"Dream...," Suga woke up from a doze awkwardly, having been lying
on the rocking chair thanks to Eriko. He has probably moaned due to the
nightmare of the Four Gods. It was a momentary rest for him.
Eriko is making fresh tea for adzuki-bean jelly of Funawa which is Suga's
regular souvenir from Asakusa.
The stereophonic sound of the CD Tsubune selected is "The Sorcerer's Apprentice" by Paul Dukas. The speakers of the pitch-black NS1000 are carrying a profound sound to each of their stomachs.
"Because of this music? ...," Suga is now convinced of the dream.
An old Sorcerer departs his workshop, leaving his apprentice with chores
to perform.
Tired of fetching water by pail, the apprentice casts a spell in a vague memory to a broom, and lets it do the work for him.
The floor is soon awash with water, and the apprentice realizes that he cannot stop the broom because he does not know how.
The apprentice splits the broom in two with an axe - but each of the pieces
becomes a whole new broom that takes up a pile and continues fetching water,
now at twice the speed.
When all seems lost, the old sorcerer returns and quickly breaks the spell.
Mari walks to close the window opened for ventilation in step with the
broom. Now Tsubune switches off the stereo.
Letting out a small yawn, Suga returns to the seat, and hands out the brief
chronological table for dozen years or so from Shinyu Case to the Great
Kanto Earthquake.
Before the main subject of the school campus moving on account of the Great
Earthquake occurred in September, Taisho 12 (1923), he would probably like
to talk about how the college was born with long difficulties and its relationship
with Shihin-kai, seniors of the boat club.
The students of Tokyo High Commercial School (THC) started the so-called
Shinyu Case in Meiji 42 (1909), protesting the government at the risk of
their withdrawal. While the arrested and the injured were coming out one
after another, the professors, the graduates, the supporting groups and
organizations, and consequently many celebrities with no relationship got
together for backup. The whole of them fought as one banded together. In
the result, they overturned the government decision already executed. This
case barely escaped the crisis of the continuation of commercial education,
and the flow changed to go to the birth of Tokyo Commercial College (TCC).
However, it took ten years to be realized since then.
Most of the reasons were at the mercy of a turbulent intenational situation
leading to the World War 1 and the acceleration of the invasion of Japan
to the adjacent countries.
Japan was under the aftereffects of the Russo-Japanese War which finished
a couple of years before the Shinyu Case, and in such a situation occurred
the Russian Revolution in 1917.
Japan had already colonized the Korean Peninsula and was dashing for the ambition to control Manchuria
Elderly Suga shows his own-made chronological table limited to the period
of the birth of the college.
Out of habit, Suga stops by 'the three doctors'. They are the three leading professors, the primary breadwinner of the school from the high school period to the campus-move decision via Shinyu Case.
He cannot help mentioning their great job for the birth of the college
and the conflict among them because each was an influential person.
"Are they the wise men came all the way from the east at the birth of Jesus Christ? Do they even have any relationship with the school?"
Eriko says as a joke.
"Well, true. They are more famous."
Suga seems not to have thought that much. He is rubbing his bald head.
Eriko adds in smile.
"It is in the Gospel according to Matthew of the New Testament."
"Thanks much. My side is in the story of my alma mater."
Suga, saying so, poses a funny riddle to them.
"A doctor's degree is now even called the grain of cooked rice stuck
on the sole, ..."
Mari accentuates her black eyes. Looking at her odd face, says the elderly.
"You feel unpleasant not to take it away, but not eatable. It means
too many to be precious. But in those days the ideal image in the future
was a Doctor or a Minister."
Mari is relaxed.
The three doctors the elderly refers to are Zensaku Sano, Tokuzo Fukuda
and Hajime Seki.
-----
Fukuda, already presented with the doctor's degree (PhD) from Munich University
while studying in Germany, obtained the PhD of Law from the Law College
of Tokyo Imperial University by the review of his dissertation.
After ten years, in Meiji 33 (1900), the next year of Shinyu Case, Seki
and then Sano also became PhD of Law.
It was a noteworthy event at that time, so the academic world came to call
them the three doctors of Tokyo Commercial School.
These three doctors would have competed together themselves for the top
of the school both in public and private, but only one would have been
selected at last.
"In the result," says the elderly, sitting up straight.
"Zensaku Sano was finally appointed as the principal of Tokyo High
Commercial School in Taisho 3 (1914), five years after Shinyu Case, the
first principal from the start, 39 years after the foundation of the Commercial
Law Institute."
"Wasn't it the year when World War 1 broke out?", says Mari.
"Yes, it was. It led the whole Europe to a bottomless swamp and caught
the main countries in the world, and what worse, it lasted for several
years."
Saying so, Suga adds.
"It was the time that Japan could not be an outsider even faraway.
Therefore this event must have been in a big voice in Japan, too."
He does not stick to this world topic any more, and rather than that he
seems to talk more about his local story.
"It was understandable whichever professor would become the principal, Sano, Seki or Fukuda. Sano and Seki were the same age of 40 and Fukuda was one year younger than them. Not only achievement but also leadership and confidence, ...they were running neck and neck in everything. I consider it was hard to say which of the three was better."
In the result Sano was appointed as the principal of THC, Seki decided
to move out to the Vice Mayer of Osaka City and left the school just before
it. Since it was the sudden resign of the main and popular professor, it
is said that the whole school then made a vehement objection. Later, Seki
served there as Mayer.
Tokuzo Fukuda was a passionate man and an opinion leader in the whole school. He contributed very much both in the study and as a leader of the school, but he died early at the age of 57.
Hot-blooded Fukuda turned on the then principal Matsuzaki of amakudari
(the parachuting of a retired government official) and received the punishment
of a leave of absence, because of which he quit THC in Meiji 39 (1906)
three years before Shinyu Case.
He taught at Keio-gijuku School (presently, Keio University) for 13 years
from the previous year of the quit from THC to Taisho 8 (1919). He is well
known to have developed such human resources as Shinzo Koizumi and Seiichiro
Takahashi.
He returned to THC afterward, but he had no idea to be the president.
