"But how big and handsome you have grown! No wonder I did not know you."
He blushed like a girl, as he slipped off his shoes and unbuckled his sword. I remembered that he used to blush the same way in class, both when he made a mistake, and when he was praised. Evidently his heart was still as fresh as then, when he was a shy boy of sixteen in the school at Matsue. He had got permission to come to bid me good-by: the regiment was to leave in the morning for Korea.
We dined together, and talked of old times,—of Izumo, of Kitzuki, of many pleasant things. I tried in vain at first to make him drink a little wine; not knowing that he had promised his mother never to drink wine while he was in the army. Then I substituted coffee for the wine, and coaxed him to tell me all about himself. He had returned to his native place, after graduating, to help his people, wealthy farmers; and he had found that his agricultural studies at school were of great service to him. A year later, all the youths of the village who had reached the age of nineteen, himself among the number, were summoned to the Buddhist temple for examination as to bodily and educational fitness for military service. He had passed as ichiban (first-class) by the verdicts of the examining surgeon and of the recruiting-major (shōsa), and had been drawn at the ensuing conscription. After thirteen months' service he had been promoted to the rank of sergeant. He liked the array. At first he had been stationed at Nagoya, then at Tōkyō; but finding that his regiment was not to be sent to Korea, he had petitioned with success for transfer to the Kumamoto division. "And now I am so glad," he exclaimed, his face radiant with a soldier's joy: "we go to-morrow!" Then he blushed again, as if ashamed of having uttered his frank delight. I thought of Carlyle's deep saying, that never pleasures, but only suffering and death are the lures that draw true hearts. I thought also—what I could not say to any Japanese—that the joy in the lad's eyes was like nothing I had ever seen before, except the caress in the eyes of a lover on the morning of his bridal.
"Do you remember," I asked, "when you declared in the schoolroom that you wished to die for His Majesty the Emperor?"
"Yes," he answered, laughing. "And the chance has come,—not for me only, but for several of my class."
"Where are they?" I asked. "With you?"
"No; they were all in the Hiroshima division, and they are already in Korea. Imaoka (you remember him, teacher: he was very tall), and Nagasaki, and Ishihara,—they were all in the fight at Söng-Hwan. And our drill-master, the lieutenant,—you remember him?"
"Lieutenant Fujii, yes. He had retired from the army."
"But he belonged to the reserves. He has also gone to Korea. He has had another son born since you left Izumo."
"He had two little girls and one boy," I said, "when I was in Matsue."