むかしハンニバルがアルプス
In times of old, when Hannibal led his army through the Alps, he came across a large boulder that lay in the middle of the road and blocked his path. He softened it up, as the story's told, with vinegar and fire, then sawed it into slices like a fishcake. His army proceeded on its way with minimal delay. For one like my master, who boils himself beet red in the medicated bath to no apparent effect, is there any option left but vinegar and fire? Barring such measures, confrontation with however many hundreds of boarding students, over however many tens of years, will never dent his rock-hard head. Floating in these tubs, and scattered about this wash area, are a party of brutes who've shed off their clothing, and in doing so cut themselves loose from the world of civilized men. They can hardly be held to everyday standards and norms. Within these reaches, anything goes. A stomach can lie where a lung belongs, Watōnai is a Minamoto, descended from Emperor Seiwa, and Tami-san is no end of dodgy. However, on leaving the wash area and stepping across the wood-planked floor, the brutes become brutes no more. They don their clothes, as civilized society requires, and re-emerge into the living world of men. It should follow then, that their conduct there is the conduct of men. The master now treads on this threshold. He's halfway in the wash area, and halfway onto the wood-planked floor, marking his return to a world of civility and discretion. On the verge of such return, his obstinacy persists. This obstinacy, it would seem, is his trademark flaw, inextricably fused to the core of his being. An ingrained flaw is never easy to root out or rectify. Only one approach, in my opinion, can root it out. That approach is this - have the principal of the school call the master in and relieve him of his post. Once relieved of his post, the master, unable to adapt, will be thoroughly out in the cold. Out in the cold, he'll perish by the wayside. In other words, to lose his post means to lose his very life. The master revels in embracing his trademark flaw, but he's terrified of death. He seeks to indulge his flaw, but not to the point of cutting short his existence. He's a coward at heart, so the threat of his own demise is sure to set him trembling with fear. Set him trembling with fear, and his trademark flaw, I believe, will cleanly depart. If that doesn't do it, then nothing will.