Chapter II

But there was one odd fellow on the Tsukuda boat. He was an eccentric middle-aged man named Mori Gonnoshin, an officer of foot with an allowance of seventy bales of rice and rations for five men. Strangely this man alone did not catch lice. Therefore, of course, he was covered with them all over. While some mounted to the knot on his queued hair, others crossed over on the edge of the plate at the back of his divided skirt. Yet he paid no special attention to them.

Then if you think that this man alone was not bitten by the lice, still you are mistaken. Just like the rest, he was covered with so many red blotches all over his body that he might well be described as spotted with coins. Moreover, from the way he scratched them, it did not look as if they were itchless. But no matter whether they itched or what they did, he affected utter indifference.

If it had all been affectation, it would not have been so strange, but when he saw the others diligently gathering lice, he called to them,

“If you catch ’em, don’t kill ’em. Put ’em in teacups alive, an’ I’ll take ’em.”

“When you get ’em, what’ll you do with ’em?” asked one of his fellows, with a look of surprise.

“When I get ’em? Then I’ll go so far as to raise ’em,” Mori calmly replied.

“Then we’ll take ’em alive and give ’em to you.”

The officer, because he thought it a joke, worked half a day with two or three others and collected several cupfuls of living lice. He thought in his heart that if he handed them over thus and said, “Well, raise ’em,” even Mori, despite his contrariness, would be stumped.

Then, before he had time to utter a word, Mori spoke up and said,

“You’ve got ’em, haven’t you? Then I’ll take ’em.”

His fellows were all taken aback.

“Then put ’em in here,” said Mori calmly, opening the neck of his garment.

“Don’t go makin’ yourself put up with it now and afterwards gettin’ into trouble for it,” said the others, but he would not listen.

Then one at a time, they turned their teacups upside down, like ricemen measuring rice in half-gallon measures, and poured the lice down Mori’s neck, whereupon he, maintaining his composure and carefully picking up those that had spilled outside, said, as if to himself,

“Thanks. With these I can sleep warm from this night on.”

“When you have lice, is it warm?” said the dumbfounded officers to nobody in particular, all looking into each other’s faces.

Then Mori, adjusting with particularity the neck of his dress which had received the lice, gave one triumphant look around at each of their faces and proceeded to express himself to this effect:

“Each and every one of you caught cold in this recent snap, but what of this Gonnoshin? He doesn’t sneeze. He doesn’t run at the nose. More, not once has he felt feverish or cold in the hands or feet. Whose good work do you s’pose this is? It’s all the good work of the lice.”

According to Mori’s explanation, it seems that when there are lice on the body, they are bound to bite and make it itch. When they bite, one is sure to want to scratch. Then, when the whole body is bitten all over, one wants to scratch all over the whole body, too. But man is wonderfully made, so that while he scratches where he feels himself itch, the scratched places naturally get warm as with a fever. Then, when he is warm, he gets sleepy. When he is sleepy, he no longer feels the itch. In this way, if one but have many lice on one’s body, one falls asleep easily and catches no colds. Wherefore, we should by all means keep lice and by no means kill them out.

“Sure enough, it’s like that, ain’t it?” said several of his fellows approvingly when they had heard Mori’s argument.