13.

(Autumn, i. 44.)

What bark impell'd by autumn's fresh'ning gale Comes speeding t'ward me ?-'Tis the wild geese driv'n Across the fathomless expanse of Heav'n,

And lifting up their voices for a sail!

(Anon.)

14.

(Autumn, i. 58.)

The silv'ry dewdrops that in autumn light
Upon the moors must surely jewels be;
For there they hang all over hill and lea,
Strung on the threads the spiders weave so tight.

(ASAYASU.)

15.

(Autumn, ii. 2.)

The trees and herbage, as the year doth wane,
For gold and russet leave their former hue,—
All but the wave-toss'd flow'rets of the main,
That never yet chill autumn's empire knew.

(YASUHIDE.)

16.

(Autumn, ii. 9.)

The dews are all of one pale silv'ry white:
Then tell me, if thou canst, oh! tell me why

These silv'ry dews so marvellously dye

The autumn leaves a myriad colours bright?

17.

(Autumn, ii. 44.)

(TOSHIYUKI.)

The warp is hoar-frost and the woof is dew,
Too frail, alas! the warp and woof to be:
For scarce the woods their damask robes endue,
When, torn and soil'd, they flutter o'er the lea.
(SEKIWO.)

18.

(Autumn, ii. 47.)

E'en when on earth the thund'ring gods held sway

Was such a sight beheld?-Calm Tatsta's * flood,

Stain'd, as by Chinese art, with hues of blood,
Rolls o'er Yamáto's peaceful fields away.

(NARIHIRA.)

19.

(Winter, 10.)

When falls the snow, lo! ev'ry herb and tree,
That in seclusion through the wintry hours
Long time had been held fast, breaks forth in flow'rs
That ne'er in spring were known upon the lea.

(TSURAYUKI.)

* Properly written Tatsuta. The allusion here is to the crimson and scarlet of the autumn maple-trees, which may well form a constantly recurring theme for the raptures of the Japanese poets, who in the fall of every year see around them a halo of glory such as our dull European forests do not even distantly approach.

i

20.

(Winter, 17.)

When from the skies, that wintry gloom enshrouds,
The blossoms fall and flutter round my head,
Methinks the spring e'en now his light must shed
O'er heavenly lands that lie beyond the clouds.
(FUKAYABU.)

21.

(Congratulations, 1.)

A thousand years of happy life be thine!
Live on, my lord, till what are pebbles now,
By age united, to great rocks shall grow,
Whose venerable sides the moss doth line!

(Anon.)

22.

(Congratulations, 9.)

[Ode composed on beholding a screen presented to the Empress by Prince Sadayasu* at the festival held in honour of her fiftieth birthday, whereon was painted a man seated beneath the falling cherry-blossoms and watching them flutter down.]

Of all the days and months that hurry by
Nor leave a trace, how long the weary tale!

* The Empress intended is the one famous in Japanese literature under the designation of Nideu-no-Kisaki, consort of the Mikado Seiwa and mother of Prince Sadayasu. It was in A.D. 891 that the festival was held.

And yet how few the springs when in the vale
On the dear flow'rets I may feast mine eye!*

(OKIKAZE.)

23.

(Congratulations, 11.)

If ever mortal in the days of yore

By Heav'n a thousand years of life was lent,
I wot not; but if never seen before,
Be thou the man to make the precedent ! †

(SOSEI.)

24.

(Parting, 39.)

Mine oft-reiterated pray'rs in vain

The parting guest would stay: Oh, cherry-flow'rs! Pour down your petals, that from out these bow'rs He ne'er may find the homeward path again!

(Anon.)

25.

(Travelling, 4.)

With roseate hues that pierce th' autumnal haze
The spreading dawn lights up Akashi's shore;

66

* In rendering this stanza the translator has followed, not the original Kokiñshifu" text, but the better known reading of the "Rauyeishifu” ("Collection of Bright Songs "), a compilation made early in the eleventh century as a wedding-present for his son-in-law Michinori (afterwards regent of the empire) by the Minister Kiñtau.

For this very prosaic expression the Japanese original is responsible.

But the fair ship, alas! is seen no more :-
An island veils it from my loving gaze.

(Attributed to HITOMARO,)

But more probably by some court lady who thus expresses her grief at the sight of the departure of the vessel bearing her love from her side. Akashi is a lovely spot on the shores of the Inland Sea.

26.

(Travelling, 6.)

[The high-born poet Narihira, who had been banished from the court on account of an intrigue with the Empress, was either compelled, or himself chose, we know not which,—to hide his disgrace in a temporary absence from the capital, and made to what were then the wild and almost undiscovered districts of Eastern Japan, a journey whose every step has been rendered classic in the national literature through the pages of the "Ise Mono-gatari," an historical romance which details in the most perfect literary style Narihira's amorous and other adventures, and strings together on a thread of narrative the various odes that he composed. "He had now," says the original, "reached the banks of the river Sumida, which floweth between the lands of Musashi and Shimofusa,+ and had dismounted and sat him down awhile with his heart full of loving remembrances of Miyako, gazing steadfastly before him, and thinking of the immeasurable distance that he had travelled. Nor was there any in the whole company whose thoughts went not back to Miyako, as the ferry. man bade them hasten on board for that the daylight had waned; and so they stepped into the boat. And as thus they grieved, they saw a white fowl sporting on the bank of the river,—white, with

*

*This is not the place to discuss, but the translator may state that hetotally rejects the theory of one eminent native critic, who holds that the Narihira of literature and the Narihira of history are not the same individual. There is no warrant for such an opinion.

On the spot where, seven and a half centuries later, rose the great city of Yedo.