Chapter IV: Yūgao (2)

‘He went up to the mountain yesterday’ said Koremitsu. ‘But I see that there has been terrible work here afoot. Was it in some sudden fit of madness that you did this thing?’ Genji shook his head. So moved was Koremitsu at the sight of his master weeping, that he too began to sob. Had he been an older man, versed in the ways of the world, he might have been of some use in such a crisis, but both of them were young and both were equally perplexed. At last Koremitsu said: ‘One thing at least is clear. The steward’s son must not know. For though he himself can be depended upon, he is the sort of person who is sure to tell all his relatives, and they might meddle disastrously in the affair. We had best get clear of this house as quietly as we can.’ ‘Perhaps’ said Genji; ‘but it would be hard to find a less frequented place than this.’ ‘At any rate’ Koremitsu continued, ‘we cannot take her to her own house; for there her gentlewomen, who loved her dearly, would raise such a weeping and wailing as would soon bring a pack of neighbours swarming around, and all would quickly be known. If only I knew of some mountain-temple—for there such things are customary[14] and pass almost unnoticed.’ He paused and reflected. ‘There is a lady I once knew who has become a nun and now lives on the Higashi Yama. She was my father’s wet-nurse and is now very old and bent. She does not of course live alone; but no outside people come there.’ A faint light was already showing in the sky when Koremitsu brought the carriage in. Thinking that Genji would not wish to move the body himself, he wrapt it in a rush-mat and carried it towards the carriage. How small she was to hold! Her face was calm and beautiful. He felt no repulsion. He could find no way to secure her hair, and when he began to carry her it overflowed and hung towards the ground. Genji saw, and his eyes darkened. A hideous anguish possessed him.

He tried to follow the body, but Koremitsu dissuaded him, saying ‘You must ride back to your palace as quickly as you can; you have just time to get there before the stir begins,’ and putting Ukon into the carriage, he gave Genji his horse. Then pulling up his silk trousers to the knee, he accompanied the carriage on foot. It was a very singular procession; but Koremitsu, seeing his master’s terrible distress, forgot for the moment his own dignity and walked stolidly on. Genji, hardly conscious of what went on around him arrived at last in ghostly pallor at his house. ‘Where do you come from, my Lord?’ ‘How ill you look.’ ... Questions assailed him, but he hurried to his room and lay behind his curtain. He tried to calm himself, but hideous thoughts tormented him. Why had he not insisted upon going with her? What if after all she were not dead and waking up should find that he had thus abandoned her? While these wild thoughts chased through his brain a terrible sensation of choking began to torment him. His head ached, his body seemed to be on fire. Indeed he felt so strange that he thought he too was about to die suddenly and inexplicably as she had done. The sun was now high, but he did not get up. His gentlemen, with murmurs of astonishment, tried every means to rouse him. He sent away the dainties they brought, and lay hour after hour plunged in the darkest thoughts. A messenger arrived from the Emperor: ‘His Majesty has been uneasy since yesterday when his envoys sought everywhere for your Highness in vain.’

The young lords too came from the Great Hall. He would see none of them but Tō no Chūjō, and even him he made stand outside his curtain while he spoke to him: ‘My foster-mother has been very ill since the fifth month. She shaved her head and performed other penances, in consequence of which (or so it seems) she recovered a little and got up, but is very much enfeebled. She sent word that she desired to see me once more before she died, and as I was very fond of her when I was a child, I could not refuse. While I was there a servant in the house fell ill and died quite suddenly. Out of consideration for me they removed the body at nightfall. But as soon as I was told of what had happened I remembered that the Fast of the Ninth Month was at hand and for this reason I have not thought it right to present myself to the Emperor my father. Moreover, since early morning I have had a cough and very bad headache, so you will forgive me for treating you in this way.’

‘I will give the Emperor your message. But I must tell you that last night when you were out he sent messengers to look for you and seemed, if I may venture to say so, to be in a very ill humour.’ Tō no Chūjō turned to go, but pausing a moment came back to Genji’s couch and said quietly: ‘What really happened to you last night? What you told me just now cannot possibly be true.’ ‘You need not go into details,’ answered Genji impatiently. ‘Simply tell him that unintentionally I became exposed to a pollution, and apologize to him for me as best you can.’ He spoke sharply, but in his heart there was only an unspeakable sadness; and he was very tired.

All day he lay hidden from sight. Once he sent for Tō no Chūjō’s brother Kurōdo no Ben and gave him a formal message for the Emperor. The same excuse would serve for the Great Hall, and he sent a similar message there and to other houses where he might be expected.

At dusk Koremitsu came. The story of Genji’s pollution had turned all visitors from the door, and Koremitsu found his palace utterly deserted. ‘What happened?’ said Genji, summoning him, ‘you are sure that she is dead?’ and holding his sleeve before his face he wept. ‘All is over; of that there is no doubt,’ said Koremitsu, also in tears; ‘and since it is not possible for them to keep the body long, I have arranged with a very respectable aged priest who is my friend that the ceremony shall take place to-morrow, since to-morrow chances to be a good calendar day.’ ‘And what of her gentlewoman?’ asked Genji. ‘I fear she will not live,’ said Koremitsu. ‘She cries out that she must follow her mistress and this morning, had I not held her, she would have cast herself from a high rock. She threatened to tell the servants at my lady’s house, but I prevailed upon her to think the matter over quietly before she did this.’ ‘Poor thing,’ said Genji, ‘small wonder that she should be thus distracted. I too am feeling strangely disordered and do not know what will become of me.’ ‘Torment yourself no more,’ said Koremitsu. ‘All things happen as they must. Here is one who will handle this matter very prudently for you, and none shall be the wiser.’ ‘Happen as they must. You are right’ said Genji ‘and so I try to persuade myself. But in the pursuit of one’s own wanton pleasures to have done harm and to have caused someone’s death—that is a hideous crime; a terrible load of sin to bear with me through the world. Do not tell even your sister; much less your mother the nun, for I am ashamed that she should even know I have ever done that kind of thing.’[15] ‘Do not fear’ answered Koremitsu. ‘Even to the priests, who must to a certain extent be let into the secret, I have told a long made-up tale’ and Genji felt a little easier in his mind.

The waiting-women of his palace were sorely puzzled; ‘First he says he has been defiled and cannot go to Court, and now he sits whispering and sighing.’ What could it all mean? ‘Again I beg you’ said Genji at last ‘to see that everything is done as it should be.’ He was thinking all the time of the elaborate Court funerals which he had witnessed (he had, indeed, seen no others) and imagined Koremitsu directing a complicated succession of rituals. ‘I will do what I can; it will be no such great matter,’ he answered and turned to go. Suddenly Genji could bear no longer the thought that he should never see her again. ‘You will think it very foolish of me,’ he said, ‘but I am coming with you. I shall ride on horseback.’ ‘If your heart is set upon it,’ said Koremitsu, ‘it is not for me to reason with you. Let us start soon, so that we may be back before the night is over.’ So putting on the hunting-dress and other garments in which he had disguised himself before, he left his room.

Already the most hideous anguish possessed him, and now, as he set out upon this strange journey, to the dark thoughts that filled his mind was added a dread lest his visit might rouse to some fresh fury the mysterious power which had destroyed her. Should he go? He hesitated; but though he knew that this way lay no cure for his sadness, yet if he did not see her now, never again perhaps in any life to come would he meet the face and form that he had loved so well. So with Koremitsu and the one same groom to bear him company he set out upon the road.

The way seemed endless. The moon of the seventeenth night had risen and lit up the whole space of the Kamo plain, and in the light of the outrunners’ torches the countryside towards Toribeno now came dimly into sight. But Genji in his sickness and despair saw none of this, and suddenly waking from the stupor into which he had fallen found that they had arrived.

The nun’s cell was in a chapel built against the wall of a wooden house. It was a desolate spot, but the chapel itself was very beautiful. The light of the visitors’ torches flickered through the open door. In the inner room there was no sound but that of a woman weeping by herself; in the outer room were several priests talking together (or was it praying?) in hushed voices. In the neighbouring temples vespers were over and there was absolute stillness; only towards the Kiyomizu were lights visible and many figures seemed to throng the hill-side.[16]

A senior priest, son of the aged nun, now began to recite the Scriptures in an impressive voice, and Genji as he listened felt the tears come into his eyes. He went in. Ukon was lying behind a screen; when she heard him enter, she turned the lamp to the wall. What terrible thing was she trying to hide from him? But when he came nearer he saw to his joy that the dead lady was not changed in any way whatsoever, but lay there very calm and beautiful; and feeling no horror or fear at all he took her hand and said, ‘Speak to me once again; tell me why for so short a while you came to me and filled my heart with gladness, and then so soon forsook me, who loved you so well?’ and he wept long and bitterly by her side.

The priests did not know who he was, but they were touched by his evident misery and themselves shed tears. He asked Ukon to come back with him, but she answered: ‘I have served this lady since she was a little child and never once for so much as an hour have I left her. How can I suddenly part from one who was so dear to me and serve in another’s house? And I must now go and tell her people what has become of her; for (such is the manner of her death) if I do not speak soon, there will be an outcry that it was I who was to blame, and that would be a terrible thing for me, Sir,’ and she burst into tears, wailing ‘I will lie with her upon the pyre; my smoke shall mingle with hers!’

‘Poor soul’ said Genji, ‘I do not wonder at your despair. But this is the way of the world. Late or soon we must all go where she has gone. Take comfort and trust in me.’ So he sought to console her, but in a moment he added: ‘Those, I know, are but hollow words. I too care no longer for life and would gladly follow her.’ So he spoke, giving her in the end but little comfort.

‘The night is far spent’ said Koremitsu; ‘we must now be on our way.’ And so with many backward looks and a heart full to bursting he left the house. A heavy dew had fallen and the mist was so thick that it was hard to see the road. On the way it occurred to him that she was still wearing his scarlet cloak, which he had lent her when they lay down together on the last evening. How closely their lives had been entwined!

Noting that he sat very unsteadily in his saddle, Koremitsu walked beside him and gave him a hand. But when they came to a dyke, he lost hold and his master fell to the ground. Here he lay in great pain and bewilderment. ‘I shall not live to finish the journey’ he said; ‘I have not strength to go so far.’ Koremitsu too was sorely troubled, for he felt that despite all Genji’s insistence, he ought never to have allowed him, fever-stricken as he was, to embark upon this disastrous journey. In great agitation he plunged his hands in the river and prayed to Our Lady Kwannon of Kiyomizu. Genji too roused himself at last and forced himself to pray inwardly to the Buddha. And so they managed to start upon their journey again and in the end with Koremitsu’s help he reached his palace.

This sudden journey undertaken so late at night had seemed to all his household the height of imprudence. They had noted for some while past his nightly wanderings grow more and more frequent; but though often agitated and pre-occupied, never had he returned so haggard as that morning. What could be the object of these continual excursions? And they shook their heads in great concern. Genji flung himself upon his bed and lay there in fever and pain for several days. He was growing very weak. The news was brought to the Emperor who was greatly distressed and ordered continual prayers to be said for him in all the great temples; and indeed there were more special services and purification-ceremonies and incantations than I have room to rehearse. When it became known that this prince so famous for his great charm and beauty, was likely soon to die, there was a great stir in all the kingdom.

Sick though he was he did not forget to send for Ukon and have her enrolled among his gentlewomen. Koremitsu, who was beside himself with anxiety concerning his master, yet managed on her arrival to calm himself and give to Ukon friendly instruction in her new duties; for he was touched by the helpless plight in which she had been left. And Genji, whenever he felt a little better, would use her to carry messages and letters, so that she soon grew used to waiting upon him. She was dressed in deep black and though not at all handsome was a pleasant enough looking woman.

‘It seems that the same fate which so early stayed your lady’s course has willed that I too should be but little longer for this world. I know in what sore distress you are left by the loss of one who was for so many years your mistress and friend; and it was my purpose to have comforted you in your bereavement by every care and kindness I could devise. For this reason, indeed, it grieves me that I shall survive her for so short a time.’ So, somewhat stiltedly, he whispered to Ukon, and being now very weak he could not refrain from tears. Apart from the fact that his death would leave her utterly without resource, she had now quite taken to him and would have been very sorry indeed if he had died.

His gentlemen ran hither and thither, distracted; the Emperor’s envoys thronged thick as the feet of the raindrops. Hearing of his father’s distress and anxiety, Genji strove hard to reassure him by pretending to some slight respite or improvement. His father-in-law too showed great concern, calling every day for news and ordering the performance of various rites and potent liturgies; and it was perhaps as a result of this, that having been dangerously ill for more than twenty days, he took a turn for the better, and soon all his symptoms began to disappear. On the night of his recovery the term of his defilement also ended and hearing that the Emperor was still extremely uneasy about him, he determined to reassure the Court by returning to his official residence at the Palace. His father-in-law came to fetch him in his own carriage and rather irritatingly urged upon him all sorts of remedies and precautions.

For some while everything in the world to which he had now returned seemed strange to him and he indeed scarce knew himself; but by the twentieth day of the ninth month his recovery was complete, nor did the pallor and thinness of his face become him by any means ill.

At times he would stare vacantly before him and burst into loud weeping, and seeing this there were not wanting those who said that he was surely possessed.

Often he would send for Ukon, and once when they had been talking in the still of the evening he said to her ‘There is one thing which still puzzles me. Why would she never tell me who she was? For even if she was indeed, as she once said, “a fisherman’s child,” it was a strange perversity to use such reticence with one who loved her so well.’

‘You ask why she hid her name from you?’ said Ukon. ‘Can you wonder at it? When could she have been expected to tell you her name (not that it would have meant much to you if you had heard it)? For from the beginning you treated her with a strange mistrust, coming with such secrecy and mystery as might well make her doubt whether you were indeed a creature of the waking world. But though you never told her she knew well enough who you were, and the thought that you would not be thus secret had you regarded her as more than a mere plaything or idle distraction was very painful to her.’

‘What a wretched series of misunderstandings’ said Genji. ‘For my part I had no mind to put a distance between us. But I had no experience in such affairs as this. There are many difficulties in the path of such people as I. First and foremost I feared the anger of my father the Emperor; and then, the foolish jesting of the world. I felt myself hedged in by courtly rules and restrictions. But for all the tiresome concealments that my rank forced upon me, from that first evening I had so strangely set my heart upon her that though reason counselled me I could not hold back; and indeed it seems sometimes to me that an irresistible fate drove me to do the thing of which I now so bitterly and continually repent. But tell me more about her. For there can now be no reason for concealment. When on each seventh day I cause the names of the Buddhas to be written for her comfort and salvation, whom am I to name in my inward prayer?’

‘There can be no harm in my telling you that’ said Ukon, ‘and I should have done so before, did I not somehow feel it a shame to be prating to you now about things she would not have me speak of while she was alive. Her parents died when she was quite small. Her father, Sammi Chūjō, loved her very dearly, but felt always that he could not give her all the advantages to which her great beauty entitled her; and still perplexed about her future and how best to do his duty by her, he died. Soon afterwards some accident brought her into the company of Tō no Chūjō[17] who was at that time still a lieutenant and for three years he made her very happy. But in the autumn of last year disquieting letters began to arrive from the Great Hall of the Right,[18] and being by nature prone to fits of unreasoning fear she now fell into a wild panic and fled to the western part of the town where she hid herself in the house of her old wet-nurse. Here she was very uncomfortable, and had planned to move to a certain village in the hills, when she discovered that it would be unlucky, owing to the position of the stars since the beginning of the year, to make a journey in that direction; and (though she never told me so) I think, Sir, it troubled her sorely that you should have come upon her when she was living in so wretched a place. But there was never anyone in the world like my lady for keeping things to herself; she could never bear that other people should know what was on her mind. I have no doubt, Sir, that she sometimes behaved very oddly to you and that you have seen all this for yourself.’

Yes, this was all just as Tō no Chūjō had described. ‘I think there was some mention of a child that Chūjō was vexed to have lost sight of’ said Genji more interested than ever; ‘am I right?’ ‘Yes, indeed,’ she answered ‘it was born in the spring of last year, a girl, and a fine child it was.’ ‘Where is it now?’ asked Genji. ‘Could you get hold of it and bring it to me here without letting anyone know where you were taking it? It would be a great comfort to me in my present misery to have some remembrance of her near me;’ and he added, ‘I ought of course to tell Chūjō, but that would lead to useless and painful discussions about what has happened. Somehow or other I will manage to bring her up here in my palace. I think there can be no harm in that. And you will easily enough find some story to tell to whatever people are now looking after her.’ ‘I am very glad that this has entered your head,’ said Ukon, ‘it would be a poor look-out for her to grow up in the quarter where she is now living. With no one properly belonging to her and in such a part of the town....’

In the stillness of the evening, under a sky of exquisite beauty, here and there along the borders in front of his palace some insect croaked its song; the leaves were just beginning to turn. And as he looked upon this pleasant picture he felt ashamed at the contrast between his surroundings and the little house where Yūgao had lived. Suddenly somewhere among the bamboo groves the bird called iyebato uttered its sharp note. He remembered just how she had looked when in the gardens of that fatal house the same bird had startled her by its cry, and turning to Ukon, ‘How old was she?’ he suddenly asked; ‘for though she seemed childlike in her diffidence and helplessness, that may only have been a sign that she was not long for this world.’ ‘She must have been nineteen’ said Ukon. ‘When my mother, who was her first wet-nurse, died and left me an orphan, my lady’s father was pleased to notice me and reared me at my lady’s side. Ah Sir, when I think of it, I do not know how I shall live without her; for kind as people here may be I do not seem to get used to them. I suppose it is that I knew her ways, poor lady, she having been my mistress for so many years.’

To Genji even the din of the cloth-beaters’ mallets had become dear through recollection, and as he lay in bed he repeated those verses of Po Chü-i.

_In the eighth month and ninth month when the nights are growing long A thousand times, ten thousand times the fuller’s stick beats._

The young brother still waited upon him, but he no longer brought with him the letters which he had been used to bring. Utsusemi thought he had at last decided that her treatment of him was too unfriendly to be borne, and was vexed that he should feel so. Then suddenly she heard of his illness, and all her vexation turned to consternation and anxiety. She was soon to set out upon her long journey, but this did not much interest her; and to see whether Genji had quite forgotten her she sent him a message saying that she had been able to find no words in which to express her grief at hearing the news of his illness. With it she sent the poem: ‘I did not ask for news and you did not ask why I was silent; so the days wore on and I remained in sorrow and dismay.’ He had not forgotten her, no, not in all his trouble; and his answer came: ‘Of this life, fragile as the utsusemi’s[19] shell, already I was weary, when your word came, and gave me strength to live anew.’ The poem was written in a very tremulous and confused hand; but she thought the writing very beautiful and it delighted her that he had not forgotten how, cicada-like, she had shed her scarf. There could be no harm in this interchange of notes, but she had no intention of arranging a meeting. She thought that at last even he had seen that there could be no sense in that.

As for Utsusemi’s companion, she was not yet married, and Genji heard that she had become the mistress of Tō no Chūjō’s brother Kurōdo no Shōshō; and though he feared that Shōshō might already have taken very ill the discovery that he was not first in the field, and did not at all wish to offend him, yet he had a certain curiosity about the girl and sent Utsusemi’s little brother with a message asking if she had heard of his illness and the poem: ‘Had I not once gathered for my pillow a handful of the sedge that grows upon the eaves,[20] not a dewdrop of pretext could my present message find.’ It was an acrostic with many hidden meanings. He tied the letter to a tall reed and bade him deliver it secretly; but was afterwards very uneasy at the thought that it might go astray. ‘If it falls into Shōshō’s hands’ he thought ‘he will at once guess that it was I who was before him.’ But after all Shōshō would probably not take that so very hard, Genji had vanity enough to think.

The boy delivered the message when Shōshō was at a safe distance. She could not help feeling a little hurt; but it was something that he had remembered her at all, and justifying it to herself with the excuse that she had had no time to do anything better, she sent the boy straight back with the verse: ‘The faint wind of your favour, that but for a moment blew, with grief has part befrosted the small sedge of the eaves.’ It was very ill-written, with all sorts of ornamental but misleading strokes and flourishes; indeed with a complete lack of style. However, it served to remind him of the face he had first seen that evening by the lamplight. As for the other who on that occasion had sat so stiffly facing her, what determination there had been in her face, what a steady resolution to give no quarter!

The affair with the lady of the sedge was so unintentional and so insignificant that though he regarded it as rather frivolous and indiscreet, he saw no great harm in it. But if he did not take himself in hand before it was too late he would soon again be involved in some entanglement which might finally ruin his reputation.

On the forty-ninth day after Yūgao’s death a service in her memory was by his orders secretly held in the Hokedō on Mount Hiyei. The ritual performed was of the most elaborate kind, everything that was required being supplied from the Prince’s own store; and even the decoration of the service books and images was carried out with the utmost attention. Koremitsu’s brother, a man of great piety, was entrusted with the direction of the ceremony, and all went well. Next Genji sent for his old writing-master, a doctor of letters for whom he had a great liking and bade him write the prayer for the dead.[21] ‘Say that I commit to Amida the Buddha one not named whom I loved, but lost disastrously,’ and he wrote out a rough draft for the learned man to amend. ‘There is nothing to add or alter,’ said the master, deeply moved. Who could it be, he wondered, at whose death the prince was so distressed? (For Genji, try as he might, could not hide his tears.)

When he was secretly looking through his store for largesse to give to the Hokedō priests, he came upon a certain dress and as he folded it made the poem: ‘The girdle that to-day with tears I knot, shall we ever in some new life untie?’

Till now her spirit had wandered in the void.[22]

But already she must be setting out on her new life-path, and in great solicitude, he prayed continually for her safety.

He met Tō no Chūjō and his heart beat violently, for he had longed to tell him about Yūgao’s child and how it was to be reared. But he feared that the rest of the story would needlessly anger and distress him, and he did not mention the matter. Meanwhile the servants of Yūgao’s house were surprised that they had had no news from her nor even from Ukon, and had begun to be seriously disquieted. They had still no proof that it was Genji who was her lover, but several of them thought that they had recognized him and his name was whispered among them. They would have it that Koremitsu knew the secret, but he pretended to know nothing whatever about Yūgao’s lover and found a way to put off all their questions; and as he was still frequenting the house for his own purposes, it was easy for them to believe that he was not really concerned in their mistress’s affairs. Perhaps after all it was some blackguard of a Zuryō’s son who, frightened of Tō no Chūjō’s interference, had carried her off to his province. The real owner of the house was a daughter of Yūgao’s second wet-nurse, who had three children of her own. Ukon had been brought up with them, but they thought that it was perhaps because she was not their own sister that Ukon sent them no news of their mistress, and they were in great distress.

Ukon who knew that they would assail her with questions which her promise to Genji forbade her to answer, dared not go to the house, not even to get news of her lady’s child. It had been put out somewhere to nurse, but to her great sorrow she had quite lost sight of it.

Longing all the while to see her face once more though only in a dream, upon the night after the ceremony on Mount Hiyei, he had a vision very different from that for which he prayed. There appeared to him once more, just as on that fatal night, the figure of a woman in menacing posture, and he was dismayed at the thought that some demon which haunted the desolate spot might on the occasion when it did that terrible thing, also have entered into him and possessed him.

Iyo no Suke was to start early in the Godless Month and had announced that his wife would go with him. Genji sent very handsome parting presents and among them with special intent he put many very exquisite combs and fans. With them were silk strips to offer to the God of Journeys and, above all, the scarf which she had dropped, and, tied to it, a poem in which he said that he had kept it in remembrance of her while there was still hope of their meeting, but now returned it wet with tears shed in vain. There was a long letter with the poem, but this was of no particular interest and is here omitted. She sent no answer by the man who had brought the presents, but gave her brother the poem: ‘That to the changed cicada you should return her summer dress shows that you too have changed and fills an insect heart with woe.’

He thought long about her. Though she had with so strange and inexplicable a resolution steeled her heart against him to the end, yet each time he remembered that she had gone forever it filled him with depression.

It was the first day of the tenth month, and as though in sign that winter had indeed begun heavy rain fell. All day long Genji watched the stormy sky. Autumn had hideously bereaved him and winter already was taking from him one whom he dearly loved:

Now like a traveller who has tried two ways in vain
I stand perplexed where these sad seasons meet.

Now at least we must suppose he was convinced that such secret adventures led only to misery.

I should indeed be very loth to recount in all their detail matters which he took so much trouble to conceal, did I not know that if you found I had omitted anything you would at once ask why, just because he was supposed to be an Emperor’s son, I must needs put a favourable showing on his conduct by leaving out all his indiscretions; and you would soon be saying that this was no history but a mere made-up tale designed to influence the judgment of posterity. As it is I shall be called a scandal-monger; but that I cannot help.

[1] Lady Rokujō. Who she was gradually becomes apparent in the course of the story.

[2] Lady Rokujō’s house.

[3] Rokujō.

[4] Genji was now seventeen; Rokujō twenty-four.

[5] The god of bridges. He built in a single night the stone causeway which joins Mount Katsuragi and Mount Kombu.

[6] Genji’s brother-in-law.

[7] His own palace.

[8] Foxes, dressed up as men, were believed to be in the habit of seducing and bewitching human beings.

[9] We gather later that she was only nineteen.

[10] I.e. covered part of his face with a scarf or the like, a practice usual with illicit lovers in mediæval Japan.

[11] _Shin Kokinshū_, 1701.

[12] Lady Rokujō.

[13] To summon a servant.

[14] The bringing of a corpse. Temples were used as mortuaries.

[15] I.e. pursued illicit amours.

[16] Pilgrimages to Kiyomizu Temple are made on the seventeenth day.

[17] Chūjō means ‘Captain’; see above, p. 71.

[18] From Tō no Chūjō’s wife, who was the daughter of the Minister of the Right.

[19] Cicada.

[20] ‘Sedge upon the eaves ‘is _Nokiba no Ogi_, and it is by this name that the lady is generally known.

[21] _Gwammon_.

[22] For forty-nine days the spirit of the dead leads the intermediate existence so strangely described in the _Abhidharma Kośa Śāstra_; then it begins its new incarnation.