, "The Narrative of a Japanese" by

Joseph Heeo or James

Murdoch ?'

Piers H. T. Dowding

HISTORICAL BACKGROUND

The first Japanese American, Joseph Hecoo (1837-1897) wrote an

account of his unusual life where, as a boy, he was swept out into

mid-Pacific, rescued and educated in America. He returned in time to

observe with the eyes of the first foreigners Japan's turbulent move­

ment towards and entry into the. first thirty years of the Meiji Era.

This unique account was first published in two volumes under the

title of it The Narrative of a Japanese "2) in 1892/33) and 1895. It was

edited by a 6 sometime assistant professor of Greek at Aberdeen Uni­

versity' 4) James Murdoch M. A. (1856-1921), later to write. a very good t History of Japan' in three volumes.5) ..

1). Unlike John Manjiro, his more famous predecessor (by 10 years), Heco took American citizenship and was baptized a Christian.

2) Heco, Joseph, The Narrative of a Japanese; what he has seen and the people

he has met in the course of the last 40 years. James Murdoch M. A. ed., (San Francisco: American-Japanese Publishing Association, 1741 Sutter Str., Tokyo: Kudo Printing Co. Ltd., No. 97 l-chome, Kashiwagi, Shin juku

ku, n. d. , 1950?) . 3) Dowding, Piers, Hamada Hikozo, New Discoveries in Tenri Library, Oka­

yama Shodai Ronso, Vo1. 18, No.2 (consecutive, No. 38). This,' my pre­ceding paper, suggests that the first Vol. was probably published in 1893, though the literature suggests 1892.

4) As he described himself in History of Japan Vol. 1., From the Origins to

the Arrival of the Portuguese in 1542 A. D., on the title ·page. (Printed at Kobe Chronicle, published by the Asiatic Society of Japan, 1910)

5) Sissons, D. C. S., Australia's First Professor of Japanese, James Murdoch

(1856-1921), (Australian National University May 7th 1 982). P. 0107, note 1, Sydney Morning Herald, 5/1 1/21, says that the fourth volume was in his head ready to be written down, when he died.

1 15

Vol. 18. No.3

This • Narrative ' has since been translated twice into Japanese6)

the trans.lations haying in both : cases follo:wed the� printed, ed�ted version

of Heco's story with varying degrees of accuracy.

WHY IS MURDOCH UNSUNG?

Thus matters might have stood, except that a nagging question

remains. Why did the translators follow an edited version and not the

original? That is to say, why were they content to translate Heco's

story after Murdoch's. contact with it? Surely such a thing would

happen only if they were completely assured of the very high quality

of Heco's English, and therefore of an absolutely minimal influence

from Murdoch. The only other possibility which comes; to mind is

that Heco's English was not considered to be a suitable model for

translation. and that it took someone like Murdoch to turn it into a

piece worthy of translation.

In this paper I would like to suggest that the former supposition

is true. that is that the translators assumed that Murdoch played little

if any part in the production of the • Narrative of a Japanese '. They

assumed that Joseph Heco's English was close enough to perfect, and

that assumption has continued almost unchallenged to this day. One

could say that it does not matter what the translators and scholars

think. so long as the end result is acceptable. We have to consider

Murdoch's reputation, however. He was not a man giv.en to seeking

fame; thus it is up to someone else to set the record straight.

It may be that the original impetus for this mistaken assumption

came in part .from Heco himself; Murdoch was probably to blame in

a sense. and thirdly the circulating rumours which held Heco's English

6) 1. a) Vol. I Kaikoku no Shitatari (A Drop in the Opening of the Country)

by Kyiicho Hijikata, 'Oshiisanshi' (pseud.) (Tokyo: Hakubunsha Nov. 5 1893)

b) Vol. II Kaikoku no Shitatari, Zokuhen (a continuation) Fujishima Chobin, tr., published together with Vol. I and corrected and edited by Yoshio Takeichi (Kyoto: Gloria Society, 1932), under the title of ' Kaikoku Ishi America Hiliozo Jijoden'.

2. America Hikozo Jiden 2 Vols., Nakagawa, Tsutomu, and Osamu Yamaguchi, trs., (Tokyo: Heibonsha, 1964) This is the most accurate

translation of Murdoch's edited • Narrative '.

116

' ''The Narrative of a Japanese" by Joseph Heco or James Murdoch?'

to be spotless must bear part of the blame.

Most people were probably in no position to judge whether Heco's

English was good or not. That he could speak English at all must

have raised him high in everyone's esteem, and who after all would

want to say otherwise? Besides, from all accounts, his English was

extremely fluentY People have a tendency, however, to believe what

they hear rather than the facts themselves, and in this case they have

overlooked the distinction between the spoken and the written word.

Heco himself seems to have been unwilling to show the original

t diaries ' to anyone apart from Oshiisanshi and Murdoch. He probably

directed people to the edited printed version. The reasons for this

will follow in a later paper. Further, Murdoch in his oft-quoted three­

page introduction to the t Narrative' bequeathed us a casual, British

'it was nothing ' type of litotes.S) Murdoch often downplayed himself

and on occasion accused himself of laziness in his writings: "this t ere

bard is beastly, vilely, lazy ".9)

In addition to this the young Oshiisanshi's translation of this in­

troduction probably became the source material for Takeichi shi's au­

thoritative but misleading statement about Murdoch's role. Oshusanshi

translated Murdoch's Introduction thus:

���� •• �flfi������, ��8E*KE.�����.�

�*���Lt,:'f19HlUt-�� <, l1i�;:'iL�tJ:fflHt�mmL, ii�tJ:��

7) Dowding, P., Op. cit., pp. 15-18; see also' Narrative " Vol. I, p.280; in a recommendation letter to the Hon. Gideon Welles, Secretary of the U. S. Navy, Thos. G. Cary says, "He speaks the English language fluent­ly." Also see Takeichi Shi's introduction to Op. cit ., pp. 17-18.

8) Heco, J., Op. cit., James Murdoch's Intro., p. III: Nothing in the sense of Mr. Heco's, diary has been changed in the setting forth of his story. I have confined myself to condensing it, and to weaving as far as pos­sible the disconnected items into a continuous narrative. For the first few chapters of Vol. I my responsibility ends with cutting out a quantity of irrelevant details, and with here and there recasting a paragraph. These chapters had been already prepared for publication when I took the matter in hand." (This seems to have been written before Vol. II was edited and thus bears no witness to the effort involved. There was nO Introduction to Vol. II.)

9) Miall, A., (pseud., Murdoch) Don Juan's Grandson in Japan, v. CLXVIII,

p. 75. (Tokyo: Hakubunsha, 1890)

1 17

Vol. 18. No. 3

§ ��1§.b�1! � m.3i: '""( '""(, iF1E-s 0 ¥g� t.1t L t.:.. � (J):l-j. '1:'S 0 0 g;f;*m ·-�(J)1JJ�.t�l*I-t ��(J).tHi, �t�l*IlIlF��*IB$�m � �'""(, ��Jt � z.�lE L t.:.. 0 v�1f-t 0 (J):l-j.o !I:tn £?ff(.vi, �iJt'*�z. A=F1:!" 0 tI.iW v�fUrr(J)�om*t�Ai L t.:.. Q t (J)'1:'S � 0 CMvH1ti±� r�OOZ�J p.3)

" In the process of publishing Mr. Heco's story, I have not in

.any way changed the meaning of the sentences written in the

diaries; I have only shortened the redundant passages, system­

atized unconnected items as much as possible and changed it into

a consistent story. In particular my res�onsibi1ity regarding

the first few chapters of Vol. I has merely been to cut out the

parts with little relevance, and in some places I have modified the

phraseology. These several chapters were being prepared for

publication before I received the MSS."lO)

The corrector and editor of I Kaikoku' Ishi, America Hikozo Jijoden',

Takeichi Shi makes this sta temen t : .

�(!: :J)(J)��O) 1.J:l:vi '5iiJ�tJ: t (J)'1:', ��vim�lfU,' i1C:l-j..� "cJf�'""( t, �jj (J)��S � 7 � V 7J A t. � L t.:.. � �vi�iJ� "? t.:.. t (J) t. m-t� �

. '1:'� 00 �(J)�Jt§��(J)�Q� t, 3i:�tJ:��'1:', �n�X' - F ':/ � i . X�,,�St\,' '""( Lt =¥ � An � �:ttt!iJ� tJ: iJ� "? t.:.. t. � L -C 1..> � 0 (�m.1$

r � g � 7 • 1:: ::r §��MmJ p.17)

If We have to understand that his (Heco's) English ability is beyond

question; not only as regards conversation, but even in reading and writing there was no perceptible difference from that of any

. ordinary educated American. As in the case of his English au­

tobiography, the English was excellent; Murdoch, who revised it,

indicates that there was no room for improvement."ll)

10) Hijikata, op. cit., p. 3 11) Ibid. (Intro.) p. 17 To say that Murdoch had nothing to do because

Heco's English was so good is bending the truth beyond the breaking point.

118

'. "Th.e Narrative of a Japanese" by Joseph Heco or James Murdoch?'

Takeichi shi· goes on to describe all the independent witnesses

who testified at. one time or another to the power of Hec,O's English.

He himself, however, seems not to have read Heco's original writings.

And yet he mentions that Heco even wrote poems in his Engli�h diaries.

A reading of them reveals no formal poetry� though on occasion his

description of a country scene may approach a prose poem.

All further commentaries, save those of Mr. Tominaga of Tenri

Library (former Chief Librarian ) and Professor Sugiyama of Okayama

College of Commerce, accept Mr, Takeichi's statement. Maruzen says :

���.��������?�, �n*�-��p�.������

t�tJ�?t.::.i::. "'? 0 CJL�Elf.5e., m-�229J{)

H It was written in splendid English, and it is said that Murdoch,

the editor, found no place for correction."12)

This is poor tribute to Murdoch. Sakanishi and Takeda praise Heco's

English in glowing terms, but a protracted search for Murdoch's name

turns up nothing :

��i!!/j�v;::t�? �tJ� I?, H The Narrative of a Japanese" i::."'? J::.

T=����§��.��L-t.::.o ;:;h�iE*AtJ�.",t.::.���.¥,oc L­

� �i, �i CO'J-C � � ��';f, ":> t.::.o Ctlfgg�1* f7,';c I} 7J��J p. 64)

VfEtflt����'� I? 1" I? c.'" �;f, � i -to ;:;h �W'CJV -e if�-r � ;:

i::. �i, � 0) ffl� 0)$B1m iJ��f�V;::.&t': C ,, ' ? ;: i::. �'-t 0 -tntJ� I? ��iJ� ��t� Iv �'� 0 t.::. < � JV;f, G s �� ? �tJ� I?, en ��? t-:.I? �",tJ�,

�G�v;::�i;: � ����? 0 -t�(Xv;::�i cb ?-��;tIl[L- � ...... (tlZIl9 �* r 7 ,;C I) 7J ��J p. 64-p. 65)

U After the beginning of Meiji,13) he wrote down for us an English

autobiography in 2 vols. called the . . Narrative of a Japanese ".

12) Maruzen Hyakunenshi, Vol. I. p. 229 (Tokyo: Maruzen K. K. 1980). (This article drawn to my attention by O. C. C. librarian, Mr. Fujii)

13) This is very vague. It was over thirty years after the beginning of Meiji that he wrote the Narrative.

119

Vol. 18. No.3

This was the first such book in English written by a Japanese .

. . . it is written smoothly in fluent English. Upon reading

this, the first thing we feel is how rich was the range of his

vocabulary, and how precise the expressions were. From out of

so many words, (he knew) which word to use, in one case using

this particular word, and in the next thinking the whole thing

over again . . .. "14)

There is no need to read further ; it is obvious they are making no

distinction between Heco and Murdoch, and Murdoch does �ot exist

to them. Mr. Kimura has this to say about the matter :

..".." ctJ:.'0t'::'�x-A;(· �- F�!J (James Murdock) t�{&.Lt.::.c�

6, Jt.�ir�jtt--r Q c � .0tJ:. L 1::. "', � -C, t.::.t':l:�O)�%tJ:.l�V��7tC7)

m��:hQx. t.::.tJ.?}, � C C7)"£"£ fUfiL t.::.o (*t-i� r E *Jt��Vft5f:.C7)

1i1f5eJ p. 136)

" When Heco gave the work of revision to the university profes­

sor, James Murdock. (sic) later to become the author of that

great work, "History of Japan" in 3 vols., Murdoch said that

there was nothing in the script to perfect, so apart from trim­

ming a few redundant passages, he published it as it was."1S)

Mr. Chikamori is closer to the truth in the sense that lacking

definite proof he takes a neutral stance. Although his book is in

other respects very thorough on Heco, there are' scant references to

Murdoch:

W-;-V717j] vi, �- t:'� ? iJtl::.::IC7)Jij{.��=F�A.;h" rtJt�." ..

-c" .. Q 0 (���:& r � 3 1! 7 • l::. ::I J p. 72)

14) "Nihon Ski Tanbo," Vol. 14, Kadokawa Shoten, "America Hikozo", by Sakanishi, Shiho, p.64 (Tokyo : Kadokawa, 1975)

15) Kimura, Tsuyoshi, CI Nicki Bei Bungaku Koryuski .no Kenkyu", p. 136

(Tokyo : Kobunsha, June 30 1982)

120

'''The Narrative of a Japanese" by Joseph Heco or James Murdoch?'·

1:: ::7 O))Jj{�v;:' -:r - }:' 'Y ? jQt =F� An""( i c ?i;)t.::..o (j[[!l£I1#� r � s �

7 • 1::::7, p. 112)

"Murdoch touched up Heco's MS. and wrote the introduction to

the 'Narrative '."16)

" Murdoch touched up and organized Heco's MS."17)

He does not mention the quality of either Heco's or Murdoch's English,

nor to what extent Murdoch corrected the MSS.

Further, the authors of the most recent translation of the' Nar­

rative ' fail not only to translate the introduction, but even to mention

Murdoch's name.1S)

Mr. Tominaga, writing more recently, takes a radically different

view, having seen Heco's original script in Tenri Library. He calls

Heco's English ' heibon ' (mediocre), also 'typical Japanese English'�

But perhaps he tends to hyperbole when he says that the' Narrative '

was:

�vi-:r- }:''Y?O) rrv7� -t/'J -C:' 1:: ::7O)tO)c�ia"'."'o)-C:'� Go (�7k!&:t: W7 � !J j] �� rr V7 � -l/� �*� �'?""(� p.105-

I �7�!J 7 J �-� 1949 ;R�*�lZJ�tflAji��)

" Actually it was Murdoch's 'Narrative ' ; it would be hard to

call it Heco's."19)

vVas it in fact Murdoch's narrative ? Was Heco's English' heibon '

as Mr. Tominaga has suggested? Exactly whose narrative was it ?

A glance at Heco's original English at once dismisses the notion

that it was so good that Murdoch had nothing to do. Murdoch had

a huge task, as can be discovered when retracing his footsteps.

16) Chikamori, Haruyoshi, "Joseph Hiko" p. 72 (Tokyo: Yoshikawa Kobunkan, Dec. 1963)

17) Ibid., p. 112. 18) Nakagawa, T. and O. Yamaguchi, Op. cit.

1 9) Tominaga, Makita, " Amerika Hikozo • Narrative' Shohon 0 Megutte ", 'Biblia,' p. 105, Vol. 1., Tenri University Library (Tenri : Tenseki Gakkai Hakko, 1 949)

121

Vo1.18 No.3

But this does n ot mean that Heco's written English was poor by

any m ean s. On t he contrary, it was surprisingly broad, rich and deep,

full of natural American expressions and turns of phrase . It was not

great literature, but t here must be many native Americans alive today

who would be hard put to write something similar. From the com­

ments o f his contemporaries it is most likely that his spoken English

was even better. That Heco even left a written record is a tribute

to his confidence in using English . John rvlan jiro kept his lips sealed,

and it is only through letters written to acquaintances and through

foreigners' observations that we co me to know he was afraid to ex­

press himself openly.20) Perhaps fo r Heco his' diaries ' were a kind

of c oded reco rd, a histo ry of actual facts, a world where he alone could

enter, because few people could yet read English.

To get a 'feel ' of the type of English Heco used and Murdoch

had t o fac e we can choose a passage at random from Heco's diaries:

" Jany 11t h 1889 . . The Mikado and his wife were in doubleteem

car riage and acco mpanied by ministers of states who were all

in ca rriages. Had fireworks, 9 flags with p oles attached, Westeria,

Tigar, balls, horses, girls etc. in all 50 rockets sent.

Here a m ost peculiar occurrence took place which I saw it

close by - which was Hanabusa21) cam e in double horse car riage

on way ca stle - his betto, who pushed an old man (of 60) who

fell on the gravel and could not get up for some seconds which

he saw with side look, but without shimesu,22) but went on - and

20) E. g., Lt. Brooke, who commanded the Kanrin Maru with the first Japa­

nese embassy to America, records in his log, (Feb. 22, 1860):

"Manjiro is often consulted by the Emperor and has aided the Amer­

icans very much although from policy he has never approached our

minister at Yedo. He does not wish anything published which would be turned to his disadvantage by jealous Japanese . . . " Collected Documents of the Japanese Mission to America 1860 Vol. 5 Brooke Journals, George M. Brooke, Jr., Ed., Eiichi Kiyooka, tr. p.82 (Associa­

tion for Japan-U. S. Amity & Trade Centennial, 1960) 21) Viscount, (Ito Shunsuke), Prime Minister of Japan and old friend of

Heco in Nagasaki before the restoration.

22) Without showing it. Double coded r Few people could read his diaries,

even fewer would understand Roman-lettered Japanese. On one occasion

he recorded seeing prostitutes in New York, but used the code word , baijo ' in the diary.

122

'''The Narrative of a Japanese" by Joseph Heco or James Murdoch?'

the police saw that his man did it. but did nothing; because he

was higher official of the government, we supposed."23)

This' o ccurrence' does not, incidentally, appear in the 'Narrative',

having been cut either by the author or by Murdoch, though the first

part of the entry for January 11th, not quoted here, went into print.

As can be seen, the word order is generally all right, but there are

many faults in the punctuation and phrase junctions.

Sometimes one can see clearly that he is master of the key words

of unusual expressions, though he has not had enough exposure to

English for the c omplete expression to be fleshed out internally. Here

is one interesting example : It & (they) gathered everything possible get hand onto." This

sentence is missing the words 'they could' between t possible' and

, get', also the word' their 'between' get' and' hand', and the t s' is

missing from t hand ' .. The complete sentence should read, t & (they)

gathered everything possible they could get their hands onto', or

, they could possibly get their hands onto '.24)

GRAMMAR MISTAKES:

Listed below· are some of the typical mistakes that Heco makes

In his two MSS. First come errors in grammatical construction; fol­

lowing these are some of the spelling mistakes which occur in his

diaries.

Heco has proble�s in these areas throughout his writings:

Past partici pIes

Conditional sentences

Singular and plural of nouns

I�direct speech (e. g. redundant question mark)

Irregular past tenses (e. g. t drinked ')

Phrasal verbs

Relative pronoun c onstructions

Sing. and plural of verbs (e. g. t we was')

23) MS. I. Large black bound diary 3, p. 183. (Tenri Univ. Library)

24) MS. II. Small Notebook 2, p. 3, line 7 ( 11 )

123

Vol. 18 No.3

Passives (e. g. � caused me to freightened')

Comparison of adjectives (e. g. � a biggest specemen', � high rank

than ')

The definite and indefinite article, (also � a ' . and 'an')

� during' instead of • while'

Confusion of the usages of 'like' (e. g. • he enjoyed it with much

likeness ')

lVlisuse of the phrase • no sooner had . . . than'

Redundant use of � it' (as in the � peculiar occurrence' incident

quoted above)

Distinction between � there' and' it' (e. g. ' there requires')

Prepositions (e. g. 'great on climbing')

Distinction between' little' and' a little'

Adjective order (e. g. 'red large lips')

Confusion of adjective endings (e. g. 'affected - affec ting')

Negatives after some verbs (e. g. 'dissuade not to do')

Lack of verb 'to be' after 'seem to' (e. g. '.he seems to tall') �almost' lacks the folJQwing 'all'. (e. g. '�lm�st· the people�.) .":'l'

Future tense with' going to' (e. g. 'what does he going to?') • a ' instead of 'one' (e. g. 'there is only a vessel there ')

Non-conform ity of tenses (e. g. 'your mistake in. attacking; and opposed ')

Adjectives, adverbs and nouns mixed (e. g. 'in gaily attire' 'a

well-behaviour man ').

There are also some special turns of phrase peculiar to Heco, such

as 'an owing to' which he often uses, also the word 'tho!'.

In one instance a small miss in syntax causes a big mis�nder­standing in Nagasaki; yet Heco never seems to hCilV� realized. that this was due in large part to his own ambiguity. He had been asked if he . ) . " .. could get permission for a Minister of the Prince of Hizen to visit an Amerkan man-of-war then in port. So he wrote a letter to a lieutenant on board who was a friend of his, including this s entence:

"I have been requested by one of the Cabinet Ministers of the . . ' . .. Prince of Hizen to inquire, and *he proposes to go on board tomor-

*My italics.

124

• "The Narrative of a Japanese" by Joseph Heeo or James Murdoch?'

.row if. your' Captain has no objection.25)

Joseph Heeo received a reply directly from the Captain himself:

" . • . If the' Prince of Hizen wishes to visit the ship, the Admiral

will be glad to receive him on board on Wednesday at one o'clock p. m."26)

To this Heco comments to himself ;

It When I received the above note, I noticed that the commander

mentioned a person whom I had never referred to in my note; ,but thinking that he might have misread my letter I thought it

was all right, and went straight to Motono and informed him of

the contents of the note, and saw the minister for the first time.

Both were quite pleased to wait for a few days and then go on

board and see the vessel.

But on the following day, when I got to my office, I found

a note which had come from the commander through a ship

chandler's chit-book. I �pened it and read as follow: - (sic)

Nagasaki, 22nd October, 1867.

Mr. J. Heco, .

Sir,- In your note of yesterday written to Lt. S . . . , of

this vessel, you stated that the Prince of Hizen desires to

come on board. Upon inquiry I am credibly informed' that

the Prince is not in town, and until the mistake made in

your note is explained, neither yourself nor your friends will

be ad'mitted on board.

Respectfully,

Your obedient servant,

(Signed) "27)

There is no point in· following this through to its tangled conclusion,

but it can be seen that the peppery Captain's imagination has run rie>t

25) Heco, J., Op. cit., Vol. II, p. 103. (This incident occurred in 1867) 26) Ibid., p. 103.

27) Ibid., p. 104.

125

Vol. 18 No.3

all because of a clumsy anaphora. Heco spent days trying to track the

mistake back to the Captain, thus to extract an apology to clear his

own name, but the incident remained a baffling and unpleasant memory to him. lThree and a half pages of the' Narrative' are devoted to

this sub jec t.

SPELLING MISTAKES:

As far as spelling goes, his mistakes can be roughly broken down

into; - words of Negro or poor white influence, those bearing the

influence of his Japanese background, those stemming from a lack of

French or Latin study, malapropisms, typical ' Hecoisms ' (e. g. con­

fusion of the letters 'i' and 'e '), words showing influence from his

commercial training, and more general plain spelling mistakes (including

proble ms with the doubling of consonants).

Probable (poor) Negro/poor liVhite:

, hole' (hold) , genises '

, shoke ' (shook) , clapse '

(geniuses) (collapse)

'choke' (chalk) , burrow' (borrow)

, set' (sit, sat) , criminate' (incriminate)

, strickly , (strictly) , grove, (groove)

'excaped' (escaped) 'borned' (born)J

, petty' (pity) , siezer ' (seizure)

, excussion ' (excursion) 'hep ache' (hip)

Japanese influence:

'Isumus' (Isthmus) (influence from kana 'su' in approximating

the 'th' sound)

'Fuiji' (Fiji) (influence from kana' hu', difficulty with' f' pronuncia-

tion; pronounced' Fuiji' in Japan today)

, creaking' (clicking) (problems with' l' and ' r')

, pouled ' (poured) (' l' & 'r ') also' fouled,' or 'filled '.

, crue' (clue) (-"-)

'Presbitalian' (Presbitarian) (- "' -)

· hairly foreigners' (hairy) (-"-)

'anniversal' (anniversary) (-"-)

126

, "The Narrative of a Japanese" by Joseph Heco or James Murdoch?'

'Real Admiral' (Rear)

• meagle ' (meagre)

Lack of French or Latin study :

(' I' & 'r')

(-"-)

'bureaux ' (bureau) F (retaining pI. 'x ' even in sing. use)

'facsimilar ' (facsimile) L. Fac (impv. of facere) + simile, to make

the like.28)

'Leitenant ' (Lieutenant) F. , Mongomery ' (Montgomery) F. • enveron of Yedo ' (environs) F. , suburd ' (suburb) L. Urb(s), city.

'belegerants ' (belligerants) L. Bellum, war.

Malapropisms:

. . . (a priest in his) 'surplus ' (surplice)

'court of arms '

'puddle steamer '

• alternately '

(coat of arms)

(paddle steamer)

(ultimately)

, Aide de Compte ' (Aide de Camp)

'we were already ' (all ready)

• legible & illegible ' (eligible & ineligible)

• topnut ' (topknot)

'burrow ' (borrow)

'studied with stars ' (studded)

'swallow-tale cook ' (swallow-tail coat) .

'has been cheque ' (checked)

'curios ' (curious)

Confusion of ' i' and' e' :

'i' shifted to 'e' • e' shifted to 'i' , specemen ' (specimen)

, freightened ' (frightened)

, wrenched ' (rinsed mouth)

, preist ' (priest)

, emense ' (immense) .

28) Random House Di;tionary.

127

, jitsoned ' (jettisoned)

, divil ' (devil)

'winded ' (wended)

'vixed ' (vexed)

'hight ' (height) : .....

Vol. 18 No.3

'i' shifted to t e'

I violen ' (violin) t guarden' (guardian)

'resque ' (risk)

I Vandebelt ' (Vanderbilt)

I previllege ' (privilege)

'enterview ' (in terview )

I entercourse ' (intercourse)

'desect , (dissect)

'begoted ' (bigoted)

'agetated , (agitated)

Commercial influence:

t e' shifted to t i'

• indiffinate' (indefinite)

, tribled ' (mixed, treble & tripled)

'squizze ' (squeeze)

I rebillion ' . (rebellion)

'cheque ' (v.) (check) (he was used to dealing with cheques)

. ideum ' (idiom) (obviously influenced by I idem ') I Aide de Compte ' (Camp) (probably thinking of t compte rendu '

and ' Le Com te ')

General spelling mistakes:

'star spangle banner' (spangled)

I cause' (clause)

'tidial waves' (tidal)

'paultoon ' (pantaloon) , creat ' (create)

'Philiadelphia' (Philadelphia)

• over shaped ' (oval) I Christainity' (Christianity)

• aceon '

'Tueseday ,

I scrab '

'hammacks'

, lightening'

• jocking ,

(ocean)

(Tuesday)

(scrub)

(hammocks)

(lightning)

(joking)

I grandier ' (grandieur)

I St. Francisco' (San Fr.)

'had or played Billard (billiards)

128

I insenseable' (insensible)

'beconed' (beckoned)

I past' (passed)

'tarpolin or tarperline ' (tarpaulin)

I horrah ' (horror)

'where ' (were)

, Illonia ' (Illinois)

t yayt ' (yacht)

I techinacall ' (technical)

I electro city , ( electrici ty)

'phsycion' (physician)

'openedly ' (openly) I coecive' (coercive)

'wriples' (ripples)

I hazzard' (hazard)

'bazzard' (bazaar)

''' The Narrative of a Japanese" by Joseph Heco or James Murdoch?'

�sucking wet ' (soaking)

� un vailing , ( un veiling)

� Empress dowdger' (dowager)

Problems with consonant doubling:

� criples ' ( cripples)

' canabels' ( cannibals)

� occassion ' (occasion)

' citty ' ( city)

' confussion' ( confusion)

� sq uals ' ( sq ualls )

'English' (to mean England,

or Englishman29»)

'snuzzing ' (snoozing)

6 shay' (shy)

, serverance ' (?)

I flittiness ' (?)

, begginning' (beginning)

'noded' (nodded)

'fogg' (fog)

'left of his writing ' (off)

'squated' (squatted)

etc.

Fro m the above we can see that he knows the words by ear and

was probably pronouncing them perfectly,29) but has problems when

it comes to putting pen to paper. He is particularly unclear about the

vowels ' a, e, i' and' u' which are only learnt by practice as they fol­

low rio seemingly logical rule in English. After a mere two years of

education he had to leave school on account of his benefactor 's bank­

ruptcy.

When all the mistakes are assembled they appear to be quite a lot,

but actually these are the siftings of more than a thousand pages of MS.

Had Joseph Heco worried about his mistakes, he would never have

achieved what he did. And it is important to remember that even

well-educated contemporary Americans had less than perfect spelling.

When John Manjiro had been rescued some ten years before Heco's

experience, Captain Whitfield of the American whaler' John Howland'

wrote in his log (1840):

II On a w haleing voyage.

Sunday, June 27th. this day light wind from S. E. the Isle in

sight at 1 p. m. sent in 2 boats to see if there was any turtle

29) Except ' 1 ' and' r' which still today , as with Heco 100 years ago, cause

difficulty for the Japanese.

129

Vol. 18 No.3

found 5 poor distre�ed people on the isle tuck thim of cold30) not

understand anything from them. more than that they was

hungry.H3l)

But Heco's English was solid, reliable, written in his own style; it

was a record of events, with no ascertainable audience in mind save

himself, or perhaps an imaginary, impartial reader, sane and possessing

a higher sense of, judgement. In general his observations are well

balanced, and one is struck by the maturity of his hand. Often one

can feel how upset he becomes in the face of unfair dealings, especially

when it comes to human relationships, money and politics. In such

cases he tends to record facts which will support a case against, or

criticism of, something which he finds distasteful. In this sense there

is an element of newspaper sensationalism - not too surprising when we

remember that he had produced the first private newspaper in Japan.32)

His diaries are packed with facts and figures, sometimes crossing

the border into the banal. This recording of minutiae must in part have

stemmed from his commercial training at Macondray & Co. in San

Francisco. In later years he records trips which p.e tqok along the

old T6kaido for pleasure, or to hot spring resorts for ,neuralgia etc.,

and he has left us details of his hotel bills, down to how many sen for

chadai. Most of these, details were removed, probably by Murdoch,

so that they do not appear in the printed' Narrative ' :

" At Takasaki station I met Dr. & Mrs. Hepburn, who has been to the Ikao, on account of neuralgia of the face,etc.

At Ikao-hotel The bill for the week as, follows. viz:-Hire of 8 & 6-two rooms '��dth all utensils- ¥ 5.00 (1st class) Two sets of Futon or beddings O. 77 Food, or provission, such as rice, soy',' oil, wood, coal, et.c.

, 7: 50 Fish, Eggs, fowls (?), etc. etc. 10.50 A servant's wages 0.70

30) 'tuck thim of �=' took them off 'I' cold '=' could'. 31) Nakahama, Toichiro, 'Nakahama Manjiro Den' p.30, (Tokyo: Tomiyama

Bo, 1936)

32) 'Kaigai Shimbun', circa 1864.

130

'''The Narrative of a Japanese" by Joseph Heco or James Murdoch?'

Chadai (declined) & presents to servants & hotel people

0.70

¥ 25.17"33)

In his later years he also assembled, and thus bequeathed us, many

commercial account books, newspaper cuttings, memos, letters etc .

Murdoch's given task

This record34) Heco handed to James Murdoch, "sometime in the

spring of 1892 ",35) (three years after the first Meiji Constitution, and

two years before the Sino-Japanese war), with an exhortation to:

.. extract from them all that was of more than purely personal

interest, and if I deemed the excerpts so made worthy of being

made public, to see to the publication of the same."36)

Why did Heco choose Murdoch? This will be discussed in a future

paper, but among the many factors Murdoch's very different back­

ground must have been one. Heco was Japanese-American, and Mur­

doch was Euro-Australian. Their worlds were almost polar opposites,

but this � outside' quality in Murdoch must have aftracted Heco.

Murdoch must have had a shining reputation as a first-class.' scholar,

so he was someone that Heco could respect. It so happens also, that

they both had several interests in common; among them being con­

nections with the world of journalism and a fondness for history. Mr.

Chikamori suggests that- it was discussions about history that led Heco

to hand over his MSS,37)

There are very few pages of Murdoch's edited MS. left in Tenri

University Library38) and most of these were not used for the t Narr­

a tive " but it can 'be readily assumed that it was he who corrected all

of the above-mentioned gramma'r and spelling mistakes in Heco's MS.

33) MS. , 1. Large black bound notebook 3, p. 180 (1888) (Tenri, Op. cit.) 34) at least the thin end of the wedge, i. e. eight notebooks comprising ]\1S.

II. for the first half of Heco's writings�

35) Heco, J., Op. cit., (Intro., p. I, Murdoch.)

36) Ibid., (Intro. p.1., Murdoch) ,

37) Chikamori, H., Op. cit., p. 72.

38) Dowding, P., Op. cit., p.25.

131

Vol. 18 :\0. 3

Apart from grammar and spelling correction, 11urdoch actually

revamped and wrote out at least the 254 pages of Vol. II. of the ' Narr­

ative' by hand.39) This must have been an enormous task. He had

to untangle Heco's constructions and then recompose them in more

elegant English. But, in so doing, Murdoch assures us that:

"Nothing in the sense of tvIr. Heco's diary has been changed in

the setting forth of his story."40)

Murdoch's stylistic influence In order to discuss rvlurdoch's role in the creation of the ' Narr­

ative' it is necessary to distinguish between what is characteristically

Heco's style and that which is Murdoch's. But how is this to be done?

No one has yet been able to s tate with confidence, on reading the

'Narrative', whose composition was whose.

The period from 1888, when Murdoch first set foot in Japan, to

1892-3 when the' Narrative' was being type-set, was a time of enormous

literary activity for tviurdoch.41) Common themes and stylistic habits

appear throughout these writings; familiarization with these leads to

a clearer recognition of Murdoch's touches in the final printed 'Narr­

ative of a Japanese '.

Murdoch's influence can be seen in the following ways, at least.

He started rewriting the ' Narrative ' with a young Western audience

in mind. At 36 years of age he was, inter alia, an ex-grammar school

headmaster with a particular view of and understanding for young

boys. At times we can see him writing dramatically with a typically

Scottish fascination for blood and intrigue. At other times he writes

with humour. There is evidence of Murdoch's scholarly background ,

in the discussions of religious and political history and in the use of

other languages. Also in the ' Narrative' can be found borrowings

from, or similarities with certain passages or phrases in his other

writings. There are many typical • Murdochisms '. There are faint

traces of his known racial views,42) but his famed agnosticism can be

39) Ibid., p.25.

40) Heco, J., ap. cit., In tro., p. 11. 41) See Sugiyama, Tamaki, .. James Murdoch(l) - A Bibliographical Study-."

(Okayama Shodai Rons6, Jan. 1983)

42) Sis sons, D., ap. cit., pp. 0020-0026.

132

'''The Narrative of a Japanese" by Joseph Heco or James Murdoch?'

felt only hi a passive way.

We can find some of Murdoch's pet themes woven into the' Narr­

ative ', and in some instances these threads can be pulled out whole.

Also in evidence are " certain disorders of style ... (which) are easily

forgiven in consideration of the author's perfect candour, and his skill

in unravelling . .. "43) of which Chamberlain accused him. And through­

out there are persistent reminders of Murdoch's Scottishness.

All of the above are features which distinguish Murdoch's hand

from that of Heco.

As Tominaga44) and Sugiyama45) have pointed out, the detail- packed

first page of Heco's chronicle is missing in Murdoch's finished version.

This may appear radical or indeed brutal treatment, far beyond what

we were led to believe in the Introduction. Murdoch, however, had a

good sense for how to tell a story. This is, after all, a fascinating

tale of a young boy's adventures ; rather than start out therefore

with a long dry historical explanation, he chose to shelve it and in­

troduce it little by little. This is certainly effective with children,

tha t is, to teach necessary facts by mixing them in with a story. It is rather like crushing up bitter medicine and mixing it into a spoonful

of strawberry jam! Indeed this is what he did, the contents being not

discarded, but rather rewoven into the' Narrative' further on.

This gives us a primary inkling that Murdoch's intended readers

were, at least for the beginning of the 'Narrative', to include the

young. 46) Phrases like" a few were sea-faring men "47) recall adventure

stories such as 'Treasure Island'. Reminders of the conditions of a

past civilization appeal more to youthful imagination:

" .. in these days the means of. communication and travel were

very different from the railways, steamers and telegraphs of

today, and the simple village folk seldom went .. ."48)

43) Chamberlain, Basil, Things Japanese, p. 62, (London: Kegan Paul, 1939) (pointed out to me by Mr. Sugiyama to whom I am indebted for count­less kindnesses.)

44) Ope cit., p. 102. 45) Sugiyama, Tamaki, 'Joseph Heco Snoron', Okayama Shadai Ronsa, Vol. 4,

Nos. 1 & 2 combined, (Okayama Shadai Gakkai, 1969) 46) His 10 year old son was living with him at this time. 47) HecD, J., Ope cit. p. 2. 48) Ibid., p. 2.

133

Vol. 1 8 No. 3

:NIurdoch has introduced a measurin g stick usin g Mos c o w f r o m London

to illus trate the c o n s ciousness with whic h villa ge pe ople o f H e c o ' s area

must have rega rded a dis tant pla ce like Nagasaki.4 9 ) F r o m this we know

that Murdo c h m eant this book to be read a m o n g Westerners, p rimarily

B riti sh people. Heco himself does not seem to have given much

thought to the type of read e r o f his dia ries .

Sometimes after a d ive rting des c rip tive c o m ment there c o mes an

apology add ressed dir e c tly t o the reader, for having w a n d e r e d . This

is a charac teristic habit o f NIurdoch's , which can be found in s o m e of

his other w ritin gs, and leads one to identify the pa r ticula r c o m m ent

as o n e of IVlurd o c h's manufacturing . F o r exa m ple :

" But the r e ! Agai n the f risky jade's been tripping

And wan tonly m eande ring from the way.

I r eally must this wretc hed vice be nipp ing

l ' the bud , or she will ever thusly stray

From off the t rack . . . ; 0 )

I n the ' Nar ra tive ' the following passage IS obviously Murdo c h 's :

" To m e the excitement of being a t last fairly on my way into

that strange wo rld of which I had heard so much, was s o g r eat

that I can r ecall ever y little incident of the trip a t t his day, and

altho ugh they are trivial l ittle details w hich can be of n o in­

terest to the general reader , I a m sur e that every one will have

much sy m pa thy with the youngster who was then taking his

plunge into the g r ea t o c ean of life . " 5 1 )

This is n o t Heco rew ritten, b u t pure Murdoch. In the descrjption of

Miya jima nea r the beg i nnin g of the ' Na r rative ' there are extra details

which ar e not eviden t in Heco's ]\;lSS. It could be that Murdo ch heard

them from Heco personally, but one is in clined to attribute them to

Murdoch himself if o nly f o r the reason that he apologizes afterwa rds.

49) Ibid . , p . 3, It is interesting to see how the Japanese translators have

laboured to turn this word for word into Japanese. This measuring

stick would surely c onfuse, rather than enlighten the average Japanese.

50) NIia 11 , A. Gp. cit . , p. 1 9, v . XLVIII. 5 1 ) H ec o, J. , Gp. cit, pp . 7-8.

1 34

, "The Narrative of a Japanese" by Joseph Heco or James Murdoch ? '

He has a slight tinge of guilt for not sticking to the letter of his intro­

duction !

« I have wandered a way from my narrative and must now

return."52)

This device gradually disappears with the flow of events as the t Narr­ative ' . becomes a more generalized politico/historical account, growing

in detail, until towards the end of Vol. II it would be quite unpalatable for a child. This is one of the changes which occur in Murdoch as

he gradually falls in line with the general tone of Heco's chronicle.

That Murdoch had a horrible fascination with blood, war, plots

and dark dealings will not surprise anyone familiar with Scottish his­

tory and literature ( the Border Ballads, MacBeth etc.) In I Sights and scenes on the Tokaido '53 ) he quotes a particularly

grisly paragraph from Kaempfer's t History of Japan ' about the I publick '

execution ground in Suzugaoka, then tops i t off with a comment of

his own :

<I For nearly three centuries its blood pits were forever moist

and soaking."54 )

This kind of language is not used by Heco but · appears in the

I Na rrative ' here and there, indicating Murdoch's hand. As an example

he recreates the assassination of Heco's former shipmate Dan who had been employed as a cook by Rutherford Alcock in the British

Embassy in Yedo :

« Shortly after the year set in, Dan, . . . had been cut down a t Takanawa, in t h e midst of the highway i n open daylight. He was helping some boys to fly their kites in the street about 4 p. m. Suddenly a man, with a great broad straw-hat down over his fac e ca�e behind him, plunged a cruelly.,.sharp dirk

52) Ibid., p. 16. 53) Ogawa, K., (photographer ) ' Sights and Scenes on the Tokaido with des­

criptive text by James Murdoch, M. A., ( Yokohama Printing & Publishing Co. Ltd., May 1 1 , 1892 )

54) Ibid., plate VII (description)

135

Vol. 1 8 No. 3

into Dan's back, twisted it round in the wound to I mak sic car "

and ran off like a deer. Dan shouted for help and staggered

into the gate of the Consulate. After a few paces he fell with

the blood pouring from him in streams, and in a few minutes

life had left him."55)

In fact it is at times like this that Murdoch quits plodding along

and with a strange glee he enters into the drama of the situation,

elaborating way beyond Heco's record. Reading the I Narrative ' with

an eye out for this type of language will help one to recognize

Murdoch.

Murdoch's humour is mostly what might be called I dry ' in the

U. S. A., and hides among twists of phrases as irony, or as pun, but

examples of it in his other works lead us to discover his handiwork

in the I Narrative '. In the I Tokaido ' he refers to the fact that in

Japan it was the carpenter and not the shoemaker who traditionally

made wooden geta ;

It • • it is the carpenter that is responsible for your understand­

ings."56)

In the middle of a serious description of Nikko there is a list of

revered objects contained in one of the temples there,. with one out­

standing absurdity. Murdoch, like the child in the story of the I Em­

peror,s New Clothes', could not force himself to respect that which is

not worthy :

.. inside the balustrade of this platform the chief objects are

those represented in plate XV ; to wit - the Drum Tower, the Bell

Tower, the moth-ea ten Corean Bell, and the Dutch Candelabrum."57)

Likewise in the very first paragraph of Vol. II of the I Narrative ' a

detail about the eagle ensign having been stolen from the gate of the

55) Heco , J., Ope cit., Vol. 1. pp. 236-7. � 56) Ogawa, K., Ope cit., plate XI (descr.) 57) Ogawa, K., The Nikko District, with descriptive text by James Murdoch,

M. A., plate XV (Yokohama : Gazette Press, May 1 9, 1893)

136

' ''The Narrative of a Japanese" by Joseph Heco or James Murdoch ? '

American Embassy catches his fancy. He plays with bird images ;

these were not of Heco born !

<I August 4th. This morning the U. S. Consulate was found to

be minus its national coat-of-arms over the gateway. This se­

emed to ruffle the worthy Consul very considerably. He at once

issued a notice offering a reward for information leading to the

apprehension and conviction of the thief who had been tampering

with Uncle Sam 's fowl-yard . . . "58)

He also liked the element of the bizarre in Heco's story of a cu­

stoms officer who was reluctant to commit I hara-kiri'. To Westerners

peering from outside, this is interesting stuff ; to be given a glimpse

behind the mask of Japan and to see a recognizable, familiar and

welcome human trait being expressed, i. e. r eluctance in the face of

death. The irony in ' Happy Despatch ' is emphasized by Murdoch by

his of capital letters :

u It would seem that hara-kiri is an institution that is not always

appreciated by its victims as it should be. For instance, a local

custom-house officer detected . in aiding and abetting silk smugglers

exhibited the greatest reluctance to quit life by the Happy

Despatch some five days ago. In truth, we are given to under­

stand that it needed all the combined eloquence of his house

hold and relatives and friends to induce him to take the step.

They surrounded him in his own house, urging and imploring

him to thus wash away his guilt, and to preserve the heredita ry

income and rank of his family, and, at last, after exhibiting th�

greatest reluctance, the smuggler allowed himself to be persuaded

to do the deed. But it was sorely against the grain."59)

One may wonder how much and in what way this is different from

Heco's original English. Here is the original version of the above pas­

sage :

58) Heco, J., Ope cit., Vol. II, p. 1. 59) Ibid., Vol. II, p. 41 . (The italics in this paragraph are Murdoch's)

137

Vol . 1 8 �o. 3

" In t h e a f ternoon, it is re ported & confir med that a C. H. o fficer­

r esid-at Ben t e n , Yoko : "'.\Tho was im plicated in the smugling Raw

silks int o Y okoha m a , against guild , without pa ying licence-had

c o m mitted Ha ra-kiri on the night of the 1 st. in s t : at his house.

The town talk said that he did not want t o d o Ha ra-kiri, but his

r elatives surr ounded him & make him to do i t , in o rde r to save

his hereditar y inc o m e for the family, & atone his g uilt, like t rue

Sam urai."60 )

Yes, Murd o c h has c e r tainly changed n o thing i n the sense of 1tlr . Heco's

diary, . . . but h e has c e r tainly en joyed himself in the d e c o ra tion !

And h e has done a g ood job in the p r o c ess. Mur d o c h eXJ: oses the

underlyin g human elements which are semi d o r mant in Heco's obser va­

tions. This is jus t one exam ple ; there are many m o r e of these little

cameos, but unfor tunately this is not the m o m ent to quote all o f them.

James Ivlu r d o c h ' s schola rship manifests characteristically on oc­

casion , but c o m pa r ed t o the tortuous flippan c y of earli er w ri tin g s like

' D on Juan ' and ' Lord Tennyson ' 6 1 ) o r the ethereal sc enic desc riptions

in Mr. Ogawa's p h o t o g raphic travelo gues, this time it is n o ticeably

subdued, indicating that he exer cised a modicum of self-restraint. There

are, for exam ple, supplementar y explanations about Buddhism and

Shin toism for the uninformed reader, which are s t r o n gly reminiscent

of those in the ' Scenes ' series . 6 2 )

Joseph H e c o w r o te out a sho r t back g round history of the 1\.1ikado,

the Shogun and the p r oble m s caused by the a r rival o f the f o r eigners,

which was dic tated to him by Hitotsubashi's doctor . It concerns the

c rucial yea r s 1 863-4 ; two extra-large pages of clo sely w ritten MS. in

Heco's hand can be found f olded inside the back c over of o n e of his

three diaries. Mur d o c h has rew ritten and expanded this to include

further detail. Proba bly his reading of Kaem pfer, G r i ffi s and Mitford

provided this j n f o r mation, as his quotations show that it did for the '47

Ronin s ' , the ' Hakone Distric t ' etc . ( Kaempfer is quo ted especially

60) Heeo's MS. I, large black bound n o tebook 2, p. 1 1 2 ( Tenr i )

6 1 ) Miall , A. , Op. cit. , (appended to ' Don Juan ' ) " Lord Tenny-n i n Jap an ".

62) Mention of the ' M on t o ' seet of Buddhism draws our eye in both the

, Tokaido ' , Plate XV, and the ' Narra tive ' p. 30.

138

' ''The Narrative of a Japanese" by Joseph Heeo or James Murdoch ? '

lavishly, and his name even appears in the • Narrative ', though no­

where can it be found in Heco's original diaries.63 ») Apart from the final

chunk of this history, Murdoch has put the whole expanded version

into the • Narrati ve ' on pages 46 to 52.

Whether by request or not, Murdoch has hidden his Latin lantern

under a bush for the time being, yet we know how much he loved this

language.64 ) We can find only brief mention of • ex-votos ' on Kompira

san, and not much else in Latin. Likewise there is no Greek in the

I Narrative " though both languages abound in other writings.

The Russian word I ukase ' creeps in, and there are several French

phrases which bear witness to Murdoch's time at the Sorbonne, e. g.

I raison d'etre " t coup de main " • coup d'etat ' and • mal de mer '. (We

know that Heco never studied French.) In ' Don Juan ' Bill Snooks,

the • hero ', finds himself suffering from seasickness in the English

Channel. He was · brought up to be a paragon of virtue, yet here he is

jn the same dire strait ( I) as everyone else on board. His complaint is :

tt It certainly was wrong that saints should share with sinners

in the throes of ma1-de-mer ! "65)

Heco's diary records his r eturn by ship from Kobe to Yokohama in

Feb. 1888. It states simply that there were six Provincial Governors

on the same boat and that there was a storm. Beyond a little name­

dropping, Heco obviously had no further axe to grind. But Murdoch's

version has the pompous Governors being cut down to size by Nature :

.. Among the passengers I noticed no fewer than a round half­

dozen of Provincial Governors, for none of whom mal de me'y

had the slightest respect ; sea-sickness being no great respecter

of dignities."66)

63) Heco, J., Op. cit., Vol. II, p. 189 " So my Banto and I . . . went to Kobe, even as our Japanese forefathers went in the time of Kaempfer."

64) A. M., (pseud.) • From Australia and Japan ', 7 novelettes, ( The Bear Hunt

on Fuji-San, p. 1 93, I I Truly a glorious thing is Latin, it is a high and

lofty privilege to be acquainted with it." Slightly tongue-in-cheek here.)

(Newcastle and London : Walter Scott Press, 1892)

65) Miall, A., Op. cit., p. 34, verse XCV:. 66) Heco, J., Op. cit., Vol. II, p . 243.

139

Vol. 18 No. 3

This shot was plainly hard to resist ; though, to be fair, if you examine

the language closely, you will find that Murdoch has not actually stated

that they were sea-sick.

Apart from this smattering of French, we find little or no evidence

for all the other languages, e. g. Portuguese, Spanish, German, and so

on, which he is said to have learned with such' amazing rapidity.

If there are few t foreign ' languages, there are on the other hand

many Scottish/English words, some of which lend to the ' Narrative'

an air of elegance, some of scholarship, and some of atmosphere. On

the other hand this has its dangers. Murdoch sometimes overstepped the line ; simple correction of mistakes and style is one thing, but

replacement of words of which he does not approve culturally is quite

another. He steps not on the Japanese, but on the American and the

human in Heco.

Tha t Heco never used such Scottish/English words in his text is

clear from a reading of his original diaries. Heco was never exposed

for any length of time to this kind of European language. Most of

the words which will be listed below in greater detail (e. g. ' dirk',

• twain ', t darkling ', etc.) make their appearance in • Ayame San',6?>

• Tales from Australia and Japan ' and so on, so there can be no doubt

that they came from Murdoch's quill.

For the sake of comparison, here is a list of typical sample words

usen by Heco and by Murdoch. A line indicates the word's correction,

i. e. its movement from Heco's to Murdoch's choice of word. A cross

shows a word which was taken out by Murdoch and does not appear

in print. Heco's words are broken down into three approximate cat­

egories of : a) Natural, acceptable, expressive American (or slang),

b ) Language with no • class', gauche, and c) Universal English ; this

latter had to suffer ignominy at Murdoch's pen, for sometimes next

to no pretext.

Murdoch's language is broken into four main d�visions. a) Universal

English, (which, being universal, had little claim to superiority over

Heco's universal English), b) The type of English used mostly in Eng-

67) Murdoch, James, Ayame San, A Japanese Romance of the 23rd Year of NIeiji ( 1890), (London : Walter Scott, 1892)

140

, "The Narrative of a Japanese" by Joseph Heco or James Murdoch ? ' .

land, (though the border with Scotland is well nigh invisible), c) Scot­

tish English (again, here, one has to rely on feeling generally), and

d) Biblical, literary, poetic or archaic English.

(This is not a definitive statement of word origins, and it · is open

to argument. In many cases it might have been better to have quoted

the whole context for each word ; as it is many people . will find this

table a little hard to follow, no doubt. Words or phrases appearing in

the top right quarter are simply a sample of the Narrative's vocabu­

lary which are without question Murdoch's.)

It should be noted that many of Murdoch's corrections of Heco

are unnecessary, being merely six of one and half a dozen of the

other. This kind of thing must have been rather irritating for Heco,

tending to open the door for argument, and ultimately leading to a

breakdown of mutual trust and a questioning of earlier justified cor­

rections.

Why does a dagger have to be a dirk ? Obviously to Murdoch

there were many similarities between old Scotland and old Japan, and

he has lifted the vocabulary of the one for the other. Therefore if he

once calls the Satsuma Han the • Satsuma Clan ', then it would naturally

follow that like true Scottish clansmen they should carry dirks. Within

such a frame ·of reference Murdoch could feel somewhat at home, and

we come to understand his hero worship of the 47 Ronin68 ) and of Saigo

Takamori.69) This also explains his love of, and poetic descriptions of.

the mountainous areas of Japan.

Murdoch not only corrected Heco's mistakes, he also interfered

with normal American or universal English. He definitely preferred

68) Ogawa, K., • Scenes from the Chiushingura and the Story 0/ the Forty­

Seven Ronine' Descriptive text by James Murdoch, M. A. (Tokyo : Tsukiji Katsuban SeizQsho, Dec. 17, 1892). One can feel the reverence with which he attempts to tell the real story.

69) In Vol. II of the Narrative, where he had a free hand arranging news­paper clippings etc., he devotes six and a quarter pages of . fine type to the report in the Japan Mail of Saigo's uprising, pp. 216-222. He also wrote a 12 stanza poem in praise of Saigo Takamori which is included in • Don Juan's Grandson in Japan '. In the explanatory footnote he wrote, " Saigo Takamori is one of the finest and grandest figures to adorn the glowing pages of Japanese History." p. 62.

141

Co n tras ting TVord Usage of Heco and ��Iurdoch, and Murdoch's handling of Heco's voca bu lary.

JOSEPH HEe O I J AllIES NIURDOCH ---

1 . Accep table, n a tural , exp r e s s i v e A m erican Engl i sh , (and slan g )

m ighty lone ly belly ac h e

x

x fun ked out

set-------------------------�

done------------------------4

stuck h i s pan t s 111 - -- ------t h o ! x

I--

-;�iv er sal

I English

a la cr i t y

diarrhoea

clo tted

s i t , sat

did

Engl ish En gl i sh

sixpence

al l in a twinkling

saucy . . . . . . . . .

----------------- �tucked h i s t r ousers in gr i s ly gory

----------------- �carriages cars --------------------­

sing ou t ------------------­ . � call out fClg-end o f measles

n on ey

or

cleal' r ound ­

for love of 1

flavor, favor

labor, n e i ghb

honor, c olor ·

behavior -­travel ed , tra veling

2 . Gauche

t iffen ---­

chow

a feed

A . 1 .

O . K.

, I . :

x

x

x

x

-4 �

. __ ._-

�

all r ound

f or l ove or m on ey

d inn er . . umbrage

. . . . .

i t was t h e w on t

--flavou r , fav our

�la bour , n e ighbour

�h onou r , c ol onr

�behavi our

�travelled/-el l ing

. t iffin

.'. • :: � .. � t '

Sc o t t ish En gl ish

in very s o o t h .

mak sicc a r

. sau cy

run l ike a deer

l i k e sick chickens

Biblical , l i terary poetic , archaic

. in very sooth

odes

darkling

wax b old apace

set a-cla m ouring

g o a-missing

brea k a sund e r

clan s try t h e m e t tle o f t h e i r sw ord s

clan s m en m ore a n on

sh e w . . uncouth

. sh ew

....... (Xl

Z ? w

a la foreign x

a la European x

she ( the ship) cleaned her bottom

-

3. Hec o's Universal English

eat us up -

top sails -

serpent •

funny •

grain : -

exactly -

'hired •

refined -

roving - .

sails -

tea-chests •

bark •

port -

store-ship -

stiff wind

burden

clothed -+

- dagger

wash hands

dared

two -

kill

she was careened

devour us

royals

dragon

ludicrous

wheatfields

precisely

chartered

respectable

rambling

canvas

chests

barque

harbour

hulk

.rousing w ind . . . . . . . rousing wind -burthen

clad . . . . . . . . . . . . clad . . . . . . . . . . . . . clad . . . . . . . . . . clad

-dirk

-lustration

-durst . . . . . . . . . durst

-twain

-slay

Vol. 1 8 No. 3

the En glish spelling with ' u ', such as in ' favour ' ! ' Fred �Yilso n's Fa te '

con tains this passa ge :

" It was a1l over the question of a ' u ' m o r e o r less that the

deadly feud between Fred Wilson and old Symonds at first or ig­

inated . . . . Now, being Engli sh, and high-toned Conservative at

that, h e insisted on spelling English in the old approved o r thodox

fa shion. So when Vlilson, in " subbing " his c o p y, c ut out all

the " u's " fr o m " favour ", " honour ", and so f o rth, there was

a deba tin g society o r tWO."70 )

Is it a sim ple coin ciden ce that the very sa me t w o words a p pear within

the sa m e sentence on page 46 of Vol. II of the Narrative ?

" Princ e Hitotsu-bashi has beco me quite a fa vourite with the ab ove

party and has been hono u red with the appointment of C o m mander­

in-chief o f all the forces in Osaka ."7 1 )

(Could Murdoch have been wo rking o n t wo p r o jects at once ? )

T h e exam ple of ' pants ' i s interesting. When H e c o was picked u p

I n the Pacific by the American bark ( Murdoch, ' barque ' ) he desc ribed

the unusual dress of the foreigners. In one pla c e Heco would use the

word t pantaloon s ' and in another ' pants '. 11urdoch inva riably allo wed

t pantaloon s " but always changed t pants ' into the British t trouser s ',

because ' pants ' means under wear in Britain. Where Hec o noted the

Captain havin g " long boots into which he stuck his pants into it ", Mur­

d och quickly decided that H long boots into which his tro use rs were

tucked " would b e fa r m o r e apropos .

And so Vol. I c ontinues from page 59 t o 86 with t pants ' changing

unerringly into t trousers ' until Heco's rescuers ' ship anchors in San

Francisco Bay. I m mediately, various boats draw up alongside car­

rying eithe r workers or gentlemen. The stevedores wear cloth pantalo­

ons and are rough and of common class. Heco reports on seeing t wo

men who :

70) From Aus tra lia and Japan, Op. cit . , p. 274. 7 1 ) He sticks to this sp elling to the end o f the Narrative ; whether out of

orthodoxy or out of regard for the orthodox reader cann ot be said.

1 44

' ' 'The Narrative of a Japanese" by Joseph Heco or James Murdoch ? '

.. dressed in flannel shirts and cloth pants, wore felt hats, &

suspenders across their shoulders to uphold ' their· pants."72)

At last the penny must have dropped ; Murdoch realized that pants

made of cloth and held up by suspenders must be the self-same pan­

taloons that Heco was talking about, and thus quite different from

what he had imagined. For the first time, on page 86 of. the Narr­

ative, he allows ' pants ' to go unchanged,

.. two men in flannel shirts, cloth pants, felt hats, and suspenders

over their shoulders to uphold their pan ts."

though he leaves his previous corrections up to page 86 all unchanged.

In other words Murdoch has recognized Heco's use of this word

for the first time, and has backed down. For a while the word had

been unacceptable, then Murdoch understood it in its proper setting.

Murdoch went through this same process with the American word

' car ' (in the meaning of that which is pulled by a locomotive). Heco

was relating his first train ride, from New York to Baltimore in 1853.

Reading the Narrative we can see the traces of Murdoch's contact

with this passage :

.. We left New York next morning at 7 o'clock. On the way to

the Depot he told me we were to ride in a car riage drawn by a

steam-engine, which could go at the rate of 25, 40, or even 60

miles an hour. This, of course, I set down as another story

told by the old gentleman to excite my wonder. However when

we got to the Depot I saw a number ot beautifully fitted ca r­

riages with a steam-engine at their head. We took our seats in

one of those, and while we sat there the engine began to snort

and puff and the car to move. It moved slowly at first but

presently it sped along so rapidly that what we passed could

not be distinctly seen, while the train itself vibrated and undulated

like a snake chased in the water."73)

72) Heeo, J., Ope cit., Vol. II, p. 46. 73) Heeo, J" Ope cit., Vol. I, pp. 138-9.

145

Vol. 18 No. 3

This backing down is subtly evident throughout the Narrative.

The majority of Murdoch's explanations, asides and additions pre­

sent themselves within the first few chapters of Vol. 1.74> There are

also whole passages which do not exist in the diaries, yet which could

not have been made up by the editor. The reminiscences of Heco's

stepfather concerning Commodore Biddle's first visit to Uraga in 1846,

found on pp. 33 & 34 of the Narrative are one example . This particular

story is likely to have come directly from the horse's (Heco's) mouth.

The young Hecotaro's walk around the sights of Yedo sou:nds at first like a total Murdoch composition, but one cannot be sure. " The

, first officer of the ' Eiriki Maru' one of the c rew and myself (Heco)

started out", is too real ; in all likelihood it is the descriptive ·and

decorative language which remind us of Murdoch.

The first day of the abov� walk took them from the Sumida River,

where they could ' see the castle in the distance, to ' the Temple of

Kannon in Asakusa. Gifford in t Ayame San ' took a jinrickshaw to

the castle, then to. Asakusa, to the Sumida and finally to the Temple

of Kannon. In the Narrative a distinctive feature of the temples in Yedo i s : It the huge pa rabolic sweep of their black tiled roofs."75) In t Ayame San ' Murdoch mentions the roof of the Temple of Kwannon

with its: I t huge pa rabolic sweep of somb re tiles."76)

The similarities are str�ing . an� one wonders exactly who got

his ideas from whom. This question arises in other places too. (Al­though Ayame San was published first it contains ' traces of Heco's Nar rative. ) Murdoch had on occasion been accused of plagiarism,7?)

but that again is another topic. ' .

The above mentioned backing-down is a two-fold process. At first

74) One can find them easily on pages 1, 8, 9, 10, 1 1 , 12, 1 3, 15, 16, 2 1 , 23, 27, 28, 30, 31 , 36, 37, 44, 45 and 46. Pure Murdoch are the threeliners in Vo1. II, p. 128, " And such is a fair sample of the way people of wealth travelled in old Japan, when the hours were of little .value and folk had really time, to· live." and p. 241 , " As the, .English play has it : ' The age is grown so picked that , the toe of the peasant comes so near the heel of the courtier, he galls llis kibe." (Shaks. Hamlet V. l. 153)

75) Heco, J. Ope cit., Vo1. I. p. 28. 76) Ayame San, Ope cit., p. 262. 77) Sissons , D., Ope cit., p. 0061 .

146

I "The Narrative of a Japanese" by Joseph Heco or James Murdoch ? '

Murdoch is eager, full of spirit, radical and impetuous. ready to take

on Heco's story and to do as he likes with it, carte blanche. In this

we may detect an element of ego. Heco had probably used that time­

honoured Japanese approach designed to get someone to do you a

favour. That is to say that you lower yourself, flatter the other person

and treat him to all kinds of attention until the balance of obligation

has swung far enough jn your own favour that it has now become

possible to ask a favour in return.

If so this would explain to some extent the gradual withdrawal of

Murdoch into the background as the Narrative proceeds. After initial

eagerness Murdoch seems to flag as he comes up against the steady

reliability of Heco's pen. He becomes content to confine himself to

simple correction of Heco's grammar and worst stylistic traits. His

effervescence, confidence and ego have become somewhat crushed as

he reads deeper and discovers the validity of Heco's writings.

In other words Murdoch begins to recognize Heco as one more

human-being, neither better nor worse. but simply very different in

background, m o od, outlook etc. Whether he liked Heco or , not is

difficult to say. but it is likely that he felt that he had bitten off more

than he could chew, especially when it came to Vol. II. He edited

this when he came back from his brief and rather fruitless trip to

Paraguay's New Australia in 1893/4.

Volume II is, as Mr. Tominaga has pointed out in Biblia78) , full of

material not to be found in Heco's diary, in large pa,rt newspaper

clippings. Conversely, large sections of Heco's travels around Japan

have been lopped off and appear either in highly condensed form, or

not at all. Sometimes Murdoch has cut out incidents which are fascina­

ting today but must at that time have been too obvious to mention.

The diaries themselves are very confused in parts as Heco has

struggled to remember sections of his life where, for example, he

was settled, doing business in one place, and repeating things year by

year. It is difficult for him to distinguish exactly what hal>pened. and

when. Indeed one comment in Heco's hand in . the index for his third i ' • O r ' .

large black dia'ry, ' MS. I., states : I I the dates may be out . in .some

78) Biblia, Op. cit., p. 103.

147

Vol. 18 No. 3

instances." 79 )

Some of this confusion and doubling of events remains m the

Narrative and shows that Murdoch has not completely 'sorted it out

to everyone's satisfaction.sO) We may surmise either that he was in a hurry, that he did not notice repetitions, or that he was tired of

struggling to rearrange everything and gave up partway through the

editing process. Perhaps none of these are far from the mark. There

are places in his other writings, however, where he repeats himself,81 )

so it may be fair to say that this was one of his particular weaknes­

ses, or blind spots. A child will often be unwilling to tidy up a room

after playing there.

Ultimately Joseph Heco had the final say over Murdoch's MSS.

There is at least one page of Murdoch's writing bearing small cor­

rections in Heco's hand, extant in Tenri. There are also several MS.

pages of Murdoch's detailing ·' A History of Korean Affairs ", which

Murdoch must have put together from newspaper reports. Yet only

one brief paragraph appears in the finished Narrative.82)

Mr. Sissons mentions Murdoch's racial views, especially towards

the Chinese who at that time in history appeared to be taking over

certain areas of Australia. A search of the Narrative for this charac­

teristic trait of Murdoch's reveals some racial slurs against the Chinese,

but these have come originally from Heco, from his unpleasant ex�

periences in Hong Kong : H Now the Chinese are a greedy and a

cringing race . . . " On other occasions, e. g. where Heco is crossing

the Pacific and mentions one passenger who : " got nightmares because

of 60 Chinese in steerage ",83 ) and where Heco approaches Canton for

sightseeing, but finds it H just as dirty as any Chinese city so I didn't

visit it,"84) Murdoch cuts them out altogether.

79) Tenri. Ope cit. 80) See Vo1. II, pp. 100 & 108, 142 & 143. 236-24l . 8 1 ) e . g. on the first couple o f pages o f ' Sights and Scenes on the Tokaido '.

Ope cit. Twice he mentions that the roads of old Japan were as busy as those of any European city ; this redundancy is not a rare find among his writings. '�

82) Heco. J .• Ope cit., Vol. II., pp. 232-3. 83) B. B. 2 (Black bound notebook 2) Tenri. Insert, p. 55, On board " Storm

King ". 84) Ibid., p. 57.

148

' ''The Narrative of a Japanese" by Joseph Heeo or James Murdoch ? '

Likewise Heco had mixed feelings about his first sight of a black

man in San Francisco in 1851. The diary mentions seeing a strange

' object '. Murdoch expanded this idea and five times in the following

paragraph refers to the man as ' it ', not ' he ' : II Its black face and

white teeth and huge red lips . . . "85)

All we can really say about these incidents as they appear in the

Narrative is that Murdoch does on occasion climb briefly onto Heco's

bandwagon, but not with enough energy to make this a useful tool for

spotting his influence on the Narrative.

In much the same way, the agnosticism for which Murdoch was

well known is of little help in discovering his role in the creation of the

Narrative, save that there is a certain eagerness to explain Buddhist

and Shinto customs per see He may have been anti-clerical, but he

treats Heco's Christening into the Catholic faith with discreet neutrality,

carefully putting capital letters on ' Holy Water ' and so on. Many

places in his writings show that he was in fact a very spiritual person

potentially, rather it was sham and pretense that he disliked so much.

A quotation from ' Don Juan ' makes this clear :

" Again we badly want the Lord's Anointed

He'd choke with indignation . . .

Finding his pure religion quite a sell

In these times . . . "

The continuing poem suggests that if Christ went to England, he would

be put in prison for not having enough money with him ! 86 )

DISCUSSION

To get a feel for the quality of their relationship is a little difficult

after such a passage of time, and with such a meagre written record.

The tone of Murdoch's Introduction to the Narrative sugges ts

respect for, and a recommendation to read the book.

The only indication that their relationship was anything less than

cosy is the existence of very sharp comments which we find on the

85) Heeo, J., Ope cit., Vol. I, p. 90. 86) Miall, A., Op e cit., p. 27.

149

Vol. 1 8 Xo. 3

post-Narrative 1fSS. (cir ca 1894/58 7 ) . To be able to a c cuse so meone

of ' c o wa rdice ' i m plies that you kno w that person well enough to d o

so, and that you are s o assured of your p osition that you need n o t

beat about the b u s h . But these c o m ments m a y simply have been

the outwa r d manifestation of a day of inner frustration fo r Murdo ch.

Sometime s people were said to have reacted to the shar pness of his

tongue though he does not appear to have meant har m . The whole

snide, satirical, g o ssipy poem of Don Juan's G randson ends lamely with

the t w o lines :

" Poetry it ai ' n t, ' tis only chinking quacke ry :

Mistake m e n ot ; ' t is meant as Jodan bakari." ( a j oke only)

Bu t to wha t did Murd o c h rea c t so sha r ply in Heco ? If you m ean

to c ritic ize or a tta ck someone in prin t, you should either quo t e the

person's full name, or leave it out , he says, rather than put an initial

capital letter followed immediately by a blank. " I t is cowardly to

put the first letter and not the whole name. "88 )

A quick check of Mu rdoch's o wn "v o rk s catches hi m d o i n g the

very same thin g himself ! 8 9 )

But he had a t least one other secret device which may c ontain in

one in s ta n c e an indication of his feelin g f o r Heco. This was the an ­

agra m . As with Samuel Bu tle r, whose " Erewhon " spells ' n owhere'

when r e versed, Mu r d o c h loved to move letters ar ound, f orm ing fictional

nam es, u sually with some connec ting link to the o riginals .

Firs tly Murd o c h played with his o w n name, initials, and unive rsity

degree, eM. A. ) , als o wi th the names of his friends and rela tives, n o ­

tably tha t of his g randfather John ( ? ) Ma cD onal d . He often ap peared

in his o w n n ovels as the narra tor, using an alias .

Upon a r rival in Y okoha ma in 1888 he signed his na me a s M c D.

Murdo ch. M r . Sissons wa s relatively cer tain that this was Murdo ch90)

and in a r ecent paper Mr. Sugiya ma proves this with a personal histo ry

87) See Dowding, P. , Gp. cit. , p. 24. 88) Ibid . , p . 25 . 89) For example Don Juan is full o f them.

90) Sissons, D., Gp . cit . , p. 0024.

1 50

• "The Narrative of a Japanese" by Joseph Heco or James Murdoch M. A. ? '

of Murdoch's indicating that he did indeed enter Japan in May 188891 ) ;

and the only May docking date of the General Werder was the one with the above name on .the passenger list. (Sissons)

' From Australia and Japan ' was written under the pseudonym

A. M. eM. A. backwards). ' Don Juan's Grandson ' was written by A.

Miall. (My all ?) His mother being a MacDonald he was naturally the

son of ' the child of Donald " thus the grandson of Don (aId) . . . Don

Juan's grandson.

His writings reveal that he had a definite preference for a select

few letters of the alphabet when giving his stories characters and titles.

There are exceptions of course, but the sheer quantity of repetition

squashes coincidence and suggests also that Murdoch was eternally

writing about one great theme, and was trying to, or trying not to

express it in direct language.92) But by changing the names back again

we can get a pretty accurate view of Murdoch's life. He seems to have found faCt far more vivid than fiction and borrowed "ex'tensively from

real life for his plots.

Among the letters he favoured were ' M ' (Morrison, Manson, Marius,

Merton, Morton, Marian, Mick, Murray etc.) • A ' (Amy, Ayame,93 )

A. M., Armidis etc.) 'F' (Faustus, Fred, Frank, Felix, Fitz-Snooks, Francis

etc.) and t W '94 ) ( William, Wilson, Whitmore, Walker, Wooing of Webster

etc. ). • J ' figures frequently, and to a lesser extent ' H ', , S ' and ' P '. He quipped with Prime Minister Ito's name (thread) in Ayame

San, satirizing an episode that he is likely to have heard from Heco,

as it is a central theme of the Narrative.

It In the middle of the summer of t gO! there was an unusual

stir in political circles throughout the Empire of Japan. Tailor

Ito and his assistants, after a visit to Berlin to make personal

note of the latest fashi<?ns in Clothes Constitutional had come

back and set to work to contrive and cut out and stitch together

91) Sugiyama , T., Op. cit. , " James Murdoch ( 1 ) � A Bibliographica l Study-." 92) Being jilted and heartbroken in Scotland, etc. 93) Were Amy and Ayame the same person, and is A. M. another tribute

to this lady ? " Ah. my ! Ah, me ! " are sighs expressing lovesickness ; was he playing with these sounds ?

.

94) • W ' is an inverted • M ', and his father's name wa� ' William '.

151

Vol. 18 No. 3

a brand new suit for the Land of the Rising Sun. It was the

first outfit of the kind ever turned out in Asia . . . so when it

came to actually trying on the Jacob's-coat-like robes there was

excitement."95 )

Was this a small object lesson for Heco in how to satirize ? Now with

this kind of a disposition to be borne in mind, what should " we think

of the following lines which lie buried in the first novelette in � Tales

from Australia and Japan I, i. e. • Felix Holt Secundus ' ? The central

character is Will Hawkston, whose name is, shortly after being in­

troduced, shortened to � Hawkie '. If we reverse the sounds 1:> : 1 and

l i : 1 the name Ihi : k:> : 1 appears. Was. this too an anagram, and could

Murdoch have been talking about Heco here ?

" For Hawkie ,had been my closest friend for the last twelve

months . . •

Among o ther things Hawkie ga ve me a few fat MS.. volumes

bound in black and closely packed with his own crabbed h ierogly­

phics. For Hawkston's copy is with one exception the worst I

ever set ,eyes upon, and that exception is my own."

Hawkston (Heco?) then says :

,. Now there are some things I know o f that no one else does,

and it is just as well for the Cause - a capital C or course - that

someone should be able to use the knowledge if need be • • • .

There are other matters there besides that a re purely private . . . •

Bnt I'm without father o r mother, o r sister o r brother, • • •

and you may just as well have them as anyone else."

Murdoch's alias takes up the story :

I. Well I set to work on the -volumes as in duty bound, and found

them not at all unlike the earliest attempts at literature we pos­

sess, in the variety of subjects : dealt with. They constituted a

so rt of diary where (I ' impressions " of. slums jostled with sarcastic

95) Ayame San, Ope cit., pp. 122-3.

1 52

• "The Narrative of a Japanese" by Joseph Heco or James Murdoch ? '

etchings of high life ; while eth ics and politics and economics were

mixed up together in a jumble that would have delighted the in­

nermost heart of Moses or Confucius or of the authors of the

Laws of Manou. Then there were notes on the dodges of the cap­italists . . . and scraps and figures that might have had some far­

off connection with the integral Calculus or the Fourth Dimension.

Of course all this with the exception of the last item, was in­

teresting."96 )

This is a very realistic view of Heco's diaries. There were among

other things, three fat MS. volumes, bound in black and packed with

� crabbed ' writings. Murdoch mentions in the introduction, it will be

remembered, that he was instructed to remove " all that was of more

than purely personal interest." Heco was without father or mother,

brothers or sisters. In fact everything fits, if the surrounding camou­

flage of the story of Felix Holt Secundus is pared away. That being

so, we can presume that Murdoch's feelings about Heco and his diaries

are also to be seen here.

These I I some things I know of that no one else does " may refer

to secrets about Prime Minister Ito Hirobumi known only to Heco and

occasionally jotted down in the diaries. These do not appear in the

Narrative, for obvious reasons, but will be mentioned in a sequel to

this paper. One of them is probably the incident at the parade men­

tioned earlier in this present paper. (pp. 118-119)

CONCLUSION

It has been the general assumption of many authorities, (apart

from Mr. Tominaga of Tenri and Mr. Sugiyama of Okayama Shodai)

that Joseph Heco's English was so good that James Murdoch's role

was minimal. This paper will have demonstrated, albeit somewhat

long-windedly, that this is far from true.

This is not to say that Heco's English was poor. It was very

good in the sense that it performed the necessary function of con­

veying a whole lifetime of experience, in English, in a way that was

96) A. M., Gp. cit., (Felix Holt Secundus) pp. 9-11.

153

Vol. 18 'No. 3

understandable to anyone. Murdoch's English was naturally far better ;

far better in a scholastic sense than most people's .

Theirs was a symbiotic relationship ; Heco needed Murdoch to per­

form a vital service, that of elevating the tone of his story so that it

might be universally accepted. and Murdoch must have learned a lot

,from Heco. Heco could speak English and feed the eager non-Japanese­

speaking Murdoch with countless historical anecdotes. ( In 1892, Heco

was 53 and Murdoch only 36 years of age. )

The narrative in diary form was ninety to ninety-five percent

complete. The structure was built. There were some mistakes in

the fittings, and a large quantity of furnishings and materials were in " .

the yard, awaiting the touch of a designer to create a presentable

house. There were, besides, a quantity of cheap accessories here and

there which needed to be thrown out. " " Maybe' in this light Murdoch's rejection of words like t chow ' and

• A. 1: can be absolved, though there are obvious and unforgivable

examples where he has gone beyond simple correction of mistakes or

style.

Murdoch's wife had possibly committed suicide97 ) and he was liv­

ing in Japan alone with his young son, writing copiously and planning

to migrate to Paraguay . It was under such circumstances that he

edited Vol. I .

Disillusionment in Pa"raguay and sunstroke brought him back in

1894, minus his son, to Japan where he edited Vol. II. Influences of

the conflicting forces around him are evident in the Narrative, but

there is a wonderfully deep, rich quality throughout,' something admi­rable, which is more easily sense'd in his actual handwriting .

We can see from his editing that he was generally mild and fo­

"rehearing, and despite initial overconfidence, ego and occasional sharp­

ness, he must have handed his MSS. humbly to Heco to do with as he

pleased .

Perhaps one day someone with enough time and energy will re­create the Narrative in a more all-inclusive and satisfactory form. But Murdoch undertook a,n immensely difficult task at a difflcult time

97) Sissons, D., Op. cit., p . . 0016.

154

' ''The Narrative of a Japanese" by Joseph Heco or James Murdoch ? '

personally, and must have found even his considerable powers taxed

by how to make the huge variety of materials appealing.

Murdoch has grasped excellently what Heco was trying to say in

MSS. I & 11., and rewritten it in very clear English. Even today it

makes extremely interesting reading, despite occasional typographical

errors, etc.

Scottish-English vies with American English, to describe a meeting

between America and Japan. The result is a pretty good compromise.

It is true that "nothing " (or very little) It in the sense of the original

MS. has been changed ".

Finally, to resolve the question in the title - whose narrative ? - it might be fair to say :

I t The Narrative of a Japanese " by Joseph Heco and James Mur­

doch.

Reference :

Wright, Joseph. The English Dialect Dictionary, Oxford : 1898, reprinted

Tokyo (O.D.P. K.K.) 1 981 .

The Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles, Ed. Sir J . A . H.

Murray et. al. Oxford : 1 978.

155

1918 must have been an exac ting year for Murdoch. His wife** was still

in Japan winding up their affairs there. Besides his duties at Duntroon and the

University, he had additional work in Sydney supervising the teaching of the

language at the two high schools. He was living in two places - at Sydney from

Sunday to Wednesday and at Duntroon for the remainder of the week. (p. 70)

* two native speakers �i M. Kido c. M. Miyata -C-c:5 iJ , tj(O)f{o < ��� L "Clt ' G o

" For the University post Murdoch selected M. Kido ; for the high schools,

M. Miyata. Miyata (who succeeded Kido at the University in 1919) was

probably a former colleague of Murdoch's at Seventh High School, Kago­

shima." (Sissons p. 70)

** 1tT�A�i-t.-O)�* - .A r "7 � 7 .r....YJJ. "? t-=-iJ� , Murdoch O)1E��i1ffllE , **-Cm,

IlcrJ EB:A� O)mv::.���-lt"C \, ,t-=-iJ� , :t:ff=Fl�V¥*J1g!}c.�O) IBJa-v::,�� , 1JB;f021� ij��

.JiIJ.O) t.::O?)HEyc.�-C�� Lko (aB�3z:T* � - F' y fJ J P. 1 07)

The University of Sydney v��-C�t1917:¥ Lecturer v� , 1 918if.WJft Profes­

sor of Oriental Studies � t.r. '? t.::.. o 1 91 9:¥12}3 3 13 , Union Hall -c. � Inaugural

Lecture -C'vifif4 � L -C � -ij- Y.A !l !J 'Y r O) �A�±:5! Lt.::.. o Z�i�v� "Australia

Must Prepare : Japan, China, India, -Comparison and some Contrast.

-Inaugural Lecture, School of Oriental Studies, University of Sydney.

delivered in the Union Hall on December 3. 1919 " c L -C Angus & Ro­

bertson 7J� i? llifftt c; :ht.::.. o

JlIW*1L+ME;bt rj;:�J (:kIE1 5:¥11}3 p. 171-p. 177) v� - mH� x. t.::.. Murdoch

;btlJt:�§t§ William Morris Hughes (1864-1952) iJ� i? 13 *v� OO-t � 1BtO)�Jl

�ii� � :hJ , r l3 �/ifJMJ v��-t � 1Bt��Jl t �� , $ k mx� L , "i t.::.. v�iJ:. O)ijc

!f.§}fI29�V� t f� � iJ:. vtt.::.. ':: � t.r. c: Sissom� vi � � �{Lfs:lW v� �a� L -C " " � o (p. 8l )

(p. 103)

it Murdoch and the D. M. 1." � Jllli L '1:5- �i Murdoch iJt*� Director of

Military Intelligence t.r. Q E. L. Piesse � � 3t� , :a� 0)3t� (�::1J�.� �t

Australian National Library v�f*ff c; :h-C\" � ) v��!k:h, Murdoch ;btM:�* ,

*t$�� c L -C �� t.r. Q �� � �-c'vi ts:.iJ:. '? t.::.. -ooiJtWl � -rVf i? :h -C V , Q o (Sis­

sons p. 73-) Murdoch iJtJE��Htr t ., Jll�O)� 13 �7� L -C\" t.::.. ': c vi Chronicle Obituary

� ��JH� t :a;b:.:h -C \" Q ;bt , Sissons viiXO)�!l < ��-C\, ,, � o

68

James Murdoch

Murdoch was to leave for Japan at the end of September ( 1 921 ). By then,

however, he was suffering the last throes of cancer of the liver, the symptoms

of which had begun to appear about five months previously. He died at Sy­

dney on October 30th. (p. 106)

II. James Murdoch �*"��

- � � 3t � -

C*Jt9=t�;:' 5 I m 1.... t.::. {, O) vt� < )

1900 NOTES MADE BY DR. IAN NISH FROM THE MORRISON PAPERS,

MITCHEL LIBRARY, on PROFESSOR JAMES MURDOCH

(ARCHIVES UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY)

1903 r -;" - r � ? .a:;O)�JffiJ (�rt , §J3ra36�10J1 16 8 , -f::; � +% :}L�1*��

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* Sir Erenest Mason Satow (1843-1929) 1895 iE S �� ** Basil Hall Chamberlain ( 1850-1 935) " Thing Japanese " (1890) 7J.��0)

69

13 * v::. 1*1-r � 1iJf5e.� � 0 *** J. C. Hall, H. B. M's Consul at Kobe (Murdoch t VOL. II � Preface �::.

J. C. Hall v::.W��� L L \" Q o)

1904 Lafcadio Hearn : Japan : an Interpretation

-I regret not having been able, in preparing this essay, to avail myself

of the very remarkable " History of Japan during the Century of Early

Foreign Intercourse ( l542-165 1 ) ,"-by James Murdoch and Isoh Yamagata,­

which was published at Kobe last winter. This important work contains

much documentary material never before printed, and throws new light upon

the religious history of the period. The authors are inclined to believe that,

allowing for numerous apostasies, the total number of Christians in Japan

at no time much exceeded 300, 000 ; and the reasons given for this opinion,

if not conclusive, are at least very strong. Perhaps the most interesting

chapters are those dealing with the Machiavellian policy of Hideyoshi in his

attitude to the foreign religion and its .preachers, but there are few dull

pages in the book. Help to a correct understanding of the history of the

time is furnished by an excellent set of maps, showing the distribution of

the great fiefs and the political partition of the country before and aft�r. the

establishment of the Tokugawa Shogunate. Not the least merit of the work

is its absolute freedom from religious bias of any sort.

A HISTORY OF JAPAN VOL. II v;:.xt-r o Ji�O)If: § -r� � lXfI."C' as o o Japan : an Interpretation O) *� Bibliographical Notes 0) m:�t;:. tx: "? "'c\, '\

0 0 Hearn �t .:. O)iI¥,oO) ttl 0 1itr1f.. 19041f.� Lt..:o � "? -C �t;:. ttl t..: A HISTORY

OF JAPAN VOL. I � VOL. III �iJ!-C � \ tJ: � \o

1905 Basil Hall : Chamberlain : Thing Japanese

" HISTORY OF JAPAN, three volumes, by J. Murdoch. Based on a cri­

tical study of the original documents in nine languages, this unique work

carries the story from mythical beginnings down to the fall of the ancien

regime in 1867. Certain disorders of style, which alone mar this series of

vivid pictures are easily forgiven in �onsideration of the author's perfect

candour and of hi� skill in unravelling tangled skeins and in rendering his

re-constructions interesting. The task was one of unusual diffiGulty, because

here, more than anywhere else, it is necessary to listen at back doors, to

70

James Murdoch

peep through conventional fences, and to sift native evidenc e in the light of

foreign testimony. (p. 60-p. 61 )

Chamberlain rJ) ::" C �i J�!H(. 5 Im L k. r��J v(. �l.H,*1i+m t ." , -C " , � iJ� ,

Murdoch v'l k rJ) A HISTORY OF JAPAN, VOL. I I fJ) Preface rJ) � :aJ{v(. t t I have to thank Professor B. H. Chamberlain . . . " c. . � tfj L -C � k tJ:.Jf:

��fff� L t.: ::" C v(.X'-f L -C���� L -C J... '�0 ti Thing Japanese " rJ) :mJt1Rv'l1890

��' A HISTORY OF JAPAN VOL. II J: � 3 1f.vfiJ� � If.J... ' 0 t t A HISTORY

. OF JAPAN. three volumes, . . . " c. cb �fJf� J!:h�fm=Jt1R (l 898�) iJ�� " ' �'l

!J! V(. �:h J: � � V(.. � JE � :h t.::. t fJ) G L " , 0

1911 (§Jjffl44�) 3 )1 14 8 ft , il:fi J: � �E8*t�� viiJt � 0 G�15�� , iWC.M

� p. 43)

1 911 (§Jj ffl44�) 6 )1 14 B ft, �:fi J: 9 !Jrl3j�Jlj�.$o (il15�� , m.$�. p. 699)

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� At ts:.Afft': c ta.t':;O�· · · · · ' o J

1" '4-g(O):IIge-e�i��� '? < � 1..- t.:o " ' -:;>' - tt y 'l' jt�EJi�*t': l? ? c }i!:, ? o t L

� '? t.: I? �fx:\" '? L < n:K-"Jo

1918 Extract from Senate minutes of 19 August 1918

Mr. J. Murdoch-Lecturer in Japanese

(ARCHIVES UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY)

1918 Extract from the Report of the Senate of the University of Sydney

for 1917 (Calendar 1918, p. 615/616)

Lectureship in Japanese

Chair of Oriental Studies

(ARCHIVES UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY)

71

1 921 JAldES :MURDOCH AND TH E CHAIR OF ORIENTAL STUDIES

(ARCHIVES UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY)

1 925 llHI%1i-t:ttt i � � F' /' � )E;�O) B *tlt� J CS4m*L� I I p. 4-p. 8 )

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72

"'( \.. .... � o

1961 The Registrary, The University of Sydney

JAMES MURDOCH

James Murdoch

(ARCHIVES UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY)

1963 if�!1I� r :/ a -t!: 7 · � =z.1iJf�J (ag;ftJ=+i\�+ J1 ) (Jjf�mJiinJ) ru The Nar­

rative of a Japanese " 0) 1tI�, -=l' - J-:' ')I � 0) � � J (p. 25-p. 32) I I JAMES

MURDOCH " (B. F.) �:. .t � Murdoch O) ��o

1975 SOME ANNALS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY 1850-1975

(The University of Sydney, 1975)

1982 Piers H. T. Dowding : u The Narrative of a Japanese " by Josep Heco

or James Murdoch.

� :l (.tllE��) 0) § .J.ij(m � -=l' - J-:' ')I ? tJt =t- � A h "( II� L t.: flJ* The

Narrative of a Japanese � O)ft� t.s::lt��� O)�*O)¥fl� (r:o::kfnB. �18�

3 �)

III. r� Q � fJ\ 6 �· Q AJ--James Murdoch

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73

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"7 � ""7 - r ';/ !J (James Murdock ) , 1 856-1 92 1 . ±� i B *IN:.9:.J A History o f Japan

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74

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... � ·1 .� .� ,

,,'

James Murdoch

< , ���t r�-��q:t��J -C'0 '? t::.o *f ::k7}·�q:t$q:t��J �t ��*t5ff:tE L

-c " , ts:.7J" '? t::.o Murdoch vr) lmf@j:tEff:�:t *rlmif.il-'l'J c " ' ? J: lJ r=if.�J c \,. ' '?

t::.jj7J� J: lJ lE?it -C' c.b Q 0

D. C. S. Si�sons �tll0Jn�:&��vr) �lflfJtvr) �mt�,

Five years ago I should have said that there was no need for an article

on Murdoch-that his three-volume History of Japam and his association with

William Lane's ' New Australia ' colony in Paraguay alone were a sufficient

guarantee against oblivion. But in 1 977 the Japan Foundation printed a review

of Japanese studies in Australia in which Murdoch received no mention.1)

1. Japan Foundation News Letter (Tokyo), vol. V. No. 1 (April 1 977), p. 12

According to this review, the Department of Oriental Studies (to which Mur­

doch was appointed in 1918) was ' founded ' in 1 922 by Arthur Sadler (Mur- .

doch's successor) ! .

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c � �"" -C , .:: O)m�M t: Q o

tJft )I-II . James Murdoch �*4��flR�

1 91 9if. C::klE 8 1f:) * EH �fX.a� [f'Prof. Murdoch c �i1+I vr) B *1iJf5e�

1!f�Wif. VOL. XL-No. 9 C::klE 8 if. 2 }j )

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Schools Cf@j��13t) �O) B *8�$Avr) ,:: c v� .bn -C " ' Q o Murdoch 0)1:3L't:>�

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.v�"?" \ --C rl A History of Japan �J&J:.Vf-t O)�=�vlR!Ev�.$l. L , the last

volume O) §ij �� vl*f*Q)JJl�7J�R!Ev� lli *J:. -? --C " \ 0 .:: J:: �Jm.r{ -C " \ Q 0 Murdoch

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75

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76

James Murdoch

J: ? v:::.{t(itO) =F*J£�.\' ' t.:fjf-ei" o � C 8 *M� �=�O) lliJliO) � c �:::. �!R;h, '"( \" � tJt, � 0)�=�v1�v:::.{}t0)1:ff:* v1lli#i � ;h,tJ: \" -e� ",? t.:o

1959� (w,gfD34�) jdR1¥i r 'J'7'R/\�0) �;m� t.: 'b� :5€�w� (October 1 . 1959 VOL. CV-No . 10)

'J'fj�j\�O) 1&;m� c L ,"( James Murdoch c Reginald Horace Blyth O)=A

O) :g iWtJt��f l? ;h, '"( \" � o �T�O) � ;S b t.: L viXiJ� 1? r A /v r � !J � IvJ v:::.� ,? t.:}�\' \ lli ��OOtJ� � ;h,t.: ::: c tJt � � o L tJ � L 1894�tJ� 1? 98� � -c'Im�r�', rm��� c L -C 4:tR �;:,\" t.:.:z.- O) r A /v F' � !l J tJt�:q O) r� l':' � !J 7'e1:J .:z.- O) A-c'� Q , �

� -c' r 8 *�J �.\, ' t.: :: c vi, 18 !m�it.-c' r 8 *�J O)m4m�J! � � -c'rrW�tJ:

tJt I?, b t.::. L vi��;:' t �D I? tJ: tJ� '? t.: o � C � � o

1963� Kenneth Strong : Japanese Studies in Sydney

(KBS BULLETIN ON JAPANESE CULTURE, November-December 1963)

Kokusai Bunka Shinkokai (The Society for International Cultural Rela-

tions)

'Y' r '=' - v;:':jo� � 8 *1iJf� vi1918� (Murdoch tJt 'Y' F' '=' - *�-C' 1JJ�0) 8 *� �t�H:::. tJ:: '? t.:�) v:::.M:l � � c L It Murdoch became the first Professor of the

language Ci. e. Japanese) in any country of the British Commonwealth." c

L '"(\" G o Murduch O) :1.n:::. J: Q high school level �;:. <h 8 *�tJt¥JA � ;h,t.::. :: C

�Jffi� Miyata Sensei �:::. t a hZ.tJt� � o

.. During this long residence in Tokyo, Kumamoto and other Japanese

cities, Murdoch earned his living as journalist, editor, novelitst, and teacher

of hiatory, English, according to some accounts, of Japanese - while devoting

his main energies to the study of the Japanese and Chinese, ethnology,

and comparative religion - a labour of love which eventually bore in the

' History of Japan ' by which he is especially rmembered, the first major

work of its kind in English . . . "

*� Kenneth Strong �i 'Y' r .::. - *�*JF�$�� -c'19571p J: Q 1962� i 1:*

77

5t.!xr-}(:�c'1!J:.fz. t.::.. :::" c <L 0 � 0 "K u ma mo to " O) !WJ;�\- ' �i�U c L -C -{- O) g2}ffi vilE {i'i-c' fB1�Ht":) J: < , �t-tl¥J{iffif@[ <L � \- ' v�j={iJ G f'fiiJj1& iJ�tE*O) Wf�� O) § v� ��.h tJ: iJ:. -? t.::.. o ( :::.. O) � D . C . S . Sisson s O) tif� v� J: 0 0)

1 967� (�fP42�) Tatsu maro T ezuka : Jam es Murdo ch, Ja m es M. Dixon and Other Occidental T eachers who Tau ght English and English Lit erat u r e to

Soseki Natsu m e .

Tokyo 11unicipal N ews 1 6 ( 6 ) . ag5fp42 . 2

Z Lt r'§'Jl: � " A Suppli m ent to TOKYO MUNICIPAL NEWS, 1 967 0) THE

INTRODUCTION OF W ESTERN C ULTURE INTO JAPAN IN THE AGE

OF HER 1-10DERNIZATION " V:. " SOSEKI NATSUME'S TEACHER IN

ENGLISH-Ja m es Mu rdoch and James Dixon- c L -C �jil � n -C \- \ 0 0 $� v� �i Hist o r i o g r opher, Tokyo IVI e t r o p olitan His t o rio g r o phy Institute c IDtljJjiJ�

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Murdoch vt i*,�n v� vt <b -? c t r:P*�\- \7f-Afb:gm t� -? t.::.. c L u ""'< � F' ';J !J � A, vt ri 0) :5t� t�o 1!fOOA <b 210 A, t£: /,Ji iJ � � t� c I- \ \, \ A, i� iJ': o � c I- \ 5 if}:n 0) § �� � 1m L, �n O) t�±�E¥)N c -t ;tl. � Murdoch iJ� � m o ral backbone iJ� 2l0 0 illEMc' §

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78

James Murdoch

;;t - A r =:7 V 7 �:.M:tCb -C E *� . E *Jt1t.�*B1i' L t-: -;>' - F' � ? ���*�1i:;t *" ­

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Brisbane Grammar School (1869-1 922) � *B1i' L 1 8851f.iJ� 1? 88�v:'� 0 1mra'0)

Second Master c L -C Jam es Murdoch O) � iJt lli '"C ;t;) � , k O) .:b c V;:. M. A.

(Aberdeen ; Camb. ; Paris ; and Gottingen) c £6 0 .:. c �isE L '"C £6 0 iJ� Camb.

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0 0

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8 j} 7 'J '/ ;r. - '/ �A�t±o

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79