Hideyoshi left Himeji without a moment's delay. He reached Takaradera Castle that evening, entered Kyoto on the seventh, arrived at Azuchi on the following day, and had an audience with the three-year-old Samboshi on the ninth.
"I have just now asked Lord Samboshi for permission to subdue Takigawa Kazumasu," Hideyoshi said to Seki and the other lords as he walked into the hall, almost as if he had kicked a ball into their midst. "Katsuie is behind this. So what we have to do is conquer Ise before Katsuie's soldiers are able to move."
Hideyoshi issued a proclamation from Azuchi. It was circulated widely in his domains, as well as to the generals in those areas friendly to him, and called for all just warriors to gather at Azuchi. How pitiful for the creator of the blind strategy that inspired that proclamation. There in Kitanosho, married to the beautiful Lady Oichi and surrounded by deep snow, Shibata Katsuie waited vainly for nature to take its course.
If only the spring sun would come and melt the snow. But the snow walls that had seemed to him an impenetrable defense were crumbling even before the advent of spring.
Katsuie was shaken by blow after blow: the fall of Gifu Castle, the revolt in Nagahama, Nobutaka's surrender. And now Hideyoshi was going to attack Ise. Katsuie felt he could neither leave nor sit still. But the snow on his borders was as deep as on the mountain passes of Szechuan. Neither soldiers nor military supplies would be able to cross them.
He had no need to worry about an attack from Hideyoshi. He would march forward the day that the snow melted, but who could tell when that would be? The snow seemed to have become a protective wall for the enemy.
Kazumasu is a veteran, too, Katsuie thought, but taking the little castles at Kameyama and Mine was a careless movement of soldiers without much regard for timing. That was stupid. Katsuie was furious.
Although his own strategy was riddled with faults, he criticized the actions of Takigawa Kazumasu, who had attacked too early.
But even if Kazumasu had abided by Katsuie's plans and waited for the snows to melt, Hideyoshi—who had already seen through the enemy's intentions—would not have spared them the time. In a word, Hideyoshi had outwitted Katsuie. He had seen what was in Katsuie's heart from the time the man had sent envoys for peace talks.
Katsuie was not simply going to take all that sitting down. Twice he sent out messengers: first to the ex-shogun Yoshiaki, asking him to encourage the Mori to attack from the western provinces; then to Tokugawa Ieyasu.
But on the eighteenth day of the First Month, Ieyasu, for reasons unknown, met secretly with Nobunaga's eldest son, Nobuo. Ieyasu had been professing strict neutrality, so what was his plan now? And why was a man of such cunning meeting with one entirely lacking in that quality?
Ieyasu had invited Nobuo, who was timidly being swept along in the violent tide of the times, to his own private quarters. There he favored that frail man with entertainment
And secret conversations. Ieyasu treated Nobuo exactly as an adult would treat a child, and whatever conclusions the two reached remained secret. At any rate, Nobuo returned to Kiyosu delighted. His appearance was that of a commoner very pleased with himself, and there was also something of a guilty conscience about him. He seemed extremely hesitant to look Hideyoshi in the eye.
And where was Hideyoshi on the eighteenth day of the First Month? What was he doing? Accompanied by only a few trusted retainers, he had wound around the northern part of Lake Biwa, stealthily traversing the mountainous area on the border of Omi and Echizen.
As Hideyoshi toured the mountain villages and high ground, which were still under deep snow, he pointed out strategic places with his bamboo staff and gave out orders as he walked.
"Is that Mount Tenjin? Build some ramparts there, too. And construct some right away on that mountain over there as well."
On the seventh day of the Second Month, Hideyoshi sent a letter from Kyoto adressed to the Uesugi, proposing an alliance.
The reason was not complicated. The Shibata and the Uesugi had continually fought bloody battles over a number of years, now taking land from one another, now losing it. It was likely that Katsuie would now be thinking about mending those old grudges so that he could concentrate all of his strength on the confrontation with Hideyoshi. But his stubbornness and pride made it unlikely that he would succeed in carrying off so subtle a strategy.
Two days after sending the letter to the Uesugi in the north, Hideyoshi announced his army's departure for Ise. He divided his forces into three corps, which advanced along three different routes.
With war cries, under clouds of banners and drums, their march shook the mountains and ridges. All three armies crossed the central mountain range of Omi and Ise and regrouped in the areas of Kuwana and Nagashima. That was where Takigawa Kazumasu was to be found.
"First let's see what battle formation Hideyoshi chooses," Kazumasu said when he heard that the enemy was approaching. He was fully confident of his own ability.
It was a matter of timing, and he had misjudged the moment to begin hostilities. The treaty between Katsuie, Nobutaka, and Kazumasu had been kept secret even from their own advisers, but now the fuse had been blindly ignited because Kazumasu had been so eager for an opportunity. Dispatches were sent to Gifu and Echizen. Leaving two thousand soldiers in Nagashima Castle, Kazumasu himself went to Kuwana Castle.
The castle was protected on one side by the sea and on the other by the hills around the castle town, and it was easier to defend than Nagashima. Even so, Kazumasu's strategy was not simply to retreat to this narrow strip of land. Hideyoshi would have to divide his sixty-thousand-man army to attack Gifu, Nagashima, and Kuwana, as well as the various other castles in the area, so even if his main army attacked, it would not be with overwhelming strength.
On the one hand, he had heard that the enemy army was impressive in its numbers, but on the other, he knew that its soldiers would be taking the roads over the peaks of the
Owari-Kai mountain range. It was obvious that the supply train carrying the munitions and provisions would be very long.
With that in mind, Kazumasu believed that destroying Hideyoshi would be no difficult task at all. Draw him in, attack mercilessly, watch for the opportunity to get Nobutaka on his feet again, unite with the soldiers in Gifu, and destroy Nagahama.
Contrary to Kazumasu's expectations, Hideyoshi had not bothered to take the small castles, but had decided to attack the enemy's main stronghold. At that moment, urgent messages began to come to Hideyoshi from Nagahama, Sawayama, and Azuchi. The situation was not an easy one; the clouds and surging tides that covered the world changed with every passing day.
The first dispatch read: "The vanguard of Echizen has passed through Yanagase. A part of it will soon be invading northern Omi."
The next courier bore a similar message: "Katsuie's patience has finally broken. Instead of waiting for the thaw, he has engaged twenty or thirty thousand coolies to clear the snow from the road."
Yet a third messenger reported how critical the situation was: "It is probable that the Shibata forces left Kitanosho around the second day of the Third Month. By the fifth, the vanguard had advanced as far as Yanagase in Omi. By the seventh, one division was threatening our positions on Mount Tenjin, while other divisions set fire to the villages of Imaichi, Yogo, and Sakaguchi. The main army of twenty thousand men under the command of Shibata Katsuie and Maeda Inuchiyo is steadily advancing southward."
"Strike camp immediately," Hideyoshi ordered. And then, "On to northern Omi."
Leaving the Ise campaign to Nobuo and Ujisato, Hideyoshi turned his army toward Omi. On the sixteenth he reached Nagahama, and on the seventeenth his troops were snaking their way along the lakeside road that led to northern Omi. He himself rode on horseback. The spring breeze played on his face as he rode beneath the commander's standard of the golden gourds.
At the border of Omi in the mountainous area of Yanagase, the fresh snow lay in pleats and folds. The wind blowing over the area and swooping down on the lake from the north was still cold enough to redden the noses of the warriors. At dusk the army divided to take up positions. The soldiers could almost smell the enemy. And yet not a single column of smoke from an enemy campfire, or a single enemy soldier, could be seen.
But the officers pointed out the enemy positions to their men. "There are Shibata units along the base of Mount Tenjin and in the area of Tsubakizaka. There is also a large division of the enemy stationed in the areas of Kinomoto, Imaichi, and Sakaguchi, so stay on your guard, even when you sleep."
But the white mist trailed into camp, ushering in an evening so peaceful it could hardly be imagined that the world was at war.
Suddenly, sporadic gunfire was heard in the distance—all from Hideyoshi's side. No a single shot was returned throughout the night. Was the enemy asleep?
At dawn the gunners who had been sent to test out the enemy's front line pulled back. Hideyoshi ordered the commanders of the musket corps to report to his headquarters, where he listened carefully to their reports of the enemy positions.
"Have you seen any trace of Sassa Narimasa's troops?" Hideyoshi asked.
Hideyoshi wanted to be sure, but all three commanders answered in the same way.
“The banners of Sassa Narimasa are nowhere to be seen."
Hideyoshi nodded, acknowledging that it might be true. Even if Katsuie had come, he would be unable to do so without anxiety because of the Uesugi at his rear. Hideyoshi could imagine that Sassa had been left behind for precisely that reason.
The order to eat breakfast was issued. The rations carried during a campaign were unpolished rice balls packed with bean paste and wrapped in oak leaves. Hideyoshi talked his pages while chewing his rice noisily. Before he had eaten half of it, the others had finished.
“Don't you chew your food?" he asked.
“Aren't you just a slow eater, my lord?" the pages answered. "It's our custom to eat quickly and shit quickly."
'That's a good way to be," Hideyoshi replied. "Shitting quickly is good, I guess, but you all should try to eat like Sakichi."
The pages looked at Sakichi. Like Hideyoshi, Sakichi had eaten only half of his rice and was chewing it as carefully as an old lady.
“I'll tell you why," Hideyoshi continued. "It's all right to eat quickly on days when there's going to be a fight, but it's different when you're besieged in a castle and there are limited provisions that you have to stretch out for the day. At that time you'll be able to see the wisdom of eating slowly both in the well-being of the castle and in your own health. Also, when you're deep in the mountains and plan to hold out for a long time out provisions, you may have to chew on anything—roots or leaves—just to satisfy stomach. Chewing well is an everyday matter, and if you don't get into the habit you won’t be able to do it voluntarily when the time comes." Suddenly getting up from his camp stool, he waved them along. "Come on. Let's go climb Mount Fumuro."
Mount Fumuro is one of a cluster of mountains at the northern edge of two lakes—the smaller Lake Yogo and the larger Lake Biwa. From the village of Fumuro at its foot to its summit is a height of almost eight hundred meters and a walking distance of over two leagues. If the traveler wanted to climb its steep slope, he would have to plan on taking at half a day.
“He's leaving!"