Tales of Old Japan - Maybe You Like It

The second piece was Tsunémasa. Tsunémasa was a hero of the
twelfth century, who died in the civil wars; he was famous for his skill in
playing on the biwa, a sort of four-stringed lute.
A priest enters, and announces that his name is Giyôkei, and that before
he retired from the world he held high rank at Court. He relates
how Tsunémasa, in his childhood the favourite of the Emperor, died in
the wars by the western seas. During his lifetime the Emperor gave him
a lute, called Sei-zan, "the Azure Mountain"; this lute at his death was
placed in a shrine erected to his honour, and at his funeral music and
plays were performed during seven days within the palace, by the special
grace of the Emperor. The scene is laid at the shrine. The lonely and
awesome appearance of the spot is described. Although the sky is clear,
the wind rustles through the trees like the sound of falling rain; and although
it is now summer-time, the moonlight on the sand looks like
hoar-frost. All nature is sad and downcast. The ghost appears, and sings
that it is the spirit of Tsunémasa, and has come to thank those who have
piously celebrated his obsequies. No one answers him, and the spirit
vanishes, its voice becoming fainter and fainter, an unreal and illusory
vision haunting the scenes amid which its life was spent. The priest
muses on the portent. Is it a dream or a reality? Marvellous! The ghost,
returning, speaks of former days, when it lived as a child in the palace,
and received the Azure Mountain lute from the Emperor—that lute with
the four strings of which its hand was once so familiar, and the attraction
of which now draws it from the grave. The chorus recites the virtues of
Tsunémasa—his benevolence, justice, humanity, talents, and truth; his
love of poetry and music; the trees, the flowers, the birds, the breezes,
the moon—all had a charm for him. The ghost begins to play upon the
Azure Mountain lute, and the sounds produced from the magical instrument
are so delicate, that all think it is a shower falling from heaven. The
priest declares that it is not rain, but the sound of the enchanted lute. The
sound of the first and second strings is as the sound of gentle rain, or of
the wind stirring the pine-trees; and the sound of the third and fourth
strings is as the song of birds and pheasants calling to their young. A
rhapsody in praise of music follows. Would that such strains could last
for ever! The ghost bewails its fate that it cannot remain to play on, but
must return whence it came. The priest addresses the ghost, and asks
whether the vision is indeed the spirit of Tsunémasa. Upon this the ghost
calls out in an agony of sorrow and terror at having been seen by mortal
eyes, and bids that the lamps be put out: on its return to the abode of the
dead it will suffer for having shown itself: it describes the fiery torments
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