The whole camp now enlivened with bustle and drive; each of the captains had been assigned his portion or placed most advantageously, in their distributions and allotments, and great preparations were making for the leave-taking—some heart-rending, others in good cheer. Most of Hideyoshi’s leaders shared Ieyasu’s former possessions, but Gamo Ujisato, one of Jokoin’s recently ardent admirers—Takiyama had been sooner banished to Kaga—without leave or let, on her part, was set down at Aizu, in the cold far north.

“Never mind, Jokoin,” promised Hideyoshi, upon her remonstrance; “you shall have left Ishida, and, perchance, another, or some others, I fear too much a mask for hypocrisy: with them, you should be able to make out, if not capture the empire.”

“What a bunch!” replied Jokoin, sorely abashed.

“Well, then, suppose you include your humble—ahem!”

“An old dried-up man like you? I had rather try—”

“Kyogoku?”

“Yes; smart Alex; he has left a bit of ginger, if not as much audacity as—some others.”

“Oho, aha; I can, perhaps, also, place him.”

“Not on your life.”

“I wonder.”