Haru ya Mukashi (translation) (4)

Hiragoroh Hisataka, Akiyama family head, has as few anecdotes as people usually have.
"I have never seen such a conscientious man."
Thus was he reputed in his younger days. From young, he held a superintendent office of infantry samurai, worked faithfully, and then met the fall of Shogunate at the Restoration. The family salary was seized, and less than 1,000 yen was substituted in lump sum. With this 1,000 yen, other samurai attempted business.
"I am not so competent."
Hence he did not do anything. He might just as well not. Most of those who attempted business failed, bankrupted, and some of them even ended up in the streets.
Hiragoroh Hisataka was rather lucky to be hired as a petty official for the educational affairs section of the Prefecture. However, he got such a small salary that it can hardly support the household of Akiyama Family with this many children.
"I do no more than feed you. Do everything else by yourselves."
Thus Hiragoroh Hisataka would always say to his children.
It was, as it were, because of Hiragoroh Hisataka's education policy that Shin-san started heating water and coming home with a Tempoh coin [a nickel] a day. Shin-san bought books with these Tempho coins, but could not attend school with the wages for heating water.
"Let me attend school."
Shin-san asked his father once. Hiragoroh Hisataka relied in a small voice:
"I have no money."
The father made a witty remark. All the heroes and giants in all ages were born poor. He was poor, as he said, for his children's own good in a sense.
He said without having money for school expenses:
"Shin, if you don't like poverty, study hard."
That was the spirit of the times. The sovereign power belonged to Satsuma and Choh-shuh Clans. The Clan sectarian government, instead, summoned all the youth in Japan to study, and guaranteed that the Government shall employ those who do well at school. Every single samurai had become masterless all together, and their new way to enter the government service was stated to be to study.
That was the way to eat, and especially for those ex-samurai of the Clans who found themselves in the position of the rebel army in Boshin War, that was the only way to escape from the slough of the poverty.
"I want to study, too."
Thus Shin-san thought. That moved him to heat water for a bathhouse, to collect bath charges, and to watch the clothes of bathing customers.
"I wonder if there weren't any school free of fees in Japan."
Thus Shin-san had been dreaming of something impossible. Thinking something or reading a book at his watcher's seat, he sometimes forgot handing changes of bath charges, and was claimed. Female customers were, notably, critical.
"Akiyama's son is, with his handsome face, a fool."
Thus, of course, he heard them gossiping on the floor in his hearing.
One day, Shin-san caught a good hearsay.
"A free school was built in Osaka."