or stepping into a dumpling shop was bad for discipline, didn't he?'

  94. 11

    'Right, in that fellow's mind buying a geisha's company must count as a spiritual amusement, while tempura and dumplings are just physical amusements, I suppose.'

  95. 'If it's a spiritual amusement, he ought to go about it more openly.'

  96. 'What's with that manner of his, anyway.'

  97. 'The moment his regular geisha comes in, he slips out and makes his escape — the man means to fool people through and through, and I can't stand it.'

  98. 'And then when someone calls him on it, he says he doesn't know anything about it, or brings up Russian literature, or says haiku and the new-style poem are like brothers — all to bamboozle people.'

  99. 'A coward like that isn't a man at all.'

  100. 'He's the reincarnation of some palace lady-in-waiting or other, plain and simple.'

  101. 'For all we know his father was one of Yushima's boy prostitutes.'

  102. 12

    'What in the world is a Yushima kagema?'

  103. 13

    'Whatever it is, it's bound to be something unmanly.'

  104. '—Say, that part there isn't cooked yet.'

  105. 'Eat that and you'll get tapeworms.'

  106. 14

    'Is that so? It's probably fine by now.'

  107. 'Anyway, they say Red Shirt sneaks off where no one can see him, over to the Kadoya in the hot-spring town, to meet his geisha.'

  108. 15

    'The Kadoya — you mean that inn?'

  109. 16

    'It's an inn and a restaurant both.'

  110. 'So, to give him the biggest comeuppance, the thing to do is catch him in the act of going in there with the geisha, and confront him to his face.'

  111. 17

    'Catch him — you mean you'd stand watch all night?'

  112. 18

    'Right, there's an inn called the Masuya right across from the Kadoya.'

  113. 'I'll rent the front room upstairs there, poke a hole in the paper screen, and keep watch through it.'

  114. 19

    'And will he come while you're watching?'

  115. 20

    'He's bound to.'

  116. 'One night won't do it, of course.'

  117. 'You've got to be prepared to keep it up for a couple of weeks.'

  118. 21

    'That sounds exhausting.'

  119. 'I once stayed up all night nursing my father for about a week before he died, and afterward I was so dazed I really suffered for it.'

  120. 22

    'A little physical exhaustion doesn't matter.'

  121. 'Leave a scoundrel like that be, and it'll do Japan no good, so I'm going to act on Heaven's behalf and strike him down.'

  122. 23

    'Delightful.'

  123. 'If it comes to that, I'll lend a hand too.'

  124. 'So are you starting the night watch tonight?'

  125. 24

    'I haven't negotiated with the Masuya yet, so tonight's no good.'

  126. 25

    'Then when do you plan to start?'

  127. 26

    'One of these days, soon.'

  128. 'I'll let you know eventually, and when I do, come lend a hand.'

  129. 27

    'Fine, I'll help any time.'

  130. 'I'm no good at scheming, but when it comes to a fight, I'm pretty quick on my feet, believe it or not.'

  131. 28

    While Porcupine and I were deep in our scheming over how to bring Red Shirt down, the landlady of the house came in and said that a student from school had come wanting to see Mr. Hotta, if you please.

  132. He'd just been round to your own house, she said, but you weren't in, so he'd guessed you'd likely be here and tracked you down, if you please — and with that she knelt on the threshold and waited for Porcupine's answer.

  133. Porcupine said, 'Is that so,' and went out to the entryway, but before long he came back and said, 'A student's come to invite me to go see the entertainments at the victory celebration.'

  134. 'A whole crowd has come all the way from Kōchi today just to perform some sort of dance, so he says I absolutely must see it — it's a dance you hardly ever get to see, he says. You should come along too,' Porcupine said, thoroughly keen on the idea, and urged me to join him.

  135. As for dances, I'd already seen plenty in Tokyo.

  136. Every year at the Hachiman shrine festival the floats come round through the district, so I know all about the Shiokumi dance and everything else.

  137. I didn't much want to see some idiotic dancing by Tosa bumpkins, but since Porcupine was so insistent, I found myself agreeing to go, and stepped out the gate.

  138. When I wondered who it was that had come to invite Porcupine, it turned out to be none other than Red Shirt's younger brother.

  139. A strange one to come calling, indeed.

  140. 29

    When we got to the grounds, long banners had been planted here and there just as at the sumo wrestling at Ekōin or the Oeshiki festival at Honmonji, and on top of that, as if they'd borrowed the flags of every nation on earth, they were strung from rope to rope, cord to cord, so that the great sky overhead looked livelier than I'd ever seen it.

  141. In the eastern corner a stage had been thrown together overnight, and it was there, they said, that this so-called Kōchi dance was to be performed.

  142. Some sixty yards to the right of the stage there was a reed-screen enclosure with an exhibit of flower arrangements on display.

  143. Everyone stood there admiring them, but it struck me as utterly worthless stuff.

  144. If bending grass and bamboo into shapes like that makes people so pleased with themselves, they might as well go boast of having a hunchback for a lover or a lame man for a husband.

  145. 30

    On the side opposite the stage, fireworks were being set off one after another.

  146. A balloon came out from inside one of the fireworks.

  147. It had 'Long Live the Empire' written on it.

  148. It drifted lightly over the pine tree by the castle keep and fell down inside the barracks grounds.

  149. Next there came a pop, and a black dumpling-shaped thing shot up as if piercing straight through the autumn sky, and right above my head it burst open with a crack, spreading blue smoke out like the ribs of an umbrella, which then drifted lazily off into the air.

  150. Another balloon went up.

  151. This one had 'Long Live the Army and Navy' dyed white on a red ground, and swaying in the wind it flew off from the hot-spring town toward Aioi village.

  152. It most likely came down somewhere in the grounds of the Kannon temple.

  153. 31

    At the ceremony itself the crowd hadn't amounted to much, but this time there was a tremendous turnout.

  154. There were so many people swarming about that I was actually startled that even the countryside had this many people living in it.

  155. You didn't see many clever faces among them, but in sheer numbers you certainly couldn't dismiss them.

  156. Before long the celebrated Kōchi dance got underway.

  157. Hearing the word 'dance,' I'd jumped to the conclusion it would be something in the style of the Fujima school, but this turned out to be a huge mistake.

  158. 32

    Men in stern-looking headbands tied at the back, wearing tight-fitting trousers, stood in three rows of about ten on the stage, and I was thoroughly startled to see that every last one of the thirty was carrying a bared sword.

  159. The gap between the front row and the row behind it was a mere foot and a half or so, and the gaps to left and right were, if anything, shorter, and certainly no longer.

  160. Only a single man stood apart from the ranks, off at the edge of the stage.

  161. This odd man out wore the same trousers as the rest, but he'd dispensed with the headband, and instead of a bared sword he had a drum slung across his chest.

  162. The drum was the same kind used in dai-kagura performances.

  163. Before long this man began letting out a lazy 'iyaa, haaa,' singing some strange chant while beating the drum with a boko-bon, boko-bon.

  164. The tune itself was a thing so odd it was quite unheard-of.

  165. You wouldn't be far wrong to think of it as a cross between a Mikawa manzai chant and a Fudaraku-ya street song.

  166. 33

    The song itself was terribly slow and slack as starch syrup in summer, but since the boko-bon beats marked off the phrases, even though it seemed to run on forever you could still keep time by it.

  167. In time with this beat the thirty bared swords flashed and glittered, and this part, by contrast, was carried out with tremendous speed and skill — watching it was enough to send a chill down your spine.

  168. There was a living man within a foot and a half on either side and behind, and that man too was swinging a sharp naked blade about exactly as you were, so unless the timing was very precisely matched, you'd end up striking one another and getting hurt.

  169. If they'd simply stood still and only swung the swords back and forth or up and down, there wouldn't have been much danger, but there were moments when all thirty of them stamped their feet at once and turned sideways.

  170. There were moments when they spun clean around.

  171. There were moments when they bent their knees.

  172. If the man next to you was even a single second too fast or too slow, your own nose might well come clean off.

  173. Your neighbor's head might get sliced off.

  174. The bare blades moved with total freedom, yet the space they moved within was boxed into a column a foot and a half on each side, and on top of that they had to flash in the same direction and at the same speed as the men in front, behind, and to either side.

  175. This, I thought, was something else — nothing the Shiokumi or the Seki no To dances could ever hope to match.

  176. When I asked around, I was told this required a very great deal of skill, and that ordinarily people could never get the timing to match up this well.

  177. The hardest part of all, they said, fell to that manzai-chanting fellow with the boko-bon drum.

  178. The footwork of all thirty men, the movement of their hands, the way they bent their hips — every last bit of it, it seemed, was governed entirely by this boko-bon fellow's single beat.

  179. Watching from the side, this chief of theirs looked the most easygoing of the lot, chanting his 'iyaa, haaa' at his leisure, and yet in truth he carried the heaviest responsibility and had by far the hardest job — a curious thing indeed.

  180. 34

    While Porcupine and I were watching this dance with rapt admiration, all of a sudden, some sixty yards or so away, a battle cry rose up with a roar, and the crowd that until then had been quietly wandering about looking at this and that suddenly rippled like a wave and began swaying left and right.

  181. No sooner had voices started shouting 'A fight, a fight!' than Red Shirt's younger brother came slipping through people's sleeves and said, 'Sir, there's another fight — the middle school is getting its revenge for this morning and has started another battle with those normal-school fellows, please come quick,' and with that he dove back into the crowd and disappeared somewhere.

  182. 35

    Porcupine muttered, 'What a troublesome lot. At it again, are they? They ought to know when enough is enough.,' and dashed off at a run, dodging the fleeing people.

  183. He couldn't very well just stand there watching, so I supposed he meant to break it up.

  184. As for me, needless to say, I had no intention of running away.

  185. Treading right on Porcupine's heels, I rushed straight for the scene of the trouble behind him.

  186. The fight was at its very height.

  187. The normal-school side numbered maybe fifty or sixty; the middle school certainly had a good thirty percent more.

  188. The normal-school boys had their uniforms on, but the middle-school boys had mostly changed into Japanese dress after the ceremony, so it was easy to tell friend from foe.

  189. But they were all tangled together, grappling and breaking apart and grappling again, so there was no telling where or how to lay hands on them to pull them apart.

  190. Porcupine, looking as if he didn't know what to do, stood there watching this chaotic mess for a while — 'Once it's come to this, there's no help for it.'

  191. 'If the police show up it'll be a nuisance.'

  192. 'Let's jump in and pull them apart,' he said, looking my way, and without even answering I plunged straight into the thick of the worst of the fighting.

  193. 'Stop it, stop it!'

  194. 'This kind of violence reflects badly on the school.'

  195. 'Won't you stop!' I shouted at the top of my voice, trying to force my way through what looked like the line between the two sides, but it didn't go nearly as smoothly as that.

  196. After I'd pushed my way six to twelve feet in, I found I could neither advance nor pull back.

  197. Right in front of me a fairly large normal-school student was grappling with a middle-school boy of fifteen or sixteen.

  198. I shouted, 'When I tell you to stop, stop!' grabbing the normal-school student by the shoulder and trying to force them apart, when at that very instant someone, I don't know who, swept my legs out from under me.

  199. Caught off guard, I let go of the shoulder I'd been gripping and went down sideways.

  200. Someone in hard boots stepped right onto my back.

  201. Bracing myself on both hands and knees, I sprang up from underneath, and the fellow who'd been standing on me went tumbling off to the right.

  202. Getting to my feet, I saw, some eighteen feet off, Porcupine's big body wedged among the students, being shoved this way and that as he kept shouting, 'Stop it, stop it, stop the fighting, stop it.'

  203. 'Hey, it's no use at all,' I called out, but either he couldn't hear me or he simply didn't answer.

  204. 36

    A stone came whistling through the air and, before I knew it, struck me square on the cheekbone, and at the same moment someone behind me thumped my back with a stick.

  205. I heard voices shouting, 'He's a teacher and he came out here anyway, hit him, hit him!'

  206. 'There are two teachers.'

  207. 'A big one and a small one.'

  208. 'Throw stones!'

  209. went another voice.

  210. I thought, don't talk so cheeky, country bumpkins, and without warning slapped the head of the normal-school boy standing beside me.

  211. Another stone came whistling in.

  212. This one grazed my close-cropped head and flew off behind me.

  213. I couldn't see what had become of Porcupine.

  214. Once it had come to this, there was nothing for it.

  215. I'd gone in to stop the fight in the first place, but what spineless fool would meekly back down just because he'd been thumped and had stones thrown at him?

  216. Who did they think they were dealing with?

  217. Small as I might be, I was a fellow trained in the very home ground of fighting, and while I went on wildly slapping and getting slapped in return, a voice at last cried, 'The police, the police, run, run!'

  218. Until then I'd been unable to move at all, as if swimming through kudzu starch, but the very moment things suddenly grew easier, both sides, friend and foe alike, pulled back all at once.

  219. Country bumpkins or not, their retreat was masterly.

  220. Better managed, if anything, than one of Kuropatkin's.

  221. 37

    Looking to see what had become of Porcupine, I found him over there wiping his nose, his crested single-layer haori torn to shreds.

  222. He'd apparently been struck square on the bridge of the nose and had bled quite a bit.

  223. His nose had swollen up bright red, and looked thoroughly wretched.

  224. I'd been wearing a splash-pattern lined kimono, which had gotten covered in mud, but the damage was nothing next to what Porcupine's haori had suffered.

  225. Still, my cheek stung so much I could hardly stand it.

  226. Porcupine told me I was bleeding quite a lot.

  227. 38

    Some fifteen or sixteen policemen had come, but since the students had retreated in the opposite direction, the only ones caught were Porcupine and myself.

  228. We gave our names and told the whole story from beginning to end, but they said we'd have to come to the police station regardless, so we went, related the entire affair before the chief of police, and then went back to our lodgings.

The particulars

The text
坊っちゃん, Natsume Sōseki. Botchan.
Translation
Public-domain Japanese (Natsume Sōseki, d. 1916; published 1906). English translation © 2026 1732 Studios, LLC.
Reading aloud
Digital narration, directed by 1732 Studios.
Words
Every word of the text, by letter.
Data
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Two whoopie pies and a pine. An inside joke.