Teito Monogatari:
The Tale of the Imperial Capital
Part 2: Supernatural Babylon
Author: Hiroshi Aramata
Part 1: Impossible Fight to the Death
Chapter 1: A Letter from Torahiko Terada
Dear Sir,
It is now midsummer here in Berlin. Thank you very much for your kind assistance when I left Tōkyō on the twenty-fifth of March. I arrived in Europe on the sixth of May and have enrolled at the Imperial University of Berlin. One of the girls at my boarding house is quite charming.
The other day I went to see the Tiergarten.1 Peacocks, cranes, and other birds are allowed to roam freely around the ponds, and it was amusing to see a South American alpaca standing there. It is said to be the foremost nature park in Germany, but I found the architectural style of the animal enclosures far more interesting than the rare beasts or exotic birds. The building for the elephants is in the style of a great Indian temple, the tigers are housed in a Chinese pagoda, and the pond where the geese gather is designed like a traditional Japanese garden. Even to an Easterner like myself, the buildings appear strange and mystical and a bit out of place.
On my way to study abroad, I stopped in India, but as far as I could tell from the deck of the steamship Prince Ludwig, I saw no temples resembling the elephant enclosure here.
I understand that the design of the Tiergarten was handled by an architectural firm called Ende & Böckmann. To my surprise, these men—Ende and Böckmann—were the very ones commissioned by the Japanese government to draft the plan for the reconstruction of Tōkyō about twenty years ago. Quite a curious connection, isn't it?2
Mr. Narutaki, they went to the trouble of traveling all the way to Japan for surveys and on-site inspections. The architectural designer Tsumaki Yoritada from Japan studied under them. I heard he ultimately received the commission. If I recall correctly, he is now in charge of the design for the new Nihonbashi Bridge, which is currently under construction.
I fear this letter is already far too long, Mr. Narutaki--I'm getting carried away, I think, by my own good mood. Please understand it as a symptom of the daily surprises and excitement of Berlin. Since you, too, probably intend to make your way in physics someday, I will tell you this: you must study abroad in Germany. If you don't have the money, raise it from acquaintances on the promise of repayment after you get established. I'll pitch in as well, of course.
While studying geophysics at the university, I intend to gather the latest knowledge about earthquakes, natural disasters, and fires. I can practically see your face as you smile at me and say, "You are as eccentric as ever." But I'm resolved to make this my life's work. I don't care if people laugh at me. In fact, part of why I'm writing to you is that I made a discovery a few days ago. Please convey what I write below to Tatsumiya Yōichirō at the Ministry of Finance. Also, please add words of sympathy for his younger sister's condition.
Taking advantage of the recent holiday week, I twisted an upperclassman's arm and had him take me to London. I wanted to research the famous Great Fire of London. I also had the rather selfish hope of meeting the revered expert Professor John Milne, who laid the foundations of seismology in Japan.
When I arrived and visited the Milne residence on the Isle of Wight, I panicked when I came face-to-face with a refined Japanese lady. Her name was Tone, and—would you believe it?— she was Professor Milne's wife! A black European-style dress suited her very well. As the professor was leaving Japan, he took a Japanese wife. I hadn't had any idea.
While in Japan, Mr. Milne collaborated with our Shinobu Hirota on seismology.3 Mr. Milne graciously agreed to meet me. His Japanese is skillful enough for him to crack jokes. Since this contact has not been officially permitted, I would like to keep it confidential for the time being.
I need not tell you that I received excellent hospitality at the Milne residence. The tale of how Professor Milne crossed Siberia in midwinter by sled to take up his post in Japan must still be popular even among today's students. Having met him in person, I felt anew the greatness of the man. He has a fine sense of humor and is a most amiable man.
Now then, Mr. Narutaki, we get to the reason why I decided that I must write to you. I heard a strange story from Professor Milne about an incident he experienced in Tōkyō. I will write it down, briefly, here.
Professor Milne had recently developed a new type of seismograph capable of accurately recording great earthquakes, and was conducting experiments to record vibrations in various parts of Tōkyō. He dug a hole in a back garden on the grounds of the Ministry of Finance in Marunouchi, set up a temporary underground chamber, and then installed a seismograph. He discovered that only this location deviated subtly from other districts. In some cases, the seismograph on the Ministry of Finance grounds would shake more violently than all the others. Even when other seismographs showed no abnormality, that one would clearly capture vibrations.
Professor Milne was troubled, of course. The seismological instruments installed elsewhere, including at the Imperial University's Earthquake Research Institute, were not particularly far away. And yet the vibration records of the Ministry of Finance grounds and those of other districts were completely incomparable.
The professor arrived at two possible causes.
His first idea was that the Ministry of Finance occupies its own geological stratum. This is possible, though not terribly likely. Second, he postulated the existence of some kind of magnetic field unique to the area. Such a magnetic field would need to be strong enough to throw seismographs out of order.
What do you think, Mr. Narutaki? Isn't that a fascinating mystery for a physics student?
Professor Milne decided to examine the strata by having them dig a further twenty feet or so beneath the floor of the temporary laboratory. An enormous number of human remains was discovered underground. Professor Milne was astonished and investigated the characteristics of the stratum itself. It became clear that the volcanic ash layer in the area was thin, and the fluvial deposit—the alluvial layer—was also remarkably thin. In other words, in ancient times, the area around the Ministry of Finance in Marunouchi may well have formed a small hill. There is not much water retained in the soil in the area.
Even so, the existence of so man human bones was bizarre. Since Professor Edward Morse's excavation research at the Ōmori Shell Mound and the Yayoi period strata, there has been much archeological interest in Japan, but this site was most unusual.4 Professor Milne did not officially announce this discovery, and for the time being surmised that the site might have been a cemetery in ancient times.
Cemeteries are usually built on sacred ground, you see, which would make the grounds of the Ministry of Finance an extremely important place for ancient people.
Professor Milne was also shocked by one other discovery. While performing an inspection to determine whether a magnetic field might be at work within the Ministry of Finance grounds, the seismograph was entrusted to an uneducated but honest man employed as a menial worker at the Ministry of Finance. He was a man in his fifties named Yōzō. Just as Professor Milne instructed him, every day at a fixed time he would go down into the laboratory to replace the recording paper and check the condition of the seismograph. He carried out his duties most assiduously.
One day, while Professor Milne was using Yōzō as an assistant and staring fixedly at the seismograph's movements, he witnessed a bizarre phenomenon. Please understand that these temporary laboratories are tiny; there is almost no room to move around in them, so there can be no doubt about what Yōzō saw.
As the honest Yōzō stared hard at the needle, it trembled. A needle that did not so much as quiver when only the professor watched it would, when stared at by Yōzō, shake within twenty or thirty seconds. At first Professor Milne took this for a trick of the mind. To verify these observations, he attempted repeated follow-up experiments.
The follow-up experiments produced the same results. Yōzō's staring caused the needle to shake, but the professor's staring did nothing.
"I cannot explain why—even now I still cannot explain it," the professor said to me.
Indeed, what explanation could there be? The situation starts to resemble the spiritualism currently in vogue in Britain. Scientists should not consider such things. While hoping that all of it might prove to be some kind of mistake, the professor had Yōzō perform various experiments.
One interesting fact emerged from these efforts. Yōzō certainly possessed at least one strange ability. By holding his hand over the instrument or simply staring at it, he could make the seismograph move faintly... but only for that one seismograph. The other seismographs did not react to his staring, only the one placed on the Ministry of Finance grounds.
Once, Professor Milne felt the ground's vibration himself and was greatly alarmed. Of course, there are vibrations that go unmeasured in other places. If you stare too intently at a recording instrument like a seismograph in all seriousness, you can fall into a kind of hypnotic state, since you must follow the subtle movements of the machine with your eyes. This phenomenon resembles many cases of misperception experienced by early microscope users.
For example, a scholar who looked at dust or grime stuck to the microscope lens would become convinced that the dust and grime was part of the magnified image of the specimen he had originally intended to study. The very act of peering into those tiny eyepieces throws the microscope user into a strange state of excited bias. They believe that what they see is what they wish to see, and miss contamination from dust or other substances. You also have probably gotten absorbed in looking through such contraptions, haven't you? A similar error in perception can occur with a seismograph as well. The vibrations you are wishing to observe can be observed and recorded without perfect accuracy.
Professor Milne took a great interest in this quasi-spiritualist phenomenon. His range of interests is broad. After returning to England, he conducted more experiments to make a seismograph shake by mental power alone. He has not managed to repeat what he saw in Japan, however. Yōzō's demonstrated results are unique, and he only achieved them on the Ministry of Finance grounds. According to the professor, that place is special, though it is not entirely clear why. Perhaps the area amplifies spiritual or mental abilities somehow?
Some time ago, when I met Yōichirō a few times at the Shibusawa residence, he told me candidly that his younger sister Yukari had fainted at the Ministry of Finance near Mitarashi Pond. In other words, her severe mental illness was directly triggered by something present on the Ministry of Finance grounds.
Of course, I do not have full confidence in this theory. However, I think it is worth investigating. What is your opinion? Perhaps the temperament that Miss Yukari was born with was amplified by the demonic power that also, supposedly, causes earthquakes?
To my senior colleague Mr. Narutaki,
July 1909
From Terada Torahiko in Berlin
P.S. The other day I toured the London Underground via a subway system. It is truly a splendid means of transportation, and I was greatly impressed. In Europe, many homes have a basement or a cellar, and they are used to underground spaces. Their easy acceptance of underground transportation supports my vision of a subterranean city in Tōkyō. Before long, underground cities will appear in Europe and North America. We must arouse interest in going underground in Japan as well to keep pace with the rest of the world. The above is my proposal as a student studying in Berlin.
1 Once a hunting ground of the
Electors of Brandenburg, the Großer Tiergarten park was designed in the
1830s by landscape architect Peter Joseph Lenné. In the course of
industrialization in the 19th century, a network of streets was laid out
in the Hobrecht-Plan in an area that came to be known architecturally as
the Wilhelmine Ring.↩
2 Ende & Böckmann did
not, in fact, make alterations to the Tiergarten, but they did build Villa
Kabrun, constructed between 1865 and 1867 in the Tiergarten area. ↩
3 Shinobu Hirota was a pivotal early 20th-century Japanese
assistant to John Milne at the Shide Observatory in England, helping
establish the first global earthquake recording network. Hirota assisted
with seismic data analysis from 1895 onward, playing a crucial role in
recording and locating early seismological epicenters before the
development of modern instrumentation. ↩
4 The Yayoi period (c. 300 B.C.E.–300 C.E.)
represents a transformative era in Japanese archaeology defined by the
introduction of wet-rice agriculture, metalworking (bronze and iron), and
the development of hierarchical social stratification. Named after a Tokyo
neighborhood where artifacts were first discovered in 1884, this period
marks a transition from hunter-gatherer lifestyles to settled,
agricultural communities. ↩
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