Indian Antiquary Vol 48

Author(s): Richard Carnac Temple, Devadatta Ramkrishna Bhandarkar
Publisher: Swati Publications

Page 169

Supr., 1919)
EPISODES OF PIRACY IN THE EASTERN SEAS
165
have exterminated the Japanese; but as soon as the troops were about to take the field, they wheedled them into moving off, telling them. We do not mean not to pay you the full amount some time or other.'
The Japanese lost the produce of their own country, and being unable to return home, were very indignant. Meanwhile the leading bad characters (of China) such as Wang Chih, Su Hái, Chin Tung and Mayeh, who had always been lying perdu amongst them, discontented with the Inner Land, escaped to the islands and became the chief advisers of the Japanese whom they induced to make descents upon China, which was accordingly ravaged by large bodies of pirates in separate squadrons, who wore the dress and counterfeited the flags and signals of Japan.........
In 1552 Wáng Chih and the Japanese made a descent with a large force : their united ships, some hundreds in number, covered the sea.
P. 141. There were on an average three native Japanese in every ten, the remaining seven (were Chinese who) followed the others. In action they used to drive their prisoners on in front, and their discipline was such that all these fought till they died.
P. 142. Dressed in red with yellow caps, they attempted the great gate of (Nanking) ....... At Hú-yó they were surrounded by the troops and pursued to Yánglin Bridge, where they were entirely cut to pieces. In this affair (in 1554) the robbers were never above 60 or 70 in number and yet they marched several tens of li, massacred and wounded perhaps 4000 people, and this during some eighty days before they were exterminated.
P. 151. Extract from the Wu Pi Chi or Annals of the Art of War.16 It was the custom of the barbarians of Japan to draw up their troops in the form of a butterfly. When they went into action the signal was given by the flourishing of a fan. One of them did this, and the body then rose (or sprang) up brandishing their swords. As they tossed the points of their weapons toward the sky, our soldiers threw their heads back in astonishment and the enemy thereupon cut at them below. Another of their formations was a long, snake-like column, in which they advanced waving a hundred-tailed banner, and marching one after the other like fish in a file. The van was composed of their stoutest men and the rearguard of the like ; in the centre the brave and cowardly were mingled together. They rose every morning at cock-crowing and ate their meal squatting on the ground. When this was ended their chief would take a seat in a high place (or above them), the rest listening to his orders (or in obedience to his commands), brought each one his book, upon opening which it was seen what place was to be foraged on such and such a day, who were to command the parties and who to serve in the ranks of the companies. These did not consist of more than thirty men, and moved independently each at a distance of one or two li from each other. At the blast of a conch, which is their call, the company immediately closed up to support that which it had heard give the signal. Sections of two or three also skirmished about irregularly, brandishing their swords. Towards evening they returned, and every one gave in whatever booty he may have seized, keeping nothing back. The chief made a partition of the spoil in proportion to the amount contributed by each. Whenever they captured women, they were sure to pass the night in drinking and wantonness, until at last they feel asleep intoxicated. When they had nearly completed the pillage of a place they set it on fire; the smoke and the fire filled and illumined the skies, and while the population were in & state of alarm at its fierceness, the pirates decamped. They practised this ruse upon
16 Sir Thomas Wade supposes this work to be by a contemporary historian.