Pathway to Japanese Literature

Within the family of Kojimaya Shōemon of Naya-chō, Nagoya, there was a helmsman named Shigekichi from Handa Village. He had been a peasant from Owari Province’s Chita District who chose to become a sailor of his own volition, working his way up from deckhand to sail handler, then to lead seaman, until he stood at the helm before reaching twenty years of age. In Bunka Era Year 10 (1813), during autumn when Shigekichi was twenty-four years old, he traveled to Edo aboard the Tokumaro—a 1,200-koku vessel transporting Owari Domain’s official rice shipments—but when the ship’s captain and five sailors contracted an epidemic and remained ashore, Shigekichi was entrusted with becoming acting captain to return the ship to Nagoya.

Japanese ships of around 1,200-koku capacity were substantial vessels—large enough to occasionally reach as far as Ezo—so their hulls were constructed with sturdy triple-layered planking (sanmai-dana). The area below the deck was divided by horizontal beams and ship frames into four compartments running successively from the bow: the Front Compartment, Midship Compartment, Galley Compartment, and Stern Compartment. The Front Compartment—also referred to as the formal chamber—was a tatami-floored space approximately eight tatami mats in size where the ship captain resided. The Midship Compartment served as the cargo hold, the Galley Compartment as the cooking area, while the Stern Compartment beneath the helm was divided into two rooms containing sleeping berths for the helmsman and sailors.

Shigekichi received the Owari Domain's ship emblem and the Uraga Magistrate's official permits from the ship captain, hired five sailors born in Izu, promoted Fujisuke of Handa Village to helmsman, appointed Shōbei as sailor leader, Tamekichi as first sail handler and Shichibei as second sail handler, then loaded two hundred barrels of lamp oil and two hundred bales of soybeans as return cargo alongside provisions officer Magosaburō, sailors, riggers, and cooks totaling fourteen men, before departing Edo in late October.

After stopping at Koneura in Izu, when they reached offshore of Omaezaki in Enshū on the night of November 4th, the sea surface suddenly began to glow brighter, and in the moment it seemed as though the entire ocean had risen up as if lifted by a giant hand, a fierce northeasterly wind came howling down with cascading rain that scattered sparks.
The violence and suddenness of it all were unlike anything experienced before or since—Fujisuke at the helm was torn from his post and sent flying like straw scraps, while Fusajiro, the fifteen-year-old cook’s assistant, spun wildly across the deck still clutching his rice tub in extreme frenzy.
Amidst the chaos of everyone aboard shouting “Lower the sails!” and “Hold the helm steady!”, an exceptionally towering returning wave crashed against the ship with a spray of brine, and Yōkichi the rigger—who had been at the bulwark’s edge—was swept away in an instant.

When someone fell overboard, they would throw whatever was at hand—be it a box or a plank—to provide something to cling to, then turn the ship around to retrieve them. But when even after searching they could not be found, it became customary to abandon a single lifeboat.
Even if abandoning the lifeboat now proved futile, doing so allowed them to justify themselves later to the deceased’s parents and siblings.
But at that moment, it was an ink-black night so dark it seemed poured from an inkstone, and the ship was caught in such violent upheaval—borne on gale winds as if flying through the air—that there could be no thought of taking any remedial action.

At long last, they managed to lower the sails—but it changed nothing.
Tossed about by waves and wind, drifting aimlessly across the ink-black sea, they caught sight of Iragosaki Lighthouse’s flame at the eighth hour of the night.
From this cape to Ise Harbor was less than five ri—so as they turned in that direction and prayed, “Save us, O Ise-sama,” the wind abruptly shifted northwest.
Because the wind that had been blowing from the northeast now shifted opposite to the northwest, waves—still surging with residual force—were whipped up into mountainous counterwaves by the wind, and through this sea surface boiling like a cauldron spewing bubbles, the ship began retreating backward, ever backward.
Having painstakingly come near Ise—where even returning would be a nuisance—they were blown back to the vicinity of Omaezaki, where Yōkichi had fallen into the sea, around dawn on the fifth day, covering fifty ri in just two hours due to winds that struck only the mast.

Since sailors are superstitious by nature, he worried they might succumb to baseless fears—and indeed, Saburosuke, a sailor from Izu Kakizaki, had refused to discard the lifeboat, and now insisted with a frenzied glare that Yōkichi’s vengeful spirit must have dragged them back—that this lifeboat, tainted by the dead man’s lingering attachment, had to be cast off without delay.
At this, Shigekichi—

“Now wait,” Shigekichi countered. “If the wind were to shift and carry us southward, all that lies there are sheer rocky islands. Even those called sailors can barely dog-paddle—without a lifeboat, none could reach shore. The presence of one boat marks the difference between life and death. While appeasing Yōkichi’s spirit has merit, the thirteen living souls aboard take precedence. Act rashly now, and you’ll gnaw your navel with regret later.”

He tried to reason with them, but Saburosuke covered his ears with both hands and refused to listen. The Izu and Owari men had always been temperamentally incompatible, compounded by their differing Buddhist sects—the Owari faction adhering to the Ikkō sect and the Izu faction to the Nichiren sect. Knowing that once matters became entangled there would be no resolving them, he had gone to great lengths to placate them with humility—but they absolutely refused to listen.

“Tagomura’s, Kakizaki’s, and then Ushizō and Fukumatsu too—how did you all hear what the captain just said? We bilge rats don’t mind drowning at sea—but it’s only because we thought you’d toss that lifeboat overboard and hold a proper memorial that we’re swallowing this bitter pill. If the captain’s got this kinda mindset, then mark my words—anyone who falls overboard from here on out’ll get left to drown for sure. What do you all think? Is that really okay with you? Don’t you find this pathetic?”

He sat cross-legged in the Midship Compartment and bellowed at the top of his lungs.
The Izu faction clustered around Saburosuke, glaring resentfully at Shigekichi,

“As Saburosuke says—being shown such cold-hearted treatment leaves us too wretched to work.”
“Throw that lifeboat overboard and we’ll call it square—otherwise don’t expect us to listen!”

they broke into an uproar.

Shigekichi turned aside and pretended not to hear, but whether the unexpected storm had sapped his resolve, even the seasoned helmsmen and sail handlers—men who understood maritime exigencies—began clamoring in unison.
In such a tempest, even under normal circumstances, they must work in unison to endure—yet with everyone’s hearts now scattered, even a salvageable ship would be beyond saving.
Though it was an irreplaceable lifeboat, there was no choice but to do as they said.
The future was the future—things would unfold as they must—and with this resolve, he decided to discard the lifeboat.

The Izu faction sailors carried out the lifeboat from beneath the tarpaulin,

“Yōkichi, we’re giving you the lifeboat—take it!”

Chanting the Lotus Sutra in unison, they threw it into the sea.
In such a storm, a lifeboat was no more than wood splinters.
After being struck by a single counterwave, it sank without resistance.
The sailors, unaware that this marked the beginning of great calamity, foolishly prattled on about how Yōkichi had gladly taken the lifeboat—a pitifully naive turn of events.

The rain eventually ceased, but the wind only grew fiercer.
When they reached a point near Koneura in Izu where land was visible, the rudder was destroyed, and the ship capsized as mountainous waves came crashing down.
Recognizing the severity of their situation, all hands worked together to jettison cargo (throwing goods overboard), but even this proved insufficient, so they set about cutting down the mast.

Felling a mast was no simple task—the proper technique required striking simultaneously from both sides at eye level: slightly lower on the leeward side where they intended it to fall, and slightly higher on the windward side.
They lined the gunwale with soft materials like sailcloth and quilts, rigging the mast to spring back gently into the sea, and just as it began to fall, swiftly severed the control lines.
If delayed, the mast—pulled by the tackle—might fall vertically and split the bow.
Easier said than done—amidst a tempest that seemed to overturn heaven and earth, they could only tumble about with axes in hand, unable to execute their plans.
Beginning at the fifth hour of the morning, they finally felled it by the eighth hour and raised their signal flag where land was visible.
They attached a straw mat and sedge hat to a pole’s tip and erected it on the bow—this drifting ship’s plea for rescue boats.
A 1,200-koku drifting vessel being uncommon, villagers must have desperately tried dispatching rescue boats—figures in straw raincoats darted across wave-lashed shores until climbing a rocky prominence to light signal fires.
With our strength, we couldn’t possibly send rescue boats.
They meant: “May fortune grant you rescue elsewhere.”
Abandonment here meant doom—we waved makeshift signals with desperate urgency.
The villagers stoked blazing fires.
If only we hadn’t discarded that lifeboat—now such lamenting was futile grumbling.
Though land lay within reach, lacking a lifeboat made rowing ashore impossible.
Now rudderless and mastless, tossed by wind and waves, they drifted farther from shore—yard by yard.
Day ended; at evening’s fifth hour, they passed between Toshima and Niijima in Izu.
The gap being mere seventeen-eighteen chō, they spliced three thick hemp ropes into three hundred hiro to drop anchor—but depths exceeded reach.
The ship drifted away dragging anchor.

On the morning of the sixth day, when Miyakejima came into view, they hurriedly raised their signal flag again—but it was no use. While they were lamenting “How wretched, how wretched…”, Miyakejima too sank beneath the waves.

By the seventh day, the wind still showed no signs of abating. Water flooded into the ship’s hold, rising to reach the beams. They rigged a water pump—two men working the crossbeam to scoop bilge water through the narrow gutter—but once a wave crashed in, all their hard labor reverted to nothing. The sailors proved utterly spineless, cowering and fidgeting restlessly as they squatted in the Midship Compartment—whenever a great wave struck, they’d shriek and flee to the Stern Compartment, pressing themselves against the sleeping platforms to chant Buddhist prayers in a display of utter hopelessness.

On the morning of the eighth day, they glimpsed a faint island silhouette to the northwest for the last time; thereafter, no matter where they gazed, there was nothing but the layered hues of the open sea.
Magobei, the provisioner, desolate with despair, shaved his head and took monastic vows that day.

From the evening of the eleventh, the wind began to subside, and on the morning of the twelfth—the ninth day—it finally fell calm.
Though the ocean stretched endlessly before them, surely there must be ships passing somewhere—they agreed to post lookouts by day, keep lanterns burning through the night, and set about fashioning makeshift rudders and masts.
With Hachijō-jima now their sole remaining hope, they took a navigational bearing with desperate fervor, only to discover they had long overshot the island and now drifted two hundred ri south of it.

No one voiced it aloud, but they seemed to have steeled themselves to the reality that returning home would not be easy under these circumstances. First, Magobei, the provisioner, requested permission to take stock of their remaining rice.
The cargo held two hundred bales of soybeans, but since it was a return voyage ship, they had only six five-to bales of rice for consumption.
By everyone’s decision, they set aside one bale for unforeseen needs, allocated five bales among the thirteen men, and beyond that, ground soybeans into flour to serve as their primary sustenance.
Since encountering heavy rain at the beginning of the month, there had been no sign of rain thereafter.
Knowing that drinking water would run short, they distilled seawater, decided to divide that water equally for drinking, and spent all of November in that manner.

From early December onward, the heat grew abruptly fierce.
Though midwinter by the calendar, they faced roasting temperatures that barred them from venturing onto the deck by day.
Moreover—though technically a calm upon open waters—great waves would rise without warning while winds blew cold enough to freeze one's marrow.
At each onslaught, they chanted Buddhist prayers and whipped themselves into panicked frenzy until those of weaker constitution grew haggard with exhaustion, broken utterly by heat's torment and gnawing dread.
Among these, Fusajiro—the sixteen-year-old cook's aide—and old Shōbei found even watching waves too burdensome; they withdrew into their berths and refused all summons.
The five Izu men—Saburosuke, Fukumatsu, Ushizo of Tago Village, Otohachi, and Hanbei of Kamezaki—cycled endlessly from fruitless complaints to heated quarrels: when seas raged they clamored prayers in desperation, only to resume their litany of grievances when calm returned.

“Ahh, how worried they must be back home.”
“Even if they ask around everywhere, they can’t know our whereabouts—so they must be waiting until their necks grow thin with hope that perhaps we’re on Hachijō-jima, counting on the island’s eighty-eighth night homebound ships to bring us back.”

When Ushizo spoke, Fukumatsu shook his head,

“No—that’s not how it is.”
“At first they’d rejoice over auspicious dreams and fret at crows’ ominous caws—praying frantically to every god and buddha they could name. But soon enough they’d resign themselves. They’d hold empty funerals without bodies—offer rice to Buddha on a single flower—make the children kneel before the altar and say: ‘Bow properly now—your father’s right there.’”
“Ah, I want to go home. I want to go home.”
“I want to see everyone’s faces.”

Then there was a man named Otohachi, twenty-four years old,

“Do you all just keep thinking about missing them, missing them?”
“I’m past that.”
“All I left behind was five hundred coins when I departed—I can’t stop worrying about that.”
“It’s been three months since I left home.”
“By now they must have run out of food—standing at people’s gates begging, ‘Please, spare us even your scraps.’”
“When I think of that, my heart feels like it’s being torn apart.”
“Oh, it’s too painful—too painful!” he cried.

Shigekichi was also only twenty-four and shared their longing to return home, but if they—already battered by wind and wave—persisted in weeping over memories of their hometowns and fretting about parents and families, they would surely sicken before long. Even should they drift ashore on some island, he thought it would be a wretched fate to perish there from illness.

“We became sailors and endure these hardships precisely to provide for our parents and families back home. Even if our wives and children lose their means of sustenance, there are masters and comrades who’ll aid them.”
“No matter how desperate things grow, they’ll never be reduced to eating bean flour like us.”

[Shigekichi] tried to console him, but Otohachi—unable to accept this, unable to resign himself—wept as though nothing else in the world mattered.

“But Otohachi—is it acceptable to weep yourself to death over pain and bitterness?”
“Wouldn’t that be an even more futile tale?”
“If you’re so worried about your family, then now’s the time to dig in your heels and devise a way to return alive.”

Otohachi snapped his face up.

“Do you think you can deceive this Otohachi with child-coddling sweet talk?”
“Today we’re a thousand ri south of Hachijō-jima in the middle of the ocean!”
“Where is there any guarantee that we can return alive?”
“Even you don’t believe we’ll ever set foot on home soil again.”
“Eventually, at some distant end of the sea lanes, our ship will be smashed to pieces, and we’ll end up as fish food—that’s our fate.”
“It’s precisely because I believe we can’t be saved that I weep like this.”
“How could anyone not weep before this?”

As he spoke, he grew increasingly agitated, his eyes bulging,

“I won’t! I won’t!”
“I won’t die being eaten by fish!”
“If we must die no matter what, let us at least hang ourselves while we still have the strength.”
“No matter which inlet we wash ashore at, let us make nooses in a single rope for all remaining crew members so we’ll be recognized as shipmates, and die together here and now.”
“Saburosuke, die! Yasubei, die!”
“Fukumatsu, Hanbei, the helmsman, the cook’s assistant—let’s all hang ourselves with one rope.”
“Once this matter is settled, we must have the ship captain die along with us.”

With those words, he pulled out a long hemp rope and, with trembling hands, began fashioning nooses.
Shigekichi wanted to stop him, but given Otohachi’s frenzied state—where any opposition might drive him to leap into the sea—he could only nod in agreement each time Otohachi pressed him with “Captain—you mustn’t die either,” replying “I’ll die too—I’ll die too.”

However, in this state of affairs, everyone would eventually go mad.
After racking his brains for some way to distract them, he—though pitying them—deceptively reclaimed the rationed rice, fashioned large rosary beads from thick rope, and announced that henceforth only those who chanted a million Buddhist prayers each morning and evening would receive a wooden bowl of rice and a teacup of water.
Some were furious at being deceived, but this time Shigekichi would not yield, and so their protests gradually subsided.
Even those who had retreated into their berths, determined not to move no matter what, still wanted to eat rice as long as they had life.
They crawled out—two from that side, one from this—and reluctantly began chanting a million prayers, but sustaining themselves on mere scraps of soybean flour and water made reciting those million prayers unbearably burdensome.
Saburosuke of Izu Kakizaki finally lost his temper one day,

“Enough of this nonsense!”
“All you do is go on about ‘Buddhist prayers, Buddhist prayers,’ but those belong in the Pure Land!”
“No mountains in sight—not a single bird takes wing.”
“Where’s your Buddha now?”
“Only the sun’s mercy stays constant.”
“This is when we should be bowing to the Great Bodhisattva Nichiren!”
“Since I’ve said it, there’s no other way.”
“From today, we quit Buddhist prayers and take up Nichiren chants.”
“Anyone caught praying Buddhist nonsense gets stripped bare and tossed to the sharks—mark my words!”

Saburosuke began straining recklessly.

The million recitations had been merely an expedient means; it mattered not which sect they followed.
They ceased the million recitations as Saburosuke demanded and began chanting Nichiren invocations that day, yet whenever storms arose and death loomed near, he would forget his own decree and desperately intone Buddhist prayers—only returning to the invocations once the waves subsided.
Just when they thought this might bring respite, Otohachi’s madness erupted anew, and he dragged the rosary rope—once used for their million recitations—before them all,

“Look, everyone.”
“What do you think? How soft this rope is!”
“I prepared these nooses for when we reach our end, but this rope—the one we used as a rosary for the million recitations—has grown soft from all our handling, and seems like it would tighten quite well.”
“Shouldn’t we exchange that and this while we still can?”

At this, even Fujisuke the helmsman and Shōbei the sailor leader agreed, each fashioning nooses from the rosary rope and lining them up along the ship’s beam,

“Whose noose is that? Whose noose is this?”

Pointing at each one and identifying their assigned nooses made for a pitiful sight.

Shigekichi thought it absurd, but voicing his disapproval was impossible.
Sixteen times before year’s end they donned their finest clothes, resolved to meet their end together by thrusting their heads into those nooses. Yet each time the decisive moment arrived, the waves and wind would calm just enough to let them narrowly cheat death.

The year pressed toward its end and became New Year's Eve.
Shigekichi summoned everyone to the front room.

“Well now, this year too has come to its final day. When spring comes, south or east winds will begin to blow—there should be an opportunity for us to be blown back to our homeland. Let’s put up auspicious New Year’s rope decorations and welcome the New Year properly, so this becomes a good start.”

He instructed the sailors to make rope decorations from whatever materials they could find, and had Magosaburō the provisioner prepare soybean flour dumplings boiled in salt water along with makeshift ceremonial rice cakes. At seven in the evening, as Shigekichi clung to the ranbiki lamp stand in the middle room and drew water as a substitute for ceremonial sake, a clamor of raised voices—as if many people were worked up about something—came from above. Thinking another fight might have broken out, he climbed up to the deck only to find all remaining people weeping as they gazed at the unfinished rope decorations. When he asked what was wrong, Hanbei of Kamisaki

“On New Year’s Day, people consider even a broken pine branch inauspicious—yet look at this wretched state we’re in! What have we done to deserve this? If only we were in our homeland, we’d be getting drunk on sake, stuffing ourselves with rice cakes, eating and drinking to our hearts’ content—yet because we boarded this damned ship, we must greet this shameful spring.”

When he said this, Tamekichi the sail handler added,

“If we’re reduced to licking kinako for New Year’s as the Izu crew insists, our fate’s already decided.”
“Even a man this spineless—just because he’s from our village, we went and made him ship captain. How absurd that seems now.”
“When we boarded that downbound ship, I felt an ill omen—that must’ve been the warning we’d end up as sea foam at the southern ocean’s end with this wretch.”

Tamekichi proceeded, alternating between anger and tears.
Shigekichi laughed,
“What’s there worth crying over? Don’t you know that for the auspicious omen of returning next year to a land where we can eat rice, I intend to stop using beans tomorrow—just for one day—take two shō from the stored rice to make porridge, and let us live solely on rice?”

Tamekichi said that if they could have rice on New Year’s Day, he had no complaints, and with that, everyone else stopped crying.

He rose before dawn on New Year’s Day, donned his haori, and went to the formal chamber in the front room.
They performed ritual gestures of etiquette, offered New Year’s greetings to Shigekichi, and began circulating cups of water in place of ceremonial sake around the makeshift feast—but since water toasts were reserved for ill-omened occasions, none dared voice their resentment.
When the cup reached Fusajiro—the sixteen-year-old cook’s assistant at the lowest seat—he suddenly burst into tears still clutching it.
Those who had restrained themselves until now could bear it no longer, and all broke into loud sobs together.
Shigekichi raised his voice sharply,

“Have you forgotten yesterday’s promise?”
“On this auspicious occasion when we’re to send our lowered ship homeward on the east wind, it’s ill-omened for the sake cup to remain passed down without being raised back up.”
“Fusajiro, stop your crying. Won’t you pass the cup back up quickly?”

When he scolded them, the sake cup was finally raised.
Then the porridge arrived.
Though they had been promised two bowls each and looked forward to eating rice, seeing porridge instead of New Year’s soup made emotions surge within them—they could only exchange sorrowful glances, none making a move to take up their chopsticks.
When Shigekichi pressed them—“What’s wrong?”—they hung their heads and began nibbling listlessly.
The quickest slurped down both bowls, while the slowest sniveled over unfinished portions.
If one began weeping, all followed in shedding tears.
Shigekichi too reached his limit; he climbed to the deck and pressed his forehead against the gunwale, weeping in stifled silence.

When he returned to the front room’s formal chamber after a while, they were still grumbling without cease.
Shigekichi, too, found himself at a loss. “That’s enough crying. Let’s all play a New Year’s game. There’s about thirty ryō of gold on this ship now. There are also seven or eight handfuls of coins with holes. The money was entrusted for port duties, but as long as we have the Uraga magistrate’s official permits and Owari domain’s ship emblem, no matter what port we drift to, we’ll never lack for port duties. So we’ll divide this among everyone. You lot love gambling so much you’d sneak into the bilge under the captain’s nose—so take this and enjoy yourselves to your heart’s content.”

When he tapped the bottom of the money box and began dividing the gold, Fujisuke the helmsman—

“Stop it! Even if we had all the gold and silver in the world, we couldn’t buy a single cup of water here. What joy could there be in winning a gamble? That’s talk for when you’re back in the living world. Or is there anyone here who actually wants to make such a gamble?”

With bloodshot eyes, he scanned the gathering and snapped, “Is there such a fool here?” No one took up the challenge. Shigekichi, too, had no choice but to put away the money box, and the entire crew aboard harbored various sorrows in their hearts; with weeping and lamenting as their only solace, they merely lay down listlessly.

January passed, February saw its days come to an end, and by the close of March, everyone’s bodies had swollen uniformly.
Shigekichi had avoided such afflictions by bathing in the bitter sweat-water left after drawing fresh water, but by month’s end they all swelled up to their heads, lying supine on the sleeping platforms, unable to even move their eyeballs, their condition growing ever more precarious. They began calling out for parents, wives, children, and siblings while muttering deliriously: “Make me rice gruel,” “Let’s eat somen noodles,” “Why aren’t you cutting the watermelon yet?”
Shigekichi did his utmost to move about and care for them, but having now taken on alone what thirteen people had previously divided among themselves—and on top of that, nursing twelve others—after about half a month had passed, he became so exhausted he could no longer lift himself up.

"This was no work for one man to shoulder alone."
"They weren't even kin."
"And though some among them hailed from distant provinces—to torment himself so for strangers' sake—what futility."

He collapsed beneath the shrine shelf—no, that wasn’t right. Though they were strangers, sharing this ship and fate must mean he’d received their kindness in a past life and now owed repayment in this one. If so—if they deserved familial devotion—he couldn’t rest idle. Between roasting soybeans, he gathered firewood; while minding the cooking pot, he drew water. What good was hoarding rice now? He poured out every grain, boiled it all into watery gruel, and forced it down their throats. Yet human effort could barely prolong a life by half a day—on May eighth, Shichibei of Handa Village died. Keeping the corpse in this heat seemed unwise, but tossing it overboard might crush the survivors’ spirits, making them dread sharing his fate. So he laid the body in the storeroom’s wooden-floored annex beside the formal chamber, ignoring the putrid stench. Next came Fujisuke the helmsman on the sixteenth. On the twenty-eighth, Fusajiro the sixteen-year-old cook’s assistant died. June twelfth claimed Shōbei and Fukumatsu of Izu’s Ko-ura. The thirteenth took Magosaburō, the provisioner-turned-monk. Tamekichi of Otogawa Village followed on the seventeenth; Saburosuke of Izu Kakisaki on the eighteenth; Ushizo of Tago Village on the twentieth; Yasubei of Ko-ura on the twenty-eighth. Between May eighth and June twenty-eighth, ten perished one after another—leaving only Shigekichi, Otohachi of Izu, and Hanbei of Kamazaki alive.

On August 1st and 2nd, in the eleventh month of their drifting, heavy rain finally fell for the first time. In this vast, directionless ocean where they lay distant from any islands or mountains, perhaps even clouds and mist could not reach them. Shigekichi told Otohachi and Hanbei that this rain beginning now must surely be proof they were nearing some country. He brought out every water-receiving container onto the deck and stored every last drop of rainwater without waste.

On the morning of the third day, the sea clattered noisily, but the dark surface revealed nothing. Thinking it might be a school of fish, they dropped a bucket into the water. When they pulled it up, a bonito about a foot long had been caught. Their joy defied all comparison. They removed the fish from the bucket and threw them down through the smoke hole into the lower compartment. When they went to the bow and put the bucket in again, seven were caught. Carrying as many bonito as he could hold under both arms, Shigekichi went below only to find that the fish they had earlier thrown down through the smoke hole were now nothing but bones. When he asked what had happened, Otohachi and Hanbei gasped for breath as—

“I don’t know whether these fish were sent by the gods or by you, Shigekichi, but the moment we saw them thrashing about here, we lunged at them from both sides in a frenzy. Between one bite and another, we ended up reducing them to mere bones like this.”
“You went through the trouble of catching them, yet we didn’t leave you a single morsel. You must be seething with anger, but there was no ill intent—we did this in some twilight state between dreaming and waking. Please grant us your forgiveness.”

they propped up their rigid bodies and bowed low with both hands pressed to the floor in apology.
Shigekichi, on the contrary, found himself feeling apologetic,

“I dropped that fish down there precisely so you could eat it as soon as possible. My wish is fulfilled if you’ve eaten it.”
“What does a fish or two matter?”
“Here, see for yourselves.”

He showed them seven bonito.

“Oh, blessed bonito!”

They pressed their hands together in prayer.

They immediately cut fillets from the fish, offered the revered first catch at the shrine, then—unable to wait for boiling or grilling—began soaking pieces in saltwater one after another, until the three of them devoured four bonito in the blink of an eye.

They must have encountered a school of fish, for every time they lowered the bucket, they caught fish.
Eating nothing but fish day and night, they grew healthier by the day, until after about ten days, even Otohachi and Hanbei had recovered enough to come out on deck and fish.

One day, Hanbei said,

“Now, Shigekichi, there’s something you must hear.”
“Whether we speak of heaven-bestowed rainwater or fish sustaining us daily—we now obtain these blessings without want. Yet considering this, those ten who perished in hungry torment without ever tasting such grace must have been truly loathed by the gods and buddhas.”
“You insisted they must be buried in earth’s soil and still keep their corpses stored in that storeroom—but at this late hour, our failure to make landfall surely comes from keeping such things aboard. Their impurity curses us.”
“This feeling will not leave me.”

Otohachi nodded in agreement,

“Today marks two full years we’ve been drifting at sea like this. No matter how vast the ocean is, could there truly be such a thing as drifting seven hundred days without glimpsing a single sail or island silhouette? However I consider it, I can’t help but believe this must be some curse. It’s all well and good to stand on principle with your comrades, but if shouldering their impurity means we never reach any shore, that’s just pitiful. Those who died have received this much care from us—even if cast into the sea now, I don’t think they’d bear resentment.”

For these past six months, Shigekichi had slept and woken in the formal chamber adjoining the storeroom, breathing the stench of rotting flesh each dawn and dusk—yet he felt only pity, never once deeming it defiled.
If they were truly cursed, he reasoned, they would never have received rainwater’s mercy or fish for sustenance—the ship would have sunk long ago, become sea-foam. But since quarreling over this proved futile, he resolved to follow the two men’s wishes and went to stand before the storeroom’s wooden door.

“Now that you have all attained Buddhahood, I trust you will listen to my words with Buddha’s compassion. As for your corpses—even keeping them like this, there’s no telling when we’ll reach land. Rather than letting them rot away with the planks, I think it better to cast them cleanly into the sea. But not immediately. I will wait one month. If you wish to be buried in land’s soil, appear in a dream and tell me so.”

he told them emphatically, as if addressing living people.

He waited until December 23rd, but no such dreams came.
So the next day, waiting until evening, the three of them set about disposing of the corpses.

When they pushed open the wooden door of the storeroom that had been kept tightly shut for so long, an indescribable stench billowed out, making it nearly impossible to keep their eyes open. In the dimness faintly lit by the setting sun's glow, shadowy human-like forms lay scattered like driftwood washed ashore on a beach. The sight horrified even those accustomed to death. The flesh that had clung to their bodies had all melted away, leaving only bones - bones that had rotted through into mud-like decay, crumbling to dust at a touch. Unable to embrace or carry them properly, they gathered skulls and hand bones together into straw bags and cast them into the sea like transporting soil.

No one had considered that far ahead, but scores of sharks drawn by the scent of human bones swarmed in and scattered the fish school trailing the ship—from then on, not a single fish could be caught.
The three went out to the deck and waited day after day for fish traces, but under such conditions even minnows wouldn’t bite.
Having reverted to mixing bean flour with water for sustenance as before, the two men grew despondent until they took on sickly appearances and retreated into their sleeping berths again, remaining motionless.

That year too came to an end, and the morning of the second New Year arrived.
Last New Year’s Day, they had gone through the motions of making token decorations, but now even that semblance of effort was gone.
The two lived in the stern compartment and Shigekichi in the front compartment, rarely crossing paths.
Thinking it was at least New Year’s Day, he went to the stern compartment to offer his greetings, but the two remained sleeping with their arms as pillows and did not respond.

Shigekichi ascended to the deck and performed his morning devotions. As he leaned against the bow fence in his usual manner, gloomily gazing eastward, his eyes were struck by a faint silhouette resembling an island or mountain in the distant horizon where sea and sky met.
It looked like a mountain yet also like a cloud.
He spent the entire day gazing out, tracing the mountain’s shape exactly as he saw it onto a plank with charcoal. The next morning, before dawn had fully broken, he went out to the deck and looked again—the shape remained unchanged from what he had seen the day before.
It was unmistakably the shape of land. He immediately wanted to bring joy to the two men, but for now, they had only managed to glimpse the island’s shoreline from afar. With neither sails nor a rudder, whether this ship could drift ashore safely remained uncertain.
Above all, Otohachi was showing signs of agitation; if he grew impatient over this vain hope and his mind were to snap, that would be disastrous.
Until they had a definite destination, he deliberately did not inform them that day.

The winds blew from both south and west, offering no favorable currents, leaving them drifting in place—neither approaching nor receding from the islands visible directly ahead—yet still drawing closer each day until January 28th, when they had neared enough to discern the shoreline’s contours.
The entire island was rocky yet bore grassy hills and valleys that suggested possible habitation. They raised their signal flags frantically, but shifting winds carried the ship southward until it swiftly drifted away from shore.
The island’s silhouette retreated with each wave, dwindling to a speck by noon on February 7th before vanishing completely into the clouds.
They would later learn it was an uninhabited island off Southern California’s coast.
Even Shigekichi grew disheartened and briefly resolved to stop scanning the sea—but having now identified land’s direction, he reconsidered: vigilant watch might yet intercept passing ships. He hung a sunshade over the bow’s triangular edge and spent every sunrise to sunset staring northeastward.

It was February 14th.

As usual, he rose early and settled beneath the reed screen. Around dawn, he spotted a large ship—equipped with two masts and an astonishing number of sails—sailing slowly northeastward about three nautical miles offshore.

Shigekichi pulled out the banner from the bow and swung it widely left and right in a daze,

“Wait, that ship! Help us!”

As he kept shouting frantically, the distant ship’s appearance began to change, its bow gradually turning toward them.
Shigekichi, sensing this was the moment to plead, climbed onto the bow’s ornamental tassels and called out, “Ahoy! Ahoy!”

Skillfully maneuvering, the large offshore ship circled around the Tokumaru three times, then lowered its sails and came to a stop about five hundred meters offshore.

As he watched, they briskly deployed a lifeboat. About six foreigners in tight-sleeved attire—appearing robust even from afar—boarded it and began rowing toward them in perfect unison.
Shigekichi, skipping with joy and exclaiming "We're saved! We're saved!", rushed into the stern compartment,

“Otohachi! Hey, Hanbei! A rescue ship has come. You can’t stay lying down—why don’t you get up and prepare?”

As he flailed about in panic, the two crawled out to the edge of the sleeping area.

“A rescue ship?”
“Shigekichi—is that true? Or is it a dream?”

they asked in quavering voices.

“This is no dream!
The lifeboat is right here now.
At least eat some soybean flour to fill your stomachs.”

Having said that, he ran to the front compartment and changed into a formal kimono with wide sleeves.
With the official permits and ship emblem hung around his neck, he ascended to the deck, lowered the ladder, and waited. Then, a lifeboat arrived there, and a tall, red-haired foreigner climbed aboard with nimble movements.

This was his first time facing a foreigner, but he summoned his courage and moved closer,

“I was born in Owari Chita District and am a ship captain called Shigekichi. However, having encountered a storm and suffered shipwreck, I have drifted in this manner for many long years.”
“The ship has been reduced to this state, with nothing to eat, and we are truly in dire straits.”
“By your mercy, I humbly beseech you to save us.”

He delivered his greeting with utmost care, but it didn’t get through at all.
Helplessly, he demonstrated through gestures that originally fourteen people had been on board, but as they died one after another, they cast them into the sea, and now only three remained alive on this ship. The foreigner gripped Shigekichi’s hand with his large, hairy hand, then for some reason gave his shoulder a firm slap.

Before long, Otohachi and Hanbei came up to the deck.
The moment they beheld the unexpected visage of the foreign ship, the two men trembled and nearly bolted in fear. But Shigekichi calmed them, had them board the lifeboat, then made a final round of the vessel to bid it farewell before gathering his belongings and departing.

After rowing a hundred meters away, they looked back to see the ship they had entrusted their lives to over the past two years floating pitifully on the waves.
Though they would inevitably have to abandon it someday, it felt as sorrowful as parting from family.
They looked back and wept, wiping their tears only to look again, and before they knew it, the lifeboat had reached the large ship’s hull.

When they climbed up the ladder to the spacious deck, the foreign guide sent Otohachi and Hanbei toward the bow and took Shigekichi alone to a large room in the stern.

In the center of the room stood a large table, beyond which sat a man imposingly attired in woolen clothes who appeared to be the ship captain.
He was no less burly than the previous foreigner, his shoulders bulging like boulders, his neck an unyielding red as if painted with crimson.
Beneath bushy caterpillar-like eyebrows were intense eyes that seemed to glare fixedly.
His physical bearing was thoroughly martial in nature, and the demeanor he directed toward them felt intensely domineering.
This man was the ship captain named Becket, and the previous one was a clerk named Ebbett.

Since he couldn’t grasp the situation at all, Shigekichi sat formally with his hands lowered to his knees—but then the captain, with unexpected kindness, had him sit on a camp stool before spreading an elaborate map across the table and beginning to ask questions.
When he listened calmly, the captain pointed here and there on the map with his finger, saying things like “Miyako,” “Kyushu,” “Edo,” or “Suruga.”
Thinking the captain was asking which country they were from, Shigekichi indicated Owari Province by answering “Nagoya,” pressed his finger near the Enshū coast, made a whooshing sound with his mouth to mimic the wind, and demonstrated how they had been swept south from there. As a sign of understanding, the captain nodded repeatedly and said, “Good, good.”

It seemed their words had been understood, so now he wanted to ask which country this foreigner was from. Shigekichi pointed to his own chest and said "Nagoya," then immediately pointed at the three of them and tilted his head questioningly. Becket immediately understood and answered "London."

No matter how many times he listened again, he could only hear "London," yet he felt certain the foreigner was saying "Holland"—that his own ears were mishearing it as such. This ship had been heading northeast, but since it was likely en route to Nagasaki, Shigekichi reasoned they had stopped upon seeing a Japanese vessel in order to rescue them and send them back to Nagasaki. With that thought, his mind settled somewhat.

After some discussion, Ebbett led Shigekichi to a small room in the bow section and demonstrated through gestures that this was where he would stay. Sure enough, everyday items had been placed there. When he asked where the two men from before were, Ebbett pointed to a hatch-like opening in the corner of the room and indicated they were below.

Peering in, he saw that below was another room with what appeared to be two-tiered sleeping berths, where Otohachi and Hanbei sat with unsettled expressions. He wondered why they were being separated, but assuming that even on a foreign ship, the treatment of the captain and sailors must be kept separate, he refrained from pressing the matter with questions.

Shigekichi, unable to wait for Ebbett to leave, peered down through the hatch opening,

“Otohachi! Hanbei! This ship is bound for Nagasaki! The day we return home draws near!”

When he said this, the two men’s faces clouded over,

“If that were true, I’d be glad—but it’s too good to seem real,” they muttered.

Perhaps from fretting since morning, their throats burned unbearably dry. As they longed for even water to drink, noon arrived with a dark-skinned child—features indistinguishable in shadow—bringing steamed wheat cakes alongside fatty morsels resembling whale blubber and sugared tea. They wolfed down everything instantly before demanding porridge instead of sweets, but the boy merely collected dishes and vanished without response. When Captain Shigekichi worried how those below endured such treatment, Hanbei and Otohachi emerged through the hatch. “You’ve stuffed yourself as captain,” they accused, “but we’re starving half-dead here.” “Let us die with full bellies if we must—one last worldly comfort.” They pressed closer begging: “Get us pot scrapings from the galley at least!”

When asked if they hadn't received lunch, that wasn't the case—

"We did eat, but just one rice cake and a cup of tea."
"It's like a mouse dropping—you can't even tell where it went," they grumbled discontentedly.

"If that's how it is," he said, trying to placate them by explaining he'd eaten the same meager portion and they must endure the hunger—but they couldn't bear it at all.
"Let us steal something then," the two began pleading persistently.
Poor souls—he'd have let them steal if possible, but being unfamiliar with the ship's layout, there was nothing he could do.

The next day around noon, Ebbett came to fetch Shigekichi.
When he followed along, they found a long dining table set up in the center of the large room, lined abundantly with cut-glass cups and spoons, wheat-flour rice cakes heaped high on a platter.

Told to sit there, he squeezed between about five people and took a seat whereupon the captain served him what appeared to be boiled corn on a plate.
Deeming this manna from heaven, he grabbed a spoon and began hurriedly scooping from the edge.
He noticed the others freely taking rice cakes from the platter but none being offered his way.
After some hesitation, he reached out to take a piece and ate it.
While the group ate quietly while conversing, Shigekichi—ravenous—finished his portion almost immediately.
Next came peas boiled with leafy greens.
Seeing others salting theirs as they ate, he too added salt and quickly finished this serving too.
Though no one else touched the rice cakes now, guilt weighed on him as he took two pieces—then another after that.

As he waited wondering if they would give him something more, they brought out polished white rice heaped on a plate.
Tears welled up as he rejoiced at being able to eat such a mountain of rice for the first time in ages—but his spirits sank when the ship captain sprinkled white sugar over it and portioned out exact shares per person.
Next appeared a smoked pig’s head complete with ears and snout.
The captain thinly sliced the meat with a kitchen knife and distributed it to everyone.
Realizing this was what he had mistaken for whale blubber the previous day, he felt sickened and broke into a cold sweat.
When he returned to his room and asked the two men below how their lunch had been, they replied that perhaps because today was the fifteenth day, they had been given plenty.
They said the whale blubber in particular had been delicious.

The ship sailed northeast for about six days and entered a quiet port backed by gentle hills around noon that day.

Wondering if they had finally reached Nagasaki harbor, Shigekichi leaned against the gunwale and gazed at the harbor shore as if intoxicated when Ebbett approached and told him to prepare to go ashore.
Assuming they would likely be taken to the magistrate office, he hurried back to his room, hung the ship emblem and official permits around his neck, explained the situation to the two men below, and hastily boarded the lifeboat.

On the shore stood as many small, unfamiliar long-eared horses as there were people in the lifeboat.
Wondering whether the magistrate office lay at a distance requiring horses, he followed instructions and rode behind Ebbett, whereupon the procession began walking toward the part of town where buildings stood.

Along the way, they passed through a wide, sandy area.
Bizarre plants with long thorns stood in clusters here and there.
When he asked Ebbett about them，he was told they were plants called shaboten—a type of cactus.
As they proceeded there, they came upon a verdant wheat field.
Though it was only February, he was thinking how Nagasaki must be a place where wheat ears sprout early when a large white-walled house came into view ahead.
That must be the Dutch trading house I’ve heard about before, but if there’s to be an immediate interrogation, this must indeed be a grave matter.
Resolving not to utter a careless word, he followed along, steeling himself.

Beyond the gate lay a spacious stone-paved garden, surrounded by shops arranged like festival stalls—displaying nothing but groceries and cuts of beef and pork.
There was no sign of anything resembling a government office.
The men all had soot-blackened faces and wore wide-brimmed hats, while the women wore trousers resembling flared hakama and had small gold hoops in their ears.

Even though this was within the grounds of the Dutch trading house—and thus on Japanese soil—he thought there ought to be at least one or two Japanese people present. Yet wherever he looked, he saw no one who resembled that description.
It was utterly perplexing, but fearing he might appear foolish, he couldn’t bring himself to ask whether this was truly Nagasaki.
Before long, a banquet began under a sunshade on one side, complete with something resembling a hand dance. Once it concluded, they were to return by horse again.

On the ship, the two men had been waiting impatiently; they stuck their faces out through the hatch and asked how things had gone at the magistrate's office.
He had gone by horse and seen the hand dance, yet he couldn't very well say he'd gone to see such things,

“Today I merely went to see what the Dutch trading house looks like—nothing came of it.”
“As for magistrate office matters, Ebbett might have taken care of them for us.”
“I suppose there’ll be another summons tomorrow.”

When he described Nagasaki town’s scenery to them, Hanbei—

“You’ve had quite the sightseeing tour,” he said with biting sarcasm. “I wish I could’ve seen those wheat ears too—even just once.”

The next morning, he rose early and waited for the summons, but all he saw were lifeboats busily shuttling between ship and shore to load firewood, charcoal, and live cattle—no sign of anyone coming to retrieve them.
Wondering if they had forgotten amid the bustle, he went to Ebbett’s room,

“Has there still been no summons from the honorable Nagasaki magistrate office? As for me, I have been prepared since earlier.”

When he pressed him, Ebbett replied in broken Japanese,

“Nagasaki’s Oyaku-sho”

[Ebbett] parroted back the words mechanically, furrowed his brows in thought for a moment, then—

“Nagasaki lies five thousand ri across the waves.”

Looking at Shigekichi with pity, he explained that their current location was a port in Nova Hispania (Mexico) between North and South America, situated approximately five thousand ri east of Nagasaki. Pressing his finger against a map affixed to the wall, he indicated where Nagasaki lay and where this port stood.

Shigekichi now understood that this country lay directly opposite Japan across the open sea, but the immensity of the ocean depicted on the map defied comprehension. He could only stare in disbelief at how they had drifted to such a distant place, robbed of even the strength to speak.

Upon hearing this, he learned that this was a ship from London, Britain, which was taking on water and firewood there before sailing north for about seventy days to trade at a place called Sitka in Russia.
It was said that the return would probably be around next summer.
He had assumed they would be taken to Nagasaki, but given these circumstances, even the prospect of returning to Japan now seemed uncertain.
It was his own mistaken assumption—there was no one to blame—but even after drifting to this easternmost edge, they were now to be taken seventy days further north.
With fate turning out like this—surely they would never set foot on Japanese soil—he grew despondent, and from then on did nothing but lie down.

Before long, the ship left the port and began sailing northwest, but around midnight on the eleventh day, the winds and waves suddenly rose, unleashing an unprecedented tempest.
Captain Becket climbed to a high point on the ship and bellowed astonishingly loud commands in rapid succession, but the tempest’s fury proved overwhelming. By dawn, the great rudder had snapped, leaving them a derelict adrift.

Shigekichi prayed inwardly—Gods, save us—as he went to the bow, went to the stern, frantically rushing about alone. But when he witnessed the ship finally becoming derelict, left to drift aimlessly at the mercy of great waves,

“Oh, what is this?”

Shouting this, he ran into his room, grabbed his head, and collapsed onto the berth.

Due to Captain Nagaeimon falling ill, I had unexpectedly become acting captain—only to break the rudder within five days.
Then came seven hundred days of shipwrecks beyond any tale told; yet instead of dying, we survived to the end, having tasted every ounce of hardship, until rescued by what seemed the sturdiest great ship imaginable. But before we could breathe relief, this very vessel we’d entrusted our hopes to snapped its rudder again and began drifting.
As I sank into despair—wondering what past sins condemned me to such retribution—Hanbei and Otohachi crawled up and asked whether some new disaster had struck, given the uproar above deck.

These two were timid souls through and through—extraordinarily so—and with the years of hardship having seeped into their very bones, Shigekichi feared that mentioning the broken rudder might stir up who knows what kind of commotion.

“In a storm this fierce,” he said, “the sailors can’t just lie about idly.”
“An uproar is only to be expected.”

He tried to brush it off with a laugh, but these were men who fretted over their lives even in sleep—they wouldn’t be fooled by such an act.

“No, no—this cannot be such a trivial matter. If one looks, tears are being shed—but for a steadfast captain to weep is no ordinary occurrence. We’re prepared for whatever comes—so cease hiding the truth and speak plainly.”

“Your concealment reeks of suspicion. Come now—tell us what happened. We’ll not let this rest.”

They pressed him from both sides.

With a calamity of this magnitude, it would inevitably come to light on its own.
Realizing he couldn’t keep concealing it forever, he explained the situation, whereupon Hanbei—

“Given how she was riding the waves and listing to one side, I’d mostly guessed as much—so this ship’s lost her rudder too?”
“Pathetic. Pathetic.”

Hanbei began weeping openly.
Otohachi forced a faint, discordant smile as he spat:

“Since a plague god like you’s taken hold, this was bound to happen.”
“How many ships must you sink before you’re satisfied?”
“To nitpick at this vessel and try drowning the very folk who showed you mercy—that’s not just excessive. That’s downright wicked.”

[he] blurted out something irrelevant.
As Shigekichi remained unresponsive, Otohachi narrowed his eyes and,

“If you don’t understand, I’ll spell it out for you.”
“I don’t know about Owari’s half-baked fools, but under Izu sailors’ code, any captain who’s sunk a ship must live penitently and never board another vessel.”
“Once you take on cursed karma, it clings forever—that’s why you must never trouble others again.”
“If you were a true captain, you’d have thought of the burden on others—back then, moved just us two to this ship and stayed behind on the Tokumaru yourself.”
“That’s a captain’s sworn duty.”

Hanbei nodded,

“There’s some logic to what Mr. Otohachi says.”
“I’ve been concerned about that for some time.”
“You’ve been treated as ship captain, living in comfort—so you wouldn’t have noticed—but the sailors of this ship consider our boarding an ill omen. If we so much as step onto the deck, they kick us from behind, hurl sticks, trip us, splash water—just the other day, for merely touching a guyline, they strung me up like a cat and nearly threw me into the sea.”
“Given all this, if we were to face another shipwreck, they wouldn’t leave things as they are.”
“We were saved once, but tonight will be the end of our world.”
“If we’re to be thrown into some godforsaken foreign sea at the edge of the east, I’d have been better off dying with the Izu crew from the start.”

Otohachi grew agitated,

“Hanbei, that gloomy face of yours isn’t needed. This shipwreck occurred due to the captain’s negligence—so even if Shigekichi dies, there’s no reason we must die. Well, isn’t that so?”

With that, he turned to face Shigekichi and sat cross-legged.

“Now, Captain—we laid out matters separately earlier, but now you must fulfill a captain’s duty. Setting aside our two lives for now—is it acceptable to let the crew of this ship, who showed us great kindness, be reduced to sea foam? Even if it’s you, you wouldn’t go so far as to commit such an unconscionable act.”

“I’ve heard enough,” Shigekichi said. “So you’re telling me to die?”

“I’m not telling you to die,” Otohachi replied. “Just leave this ship by any means necessary.”

Hanbei looked up at Shigekichi’s face with upturned eyes while,

“Mr. Shigekichi, if you would leave this ship, the two of us could avoid being thrown into the sea.”
“It may be a difficult request to hear, but please listen out of pity—I beg you like this.”

With that, he pressed his hands together.

He was too distracted to notice.
Though neither Becket nor Ebbett let it show on their faces, they must have been terribly inconvenienced by such a turn of events.
Having encountered today’s shipwreck, they must surely be gnawing their navels in regret, thinking, “If only we hadn’t rescued those people.”
He did not believe his own ill fate would sink this ship as well, but feeling he could not leave the debt of gratitude for having his life saved unaddressed, he entrusted the two men with the official permits and ship emblem, requesting they handle matters upon returning home, and with that done, he climbed up to where Becket was stationed.

In the dark sea of the night, eye-piercing lightning flashed, and mountainous waves raged like the whirlpools of a strait’s maelstrom—all visible in the distance.

Shigekichi said to Becket,

“Since today’s shipwreck occurred because of me, at least to clear my conscience, please throw me into the sea.”

After communicating through hand gestures, Becket exchanged looks with Ebbett and said something, then shook with laughter—a hearty "Hah-hah!"

The notion that a rudder would break in this world simply because they rescued shipwrecked people was utterly inconceivable.
That was simply unbelievable.
Nor did they want to believe it.
They said something like, "No need for such needless worry—it’d be best to rest easy in your room," and poured wine into an available cut-glass cup,

“Drink this.”

He pressed it to Shigekichi’s lips in such a manner.

It was an exceptionally potent liquor called Oka; one cup left one instantly drunk, and two cups lightened one’s spirits.
When he looked, Becket was vigorously exchanging cups with Ebbett while humming a tune in his spare moments.
Drifting through such tempestuous seas yet still managing to hum—Shigekichi found himself impressed by the foreign ship captain’s unflappable composure.

When dawn broke, the wind subsided somewhat, and a large number of shipwrights emerged to repair the rudder without incident; the ship, its sails filled with a gale, once again set course northward.

They stopped the ship twice at a deserted beach where sandy shoals stretched endlessly; after sailing northeast for over sixty days, they entered a large port ringed by high snowy mountains.

This area appeared to be a truly northern land; wherever one looked across the terrain, there was nothing but snow.
And yet, as if that weren’t enough, snow was falling even though it was the end of May.
Though it was midday, the sun was nowhere to be seen; a dim, twilight-like hue hung in the air, making for an undeniably bizarre sight.

Sixty days—that meant having traveled six thousand ri north from Nova Hispania’s port—yet they never imagined such a bustling place could exist here.
In the harbor, five large ships—each capable of carrying two thousand koku and sporting three masts—lay moored together; on the opposite shore, workers busily constructed vessels atop high scaffolds; and halfway up the mountain stood a castle-like structure with a central keep, its arrow slits lined with rows of cannon muzzles.
According to Ebbett, this was the port of Sitka in Russian Alaska, straddling the 70th degree north latitude.

Shortly after the ship entered the port, captains from this vessel and that came to offer greetings and share drinks, while Becket and Ebbett hurried off to return the courtesies—thus passing a hectic day.

The next morning, a summons arrived for Shigekichi from Governor Baranov, ordering him to present himself at the office posthaste.
Since around ten of the ship’s prominent members were going out to offer boarding greetings, he decided to accompany them; however, as the front of the summons instructed to come in formal haori and hakama, he hurriedly shaved his forelock, unraveled whatever hemp fibers were available to make sandals due to lacking proper footwear, then boarded the welcoming boat and went ashore.

As he waited at the boat house by the pier’s edge, two towering men arrived wearing black-furred cylindrical hats, leather packs slung over their shoulders, and shouldering rifles; they flanked Shigekichi on both sides and began ascending the snowy slope. These were called Kozaku, said to be of a rank akin to ashigaru in the gunnery unit.

After proceeding along the winding snowy slope for a while, there was a large stone gate. On both sides of the road, twelve Kozaku each stood facing one another across the roadway. Ten of them shouldered rifles, while two held bare blades reversed in their hands. When Shigekichi passed through their midst, the Kozaku raised their voices in unison,

“Hail! Hail!”

they chanted in unison.

After ascending a little further from there, there was the second gate.
There too, they were greeted with ceremonial chants.
Later, he learned that this ceremonial chanting was performed exclusively when welcoming someone of high status.

Inside the estate gate lay a wide stone-paved courtyard; after ascending about three stone steps, they entered the government office.
The Kozaku escorts withdrew their send-off there; from deeper within, a man who appeared to be a thirty-two- or thirty-three-year-old attendant came out to greet them and led them to a spacious inner room with a gesture that said "this way."

After a short while, the large door on the side opened, and a person wearing garments adorned with dazzling gold and silver ornaments entered, accompanied by a man who appeared to be a clerk; with a cordial smile, in Japanese, he greeted, “Seven hundred days of shipwreck—that must have been terrible.” He appeared to be around seventy years old, perhaps a year or two beyond, with a completely bald head devoid of even a single strand of hair—his appearance reminiscent of a grand temple’s head priest. Yet he did not appear as aged as his years would suggest—his cheeks were remarkably ruddy, his voice soft and smooth, creating an impression akin to hearing a nightingale’s song. This was the man known as Governor Baranov.

Being told to recount the full account of the shipwreck and considering this too to be part of the official inquiry, he spoke while carefully choosing his words to avoid future hardships.
The governor listened to every detail, and whenever he encountered an unfamiliar word, he produced a book that was something like a phrasebook with Japanese and Russian words side by side, pressing his finger against the characters while—
“Is the word you’re trying to say this character, or this one?” he asked back.

When the inquiry concluded, alcohol and dishes were served in the next room.
Shigekichi could see Becket and the rest of the ship’s crew drinking sake in the large hall across the way.
It was past ten in the morning when they finally cleared the meal, after which they were taken to an even more secluded room.

In the room’s seating area, six girls of dazzling beauty—ranging from sixteen or seventeen to twenty-one or twenty-two years old—sat on camp stools wearing colorful garments. When Governor Baranov said something, one of them stood up first, approached Shigekichi, cupped his face with both hands, licked his mouth, and returned to her seat.
Before he could recover from this shock, the next one came and licked his mouth in the same manner.
After all six had licked his mouth and settled back on their camp stools, Governor Baranov,

“Now, which of them do you think is the most beautiful?” he asked.

Shigekichi found himself unable to look away from the third girl—sixteen or seventeen years old—her beauty making his heart race uncontrollably. Yet he could not bring himself to admit this, replying instead that they were all equally beautiful beyond distinction. The governor laughed.

“Concealing it serves no purpose.
Your eyes keep returning to that woman on the camp stool over there.”

With this observation, he proposed that Shigekichi take the girl as his wife and settle in Sitka.

Becket was an exceptionally kind foreigner, but the fact that he never once mentioned Japan stemmed from having no intention of delivering them there in the end. Once they completed their trading, they said they’d return to England, but since Japan was a country with which they had no diplomatic relations, they’d undoubtedly end up dumping us Japanese on some island or another. He briefly wavered—since the Governor was kindly offering, perhaps it wouldn’t be so bad to set up a household here with that girl, learn trading methods, establish himself enough to own a ship, then return to his homeland with pride. But that would mean abandoning Otohachi and Hanbei. As he couldn’t bring himself to commit such an inhumane act, he declined the gracious offer, explaining that he found himself unable to remain in this land.

The next day, when Shigekichi told this story to Ebbett the clerk, Ebbett had already heard it from Governor Baranov the day before. Those six women were all Baranov’s daughters; having met a man named Takadaya Kahei in Kamchatka and been deeply impressed by his character, Baranov now wished to adopt a Japanese man as a son-in-law for one of his daughters. “In other words, you were to become his son-in-law—but with your refusal, Baranov must have been sorely disappointed,” he said. “You could have taken such a beautiful girl as your wife and become a lord of Sitka—but you refused. What a waste,” he remarked.

After spending about forty days in Sitka’s harbor to complete their trading, they loaded a dugout canoe measuring approximately twenty feet in length and four feet in width, then set sail in early August.

Governor Baranov came to see them off at the ship with the daughters, displaying grief as though parting from his own son.

The winds were favorable, and the ship made about a hundred ri each day, but contrary to expectations of heading due south, it kept veering westward.
One day, when Shigekichi inquired, Becket—

“Indeed, this ship is heading southwest by west. Day by day, we draw nearer to Japan—this must surely bring you all great joy.”

Becket nodded with a rugged yet comforting smile.

“The country called Russian Kamchatka lies five thousand *ri* west from here and has open communication with Japan. If we send you there, you should find it convenient to return to the mainland. If that doesn’t work out, we’ll dispatch the ship to Canton with Ebbett as acting captain while I winter over in Kamchatka with you all. Come spring, I’ll find a Russian ship bound for Oku-Ezo—the Kuril Islands—and see through your sacred vow to return home no matter what it takes.”
He added, “The dugout canoe we purchased in Sitka is meant for you to row ashore to Oku-Ezo.”

“After rescuing those shipwrecked, it is our duty to see them through until they set foot on their homeland’s soil,” he added.

Even that our lives—destined to vanish like seaweed in southern seas had we foundered—had been saved was gratitude enough; yet here he meant to winter in snowbound lands merely to return three Japanese strangers to their homeland.
By what karma had he met one whose kindness ran so deep? He could only stand dumbstruck.

When he returned to the room and told this story to the two, Hanbei—
“Becket’s kindness is truly appreciated, but if we’re taken to some remote edge of Oku-Ezo, we’ll either freeze to death or be eaten by bears—either way, it’s unthinkable.”
“If he’s willing to go that far out of kindness, then as an added favor, please ask him to take us all the way to Nagasaki.”

After traveling southwest for about fifty days, they arrived at a port called Kawan in Kamchatka, but a ship bound for lower latitudes had departed a month earlier, leaving no available vessels until the following spring.
Becket proposed taking them all the way to Oku-Ezo aboard his ship; the next morning, they sailed toward its offshore waters, but with the season already at August’s end, the sea lay blanketed in thick fog that made navigation impossible—no discernible islands or landmarks to guide their course.
For four days they patrolled the area fruitlessly, but continuing this way risked the sea freezing over entirely, cutting off both advance and retreat. Thus they resolved to return to Kawan and await spring’s passage.
They dispatched the ship to Canton under Ebbett’s command while Becket remained in Kamchatka, determined to winter with the three survivors. He secured a log cabin at the river mouth facing the harbor, which would serve as their dwelling until spring.

In early September, three Satsuma drifters were sent to Kawan.
The ship captain was a man named Kisanzaemon who, while transporting Satsuma’s official rice to Edo, encountered a great storm and was blown off course; after drifting near Ezo for about half a year, thirteen crew members perished, leaving only his younger brother Kakujiro and three sailors including Sasuke to be saved—or so the story went.

The year came to a close, and at last in late May of the following year, Bunka 13, the port’s ice thawed.

Becket hired a Russian ship and loaded the dugout canoe. Then Becket, six men from Satsuma and Owari, eight sailors, and others bound for Oku-Ezo aboard the available ship—sixty-one people in total—boarded and set sail from Kawan, Kamchatka, on the 28th.

On June 17th, during their wintering, Hanbei, who had long been suffering from beriberi, died.
Though they wished to bury him on land, there was no port to approach.
They asked Captain Srezni to tie stones to the corpse’s legs and had him perform a water burial in the Russian custom.

On June 28th, land came into view about one ri ahead on the sea. It was Kunashiri Island, which reportedly had a harbor and was close to Matsumae, so they decided to go ashore there. At noon, they lowered a log boat, loaded it with pots, kettles, guns, provisions of grain, pork, and other supplies, and Shigekichi, Otohachi, and the Satsuma group—five people in total—boarded. Becket emerged onto the gunwale and waved in farewell, but the Russian ship hoisted its sails, drew away from shore, and vanished beyond the horizon’s edge until its silhouette disappeared from view.

As the five rowed onward with combined strength, a headwind arose just as land drew near.
For neither oar nor rudder availed them; blown some twenty *ri* off course, they barely managed to row ashore on the northern sandy beach of a small island called Uruppu by the eighth hour of the night.
There they stayed for two days, and on July 7th, they crossed over to Etorofu Island, Japanese territory.

The place where they landed was a sandy beach along rocky mountain foothills, about a third of a *ri* ahead from where a waterfall rivaling Nachi Falls in scale came cascading down.
Though it was an uninhabited shore marked only by bear tracks, when they realized this was Japanese soil, nostalgia and joy surged through their chests until they all sat weeping on the sand for some time.

Otohachi took Shigekichi’s hand and,

“Now, Captain—I went mad and made nooses for hanging. I urged others to do the same, resolved myself too, and tried to strangle myself multiple times.
“If you hadn’t stopped me, I would have died then—I wouldn’t have lived to see this joy.
“Starting today, I regard you as my life’s savior.”

While he was saying such things, the look in his eyes suddenly began to change,

“Hey Shigekichi! For three years and three months—day after day—how you tormented me! Today I’ll finally have my revenge—take this!”

he grabbed the gun and attempted to shoot Shigekichi.

Kisanzaemon swiftly wrested the gun away and mercilessly beat down Otohachi, calling him a madman.

Shigekichi clung to Kisanzaemon’s arm—being a man of gentle disposition—and pleaded for mercy, arguing that Otohachi had likely been driven mad by finally setting foot on Japanese soil after all these long years of desperate yearning. But his entreaties went unheeded. Kisanzaemon bound Otohachi up like a bagworm with hemp rope, then had his brother Kakujiro take hold of the rope’s end and marched him off toward the magistrate’s office.

After rounding the base of the waterfall and proceeding about a third of a mile further, they came upon the magistrate’s office hut they had heard about. Officials including Magistrate Clerk Assistant Murakami Sadanosuke and Constable Kimura Jūbei were stationed there. After hearing their account of events, they had them change clothes and served them rice gruel in large bowls. After allowing them to rest for about half an hour, there was another investigation, and by the time it concluded, dawn broke.

After bathing and shaving their pates, their minds settled, but their resolve slackened and their bodies gave out; they did nothing but drift in and out of sleep, day and night.
Murakami Sadanosuke, angered by their spineless state, entered the waiting room where the five were.

“What on earth is this state of yours? This may be Japan, but it’s a remote borderland at the far northern edge. If you at least make it to Matsumae, there would be some purpose—but if you let your guard down and die in a place like this, it’d be no different from becoming Russian soil. You’re a bunch of fools!”

He mercilessly berated them while remaining on his feet.

Everyone, having thus regained their senses, encouraged one another that if they slept through here, they would not live to see the mountains and rivers of their homeland.

On September 2nd, they were sent to Matsumae and underwent an investigation by the Hakodate Magistrate.
On November 4th, they were put aboard a ship from Matsumae and arrived in Edo on December 4th.
At the Ezo administrative office, an investigation was conducted, and on April 1st of the fourteenth year, they were handed over to the Owari Domain.
On May 2nd, there was an investigation by the finance magistrate, and the following day, the 3rd, Shigekichi returned to his hometown for the first time in five years.