icide, said to his son Masatsura: "For
the sake of keeping yourself out of danger's way or of reaping some
temporal advantage, on no account are you to submit to Taka-uji. By so
doing you would bring reproach on our name. While there is a man left who
belongs to us let our flag be hoisted over the battlements of Mount Konzo,
as a sign that we are still ready to fight in the emperor's cause."

A little later than this, in A.D. 1338, the great companion and friend of
Kusunoki, Nitta Yoshisada, came to his end. He had undertaken to promote
the cause of the Emperor Go-Daigo in the northwestern provinces by
co-operating with Fuji-wara-no-Yoritomo. Nitta with about fifty followers
was unexpectedly attacked by Ashikaga Tadatsune, with three thousand men
near Fukui in the province of Echizen. There was no way of escape with his
little troop. In this condition he was urged to secure his personal
safety. But he refused to survive his comrades. Then he rode with his
brave company upon the enemy until his horse was disabled and he himself
was pierced in the eye with an arrow. He drew out the arrow with his own
hand, and then, in order that his body might not be identified, with his
sword cut off his own head, at least so it is said! Each member of his
troop followed this grewsome example, and it was only after examining the
bodies of these headless corpses and the finding upon one a commission
from the Emperor Go-Daigo, that the remains of the heroic Nitta were
recognized. The head was sent to Kyoto and there exposed by the Ashikaga
commander, and the body was buried near the place where the tragic death
occurred.(132)

The Ashikaga family had now the uninterrupted control of affairs. They
resided at Kyoto and inherited in succession the office of shogun.
Taka-uji, the founder of the Ashikaga shogunate, and who had held the
office from A.D. 1334, died in A.D. 1358, when about fifty-three years
old. He was succeeded by his son Yoshinori who was shogun from A.D. 1359
to A.D. 1367. Having retired he was succeeded by his grandson Yoshimitsu
who in turn retired in favor of his son Yoshimotsu. By this time the
precedents of abdication and effeminacy began to tell upon the Ashikaga
successors, and like all the preceding ruling families it gradually sank
into the usual insignificance. Some of the Ashikaga shoguns, however, were
men of uncommon ability and their services to their country deserve to be
gratefully remembered. A number of them