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 Neuroanatomy Research at the Leading Edge

HANDBOOK ON WHITE MATTER:

STRUCTURE, FUNCTION AND CHANGES
No part of this digital document may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or
by any means. The publisher has taken reasonable care in the preparation of this digital document, but makes no
expressed or implied warranty of any kind and assumes no responsibility for any errors or omissions. No
liability is assumed for incidental or consequential damages in connection with or arising out of information
contained herein. This digital document is sold with the clear understanding that the publisher is not engaged in
rendering legal, medical or any other professional services.
NEUROANATOMY RESEARCH
AT THE LEADING EDGE

Handbook on White Matter: Structure, Function and Changes

Timothy B. Westland and Robert N. Calton
2009 ISBN: 978-1-60692-375-7
 Neuroanatomy Research at the Leading Edge

HANDBOOK ON WHITE MATTER:

STRUCTURE, FUNCTION AND CHANGES

TIMOTHY B. WESTLAND
AND
ROBERT N. CALTON
EDITORS

Nova Science Publishers, Inc.

New York
Copyright © 2009 by Nova Science Publishers, Inc.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Handbook on white matter : structure, function, and changes / [edited by] Timothy B. Westland and Robert N. Calton.
p. ; cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-61668-975-9 (E-Book)
1. Brain--Histology--Handbooks, manuals, etc. I. Westland, Timothy B. II. Calton, Robert N.
[DNLM: 1. Central Nervous System--physiopathology. 2. Central Nervous System--anatomy & histology. 3. Central
Nervous System--physiology. 4. Nervous System Diseases--physiopathology. WL 300 H2366 2009]
QP376.H275 2009
612.8'2--dc22
2009000172

Published by Nova Science Publishers, Inc. Ô New York

 Contents

Preface ix
Research and Review Studies 1
Chapter I Interhemispheric Connectivity: The Evolution
and Nature of the Corpus Callosum 3
Sarah B. Johnson and Manuel F. Casanova
Chapter II White Matter Lesions: From Present to Future 17
R.P.W. Rouhl, R.J. van Oostenbrugge and J. Lodder
Chapter III White Matter Lesions and Aging in HIV Infection: Implications
for Development of Cognitive Decline and Dementia 29
Aaron M. McMurtray, Beau Nakamoto
Kalpana Kallianpur and Erin P. Saito
Chapter IV White Matter Changes in Drug Abuse and in HIV-1 Infection 43
Andreas Büttner, Jeremias Wohlschaeger
Ida C. Llenos and Serge Weis
Chapter V White Matter Changes in Critical Illness and Delirium 71
Max L. Gunther, Carlos Faraco and Alessandro Morandi
Chapter VI White Matter Involvement in Neuromuscular Disorders 89
Petr Vondracek, Marketa Hermanova, Kristina Vodickova,
Lenka Fajkusova, Eva Brichtová and Jarmila Skotakova
Chapter VII White Matter Hyperintensities in Psychiatric Disorders and Their
Association with Suicide Risk 111
Maurizio Pompili, Gianluca Serafini, Silvia Rigucci,
Andrea Romano, Marco Innamorati, Antonio Del Casale,
Daniela Di Cosimo, Roberto Tatarelli and David Lester
Chapter VIII A Quantitative Study of the Pathological Changes in the Cortical
White Matter in Variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (vCJD) 133
Richard A. Armstrong
vi Contents

Chapter IX Progressive Multifocal Leukoencephalopathy 147

Endre Pál
Chapter X Remyelination Failure in Multiple Sclerosis and Vulnerability
of Oligodendrocytes to Repeated Insults 165
Catherine Fressinaud
Chapter XI Endoscopic Anatomy of the Thecal Sac Using a Flexible
Steerable Endoscope 187
Jan Peter Warnke
Chapter XII White Matter Abnormalities in the Diabetic-Hypertensive
Brain 203
Natalia Rincon and Cory Toth
Chapter XIII Brain Tissue Segmentation Based on Multi-Channel Diffusion
Tensor Imaging Data 229
Tianming Liu and Stephen T.C. Wong
Chapter XIV Three-Dimensional Microstructural Analysis of Human Brain
Tissue by Using Synchrotron Radiation Microtomographs 247
Ryuta Mizutani, Akihisa Takeuchi, Kentaro Uesugi,
Susumu Takekoshi, R. Yoshiyuki Osamura and Yoshio Suzuki
Chapter XV Origin and Function of Amoeboid Microgliai Cells
in the Periventricular White Matter in the Developing Brain 279
C. Kaur and E.A. Ling
Chapter XVI Diffusion Tensor Imaging is More Sensitive than Conventional
Magnetic Resonance Imaging in Demonstrating White Matter
Abnormalities in Susac's Syndrome 299
Ilka Kleffner, Michael Deppe, Siawoosh Mohammadi,
Philip Van Damme, Stefan Sunaert, Wolfram Schwindt
Jens Sommer, Peter Young and E.B. Ringelstein
Chapter XVII Organisation of the Node of Ranvier in Myelinated
Central Axons 317
James J.P. Alix
Chapter XVIII Organizing Principles of Projections of the Long Descending
Reticulospinal Pathways and Their Targets’ Spinal Commissural
Neurons: With Special Reference to the Locomotor Function 335
Kiyoji Matsuyama and Kaoru Takakusaki
Commentaries 357
Short Communication
Diffusion Tensor MRI Data Acquisition Methods for White Matter
and Clinical Applications: Non Echo-Planar Imaging 359
Masaaki Hori
 Contents vii

Commentary The Dimensions of the Sacral Spinal Canal in Thecaloscopy.

A Morphometric MRI Study 375
S. Mourgela, A. Sakellaropoulos, S. Anagnostopoulou
and J.P.Warnke
Index 381
 Preface

White matter is one of the three main solid components of the central nervous system.
White matter tissue of the freshly cut brain appears white to the naked eye because of being
composed largely of lipid. The other two components of the brain are gray matter and
substantia nigra. This new handbook presents the latest research in the field.
Chapter I –The classical neurological notion of a dominant hemisphere responsible for
language abilities and objective processing coupled with a non-dominant hemisphere
prevailing for nonverbal, spatial, and intuitive tasks has been upheld by several studies,
though this dichotomy is not seen with the brains of nonhuman mammals. Still, no matter
how simple the task, no operation involves exclusively one hemisphere without the other; we
are constantly switching between dominant and non-dominant functions, mandating an ample
channel of communication between the two hemispheres. Along with the evolutionarily older
anterior commissure, the corpus callosum has evolved to be one of the two major inter-
hemispheric connectors in mammals.
Chapter II - White matter lesions are caused by cerebral small vessel disease, particularly
by arteriolosclerosis. Arteriolosclerosis consists of a hyaline wall thickening with consequent
narrowing of the arteriolar vessel lumen and tissue ischemia. Arteriolosclerosis relates to
hypertension, and to other cerebral ischemic lesions (lacunar infarcts, symptomatic as well as
asymptomatic). The instigating factors in the pathogenesis of arteriolosclerosis and therefore
of white matter lesions, however, remain elusive. Most accepted of current theories is
disruption of the blood brain barrier caused by endothelial dysfunction. New imaging
modalities, like molecular imaging, and new insights in endothelial biology could therefore
provide further insight into the pathogenesis of arteriolosclerosis. In the present chapter the
authors will discuss these emerging issues, their potential pitfalls, and their possibility to
eventually increase therapeutic options for the vascular pathology which underlies white
matter lesions.
Chapter III - The widespread availability of highly active anti-retroviral therapy has lead
to long-term survival for many individuals living with HIV infection. With advancing age,
many older individuals living with HIV infection are beginning to develop aging-related
changes in the brain structure, including white matter lesions. Given the known effect of
white matter lesions in the general population, these lesions are also likely to have important
effects in aging HIV-seropositive individuals as well. Aging related white matter lesions are
x Timothy B. Westland and Robert N. Calton

considered to be structural manifestations of brain small vessel vascular disease. These

lesions, more predominant in older individuals, are typically related to vascular risk factors
such as hypertension and diabetes. Furthermore, the presence of white matter lesions is a
known risk factor for development of cognitive decline and dementia. For example, when
compared to normal elderly individuals, those with lacunar infarcts score lower on cognitive
tests and have approximately twice the risk of developing dementia in the future.
Additionally, lacunar infarction in certain “strategic locations” such as the basal ganglia may
result in profound cognitive deficits and even dementia. Multiple studies demonstrate that
presence of leukoaraiosis is independently related to cognitive impairment in the elderly, and
when present in patients with lacunar strokes, indicates increased severity of small vessel
vascular disease and exacerbates adverse effects of these lesions on cognitive performance. In
elderly individuals, cerebral manifestations of small vessel vascular disease are also
important components of vascular dementia.
The relationship between white matter hyperintensities and cognitive performance in
HIV infection is an active area of ongoing research. Links between presence of white matter
hyperintensities and worse performance on tests of psychomotor speed and verbal memory
have been established. Other studies show that dementia in HIV infection is associated with
decreased white matter volumes, indicating that in this population the loss of white matter
may contribute to cognitive decline. The authors’ own research demonstrates that white
matter lesion volume in HIV infection is correlated with degree of cortical atrophy, a
potential underlying substrate for cognitive decline and dementia. Other studies, however,
have reported no relation between white matter lesions and cognitive performance in HIV
infection. This discrepancy has been partially resolved with the advent of newer
neuroimaging techniques, which allow improved detection of white matter injury and provide
further evidence for a connection between white matter damage and the severity of cognitive
impairment in HIV-seropositive individuals. In conclusion, aging-related white matter
hyperintensities likely contribute to development of cognitive decline and dementia in HIV
infection, and physicians caring for HIV seropositive individuals should discuss the
importance of treating vascular risk factors with their patients.
Chapter IV - White matter plays an important role by its involvement in a variety of
pathological states. In HIV-1 infection of the brain, white matter is already affected at an
early stage of the disease process. Whether white matter damage is a direct or indirect effect
in drug addiction has yet to be elucidated.
Until now, systematic analyses of white matter in these disease states are lagging far
behind. Much research is still to be done. In this endeavor, focus must be placed on assessing
changes of the various myelin proteins, the fate and changes of oligodendrocytes, the role of
astrocyte-oligodendrocyte cross-talk, and the changes in signal transduction cascades at work
in the white matter. Systematic analyses using gene expression arrays, proteomics and
metabolomics will provide new clues for elucidating the pathogenetic mechanisms leading to
white matter changes.
Chapter V - In the United States alone, over 50,000 individuals are treated daily in
intensive care units (ICUs). Approximately 50-80% of ICU patients develop delirium with
over half of these cases leading to meaningful and permanent losses in brain functioning.
This suggests that critical illness may lead to de novo long-term pathological changes in the
 Preface xi

central nervous system. In the current chapter the authors review the evidence regarding links
between white matter changes related to critical illness. In particular, they focus on both
acute and distal alterations in white matter that may be caused by a number of factors
including severe infection, glial cell atrophy, declines in axonal fractional anisotropy (FA)
and global hypoperfusion. Evidence from several areas of the neurosciences (animal models,
neuroimaging, case studies, etc.) suggests that delirium may be a hallmark of more permanent
changes that are occurring in the CNS. Taken together, the current evidence suggests that
critical illness may be linked to disruption of white matter tracts in the brain eventually
leading to long-term deficits in cognitive functioning. The chapter concludes by highlighting
several methodological challenges in investigating these hypotheses along with future
directions within the field of delirium and critical illness neuroscience research.
Chapter VI - The frequency of inherited neuromuscular disorders in the human
population is estimated to be approximately 1:3,500 worldwide. In some of these disorders
there is an association of the neuromuscular and central nervous system (CNS) involvement.
The explanation could be in a faulty process of expression of genetic information into the
structure of vital proteins, which play a key role in both muscle and brain functions. In these
multiorgan disorders a muscular dystrophy or peripheral neuropathy can be combined with
the white matter lesion, or other structural abnormalities of the brain, eye, and other organs,
and this combination can result in a spectrum of unusual clinical phenotypes.
The central nervous system involvement can be found especially in congenital muscular
dystrophies (CMD, MDC), myotonic dystrophy types 1 and 2 (DM1, DM2), mitochondrial
encephalomyopathies, and some variants of Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease (CMT).
The authors’ research is focused on these important hereditary neuromuscular disorders
with the white matter involvement in pediatric patients, especially children afflicted with
various forms of congenital muscular dystrophies. They present most interesting and unusual
case reports of our patients to demonstrate difficulties and pitfalls in the diagnostics of these
rare disorders. The white matter lesion is a very important and valuable diagnostic sign, and
also could have a serious impact on the management and prognosis of patients with
neuromuscular disorders.
Chapter VII - Suicide is a major worldwide public health problem. Nearly one million
lives are lost from suicide each year and between 3%-5% of adults make at least one suicide
attempt at some point in their life. Despite intensive efforts, research has failed to find
necessary and sufficient factors that indicate an increased likelihood for suicide, and effective
prevention strategies have remained elusive, suggesting that our understanding of the
interplay of factors that increase the risk of suicide remains incomplete. Furthermore,
although a great deal of research has been published on socio-psychological factors affecting
suicidal behaviour, the results lack sufficient specificity.
In recent years, studies have indicated that up to 43% of the variability in suicidal
behaviour can be explained by genetics. Thus, combining independent clinical and biological
predictors may provide improved predictive models.
A great deal of research analyzing the neurobiological basis of suicide has been
published in the last few decades. For examples, many studies have identified abnormalities
of the serotonergic system in suicidal individuals, particularly in the ventral prefrontal cortex,
as well as several other possible abnormalities, such as reduction in messenger RNA and
xii Timothy B. Westland and Robert N. Calton

protein levels of cyclic adenosine monophosphate response element binding, CRE-DNA

binding activity, and basal and cyclic adenosine monophosphate–stimulated protein kinase A
activityerations in the levels of endocannabinoid and in the density of the CB1 receptors,
lower grey-matter cholesterol content, elevated cholecystokinin mRNA levels, expression of
proteins involved in glial function, neurodegeneration and oxidative stress neuronal injury,
and higher β-adrenergic receptor binding. In the last decade, researchers have pointed out
how the brain’s white matter is implicated in mental illnesses. The aim of the present chapter
is to review research on the association among white matter hyperintensities (WMH) and
suicide behaviour.
Chapter VIII - The objective of this study was to determine the degree of white matter
pathology in the cerebral cortex in cases of variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD) and to
study the relationships between the white matter and grey matter pathologies. Hence, the
pathological changes in cortical white matter were studied in individual gyri of the frontal,
parietal, occipital, and temporal cortex in eleven cases of vCJD. Vacuolation (‘spongiform
change’), deposition of the disease form of prion protein (PrPsc) in the form of discrete PrP
deposits, and gliosis were observed in the white matter of virtually all cortical regions
studied. Mean density of the vacuoles in the white matter was greater in the parietal lobe
compared with the frontal, occipital, and temporal lobes but there were fewer glial cells in the
occipital lobe compared with the other cortical regions. In the white matter of the frontal
cortex, vacuole density was negatively correlated with the density of both glial cell nuclei
and the PrP deposits. In addition, the densities of glial cells and PrP deposits were positively
correlated in the frontal and parietal cortex. In the white matter of the frontal cortex and
inferior temporal gyrus, there was a negative correlation between the densities of the
vacuoles and the number of surviving neurons in laminae V/VI of the adjacent grey matter. In
addition, in the frontal cortex, vacuole density in the white matter was negatively correlated
with the density of the diffuse PrP deposits in laminae II/III and V/VI of the adjacent grey
matter. The densities of PrP deposits in the white matter of the frontal cortex were positively
correlated with the density of the diffuse PrP deposits in laminae II/III and V/V1 and with the
number of surviving neurons in laminae V/V1. The data suggest that in the white matter in
vCJD, gliosis is associated with the development of PrP deposits while the appearance of the
vacuolation is a later development. In addition, neuronal loss and PrP deposition in the lower
cortical laminae of the grey matter may be a consequence of axonal degeneration within the
white matter.
Chapter IX - Progressive multifocal leukoencephalopathy (PML) is a rare demyelinating
disease of the central nervous system. It is caused by opportunistic infection by the JC virus,
a human polyomavirus. The primary infection is common and usually remains asymptomatic.
The virus resides in the kidney in a latent form and can be reactivated when the immune
system becomes compromised. B cells may transmit the virus to oligodendrocytes in the
brain. Destruction of oligodendrocytes results in progressive and multifocal central nervous
system symptoms and the outcome is usually fatal. PML has been increasingly detected in
patients with AIDS and other secondary immunodeficiency conditions, and it might develop
in exceptional cases with primary immunodeficiencies. Efficient therapies have not been
established for patients with PML. Antiviral agents, highly active antiretroviral treatment in
AIDS, and immunotherapies might be beneficial in acquired and iatrogenic
 Preface xiii

immunodeficiency. The associated conditions, assumed pathomechanism, clinical and

neuropathological features and therapeutic possibilities are summarized.
Chapter X - Oligodendrocytes (OL) synthesize myelin sheaths that insulate axons,
forming the main components of the central nervous system (CNS) white matter. The
considerable importance of this structure is well underlined by the fact that its lesions
occuring during Multiple Sclerosis (MS) result often in patients’ severe disability. Permanent
neurological deficit relies on axonal lesions that are associated with demyelination, and the
remyelination process is impaired, for yet unknown reasons.
To get insight into these pathophysiological phenomenons the authors have analyzed the
capability of OL to synthesize myelin in MS chronic lesions. A constant and pronounced
decrease in the number of myelinated fibres per OL compared to the adjacent normal
appearing white matter (NAWM) was observed (Fressinaud, 2007). This suggests that, at the
cellular level, OL are incapable of synthesizing an appropriate number of myelin sheaths.
Thus, restricted metabolic capacities of OL could result in their failure to remyelinate a
sufficient number of damaged fibres, and might represent an important mechanism in MS,
since conversely, the number of OL is less constantly decreased.
This hypothesis was supported by two sets of experimental data in vivo, and in vitro. In
vivo, rat corpus callosum demyelination by lysophosphatidyl choline (LPC) stereotaxic
microinjection is followed by spontaneous remyelination, and this process is significantly
accelerated by treatment with either platelet-derived growth factor (PDGF) (Allamargot et al.,
2001), or neurotrophin-3 (NT-3) (Jean et al., 2003). As expected, given the known
proliferative effect of these growth factors on OL progenitors (Besnard et al., 1987; Barres et
al., 1994), the number of OL increased by 20% in NT-3 remyelinated lesions compared to
animals receiving LPC only, and, more interestingly, the number of myelinated fibres per cell
increased far more, up to 100%, compared to spontaneous remyelination. Thus, these results
strengthen the hypothesis that a more efficient remyelination relies not only on the
availability of a sufficient pool of myelinating OL, but also, individually, on an increased
capability of OL to synthesize myelin sheaths in large amounts, and that this ability too might
be partly lost in MS.
Since MS often evolves on a remitting-relapsing pattern, the repetition of attacks could
represent one of the main factors that account for the failure of OL to remyelinate adequately
lesions; nevertheless, the consequences for OL of repeated insults were largely unknown. In
order to mimic this schematically, the authors have constructed an in vitro paradigm in which
OL from newborn rat brain, grown in pure cultures, were submitted to either a single
exposure to LPC (2.10-5 M, 24 h) (Fressinaud and Vallat, 1994), or to several LPC exposures,
although for shorter periods and at lower concentration (0.5 10-5 M, 4 x 6 h). Indeed, OL
were very susceptible to multiple attacks versus a single one (despite a similar total dose and
duration of treatment), and in particular mature OL – which are the myelinating cells, and
constitute the major part of the population of cells of the OL lineage in the adult CNS –.
Mature OL might thus represent the principal target of relapses during MS (Fressinaud,
2005).
Taken together the authors’ results converge, and suggest that cells of the OL lineage are
particularly vulnerable to multiple insults, which lead both to the death of numerous cells and
to restricted capability to synthesize myelin by surviving OL. This defect could constitute one
xiv Timothy B. Westland and Robert N. Calton

of the significant causes contributing to their failure to remyelinate axons in MS. Our data
add to the accumulating scientific knowledge suggesting that early treatment and attempts to
avoid relapses are needed for patients suffering from MS.
Chapter XI - The use of minimal invasive methods and edoscopic procedures for
diagnosis and treatment of certain pathologic entities involving the spina canal expands
permanently. The sacral spinal canal as a place of such interventions is for a long time
known. Thecaloscopy is the endoscopy of lumbar subarachnoid space performed through
different approaches by using flexible endoscopes.
The subject of this study was the measurement of certain anatomic diameters in the sacral
spinal canal by using the lubosacral MRI studies of 25 patients.
Chapter XII – White matter fills nearly half of the brain, but receives disproportionately
less scientific attention when compared to grey matter. For the past century, neuroscientists
have demonstrated little interest in white matter, thought to be simply insulation for the more
important axonal pathways contained within. The importance of white matter in learning
tasks, mastering and executing mental and physical activities, as well as perfecting mental
and social skills has become clearer over the recent decades. Much of this realization has
developed from the study of diseases predominantly affecting white matter, and therefore
disrupting intraneural communication, such as with multiple sclerosis and the
leukodystrophies.
Two diseases that have reached epidemic status—diabetes and hypertension—also
contribute to white matter disease. The mechanisms by which these two common disorders
affect white matter remain under study and may share commonalities but also disparities.
Interestingly, the human condition of white matter abnormalities in patients with diabetes
and/or hypertension can be modeled in rodents, with the hope that this will lead to future
understanding and management.
Chapter XIII - Brain tissue segmentation has important applications in studying the
structure and function of the brain. A number of methods based on structural MRI data have
been proposed for the segmentation problem. In this chapter, the authors present a robust
method for automated brain tissue segmentation based on the multiple-channel fusion in DTI
(diffusion tensor imaging) space. Our method can be employed to define accurate tissue maps
when dealing with fused structural and diffusion MRI data. This enables us to study the gray
matter diffusivity in neurodegenerative and neurological diseases. When fusing structural and
diffusion information, the imperfect alignment of structural MRI data, e.g., SPGR (Spoiled
Gradient Echo) image, with DTI data results in the problem of heterogeneous voxels when
the anatomic information in the structural data is applied to the DTI data. Under the problem
of heterogeneous voxels, the measurements of the GM (Gray Matter) diffusivity based on the
anatomic information in the SPGR image may fail to reveal the real diffusion in the GM.
Specifically, following non-rigid co-registration using the UCLA AIR tools, the GM
boundaries of SPGR image are crossing CSF of ADC image. Consequently, the GM voxels in
the SPGR image correspond to CSF (Cerebrospinal Fluid) voxels in the ADC (Apparent
Diffusion Coefficient) image. Such a problem can occur for a variety of reasons, including
geometric distortion in DTI imaging, partial volume effect, reslicing and interpolation of DTI
data, and errors in co-registration.
 Preface xv

Chapter XIV - Recent application of synchrotron radiation to high-resolution computed

tomography has resolved three-dimensional structures at micrometer to submicrometer
resolution, although little is known about the microstructure of soft tissues including white
matter of human brain. This is because soft tissues are composed of light elements that give
little contrast in a hard x-ray transmission image. In clinical diagnosis, luminal structures of a
living body are visualized by using x-ray contrast media. These contrast media contain high
atomic-number elements that absorb x-rays efficiently. The authors have recently shown that
the neuronal structure of human brain can be visualized by contrasting neurons using the
metal impregnation method. Here, the authors report x-ray microtomographic studies of
human cerebral cortex stained with high atomic-number elements. Staining protocols were
developed to visualize the three-dimensional microstructure of white and gray matter of
human brain tissues. Methods for embedding and mounting soft tissues for the
microtomographic analysis are also described. The obtained three-dimensional images
revealed the microstructures of white and gray matter, which are responsible for human brain
functions.
Chapter XV - Microglial cells are mononuclear phagocytes present ubiquitously in the
developing brain. In the white matter, they first appear as round cells called the ameboid
microglia which differentiate into ramified forms with maturation. The amoeboid microglial
cells (AMC) are present in large numbers in the periventricular white matter (peripheral to
the lateral ventricles) in the developing brain where they are known to exert other functions
besides their primary phagocytic function. Although various theories have been proposed
regarding the origin of these cells such as mesodermal, neuroectodermal and monocytic, their
origin is still a matter of debate. The macrophagic nature of these cells has been demonstrated
by different methods such as electron microscopy and immunohistochemistry. Expression of
major histocompatibility complex class I and II antigens on them, induced by
lipopolysaccharide or interferon-γ, supports their involvement in immune functions. They are
also known to release cytokines and chemokines such as tumor-necrosis factor-α, interleukin-
1β and monocyte chemoattractant protein-1 in inflammatory and hypoxic-ischemic injuries
which may contribute to death of immature oligodendrocytes in such conditions. Recent
investigations have reported that AMC also express potassium channels (Kv1.2) and release
glutamate, nitric oxide and reactive oxygen species under hypoxic conditions. This chapter
will review the origin and function of AMC in the periventricular white matter in the
developing brain under normal conditions and the role of these cells in hypoxic/ischemic
conditions.
Chapter XVI - Objective: Susac's syndrome is characterized by the triad of hearing loss,
branch retinal artery occlusions, and encephalopathy with predominantly cognitive and
psychiatric symptoms. Focal ischemic lesions in the corpus callosum detectable by
conventional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) are a characteristic feature of Susac's
syndrome. They do not, however, fully explain the type and severity of the
neuropsychological deficits. In this study, the authors tested the hypothesis that widespread
tissue damage of otherwise normal-appearing white matter (NAWM) can be detected in
Susac's syndrome when using diffusion tensor imaging (DTI).
Methods: Three-dimensional fractional anisotropy (FA) maps were calculated from DTI
data of five patients with Susac's syndrome and a group of 63 matched healthy controls.
xvi Timothy B. Westland and Robert N. Calton

Results: Voxel-based statistics of spatially normalized FA maps revealed highly

significant widespread impairment of fiber integrity in all patients. Lesions were particularly
located in the genu of the corpus callosum and in the frontotemporal connecting fascicles.
Patients showed specifically reduced mean FA values in the region of interest outlining the
genu. This was true even if the genu was not focally affected on conventional MRI.
Interpretation: The authors conclude that DTI is much more sensitive than conventional
MRI in demonstrating WM abnormalities in Susac's syndrome. FA reductions in NAWM of
the genu of the corpus callosum seem to be disease-specific. Psychiatric symptoms and
cognitive deficits of these patients are most likely caused by the disruption of the anatomical
connectivity of the frontal lobes.
Chapter XVII - The organisation of the myelinated central axon into discrete domains is
key to the function of the central nervous system. While most of the axolemma is covered by
lipid rich myelin, areas known as nodes of Ranvier are exposed to the extracellular space.
These specialised regions are enriched with the Na+ channels responsible for action potential
conduction, which, due to the low capacitance of the internodal myelin sheath, can travel
with remarkable speed along even the smallest of myelinated axons. Restricting current flow
in this way also lessens the metabolic burden of electrical activity, permitting the
development of extensive white matter tracts. Recent work has identified numerous other
proteins present at nodes and adjacent areas. These include, for example, the scaffolding
proteins ankyrinG and βIV spectrin at the node and members of contactin associated protein
family in the paranodal and juxtaparanodal regions. The exact mechanisms by which such
proteins are recruited to the appropriate axonal domains remain elusive, although myelinating
oligodendroglia appears to play an important role. This review will describe what is currently
known about the organisation of Ranvier’s node and the myelinated central axon.
Chapter XVIII - The neural control of locomotion in vertebrates involves continuous
interactions between various kinds of neural subsystems which are widely distributed
throughout the central nervous system. Among these subsystems, the long descending
reticulospinal pathways and their targets’ spinal lamina VIII commissural neurons with axons
projecting across the midline to the contralateral side form a continuous, anatomical system
that is involved in the generation and coordination of left-right reciprocal and bilateral
locomotor activities. To advance understanding of locomotor roles of this brainstem-spinal
cord system, the authors performed a series of neural tracing studies using anterograde neural
tracers to characterize the axonal morphology of reticulospinal neurons and lamina VIII
commissural neurons in the cat, with the goal of revealing some of the organizing principles
of their projections along their rostrocaudal extent in the spinal cord, including: the number
and frequency of their axon collaterals in the white matter, the patterns of their collateral
arborizations in the gray matter, and the relationships between locations of the parent axons
and their collateral termination areas. The reticulospinal pathways are morphologically
heterogeneous, being composed of various types of in-parallel-descending axons, each of
which has a commonality of the pattern of collateral termination along its rostrocaudal extent
in the spinal cord. Commissural neurons can be classified into two major groups on the basis
of their projections, viz. those that project primarily to laminae VIII-VII and those that
project to the motor nuclei in lamina IX. These suggest that the reticulospinal pathways and
their targets’ commissural neurons as a whole comprise varying types of functional subunits,
 Preface xvii

which may serve as the flexible optimal neural substrate essential for the generation and
coordination of the bilateral locomotor rhythm in self-induced, goal-directed locomotion.
Short Communication - Among several techniques, single-shot echo-planar imaging has
been a standard technique for diffusion-tensor MR imaging (DTI) of white matter because of
its rapid acquisition time and high signal to noise ratio. However, inherent artifacts and
distortions due to susceptibility often prevent the demonstration of normal structures and
pathological changes in some situations.
Recently some studies have reported that line scan and single-shot fast spin-echo (ssfse)
techniques (non echo-planar imaging techniques) have been used for DTI and their
advantages. The line scan, simple spin-echo based one, can have benefits for brain stem and
spinal cord imaging because of insensitivity of magnetic field inhomogeneity. Ssfse
technique also avoids the artifacts and is useful for the region with geometric distortion (i.e.,
temporal lobe, metals after neurosurgical operation). However, these non echo-planar
techniques have some disadvantages and therefore, are not commonly used in many
institutions.
In this chapter, the authors review and illustrate the merits and limitations of non echo-
planar imaging techniques for the DTI. Moreover, the authors discuss the current role and
feasibility of the DTI for white matter studies in brain and spinal cord, i.e. quantitative
analysis of apparent diffusion coefficient in patients with cervical myelopathy, including
results from our experiments and clinical data.
Commentary - The use of minimal invasive methods and endoscopic procedures for
diagnosis and treatment of certain pathologic entities involving the spinal canal expands
permanently. The sacral spinal canal as a place of such interventions is for a long time
known. Thecaloscopy is the endoscopy of lumbar subarachnoid space performed through
different approaches by using flexible endoscopes.
The subject of this study was the measurement of certain anatomic diameters in the sacral
spinal canal by using the lumbosacral MRI studies of 25 patients with unclear pain
symptoms, in order to estimate, from the pure anatomic point of view, the capability to
perform thecaloscopy in this anatomical region.
Since now anatomic morphometric data of the sacral region were delivered only from the
cadaver specimens’ sectioning performed in anatomic institutes during the 60’s and 70’s
years.
The parameters measured were: 1. the inclination of the lumbosacral angle, 2. the
duralsack’s end, 3. the length of all the sacral spinal processes, 4. The length of the sacral
spinal canal in its centre, and 5. The width of the sacral hiatus.
The results of the measurements were in detail presented and an evaluation of them
concerning the applicability of flexible endoscopes in the sacral spinal canal was performed.
It was proven that the duralsack’s end in 40% of the patients at the middle of the S2
vertebral body lies, an anatomical position, which through the sacral hiatus easy to access is.
The length under the sacral spinal processes is smaller than the length of the sacral spinal
canal in its centre, a fact that makes the manipulation of a flexible endoscope easier, if
someone works straight under the spinal processes and has a smaller distance to run. Through
the sacral hiatus the introduction of the flexible endoscope is by many patients possible
because of its adequate width.
Research and Review Studies
In: Handbook on White Matter ISBN: 978-1-60741-034-8
Editors: T. B. Westland and R. N. Calton © 2009 Nova Science Publishers, Inc.

Chapter I

Interhemispheric Connectivity:
The Evolution and Nature
of the Corpus Callosum

Sarah B. Johnson and Manuel F. Casanova*

Department of Psychiatry; University of Louisville, KY, USA

Introduction

Though no one will doubt that animals have evolved into a shocking diversity of shapes
and sizes, it is remarkable that the basic neurological layout of the vast majority of species,
including at least all vertebrates and arthropods, remains preserved, with a pair of organs
arranged about the longitudinal axis of the organism (Houzel and Milleret, 1999).
Accordingly, Houzel and Milleret (1999) go on to suggest that this symmetric layout
represents the manner in which we process and respond to our environment, with “our senses
basically proceed[ing] by a balance between pairs of sensors, as our acts result from a
dynamic equilibrium between pairs of effectors, and our decisions often follow[ing]
judgements from contrasting points of view” (Houzel and Milleret, 1999). Though we
perhaps perceive our surroundings in sensory pairs, it is imperative that the output efforts of
our nervous system be united into a single, coherent, efficient response; as eloquently put by
Charles Sherrington in 1906, “the resultant singleness of action from moment to moment is a
keystone in the construction of the individual whose unity it is the specific office of the
nervous system to perfect” (Sherrington, 1906). Based on this premise of a dichotomous
receptive system requiring coherent processing and a coordinated response, “the brain must
be seen as an ensemble of several multiply interconnected neuronal systems, each with its
own functional specialization, and integration must be seen as the process of interactive

*
Contact Information: Manuel F. Casanova, MD; Department of Psychiatry; University of Louisville; 500 South
Preston Street, Building A, Room 217; Louisville, KY 40202; Email: m0casa02@louisville.edu; Tel:
(502)852-4077 (O)
4 Sarah B. Johnson and Manuel F. Casanova

cooperation between these systems that allows efficient cognition and consistent behavioral
control” (Berlucchi, 1999).
The classical neurological notion of a dominant hemisphere responsible for language
abilities and objective processing coupled with a non-dominant hemisphere prevailing for
nonverbal, spatial, and intuitive tasks has been upheld by several studies (Sperry, 1982),
though this dichotomy is not seen with the brains of nonhuman mammals (Berlucchi, 1999).
Still, no matter how simple the task, no operation involves exclusively one hemisphere
without the other; we are constantly switching between dominant and non-dominant
functions, mandating an ample channel of communication between the two hemispheres
(Houzel and Milleret, 1999). Along with the evolutionarily older anterior commissure, the
corpus callosum has evolved to be one of the two major inter-hemispheric connectors in
mammals (Katz et al., 1983).
The corpus callosum, however, has not always been recognized as the critical cortico-
cortical highway that it is. During the first half of the twentieth century, about the only
importance attributed to this structure was the possibility that it facilitated the
interhemispheric spread of generalizing seizure activity (Berlucchi, 1999); it was therefore
frequently transected surgically as a cure for patients with epilepsy. This view was initially
changed by an experiment by Sperry in 1953 in which the importance of the corpus callosum
in interocular visual transfer was demonstrated by the fact that disrupting the optic chiasm
did not hinder the ease with which visual pattern discriminations learned with one eye are
transferred to the other eye, while disrupting both the optic chiasm and the corpus callosum
certainly did (Sperry, 1961; Berlucchi, 1999). Since then, the importance of the corpus
callosum in interhemispheric cooperation has been studied in increasing detail. Nonetheless,
we still know strikingly little about the exact neuronal mechanisms of interhemispheric
integration, a fact that Houzel and Milleret (1999) attribute to “the abundance of callosal
fibers and to their manifold functions…, exist[ing] for sensory, motor, associative, frontal or
limbic cortices, and… link[ing] heterologous as well as homologous areas” (Houzel and
Milleret, 1999).
Before looking at the trends of corpus callosum evolution relative to brain evolution
overall, it is interesting to consider just how the corpus callosum could have ever come to
exist in the first place. Katz et al. (1983) offer one possible explanation based on ontophyletic
analysis, which involves inferences about callosal evolution based on a comparison of
developmental events in various organisms. Unlike the anterior commissure, which is
believed to have evolved as new axons finding their way through a pre-established “substrate
pathway,” the corpus callosum, which is found only in placental mammals, appears to have
appeared in the mammalian phylogeny with no apparent precursors (Katz et al., 1983). Katz
et al. (1983) theorize the following chain of events in the evolutionary development of the
corpus callosum: (1) the two cerebral hemispheres secondarily fused along the midline rostral
to the lamina terminalis; (2) a small number of critical genomic mutations lead to the
accumulation of a particular population of nonneuronal substrate cells, possibly a transient
class of glia, on either side of this interhemispheric contact; (3) these glia migrated across the
secondary interhemispheric fusion to form an interwoven cellular bridge, or “glial sling,”
between the two hemispheres; and (4) a portion of both new and existing axons eventually
traversed this new passageway to ultimately form the corpus callosum (Katz et al., 1983).
 Interhemispheric Connectivity 5

Katz et al. go on to make what may be somewhat of an oversimplification in claiming,

“further evolution of the corpus callosum occurred in a typical fashion for axon tracts: as the
size of the neocortex increased, the size of the corpus callosum increased—with the
additional axons following the preexisting callosal substrate” (Katz et al., 1983) They do add,
however, that even with new axons the corpus callosum would not have the capacity to
connect all cortical neurons directly (Katz et al., 1983).
This last concept foreshadows the results of a more recent study by Rilling and Insel
(1999) to determine whether or not growth of the corpus callosum keeps pace with the
growth of the forebrain in primate evolution. To accomplish this, whole brain MRI scans
from 43 individuals spanning 11 primate species (human, bonobo, chimpanzee, gorilla,
orangutan, gibbon, baboon, rhesus monkey, mangabey, cebus, and squirrel monkey) were
analyzed for brain volume, gray/white ratio, corpus callosum area, and anterior commissure
area. They hypothesized that “for cross-hemispheric communication via the corpus callosum
to keep pace with brain growth, callosal projections must increase substantially in number
and length” (Rilling and Insel, 1999), and going on the pre-established premises that (1)
callosal fiber diameter changes only minimally and (2) callosal fiber density does not
increase with increasing callosal area, they used the cross-sectional area of the corpus
callosum as an estimate of the extent of callosal projections (Jerison, 1991; Rilling and Insel,
1999). Their results showed that corpus callosum size in fact does not keep pace with
increased in brain volume, or, in other words, the ratio of corpus callosum area to brain
volume decreased systematically with increasing brain size. In fact, in their sample the
average human corpus callosum would have to be about one-third larger to match the ratio of
corpus callosum area to neocortical surface area found in an average monkey. They also
measured the anterior commissure in their samples to see if it could compensate for the
reduction in callosal connectivity—however, they found an even greater reduction in
connectivity via this commissure. Finally, they divided each corpus callosum into five equal
parts and regressed each part individually on brain volume. In doing so, they found that the
posterior fifth, corresponding roughly to the splenium, constitutes an increasing proportion of
total callosal area with increasing brain size. The implications of all of these results when
extrapolated to interhemispheric connectivity, which we define as “the number of callosal
axons in the brain relative to the number of neocortical neurons” (Rilling and Insel, 1999), is
concisely noted by another reviewer: “INTRAconnectivity [emphasis added] within each
cerebral hemisphere, as expressed by the amount of white matter, was found to be larger in
larger brains and to exceed in pace neocortical surface area. In contrast, INTERconnectivity
[emphasis added] as expressed by surface area measurements of the corpus callosum was
smaller in larger brains, like humans, than in smaller primate brains and seems not to keep
pace with increasing brain size” (Semendeferi, 2001; Rilling and Insel, 1999). This reduction
in interhemispheric connectivity likely parallels the functional lateralization that is thought to
be an emergent property accompanying brain enlargement in primate evolution, and a
possible reason for the relative sparing of the splenium amidst this reduction is the relative
inability of the visual areas of the cortex (which project fibers to and receive fibers from the
splenium) to tolerate as much of a reduction in interhemispheric connectivity as other cortical
areas less dependent on rapid bi-hemispheric integration (Rilling and Insel, 1999).
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very much have liked to see his second daughter in a similar
position. But Genji did not feel sufficiently friendly towards him to
second this design, particularly as there were many other young
ladies who were quite as well qualified to fill the post. Prince
Hyōbukyō saw nothing for it but to submit.
In the autumn Genji made his pilgrimage to the Shrine of
Sumiyoshi, where, as will be remembered, he had various vows to
fulfil. The occasion was made one of public importance and the
splendour of his cortège, in which all the greatest noblemen and
courtiers of the day vied with one another to take part, made a deep
impression throughout the kingdom. The Lady of Akashi had been
unable to pay her accustomed visit to the Shrine either last autumn
or during the spring of this year. She determined to renew the
practice, and it so happened that she arrived by boat at Sumiyoshi
just as Genji’s magnificent procession was passing along the shore.
She saw throngs of servitors, laden with costly offerings; she saw
the Eastern Dancers,8 in companies of ten, riding by on horseback,
men of picked stature, conspicuous in their strange blue-striped
dress. Not a word concerning Genji’s visit to Sumiyoshi had reached
her, and turning to some one who was standing near she asked what
procession this might be. ‘What procession?’ the man exclaimed in
astonishment. ‘Why, the Chief Minister’s!’ and a shout of laughter
went up at the notion that there could possibly exist anybody in the
world who had not heard of this all-important event, laughter in
which a number of rough scallawags who were standing by joined as
heartily as the rest.
She was confounded. That after all these long months of waiting
it should be thus she met him showed indeed to what a different
world he really belonged! Yet after all they were not quite strangers,
he and she. She was at least of more account in his eyes than these
wretches who had scoffed at her ignorance, than all this rabble who
cared nothing for him and had come here only that they might boast
of having shared in his triumph. How cruel an irony that she who
thought of him and him only, who painfully gathered together every
scrap of intelligence concerning his health and movements, should
all unwittingly have chosen this disastrous day for her journey, while
all the rest of the world resounded with the news of his coming; she
hid her face and wept. The procession moved on its way—
innumerable green cloaks, with here and there a scarlet one among
them, bright as an autumn maple-tree amid a grove of pines. In
cavalcade after cavalcade the varying colours flashed by, now dark,
now light.9 Among the officers of the Sixth Grade there was one
whose sheriff’s coat of gold and green made him conspicuous; this
was Ukon, the gentleman who upon the occasion of Genji’s visit to
the Imperial Tombs had recited the verse: ‘Little, alas, they heed
their worshippers....’10 He had become captain of the Quiver
Bearers, and as such was attended by more numerous officers than
any other of the sheriffs. Among these attendants was Yoshikiyo,
who in a resplendent crimson cloak, worn with an air of the utmost
nonchalance, was perhaps the handsomest figure in all the throng.
Here, prosperous and happy, were all the knights and gentlemen
whom she had seen at Akashi; then a pitiable band, now scattered
amongst a vast cohort of partisans and retainers. The young princes
and courtiers who rode with the procession had vied with one
another in the magnificence of their accoutrement. Such gorgeous
saddles and trappings had rarely been seen; and it may be imagined
how they dazzled the eye of a country girl, fresh from her hillside
retreat. At last came Genji’s coach. She could catch but a
momentary glimpse of it; and of the face for which she yearned with
so ardent a longing she could see nothing at all. Imitating the
example of the great Tōru11 he was attended by boy outriders. They
were charmingly dressed, their hair looped at the sides and tied with
purple ribbons. The ten of them were arranged according to their
height, and a very pretty sight they were as they filed past in their
dainty costumes. A boy rode by, clad in the dress of a Court page, a
person of some consequence evidently, for he was obsequiously
watched over and assisted, while a posse of boy grooms, each
differently dressed, yet forming between them a carefully designed
pattern, rode in his train. She was told that this was Prince Yūgiri,
Genji’s son by Lady Aoi. She thought of her own daughter for whom
so different a fate seemed to be reserved, and in sad submission
bowed her head towards the Shrine. The Governor of the Province
had now appeared, his arrival being attended by greater pomp than
had ever before marked his intercourse with a Minister on
pilgrimage. The Lady of Akashi saw clearly that even should she
succeed in forcing her way through the crowd, there was little
chance that in the midst of all these excitements the God would pay
any attention to her insignificant offering. She was on the point of
going home again, since there seemed to be no object in staying any
longer, when it occurred to her that she might at any rate row over
to Naniwa and perform the ceremony of Purification. This she did,
while Genji, still unaware that she had been so near him, spent the
rest of the evening preforming his vows within the Shrine. At last,
thinking that by now the God ought to be thoroughly content, Genji
determined to enjoy himself a little into the bargain; and the rest of
the night was spent by the whole company in the most lively fashion
imaginable. Koremitsu and the rest made a mental note that for
certain kinds of religious observance there was much to be said. It
happened that Genji went outside for a little while and Koremitsu,
who was with him, recited an acrostic verse in which he hinted that
beneath the pine-trees of Sumiyoshi a less solemn stillness now
prevailed than when the Gods first ruled on earth. This could not be
denied, and indeed to Genji too a joyful time had succeeded to an
age of sadness. He therefore answered with the verse: ‘That from
wild waves whose onslaught drove me from my course this God
delivered me, I shall not soon forget.’ Koremitsu then went on to tell
him how the boat from Akashi, dismayed by the crowds that flocked
the Shrine, had put out again to sea. He hated to think that she had
been there without his knowing it; besides, he felt now that it was
this very God of Sumiyoshi who had given her to him for a bride. He
could not let her go back without a word from him to cheer her. To
think that she had come and gone without his even hearing that she
was at hand would certainly grieve her worst of all. But for the
moment she had gone further up the coast and there was nothing to
be done.
After leaving Sumiyoshi he visited several places in the
neighbourhood. At Naniwa he too underwent the ceremony of
Purification, together with other ceremonies, particularly the Ablution
of the Seven Streams. As he passed the estuary of Horiye he
murmured ‘Like the Tide-gauge at Naniwa...,’12 hardly knowing why
the lines had come into his head. Koremitsu, who was near his
coach, overheard these words, and regarding them as a command to
him to produce writing materials (a duty for which he was often in
request) he whipped out a short-handled pen from the folds of his
dress and as soon as Genji’s coach came to a standstill handed it in
to him. Genji was amused by his promptness and on a folded paper
wrote the lines: ‘That once again our love to its flood-mark shall rise,
what better presage than this chance meeting by the tide-gauge of
the shore?’ This he sent across to Naniwa by the hand of an
underling who, from conversation with her servants, knew at what
address she was to be found. Much as she had suffered at seeing
him pass her by, it needed only this trifling message to allay all her
agitation. In a flutter of gratitude and pride she indited the answer:
‘How comes it13 that to the least of those who bide as pilgrims in
this town you bear a love that mounts so high upon the flood-gauge
of your heart?’ She had that day been bathing in the Holy Waters at
the Shrine of Rain-coat Island, and she sent him her poem tied to a
prayer-strip which she had brought from the Shrine. When the
message reached Genji it was already growing dark; the tide was
full, and the cranes along the river-mouth had with one accord set
up their strange and moving cry. Touched by the beauty of the place
and hour, he suddenly lost all patience with the crowds that surged
around him. Could he but banish them all from his sight and find
himself with only the writer of this diffident poem at his side!
The journey back to the City was enlivened by many excursions
and entertainments, but all the while his thoughts continually
returned to the strange coincidence of that unhappy meeting.
Quantities of dancing-girls had attached themselves to his retinue.
Despite their total lack of sense or breeding, their company
appeared to afford a vast deal of satisfaction to the hot-blood young
gentlemen who formed Genji’s escort. This seemed to him very
strange. One cannot enjoy beautiful scenery or works of art in the
company of any but the right person; and surely if, in such matters
as that, one is so easily put off by commonness or stupidity, it must
make some difference whom one chooses as partner in these far
more intimate associations? He could not indeed contrive to take the
slightest interest in these creatures. They on their side quickly
perceived that they were not being a success, and at once redoubled
their efforts; with the consequence that he found them only the
more repulsive.
Next day was marked a ‘good day’ in the calendar, and Genji’s
party being safely on its way back to the Capital, the Lady of Akashi
was able to return to Sumiyoshi and pursue her devotions in peace,
now at last finding occasion to fulfil the many vows that had
accumulated since her last visit to the Shrine. Her recent glimpse of
Genji in all his glory had but increased the misgivings which day and
night beset her: amid such surroundings as that it was impossible
that so insignificant a person as herself should not rapidly sink into
obscurity and contempt. She did not expect to hear from him again
till he was back at Court. She was counting the days, when to her
surprise a messenger appeared. In a letter, which had evidently
been written during the journey, he named the actual date at which
he should send for her to the City. Once more he sought to dispel all
her doubts and anxieties; she could rely upon him implicitly; her
position in his household would, he besought her to believe, be
neither equivocal nor insecure. Nevertheless, she felt that she was
embarking upon a perilous voyage under skies which, however
promising an aspect they might now be wearing, might at any
moment change to the threat of a hideous disaster. Her father too,
when it came to the prospect of actually releasing her from his care,
was exceedingly perturbed; indeed he dreaded her departure for the
Capital even more than he had feared the prospect of her remaining
forever buried in her rustic home. Her answer to Genji was full of
reservations and misgivings concerning her fitness for the position
which he promised her.
The retirement of the Emperor Suzaku had necessitated the
appointment of a new Vestal at Ise, and Lady Rokujō had brought
her daughter back again to the City. Genji had written the usual
congratulations and this had given her immense pleasure; but she
had no desire to give him the opportunity of once more distracting
her as he had done in those old days, and she had answered only in
the most formal terms. Consequently he had not, since her return,
made any attempt to visit her. He did indeed make some vague
suggestion of a meeting; but these hints were very half-hearted and
it was a relief to him that they were not taken. He had recently
decided not to complicate his life by outside relationships even of the
most harmless kind: he simply had not time. And particularly in a
case of this sort he saw no object in forcing his society upon some
one who did not desire it. He was however extremely curious to see
how the Vestal Virgin, now known as Lady Akikonomu, had grown
up. Rokujō’s old palace in the Sixth Ward had been admirably
repaired and redecorated, and life there was in these days by no
means intolerable. Rokujō herself had gifts of character and
intelligence which the passage of years had not obliterated. Her own
personality and the unusual beauty of many of her gentlewomen
combined to make her house a meeting place for men of fashion,
and though she was herself at times very lonely, she was leading a
life with which she was on the whole by no means ill-contented,
when her health gave way. She felt at once that there was no hope
for her, and oppressed by the thought that she had for so long been
living in a sinful place,14 she resolved to become a nun. This news
was a great blow to Genji. That he would ever again meet her as a
lover, he had long felt to be impossible. But he thought of her as a
friend whose company and conversation would always be among his
greatest pleasures. That she should have felt it necessary to take
this solemn and irrevocable step was a terrible shock, and on
hearing what had happened he at once hastened to her palace. It
proved to be a most harrowing visit. He found her in a state of
complete collapse. Screens surrounded her bed; his chair was placed
outside them, as near as possible to her pillow, and in this manner
they conversed. It was evident that her strength was rapidly failing.
How bitterly he now repented that he had not come to her sooner;
had not proved, while yet there was time, that his passion for her
had never expired! He wept bitterly, and Rokujō on her side, amazed
to realize from the very intensity of his grief that during all the years
when she had imagined herself to be forgotten, she had never been
wholly absent from his thoughts, in a moment discarded all her
bitterness, and seeing that his distress was unendurable began with
the utmost tenderness to lead his thoughts to other matters. She
spoke after a while about her daughter, Lady Akikonomu, the former
Virgin of Ise, begging him to help her on in the world in any way he
could. ‘I had hoped,’ she said, ‘having cast the cares of the world
aside, to live on quietly at any rate until this child of mine should
have reached an age when she could take her life into her own
hands....’ Her voice died away. ‘Even if you had not mentioned it, I
should always have done what I could to help her,’ answered Genji,
‘but now that you have made this formal request to me, you may be
sure that I shall make it my business to look after her and protect
her in every way that lies in my power. You need have no further
anxiety on that score....’ ‘It will not be so easy,’ she answered. ‘Even
a girl whose welfare has been the sole object of devoted parents
often finds herself in a very difficult position if her mother dies and
she has only her father to rely upon. But your task will, I fear, be far
harder than that of a widowed father. Any kindness that you show
the girl will at once be misinterpreted; she will be mixed up in all
sorts of unpleasant bickerings and all your own friends will be set
against her. And this brings me to a matter which is really very
difficult to speak about. I wish I were so sure in my own mind that
you would not make love to her. Had she my experience, I should
have no fear for her. But unfortunately she is utterly ignorant and
indeed is just the sort of person who might easily suffer unspeakable
torment through finding herself in such a position. I cannot help
wishing that I could provide for her future in some way that was not
fraught with this particular danger....’ What an extraordinary notion,
thought Genji. How could she have got such a thing into her head?
‘You are thinking of me as I was years ago,’ he answered quickly. ‘I
have changed a great deal since then, as you would soon discover if
you knew more about me....’
Out of doors it was now quite dark. The room where he was
sitting was lit only by the dim glow that, interrupted by many
partitions, filtered through from the great lamp in the hall. Some one
had entered the room. He peeped cautiously through a tear in one
of the screens which surrounded the bed. In the very uncertain light
he could just distinguish Rokujō’s form. Her hair was cropped, as is
customary with novices before the final tonsure; but elegantly and
with taste, so that her head, outlined against the pillows, made a
delicate and charming picture. On the far side of the bed he could
distinguish a second figure. This surely must be Lady Akikonomu.
There was a point at which the screens had been carelessly joined,
and looking through this gap he saw a young girl sitting in an
attitude of deep dejection with her chin resting on her hand. So far
as he could judge from this very imperfect view she was exceedingly
good-looking. Her hair that hung loose to the ground, the carriage of
her head, her movements and expression,—all had a singular dignity
and grace; yet despite this proud air there was something about her
affectionate, almost appealing. But was he not already beginning to
take just that interest in her person against which her mother had a
few moments ago been warning him? He hastily corrected his
thoughts. Lady Rokujō now spoke again: ‘I am in great pain,’ she
said, ‘and fear that at any moment my end may come. I would not
have you witness my last agonies. Pray leave me at once.’ This she
said with great difficulty, her women supporting her on either side.
‘How glad I should have been,’ said Genji, ‘if my visit had made you
better. I am afraid it has only made you worse. I cannot bear to
leave you in such pain. Tell me what it is that hurts so much?’ And
so saying he made as though to come to her side. ‘Do not come to
me!’ she cried out in terror, ‘I am grown hideous; you would not
know me. Does what I say seem to you very strange and disjointed?
It may be that my thoughts wander a little, for I am dying. Thank
you for bearing patiently with me at such a time. I am much easier
in my mind now that I have had this talk with you. I had meant to
for a long time....’ ‘I am touched,’ replied Genji, ‘that you should
have thought of me as a person to whom you could confide these
requests. As you know, my father the late Emperor had a very large
number of sons and daughters; for my part, I am not very intimate
with any of them. But, when his brother died, he also regarded Lady
Akikonomu here as though she were his own child and for that
reason I have every right to regard her as my sister and help her in
just those ways which a brother might. It is true that I am a great
deal older than she is; but my own family is sadly small,15 and I
could well afford to have some one else to look after....’
After his return he sent incessantly to enquire after her progress
and constantly wrote to her. She died some eight days later. He was
deeply distressed, for a long while took no interest in anything that
happened and had not the heart to go even so far as the Emperor’s
Palace. The arrangements concerning her funeral and many other
matters about which she had left behind instructions fell entirely
upon him, for there was no one else to whom her people could
apply. Fortunately the officers who had been attached to Lady
Akikonomu’s suite while she was at Ise still remained in her service
and they were able to give her a certain amount of assistance.
Before the funeral Genji called in person and sent in a note to the
bereaved lady of the house. A housekeeper (one of the people from
Ise) brought back word that her mistress was completely
overwhelmed by her loss and could not reply to him. He sent in a
second message reminding Lady Akikonomu that her mother had
solemnly committed her to his care and begging her not to regard
him as an alien intruder into her affairs. He then sent for the various
members of the household and gave them their instructions. He did
so with an air of confidence and authority which surprised those who
remembered for how long he had absented himself from that house.
The funeral was carried out with the utmost pomp, the bier being
attended not only by her servants, but by all Genji’s servants and
retainers.
For a long while afterwards he was immersed in prayers and
penances and but seldom emerged from the seclusion of a thickly
curtained recess. To Lady Akikonomu he sent many messages of
enquiry, to which she now answered in her own hand. She had at
first been too shy to do so; much to the dismay of her old nurse,
who explained to her that not to answer letters is considered very
uncivil. One day as he sat watching the wild storms of sleet and
snow that were sweeping in a confused blizzard across the land, he
could not help wondering how Lady Akikonomu was faring in this
rough weather and sent a messenger to her palace. ‘I wonder how
you like this storm,’ he wrote, and added the poem: ‘I see a house of
mourning; dark tempests threaten it, and high amid the clouds
hovers a ghost with anxious wing.’ It was written on light blue paper
tinged with grey; the penmanship and make-up of the note were
indeed purposely intended to be such as would impress a young girl.
So much did this elegant missive dazzle her inexperienced eye that
she again felt utterly unable to reply, and it was only when one
member of her household after another reproached her for such
rudeness and ingratitude that she at last took up a sheet of heavily
scented dark-grey paper and in brush-strokes so faint as to be
scarcely distinguishable wrote the poem: ‘Would that like the snow-
flakes when they are weary of falling I might sink down upon the
earth and end my days.’ There was nothing very remarkable about
the writing, but it was an agreeable hand and one which bore
unmistakable traces of the writer’s lineage. He had formed a high
opinion of her at the time when she first went to Ise and had very
much regretted her withdrawal from the world. Now she was an
ordinary person again, and, if he wished to cultivate her
acquaintance, entirely at his disposal; but this very fact (as was
usual with him) caused a revulsion of feeling. To go forward in the
direction where fewest obstacles existed seemed to him to be taking
a mean advantage. Although he was, in his attentions to Lady
Akikonomu, merely fulfilling her mother’s request, he knew quite
well how every one at Court was expecting the story to end. Well,
for once in a way their expectations would be disappointed. He was
fully determined to bring her up with the utmost propriety and, so
soon as the Emperor reached years of discretion, to present her at
Court; in fact, to adopt her as his daughter,—a thing which,
considering the smallness of his family, it was natural for him to do.
He constantly wrote her letters full of kindness and encouragement,
and occasionally called at her palace. ‘What I should really like,’ he
said one day, ‘would be for you to look upon me, if you will forgive
my putting it in that way, as a substitute for your dear mother. Can
you not sometimes treat me as though I were an old friend? Can
you not trust me with some of the secrets you used to confide to
her?’ Such appeals merely embarrassed her. She had lived so
secluded a life that to open her mouth at all in a stranger’s presence
seemed to her a terrible ordeal, and her gentlewomen were in the
end obliged to make such amends as they could. It was a comfort
that many of her officers and gentlewomen were closely connected
with the Imperial Family and would, if his project for installing her in
the Palace did not come to naught, be able to help her to assert
herself. He would have been glad to know more about her
appearance, but she always received him from behind her curtains,
and he neither felt justified in taking the liberties that are accorded
to a parent nor did he feel quite sure enough of himself to wish to
put his parental feelings to the test. He was indeed very uncertain
with regard to his own intentions, and for the present mentioned his
plans about her to nobody. He saw to it that the Memorial Service
was carried out with great splendour, devoting to the arrangement of
it a care that deeply gratified the bereaved household. Life there was
becoming more and more featureless and depressing as the weeks
went by. One by one Lady Akikonomu’s servants and retainers were
finding other employment. The Palace stood at the extreme outer
edge of the Sixth Ward, in a district which was very little frequented,
and the melancholy bells which went on tolling and tolling in
innumerable adjacent temples reduced her every evening to a state
of abject misery. She had always been used to spend a great deal of
time in her mother’s company, and even when she was sent to Ise,
though no parent had ever before accompanied the Vestal Virgin,
they still remained unseparated. It can be imagined then that her
mother’s loss left her peculiarly helpless and desolate; and the
thought that Rokujō, who had travelled so far for her sake, should
now set out upon this last journey all alone, caused her unspeakable
pain. Many suitors both high and low, under cover of paying
attentions to one or other of her gentlewomen, now began to
frequent the house. Genji however had in his best fatherly style
exacted a promise from the lady’s old nurse that she would allow no
matchmaking to go on in the house. Above all he feared that some
of her women might wish for their own ends to keep these
gentlemen hanging about the premises. It soon however became
apparent that there was no danger of this. The ladies concerned
knew that their doings would probably reach Genji’s ears, and they
were far too anxious to stand well with him to dream of abusing
their position. The suitors soon found that their advances were not
met with the slightest encouragement.
It will be remembered that at the time of Lady Akikonomu’s
departure for Ise the retired Emperor Suzaku had, when presiding at
the magnificent farewell ceremony in the Daigoku Hall, been greatly
struck with her beauty. This impression had remained with him, and
on her return to the Capital he begged Rokujō to let her daughter
come to him, promising that she should take her place as the equal
of his sister, the former Vestal of Kamo, and the other princesses, his
sisters and kinswomen whom he sheltered under his roof. This
proposal did not please her. She feared that where so many exalted
personages were gathered together her daughter would be likely to
receive but scant attention. Moreover Suzaku was at the time in very
bad health, and if he should fail to recover, his dependants might be
left in a precarious position. Now that her mother was dead it was all
the more desirable to establish her in a manner which offered some
prospect of security. When therefore Suzaku repeated his invitation,
this time in somewhat insistent terms, Lady Akikonomu’s friends
were placed in an awkward position. Genji’s private plan of
affiancing her to the boy-Emperor would, now that Suzaku had
displayed so marked an inclination towards her, be difficult to pursue
without too deeply offending his brother. Another consideration
weighed with him: he was becoming more and more fascinated by
the girl’s beauty and he was in no hurry to commit her to other
hands. Under the circumstances he thought the best thing he could
do was to talk the matter over with Lady Fujitsubo. ‘I am in great
difficulties over this business,’ he said. ‘As you know, the girl’s
mother was a woman of singularly proud and sensitive
temperament. I am ashamed to say that, following my own wanton
and selfish inclinations, I behaved in such a way as to do great
injury to her reputation, with the consequence that henceforward
she on her side harboured against me a passionate resentment,
while I on mine found myself branded not only by her but also by
the world at large as a profligate and scamp. Till the very last I was
never able to recover her confidence; but on her death-bed she
spoke to me of Akikonomu’s future in a way which she would never
have done had she not wholly regained her good opinion of me. This
was a great weight off my mind. Even had these peculiar relations
not existed between us, her request was one which even to a
stranger I could hardly have refused. And as it was, you may
imagine how gladly I welcomed this chance of repairing, even at this
late hour, the grievous wrong which my light-mindedness had
inflicted upon her during her lifetime. His Majesty is of course many
years younger than Akikonomu;16 but I do not think it would be a
bad thing if he had some older and more experienced person in his
entourage. However, it is for you to decide....’ ‘I am of the same
opinion,’ Fujitsubo replied. ‘It would of course be very imprudent to
offend the retired Emperor. But surely the mother’s wishes are a
sufficient excuse. If I were you I should pretend you know nothing
about the retired Emperor’s inclination towards her and present her
at the Palace without more ado. As a matter of fact, Suzaku now
cares very little about such matters. What energy he still possesses
is spent on prayers and meditation. I do not think you will find that
he minds very much one way or the other....’ ‘All the same, I think it
will be best under the circumstances if the request for Akikonomu’s
Presentation came from you,’ said Genji. ‘I could then seem merely
to be adding my solicitations to yours. You will think that in weighing
the pros and cons of the matter with such care I am over-
scrupulous; and indeed I fear that you have found me rather
tedious. It is simply that I am extremely anxious people should not
think me lacking in respect towards my brother....’ It soon became
apparent that, in accordance with Fujitsubo’s advice, he had decided
to disregard the retired Emperor’s wishes. But it was in Genji’s own
palace and not, for the moment at any rate, in the Emperor’s
household that Lady Akikonomu was to be installed. He explained
the circumstances to Murasaki. ‘She is just about your age,’ he said,
‘and you will find her a very agreeable companion. I think you will
get on famously together....’ Murasaki at once took to the idea and
was soon busy with preparations for the reception of the visitor.
Fujitsubo was all this while extremely exercised in mind
concerning the future of her niece, the youngest daughter of Prince
Hyōbukyō, for Genji’s estrangement from the father seemed to block
every avenue of advancement. Tō no Chūjō’s daughter, as the
grandchild of the Senior Minister, was treated on all sides with the
utmost deference and consideration, and she had now become the
Emperor’s favourite playmate. ‘My brother’s little girl is just the same
age as the Emperor,’ said Fujitsubo one day; ‘he would enjoy having
her to play at dolls with him sometimes, and it would be a help to
the older people who are looking after him.’ But quite apart from
affairs of state, Genji had (as Fujitsubo knew) such a multiplicity of
private matters to attend to and was plagued from morning till night
by such a variety of irritating applications and requests that she had
not the heart to keep on bothering him. It was something that a
person like Lady Akikonomu would soon be at the Emperor’s side;
for Fujitsubo herself was in very poor health and, though she
sometimes visited the Palace, she could not look after her son’s
education as she would have liked to do. It was necessary that there
should be some one grown up to keep an eye on him, and though
she would dearly like to have seen her niece installed as his
playmate, she was extremely glad of the arrangement whereby a
sensible creature like Lady Akikonomu was to have him in her
constant care.
1
Tenth month. The Shintō gods become inaccessible during this
month; but the Buddhas are, apparently, still available.
2
Lady Kōkiden.
3
China.
4
As opposed to a Sedan-chair. A carriage drawn by oxen is
meant; this was a great luxury.
5
Used at the birth-ceremonies of a Princess.
6
Ika—Fiftieth Day; but also ‘Why do you not come?’
7
The taxes paid by 2,000 households.
8
These men accompanied a Minister of State on pilgrimages to
the great Shintō shrines, danced in front of the shrine and
afterwards took part in horse-races round it.
9
The higher officers wore cloaks of deeper hue, i.e. dipped more
often in the dye and therefore more costly.
10
See above, p. 114.
11
For the extravagances of this statesman, see Nō Plays of
Japan, p. 293.
12
‘As to the tide-gauge at Naniwa that now lies bare, so to our
love the flood tide shall at last return.’
13
Pun on Naniwa, name of town and nani wa ‘How comes it?’
Here and in the preceding poem there is also a play on
miozukushi = tide-gauge, and mi wo tsukushi = with all one’s
heart and soul.’
14
A Shintō shrine, offensive to Buddha.
15
Aoi’s son Yūgiri was his only acknowledged child.
16
Akikonomu was now nineteen; the boy-Emperor Ryōzen,
seven.
 CHAPTER XV
THE PALACE IN THE TANGLED WOODS
WHILE Genji, like Yukihira of old, ‘dragged his leaky pails’ along the
shore of Suma, his absence had been mourned, in varying ways and
degrees, by a very large number of persons in the Capital. Even
those who stood in no need of patronage or protection and had
through his departure lost only the amenities of a charming
friendship were deeply distressed. For some of them, such as
Murasaki, this sad time was mitigated by constant messages from
his place of exile; some were privileged to busy their needles upon
such garments as his altered state prescribed, or were allowed the
consolation of rendering him other small services such as in his
present difficulties he was likely to require. But there were others
who, though they had received his favours, had done so unknown to
the world, and these ladies now learned of Genji’s last hours at the
Capital from the casual gossip of some friend who had no idea that
the matter was of any particular concern to them. Needless to say
they feigned a like indifference; but such concealment costs one
dear and not a few hearts were broken in the process.
Among those who fared worst during his absence was the lady
at the Hitachi Palace.1 During the period after her father’s death
there had been no one to take care of her and she had for a while
led a very wretched existence. But then came the unexpected
apparition of Genji. His letters and visits, which to him in the
crowded days of his glory were insignificant acts of courtesy,
implying no more than a very mild degree of interest and affection,
were to their recipient, with her narrow and unvarying life, like the
reflection of a star when it chances to fall into a bowl of water. It
was but natural, she thought, that when the outcry against him
began Genji should no longer find time for an attachment which had
in any case played only a very subordinate part in his life,
particularly as the attacks upon him were part of a widespread
movement which could not but be causing him the greatest anxiety.
Then came his exile and at last his triumphant return. But still she
heard no word from him.
In old days when she heard nothing from him for a week or two
she would become a little tearful it is true, but she still managed to
carry on her ordinary existence. Now months, years had passed;
long ago she had given up all hope, and sank into a condition of
settled apathy and gloom. ‘Poor princess!’ said the elderly
gentlewomen who waited upon her. ‘Really she has had the worst
possible luck! To see this glorious apparition suddenly descending
upon her like a God or Buddha out of the sky—not that he meant
very much by it; but she, poor lady, could never get over the
surprise of his noticing her at all—and then for him to disappear
without a word! She knows of course that it is not from her that he
has run away to Suma; it all comes of this new government! But
still, one cannot help being very sorry for the poor young creature.’
She had indeed during the time after her father’s death become
gradually inured to a life of extreme monotony and isolation; but
Genji’s visits had awakened in her quite new ambitions; for the first
time in her life she began to feel herself drawn towards the world of
taste and fashion. This made her renewed state of poverty and
isolation all the more difficult to bear. The fact that Genji frequented
the house had for the time being induced a certain number of other
visitors to present themselves. But since his departure one visitor
after another, having grown more and more remiss in his attentions,
finally ceased to come at all. Her father’s ladies-in-waiting were all
very advanced in years and every now and then one of them would
die; the other servants, both indoors and out, were continually
seeking better service, and hardly a month passed but some
member of her staff either died or drifted away. The palace grounds,
which had for long years past been allowed to sink into a sad state
of neglect, had now become a mere jungle. Foxes had made their
lairs in the garden walks, while from the ornamental plantations,
now grown into dank and forbidding woods, the voice of the
screech-owl sounded day and night alike; so little was there now any
sign of human habitation in that place, so dim was the daylight that
pierced those tangled thickets. The few servants who still lingered
on in the midst of all this desolation began to declare that tree-
spirits and other fearsome monsters had established themselves in
the palace grounds and were every day becoming more open and
venturesome in their habits. ‘There is no sense in continuing to live
like this,’ one of these ladies said. ‘Nowadays all the government
officials are building themselves handsome houses. Several of them
have for a long time past had their eye on all your timber and have
been making enquiries in the neighbourhood whether you might not
be prevailed upon to part with it. If only you would consent to do so,
you might with the proceeds easily buy some newer place that
would be less depressing to live in. You are really asking too much of
the few servants that remain with you....’ ‘Hush, how can you
suggest such a thing!’ answered the princess. ‘What would people
think if they heard you? So long as I am alive no such disrespect to
my poor Father’s memory shall ever be committed. I know quite well
that the grounds have become rather wild and dismal; but this was
his home, his dear spirit haunts the place, and I feel that so long as
I am here I am never far off from him. That has become my only
comfort....’ She broke off in tears, and it was impossible to allude to
the subject again. Her furniture too, though entirely out of fashion,
was much of it very beautiful in an old-world way, and enquiries
were constantly coming from those who made it their business to
understand such matters and had heard that she possessed a work
by such and such a master of some particular time and school. Such
proposals she regarded merely as an ill-bred comment upon her
poverty and indeed complained of them bitterly to the
aforementioned gentlewoman. ‘But, Madam,’ the lady protested, ‘it is
not at all an unusual thing....’ And to convince her mistress that
funds must somehow or other be procured she began to call her
attention to various dilapidations, the repair of which could not
safely be deferred for a single day. But it made no difference. The
idea of selling any of her possessions seemed to the princess utterly
untenable. ‘If he had not meant me to keep them, he would not
have put them here,’ she said; ‘I cannot bear to think of them
becoming ornaments in ordinary, worldly people’s houses. I do not
think he would wish me to...,’ and that was all that could be got out
of her.
Visitors and even letters were now absolutely unknown at the
Hitachi Palace. True, her elder brother the Zen priest on the rare
occasions when he came up to the Capital, usually visited the
palace. But he did little more than poke his head in and go away. He
was a particularly vague and unpractical sort of man, who even
among his fellow clerics ranked as unusually detached from all
worldly considerations. In fact he was a saint, and consequently very
unlikely to notice that the whole place was overgrown with weeds
and bushes, still less to suggest any means of clearing them away.
Meanwhile, the state of affairs was becoming very acute. The
once elegant courtyard was thickly overgrown with weeds; and lusty
hemlock clumps were fast destroying the gables and eaves of the
roof. The main eastern and western gates of the park were
barricaded by huge masses of mugwort and it was impossible to
open them. This might have given the inhabitants of the palace a
certain comforting sense of security, had it not been for the fact that
the walls which surrounded the estate were everywhere either
broken down or upon the point of falling. Horse and oxen from the
neighbouring pastures soon found their way through these gaps,
and when the summer came they began to make free with the
palace lawns in a way which scandalized the little herd-boys who
were in charge of them. At the time of the autumn equinox there
were very heavy gales, and one day the main roof of the servants’
wing was blown right away, leaving only a ceiling of thin match-
boarding, a mere shell, which would not have withstood the mildest
shower of rain. At this the under-servants left in a body.
Henceforward the few inhabitants of the palace led a pitiable
existence, not even getting enough to eat, for there was no one to
make up the fires or prepare their food. Thieves and vagabonds had
the place completely at their mercy; but fortunately it never
occurred to them to go near it. How could so desolate a ruin contain
anything worth meddling with? They shook their heads and trudged
on. But strangely enough, had he penetrated those savage thickets,
an enterprising burglar would have found, amid a tangled mass of
wreckage, a drawing-room2 perfectly appointed in every detail, each
ornament, each screen and article of furniture still standing exactly
where the late prince had left it. True, there was no longer anyone
to dust this last-surviving room, and it needed dusting badly. Never
mind, it was a real room; not just a living-place, but a noble
apartment with everything in it handsome and dignified just as it
ought to be. And here, year in and year out, her whole life was
spent.
Solitary people with a great deal of time on their hands seem
usually to turn to old ballads and romances for amusement and
distraction, but for such employments the princess showed little
inclination. Even in the lives of those who have no particular interest
in poetry there are usually periods of inactivity during which they
take to exchanging verses with some sympathetic correspondent—
verses which, if they are young, generally contain affecting
references to various kinds of plant and tree. But the princess’s
father had imbued her with the belief that all outward display of
emotion is undignified and ill-bred; she felt that what he would really
have liked best would have been for her to communicate with no
one at all, and she had long given up writing even to the few
relations with whom she might have been expected occasionally to
correspond.
At rare intervals she would open an old-fashioned chest and
fiddle for a while with a number of ancient picture-scrolls,
illustrations of such stories as The Chinese Prefect, The Mistress of
Hakoya, Princess Kaguya3 and the like. Then there were some
poems which, though all of very ancient date, were excellently
chosen, with the names of the poets and the titles of the poems
written in a nice clear hand at the side, so that one could really tell
what one was reading. They were written on the best Kanya and
Michinoku papers, now grown somewhat puffy with age,4 and
though it cannot be supposed that she could derive much pleasure
from reading the same familiar pages over and over again, yet it was
noticed that in her hours of deepest depression she would often sit
with the books spread open before her. As for reading the Sūtras or
performing those Buddhist ceremonies which have now become so
indispensable an element in fashionable life, she would have
shuddered at the thought, and would not have dreamed of so much
as touching a rosary, even though no one was there to see. Such
was the arduous standard of conduct which this lady imposed upon
herself.
Of her old servants only Jijū, the daughter of her foster-nurse,
had survived the general exodus of the last few years. Jijū’s friend,
the former Vestal of Kamo, whose company had been one of her
distractions, was dead, and the poor lady’s existence had become
such as no one could reasonably be expected to endure. A sister of
the princess’s mother had fallen on evil days and ended by marrying
a provincial official. She now lived at the Capital, and as she had
daughters, together with a bevy of unusually agreeable young
waiting-women, Jijū occasionally visited the house, where indeed
she was quite at home, for both her parents had been friends of the
family. But the princess herself, with her usual unsociability,
absolutely refused to hold any communication with her aunt’s
household. ‘I am afraid the princess looks upon me as a very vulgar
person,’ the aunt said to Jijū one day. ‘She still thinks, despite the
wretched manner in which she now lives, that to have such relations
as we is a disgrace to her. At any rate I suppose that is why she is so
careful never to come near us.’ It was in this somewhat malicious
tone that she always discussed her niece’s behaviour.
I have noticed that people of quite common origin who have
risen in the world can in a very short time achieve a perfect imitation
of aristocratic importance. And similarly, if through some accident an
aristocrat falls into low company, he generally exhibits a meanness
so thorough-going that it is hard to believe he has been at any pains
to acquire it. Of this second tendency the princess’s aunt was a good
example. She knew that after her unfortunate marriage the people
at the Hitachi Palace had regarded her as a disgrace to the family.
Now that the prince was dead and Suyetsumu herself was in
circumstances of such difficulty, there seemed to be quite a good
chance that the princess might eventually have to take shelter under
her aunt’s roof. This was what the aunt herself was looking forward
to. It was her revenge. She saw the princess installed as a
dependant, fetching and carrying for her daughters. And what an
ideal drudge she would make, being so priggish and strait-laced that
it would never be necessary to keep an eye upon her! ‘You ought to
bring her round to see us sometimes,’ the aunt would say to Jijū,
‘and if you could get her to bring her zithern, so much the better; we
have heard so much about her playing.’ Jijū did her best, and the
princess, docile as usual, admitted that there was everything to be
said in favour of paying an occasional visit. But when it came to the
point, panic overwhelmed her. She would do anything, anything that
Jijū asked; but she would not make friends. And so, greatly to the
aunt’s discomfiture, the matter was dropped.
About this time her uncle was appointed treasurer to a provincial
district. He intended to take his family with him, and was anxious to
equip his daughters with attendants whom it would be pleasant to
name in the ears of provincial visitors. The chance of being able to
exhibit a real princess as a member of their staff was not to be
thrown away and the aunt returned once more to the attack. ‘I am
very worried at having to go so far away from you,’ she sent word by
Jijū. ‘We have not had the pleasure of seeing you much lately; but it
was a great comfort to me to feel that I was near at hand and could
help you if anything went wrong. I am most anxious that, if possible,
we should not be separated....’ All this had no effect whatever. ‘The
conceited little fool! I have no patience with her,’ the aunt cried out
at last. ‘She may have these grand ideas about herself if she
chooses; but no one else is going to take much notice of a creature
that goes on year after year living in the hole-and-corner way that
she does; least of all this famous Prince Genji, with whom she
pretends to be so intimate.’
At last came Genji’s pardon and recall, celebrated in every part
of the kingdom by riotous holiday-making and rejoicing. His friends
of either sex were soon vying with one another in demonstrations of
good will and affection. These testimonies to his popularity, pouring
in from persons of every rank and condition in life, naturally touched
him deeply, and in these stirring days it would have been strange
indeed if many minor affairs had not escaped his memory. But for
her the time of his restoration was far harder to bear than that of his
exile. For whereas she had before confidently looked forward to his
return, counting upon it as we count upon the winter trees to bud
again in spring, this glorious home-coming and restoration, when at
last they came, brought joy to every hut and hovel in the land, but
to her only a hundredfold increase of her former misery. For of what
comfort to her were his triumphs, if she must hear of them from
other lips?
The aunt had the satisfaction of seeing her prophecies fulfilled.
It was of course out of the question that anyone would own to an
acquaintance with a person living in such miserable squalor as now
surrounded the princess. There are those, says the Hokkekyō,5
whom even Buddha and his saints would have hard work to redeem;
and certainly this lady had allowed her affairs to drift into a disorder
which the most generous patron would shrink from attempting to set
straight. This contempt for all the rest of the world, this almost
savage unsociability, was of course no invention of her own; it was
merely an attempt to perpetuate the haughty demeanour of the late
prince and princess, her parents. But this did not make the young
princess’s attitude any less irritating and ridiculous. ‘There is still
time to change your mind,’ said her aunt one day. ‘A change of scene
—a journey through the mountains, for example, is often very
beneficial to people who have some trouble on their minds. I am
sure you think that life in the provinces is very uncomfortable and
disagreeable, but I can assure you that while you are with us you
will never have to stay anywhere quite so higgledy-piggledy....’ The
wretched old women who still dragged on their existence in the
palace eagerly watched the princess’s face while their fate was being
decided. Surely she would not throw away this opportunity of
escape! To their consternation they soon saw that her aunt’s appeal
was not making the slightest impression upon her. Jijū, for her part,
had recently become engaged to a young cousin of the provincial
treasurer’s, who was to accompany him to his province, and she was
therefore pledged to go down to Tsukushi, whether the princess
joined the party or not. She was however deeply attached to her
mistress and very loath indeed to leave her in her present condition.
She therefore discussed the matter with her again, and did
everything in her power to persuade the princess to accompany
them; only to make the extraordinary discovery that Suyetsumu was
still from day to day living in the hope that the visitor from whom
she had for all those years had no word would suddenly reappear
and put everything to rights again. ‘He was very fond of me,’ she
said. ‘It is only because he has been unhappy himself that he has
not remembered to write to me. If he had the slightest idea of what
is happening to us here, he would come at once....’ So she had been
thinking for years, and though the general structure of the house fell
every day into a more fantastic state of dilapidation, she still
persisted as obstinately as ever in retaining every trifling article of
furniture and decoration in exactly the place where it had always
been. She spent so much of her time in tears that a certain part of
her face had now become as red as the flower which the hillman
carries over his ear; so that her appearance, particularly when she
showed her face in profile, would have struck a casual visitor as
somewhat forbidding. But of this I will say no more; it is perhaps
always a mistake to enter into matters of that kind.
As the cold weather came on, existence at the Hitachi Palace
rapidly became more and more difficult. The princess sat staring in
front of her, plunged in unbroken gloom. Meanwhile Genji celebrated
the ritual of the Eight Readings, in memory of his father, the old
Emperor. He took great trouble in choosing the priests for this
ceremony and succeeded finally in assembling a notable band of
dignitaries. Among them none was more renowned for the sanctity
of his life and the wide range of his studies than Princess
Suyetsumu’s brother, the Abbot of Daigoji. On his way back from the
ceremony, he looked in for a moment at the Hitachi Palace. ‘I have
just been celebrating the Eight Readings in Prince Genji’s palace,’ he
said; ‘a magnificent ceremony! It is a pleasure to take part in such a
service as that! I cannot imagine anything more beautiful and
impressive. A veritable paradise—I say it in all reverence—a veritable
paradise on earth; and the prince himself, so calm and dignified, you
might have thought him an incarnation of some holy Buddha or
Bodhisat. How came so bright a being to be born into this dim world
of ours?’ So saying, he hurried off to his temple. Unlike ordinary,
worldly men and women he never wasted time in discussing sordid
everyday affairs or gossiping about other people’s business.
Consequently he made no allusion to the embarrassed circumstances
in which his sister was living. She sometimes wondered whether
even the Saints whom he worshipped would, if they had found some
one in a like situation, really have succeeded in behaving with so
splendid an indifference.
She was indeed beginning to feel that she could hold out no
longer, when one day her aunt suddenly arrived at the palace. This
lady was quite prepared to meet with the usual rebuffs; but having
on this occasion come in a comfortable travelling coach stored with
everything that the princess could need during a journey she did not
for an instant doubt that she would gain her point. With an air of
complete self-confidence she bustled towards the front gate. No
sooner had the porter begun trying to open it than she realized into
what a pitch of decay her niece’s property had fallen. The doors
were off their hinges, and as soon as they were moved tottered over
sideways, and it was not till her own menservants come to the
rescue that, after a tremendous shouldering and hoisting, a passage
was cleared through which she could enter the grounds. What did
one do next? Even such a heap of gimcrack ruins as this presumably
had some apertures which were conventionally recognized as doors
and windows. A lattice door on the southern side of the house was
half open and here the visitors halted. It did not seem possible that
any human being was within hail; but to their astonishment, from
behind a smoke-stained, tattered screen-of-state the maid Jijū
suddenly appeared. She was looking very haggard, but though age
and suffering had greatly changed her, she was still a well-made,
pleasing woman; ‘at any rate far more presentable than her
mistress,’ thought the visitors. ‘We are just starting,’ cried out the
aunt to the lady of the house, who, as she guessed, was seated
behind this sooty screen: ‘I have come to take Jijū away. I am afraid
you will find it very difficult to get on without her, but even if you will
not deign to have any dealings with us yourself, I am sure you will
not be so inconsiderate as to stand in this poor creature’s way....’
She put in so moving a plea on behalf of Jijū that there ought by
rights to have been tears in her eyes. But she was in such high
spirits at the prospect of travelling as a provincial governor’s wife
that a smile of pleasant anticipation played upon her lips all the
while. ‘I know quite well,’ she continued, ‘that the late prince was
not at all proud of his connexion with us, and I am sure it was quite
natural that when you were a child you should pick up his way of
thinking and feeling. But that is a long time ago now. You may say
that it was my fault we did not meet. But really while celebrities such
as Prince Genji were frequenting the house I was not at all sure that
humble people like ourselves would be welcome. However, one of
the advantages of being of no importance is that we humdrum
creatures are not subject to the same violent ups and downs as you
exalted people. I for my part was very sorry to see your fortunes
declining so rapidly as they have done of late, but so long as I was
near at hand I was quite happy about you and did not consider it my
duty to interfere. But now that I am going away to another part of
the country, I confess I feel very uneasy....’ ‘It would be delightful to
go with you. Most people would be very glad indeed.... But I think
that as long as the place holds together at all I had better go on as I
am....’ That was all that could be got out of her. ‘Well, that is for you
to decide,’ said the aunt at last, ‘but I should not think that anyone
has ever before buried himself alive in such a god-forsaken place. I
am sure that if you had asked him in time Prince Genji would have
been delighted to put things straight for you; indeed, with a touch
here and there no doubt he would soon have made the place more
sumptuous than the Jade Emperor’s6 Palace. But unfortunately he is
now entirely preoccupied with this young daughter of Prince
Hyōbukyō, and will do nothing for anyone else. He used to lead a
roving life, distributing his favours in all sorts of directions. But now
that has all stopped, and under these circumstances it is very
unlikely to occur to him that a person living buried away in the
middle of such a jungle as this, is all the time expecting him to rush
round and take her affairs in hand.’ The princess knew that this was
only too true and she now began to weep bitterly. Yet she showed
no signs of changing her mind, and the Chancellor’s wife, after
wasting the whole afternoon in tormenting her, exclaimed at last:
‘Well then, I shall take Jijū. Make haste, please, please; it is getting
late!’ Weeping and flustered Jijū drew her mistress back into the
alcove: ‘I never meant to go,’ she whispered, ‘but this lady seems so
very anxious to take me. I think perhaps I will travel with them part
of the way and then come back again. There is a great deal of truth
in all that she has been saying. But then, on the other hand, I do
not like to upset you by leaving. It is terrible to have to decide so
quickly....’ So she whispered; but though the princess loved her
dearly and was stung to the quick that even this last friend should
be making ready to desert her, she said not a word to encourage Jijū
to stay, but only sobbed more bitterly than before. She was
wondering what she could give to her maid to keep in remembrance
of her long service in the family. Perhaps some cloak or dress?
Unfortunately all her clothes were far too worn and soiled to give
away. She remembered that somewhere in the house was a rather
pretty box containing some plaited strands of her own hair, her fine
glossy hair that grew seven feet long. This would be her present,
and along with it she would give one of those boxes of delicious
clothes-scent that still survived from the old days when her parents
were alive. These she handed to Jijū together with an acrostic poem
in which she compared her departure to the severing of this plaited
tress of hair. ‘Your Mama told me always to look after you,’ she said,
‘and whatever happened to me I should never dream of sending you
away. I think however that you are probably right to go, and only
wish that some one nicer were taking charge of you....’ ‘I know
Mama wished me to stay with you,’ said Jijū at last through her
tears. ‘But quite apart from that, we have been through such terrible
times together in these last years that I cannot bear to go off
heaven knows where and leave you here to shift for yourself. But,
Madam, “By the Gods of Travel to whom I shall make offering upon
my way, I swear that never can I be shorn from you like this tress of
severed hair.”’ Suddenly the voice of the aunt broke in upon them
shouting impatiently: ‘What has become of Jijū? Be quick, now, it is
getting quite dark!’ Hardly knowing what she did, Jijū climbed into
the coach and as it drove away stared helplessly at the dilapidated
house.
So at last Jijū had left her; Jijū who for years past, though in
sore need of a little pleasure and distraction, had never once asked
for a single day’s holiday! But this was not the end of the princess’s
troubles; for now even the few old charwomen who still remained in
the house—poor doddering creatures who could never have
persuaded anyone else to employ them—began threatening to leave.
‘Do you think I blame her?’ said one of them, speaking of Jijū’s
departure. ‘Not I! What had she to stay for, I ask you. And come to
that, I should like to know why we go on putting up with it all.’ And
they began with one accord remembering influential patrons who
had at one time or another promised to employ them. No, decidedly
they would not stay in the place any longer.
These conversations, which took place in the princess’s hearing,
had the most disquieting effect upon her. The Frosty Month7 had
now come. In the open country around, though snow and hail
frequently fell, they tended to melt between-whiles. But in the
wilderness that surrounded the Hitachi Palace vast drifts of snow,
protected by the tangled overgrowth from any ray of sunlight, piled
higher and higher, till one might have fancied oneself in some valley
among the Alps of Koshi. Through these arctic wastes not even the
peasants would consent to press their way and the palace was for
weeks on end entirely cut off from the outer world.
The princess sat staring at the snow. Life had been dull enough
before, but at any rate she had some one at hand whose chatter at
times broke in upon her gloom. But now Jijū’s laughter, Jijū’s tears
were gone, and as she lay day and night alike behind her crumbling
curtains-of-state the princess was consumed by a loneliness and
misery such as she had never known before.
Meanwhile, at the Nijō Palace, Genji remained wholly absorbed
in the girl from whom he had so long been separated, and it was
only a few very particular friends who heard any news of him at all.
He did sometimes think of the Hitachi Palace and wondered whether
the princess could still be living there all alone. But he was in no
great hurry to discover, and the New Year passed without his having
taken any steps about her. In the fourth month he decided to call
upon the ladies in the Village of Falling Flowers, and having obtained
Murasaki’s permission he set out one evening, clad in his usual
disguise. For days it had rained unceasingly. But now, just at the
moment when the heavy rain stopped and only a few scattered
drops were falling, the moon rose; and soon it was one of those
exquisite late spring nights through whose moonlight stillness he had
in earlier years so often ridden out on errands of adventure. Busy
with memories of such excursions he had not noticed where he was
driving, when suddenly looking up he saw a pile of ruined buildings
surrounded by plantations so tangled and overgrown that they wore
the aspect of a primeval jungle. Over a tall pine-tree a trail of
wisteria blossoms was hanging; it quivered in the moonlight, shaken
by a sudden puff of wind that carried with it when it reached him a
faint and almost imperceptible odour of flowers. It was for orange-
blossom that he had set out that night; but here too was a flower
that had a fragrance worth enjoying. He leaned out of the carriage
window. They were passing by a willow whose branches swept the
ground; with the crumbling away of the wall which had once
supported it the tree had fallen forward till its trunk was almost
prostrate. Surely he had seen these grounds before? Why, yes, this
must be—suddenly it all came back to him. Of course it was that
strange lady’s house. He was driving past the Hitachi Palace. Poor
creature, he must discover at once what had become of her; and
stopping his carriage and calling to Koremitsu, who as usual on
occasions of the kind was in attendance upon him, he asked him
whether this was not indeed Princess Suyetsumu’s place. ‘Why
certainly!’ said Koremitsu. ‘In that case,’ said Genji, ‘I should like to
find out whether the same people are still living there. I have not
time to pay a personal visit now, but I should like you to go in and
enquire. Make sure that you discover exactly how things stand. It
looks so silly if one calls on the wrong people.’
After a particularly dismal morning spent in staring blankly in
front of her the princess had fallen asleep and dreamed that her
father, the late prince, was still alive and well. After such a dream as
that she woke up more miserable than ever. The window side of the
room had been flooded in the recent rains; but taking a cloth she
began mopping up the water and trying to find a place where she
could put her chair. While she did so the stress of her sufferings
stirred her to a point of mental alertness which she did not often
reach. She had composed a poem, and suddenly she recited the
lines: ‘To the tears I shed in longing for him that is no more, are
added the ceaseless drippings that patter from my broken roof!’
Meanwhile Koremitsu had made his way into the house and was
wandering this way and that looking for some sign of life. He spent a
long while in poking into all sorts of corners and at last concluded
that the place had been abandoned as uninhabited. He was just
setting out to report this to Genji when the moon came out from
behind a cloud, lighting up the front of the house. He then noticed a
trellis roll-door which was half pulled up. A curtain behind it moved.
It almost seemed as though some one were there. Koremitsu,
feeling oddly enough quite nervous, turned back and approached
this door, clearing his throat loudly as he did so. In answer to this
signal a very aged, decrepit voice answered from within the room.
‘Well, what is it? Who are you?’ ‘It is Koremitsu,’ he answered, ‘could