"I couldn't remember to say all that, at once, and I had rather remain here," sighed Jokoin, her great opened-up eyes dancing at the prospect. Sitting there unconscious of another obligation, Yodogima considered also her resources. Though remembering well the countenance of Kuroda, and Fukushima's measured words, on that memorable morning, she could but believe them true to their trust. To her way of thinking, no more probable course had conformed to an aim attainable; the life she lived breathed, at every stride, of action, inviolable; their traditions known so well, Buddha's precepts, and Christ's faith all cried in her ears, "do," "do," "do"; a constant struggle had made her what she was--the face of Shin Hachiman (statue of Hideyoshi, the new War God) looked down from its pedestal at Kyoto, imploring her to stay the hand of Ieyasu: how becomingly could a faithful wife, and a mother, have concluded otherwise? "Then Hideyori may pronounce it, at the banquet table; he is my son, and the worthy mouthpiece of a nobler purpose than feasting." CHAPTER XXIX They had gathered in sumptuous splendor, round the laden trays, with Ieyasu in place and Hideyori at his left, as became an honored guest. Kitagira was there, too; he had been discovered hiding at Ibaraki, and in consideration of Hideyori's presence was allowed or compelled to witness the shogun's placing of his own valuation. With being told that Hideyori had not the intelligence to cope with Hidetada, and deciding that only Yodogima stood between himself and ultimate supremacy, Ieyasu estimated carefully the former, and planned the necessity of immediate action against the latter. He had grown old in the harness, would thence witness a widening of the channel: the prop that he had visioned must inure to the swift, for Hideyori justified a mother's confidence. The lotus studding the ponds below lagged lazily in the breeze that fanned them off the coast at Ozaka. Softened evidences of his good taste toned and inspired every nook and cranny of those immaculate halls and safely trodden grounds, but steel had marked each turn toward their advance. Must steel again assert superiority? Would he die fighting? Why should man at first despise, then relish, the olive? In his younger days Ieyasu, too, had balked at culture, but with ripened years it had become a slogan, compelling, all-forceful, and inevitable. "I'll crush him, untutored man, vain infant, inspired mongrel; endowed with better wit than I, he lacks only the wisdom--but his mother! Oh, well; she might as well be Christian, and dangle her bells at church; the taiko's jingle shall be split, and men can very well spare their better halves, in the pursuit of a less obstreperous divertisement-- "Hideyori, my lad, what do you think of women?" "They are the pendulum in a clock."