“Tajima-mori at last reached that country, plucked the fruit of the tree, and brought of club-moss eight and of spears eight; but meanwhile the Heavenly Sovereign had died. Then Tajima-mori set apart of club-moss four and of spears four, which he presented to the Great Empress, and set up of club-moss four and of spears four as an offering at the door of the Heavenly Sovereign’s august mausoleum, and, raising on high the fruit of the tree, wailed and wept, saying: ‘Bringing the fruit of the Everlasting Fragrant Tree from the Eternal Land, I have come to serve thee.’ At last he [[380]]wailed and wept himself to death. This fruit of the Everlasting Fragrant Tree is what is now called the orange.”
Chamberlain explains[4] that “club-moss oranges” signifies oranges as they grow on the branch surrounded by leaves, while spear-oranges are the same divested of leaves and hanging to the bare twig.
The location of the Eternal Land has greatly puzzled native scholars. Some suppose it was a part of Korea and others that it was Southern China or the Loocho Islands. According to the Nihon-gi, Tajima-mori found the Eternal Land to be inhabited by gods and dwarfs. As it lay somewhere to the west of Japan, it would appear to be identical with the Western Paradise which, according to Chinese belief, is ruled over by Si Wang Mu (the Japanese Seiobo), the “Royal Mother” and “Queen of Immortals”. Instead of the Chinese Peach Tree of Life, the Japanese had in their own Western Paradise the Orange Tree of Life. The orange was not, however, introduced into Japan until the eighth century of our era.[5] Whether or not it supplanted in the Japanese paradise an earlier tree, as the cassia tree supplanted the peach tree in the Chinese paradise, is at present uncertain. It may be that the idea of the Western Paradise was introduced by the Buddhists. At the same time, it will be recalled that the Peach Tree of Life grew on the borderland of Yomi, which was visited by Izanagi.
SEIOBO (= THE CHINESE SI WANG MU) WITH ATTENDANT AND THREE RISHI
From a Japanese painting (by Sanraku) in the British Museum
A similar garden paradise was known to the Polynesians, and especially the Tahitians. It was called Rohutu noanoa (“Perfumed or Fragrant Rohutu”). Thither the souls of the dead were conducted by the god [[381]]Urutaetae. This paradise “was supposed”, writes Ellis,[6] “to be near a lofty and stupendous mountain in Raiatea, situated in the vicinity of Hamaniino harbour and called Temehani unauna, ‘splendid or glorious Temehani’. It was, however, said to be invisible to mortal eyes, being in the reva, or aerial regions. The country was described as most lovely and enchanting in appearance, adorned with flowers of every form and hue, and perfumed with odours of every fragrance. The air was free from every noxious vapour, pure, and most salubrious.… Rich viands and delicious fruits were supposed to be furnished in abundance for the frequent and sumptuous festivals celebrated there. Handsome youths and women, purotu anae, all perfection, thronged the place.”
Another Polynesian paradise, called Pulotu, was reserved for chiefs, who obtained “plenty of the best food and other indulgences”. Its ruler, Saveasiuleo, had a human head. The upper part of his body reclined in a great house “in company with the spirits of departed chiefs”, while “the extremity of his body was said to stretch away into the sea in the shape of an eel or serpent”.[7]
The Japanese had thus, like the Polynesians, a garden paradise and a sea-dragon-king’s paradise, as well as the gloomy Yomi. It may be that the beliefs and stories regarding these Otherworlds were introduced by the earliest seafarers, who formed pearl-fishing communities round their shores. The Ainu believe that Heaven and Hell are beneath the earth, “in Pokna moshiri, the lower world”, but they have no idea what the rewards of the righteous are.[8] Nothing is definitely known regarding [[382]]the beliefs of the earlier and more highly civilized people remembered as the Koro-pok-guru.
The Mikado Sui-nin was succeeded by the Mikado Kei-ko, who died in A.D. 130, aged 143 years. One of his sons, Yamato-Take, is a famous legendary hero of Japan. He performed many heroic deeds in battle against brigands and rebels. At Ise he obtained from his aunt, Yamato-hime, the priestess, the famous Kusanagi sword, and a bag which he was not to open except when in peril of his life. He then set out to subdue and pacify all savage deities and unsubmissive peoples. The ruler of Sagami set fire to a moor which Yamato entered in quest of a “Violent Deity”. Finding himself in peril, he opened the bag and discovered in it a fire-striker (or fire-drill). He mowed the herbage with the dragon-sword, and, using the fire-striker, kindled a counter-fire, which drove back the other fire. The Kusanagi (herb-quelling) sword takes its name from this incident. Yamato-Take afterwards slew the wicked rulers of that land. He also slew a god in the shape of a white deer which met him in Ashigara Pass. He lay in ambush, and with a scrap of chive[9] hit the deer in the eye and thus struck it dead. Then he shouted three times “Adzuma ha ya” (Oh, my wife!). The land was thereupon called Adzuma.