red legs and a red bill; and it was a fowl never beheld in Miyako, so none of all the company did know it. So when they inquired of the ferryman its name, and Narihira heard him make answer, 'This is the Miyako-bird,' he composed this verse :]

Miyako-bird! if not in vain men give

Thy pleasing name, my question deign to hear :And has she pass'd away, my darling dear,

Or doth she still for Narihira live?

(NARIHIRA

27.

(Acrostics, 8.*)

Since that I talk'd with thee, my brooding heart
Is sadder far than when I was less blest :-
The prescient thought will never let me rest
Of the swift-coming hour when we must part.
(FUKAYABU.)

28.
(Love, i. 44.)

The barest ledge of rock, if but a seed
Alight upon it, lets the pine-tree grow:—
If, then, thy love for me be love indeed,
We'll come together, dear; it must be so!

(Anon.)

* In the English version of this stanza the general sense alone has been preserved. The play in the original is on Kara-momo-no-hana, the name of a flower, which is embedded in the text after the fashion of the popular game of "Buried Cities," thus :

Afu KARA MO

MONO HA NAHO koso

Kanashikere,

Wakaren koto wo

Kanete omoheba.

29.

(Love, i. 54.)

There is on earth a thing more bootless still
Than to write figures on a running stream:
And that thing is (believe me if you will)
To dream of one who ne'er of you doth dream.
(Anon.)

30.

(Love, i. 66.*)

Now hid from sight are great Mount Fusi's fires.
Mount Fusi, said I ?-Tis myself I mean;

For the word Fusi signifies, I ween,

Few see the constant flame of my desires.

(Anon.)

31.

(Love, ii. 2.)

Since that first night when, bath'd in hopeless tears,

I sank asleep, and he I love did seem

To visit me, I welcome ev'ry dream,

Sure that they come as heav'n-sent messengers.

32.
(Love, ii. 9.)

(KOMACHI.)

Methinks my tenderness the grass must be,

Clothing some mountain desolate and lone;

* This stanza is, by the necessity of the case, a mere free imitation of the punning original.

For though it daily grows luxuriantly,

To ev'ry mortal eye 'tis still unknown.

(YOSHIKI)

33.

(Love, ii. 23.)

Upon the causeway through the land of dreams
Surely the dews must plentifully light;

For when I've wander'd up and down all night,
My sleeve's so wet that nought will dry its streams.

(TSURAYUKI.)

34.

(Love, ii. 43.)

Fast fall the silv'ry dews, albeit not yet
'Tis autumn weather; for each drop's a tear,
Shed till the pillow of my hand is wet,

As I wake from dreaming of my dear.

(Anon.)

35.

(Love, v. 56.)

I ask'd my soul where springs th' ill-omened seed
That bears the herb of dull forgetfulness; *
And answer straightway came: Th' accursed weed
Grows in that heart which knows no tenderness.

(SOSEI.)

*The "Herb of Forgetfulness" (wasure-gusa) answers in the poetical diction of the Japanese to the classical waters of Lethe..

36.

(Flegies, 10.*)

So frail our life, perchance to-morrow's sun
May never rise for me. Ah! well-a-day!
Till comes the twilight of the sad to-day,
I'll mourn for thee, O thou beloved one!

(TSURAYUKI.)

37.

(Elegies, 23.)

The perfume is the same, the same the hue
As that which erst my senses did delight:
But he who planted the fair avenue

Is here no more, alas! to please my sight!

(TSURAYUKI.)

38.

(Elegies, 31.)

One thing, alas! more fleeting have I seen
Than wither'd leaves driv'n by the autumn gust:
Yea, evanescent as the whirling dust

Is man's brief passage o'er this mortal scene!

(CHISATO.)

*It is the young poet Ki-no-Tomonori who is mourned in this stanza. He was nephew to Tsurayuki, and, after holding several high posts at court, had been appointed to assist his uncle in the compilation of the "Odes Ancient and Modern." He died in A.D. 905, a few months before the completion of the work.

I

39.

(Miscellaneous, i. 1.)

Softly the dews upon my forehead light:
From off the oars, perchance, as feather'd spray,
They drop, while some fair skiff bends on her way
Across the Heav'nly Stream * on starlit night.
(Anon.)

40.

(Miscellaneous, i. 24.)

What though the waters of that antique rill
That flows along the heath no more are cold;
Those who remember what it was of old
Go forth to draw them in their buckets still.

(Anon.)

41.

(Miscellaneous, i. 33.†)

Old Age is not a friend I wish to meet;
And if some day to see me he should come,
I'd lock the door as he walk'd up the street,
And cry, "Most honour'd sir! I'm not at home!"
(Anon.)

The Milky Way.

+ This stanza is remarkable for being (so far as the present writer is aware) the only instance in Japanese literature of that direct impersonation of an abstract idea which is so very strongly marked a characteristic of Western thoughts and modes of expression.