of Hideyoshi's policy to await the arrival of
these barons. He had already at his command an army of some thirty
thousand men, and with this he moved out, challenging Mitsuhide to
fight on the plains of Yamazaki. Mitsuhide did not hesitate to put
his fortunes to the supreme test. He accepted Hideyoshi's challenge,
and, on the 12th of June, a great battle was fought, the issue of
which was decided by two things; first, the defection of Tsutsui
Junkei, who refrained from striking until the superior strength of
Hideyoshi had been manifested, and secondly, the able strategy of
Hideyoshi, who anticipated Mitsuhide's attempt to occupy the position
of Tenno-zan, which commanded the field. From the carnage that ensued
Mitsuhide himself escaped, but while passing through a wood he
received from a bamboo spear in the hands of a peasant a thrust which
disabled him, and he presently committed suicide. Thus, on the
thirteenth day after Nobunaga's death, the head of his assassin was
exposed in Kyoto in front of the temple of Honno-ji where the murder
had taken place, and Mitsuhide's name went down in history as the
"Three days' shogun" (Mikkakubo).

CONFERENCE AT KIYOSU

By this time the principal of Nobunaga's vassal-barons were on their
way at the head of contingents to attack Mitsuhide. On learning of
the assassin's death, these barons all directed their march to
Kiyosu, and in the castle from which Nobunaga had moved to his early
conquests thirty years previously, a momentous council was held for
the purpose of determining his successor. The choice would have
fallen naturally on Samboshi, eldest son of Nobunaga's first-born,
Nobutada, who, as already described, met his death in the Mitsuhide
affair. But Hideyoshi was well understood to favour Samboshi's
succession, and this sufficed to array in opposition several of the
barons habitually hostile to Hideyoshi. Thus, in spite of the fact
that both were illegitimate and had already been adopted into other
families, Nobunaga's two sons, Nobukatsu and Nobutaka, were put
forward as proper candidates, the former supported by Ikeda Nobuteru
and Gamo Katahide; the latter, by Shibata Katsuiye and Takigawa
Kazumasu.

At one moment it seemed as though this question would be solved by an
appeal to violence, but ultimately, at the suggestion of Tsutsui
Junkei, it was agreed that Samboshi should be nominated Nobunaga's
successor; that Nobukatsu and Nobutaka should be appointed his
guardia