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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 15 March 2011
Of the flowing river the flood ever changeth, on the still pool the foam gathering, vanishing, stayeth not. Such too is the lot of men and of the dwellings of men in this world of ours. Within City-Royal, paved as it were with precious stones, the mansions and houses of high and low, rivalling in length of beam and height of tiled roof, seem builded to last for ever, yet if you search few indeed are those that can boast of their antiquity. One year a house is burnt down, the next it is rebuilded, a lordly mansion falls into ruin, and a mere cottage replaces it: The fate of the occupants is like that of their abodes. Where they lived folk are still numerous, but out of any twenty or thirty you may have known scarce two or three survive. Death in the morning, birth in the evening. Such is man's life — a fleck of foam on the surface of the pool.
page 237 note 2 A 10 feet square hut; the name is explained later on.
page 238 note 1 Gate of the Red Sparrow—in the middle of the south face of the Palace at Kyoto.
page 238 note 2 Or Hachishō In, Hall of the Eight Boards of Government.
page 238 note 3 The University of Chinese Learning, etc.
page 238 note 4 One of the Eight Boards—answering nearly to the Home Office.
page 239 note 1 In the northern part of the capital.
page 239 note 2 In the southern part of the capital.
page 240 note 1 Kyoto was really founded by Kwammu in 784, but the next Mikado, Heizei, resided for three years at the former capital, Nara (hence he is often known as the Nara Mikado), so that the founding of Kyoto is ascribed to his successor, Saga. The removal was decreed at the instance of the famous Taira no Kyomori.
page 241 note 1 The Empress Saimei died in a.d.661 at Asakura in Tosa, where she was at the head of an army assembled to assist the Koreans against China. Her son Tenji lived in the same place, mourning for her, and ordered his Palace to be constructed of kuroki (timber with the bark on), which later mikados imitated on ascending the throne as a symbol of frugality and humility (a Chinese, not a pure Japanese idea). He made (or caused some court poet to make) the following verse on the occasion:—
Asakura ya
ki no marudono ni
ware woreba
nanori wo shitsutsu
yuku ha taga Ko zo ! (Mannyōshiu).
[In a rude palace, at Asakura, of round unbarked timber, dwell I, and as men pass shouting their names, I ask whose sons they be.] The meaning of this quintain is not apparent.
page 241 note 2 The Mikado Nintoku (a.d.313–399) is more particularly referred to.
page 242 note 1 Rice, wheat, awa (Setaria, Italian millet), kibi (Sorghum, Panicum miliaceum), and hiye (P. frumentaceum).
page 242 note 2 Misao tsukuru.
page 243 note 1 The dry parts of the bed of the river are meant—foreshores, a sort of no man's land. The river, of course, is the Kamogawa.
page 244 note 1 Bramsen gives Genryaku one year only: 1 Bunji is probably intended, the nengo were sometimes changed in the course of the year.
page 244 note 2 Tomb-chapels or mortuary shrines.
page 246 note 1 The characters seem to mean “ while a pearl (or gem) tinkles” (as part of a beadlace or chain).
page 247 note 1 Lit. ‘ white-wave [fellows],’ from a place so named in ancient China much haunted by robbers. So we might say ‘ Hounslow Heath fellows.’
page 248 note 1 This description of the interior is not very clear. I have done my best with it.
page 249 note 1 A hill in Hades crossed by souls on their way to Paradise or Hell. The hototogisu is the Cuculus poliocephalus.
page 249 note 2 A pun on utsusomi, which means ‘ mortal,’ and also an insect's empty moult.
page 249 note 3 Or Mansami, the religious name of Kasa no Ason Maro, a poet of the eighth century.—M. K.
The allusion is to some verses of his—
Asaborake
kogi-yuku fune no
shiranami,
“ the white waves left in the track of the boat sculled forth at daybreak.”
page 249 note 4 Katsura—Cercidephyllum japonicum.
page 249 note 5 A place in China mentioned in a poem by the celebrated Hakurakuten on a girl famed for her skill on the lute.
page 249 note 6 Minamoto no Tsunenobu, the founder of the Katsura school of lutists.—M. K.
page 250 note 1 Imperata arundinacea, Cyr., var. Koenigii, Hack., a sort of grass, the young shoots of which are edible.—M. K.
page 250 note 2 Lit. ‘ rock-pear ’ —Epigea asiatica, Max.—M. K.
page 250 note 3 Dioscorea japonica.—M. K.
page 250 note 4 Œnanthe stolonifera, D.C., Max.—M. K.
page 250 note 6 A kind of coarse matting.
page 250 note 6 Here is a shrine of Kwannon.
page 250 note 7 A celebrated recluse and minstrel, totally blind, who flourished in the tenth century. A courtier named Hakuga no Sammi invited him to leave his retreat and live in the capital. Semimaru sent a quintain by way of answer—
Yo no naka wa
totomo kakutomo
sugushiten
miya mo waraya mo
hateshi nakereba.
“ In this world of ours, palace or straw-roofed hut, what matters it—wherever we dwell will there be yet something unattained.” Now the blind poet was the only man who knew the secret modes of the Ryusen (Flowing Fount manner) and the Takuboku (Woodpecker manner), and the nobleman for three years spent every night, fair or foul, in the neighbourhood of -the hut in the hope of hearing these. One full-moon night in the eighth month he was there, and the blind minstrel, thinking himself alone, sang the following verses :—
Ausaka no
seki no arashi no
hageshiki ni
shiite zo itaru
yo wo sugosu tote.
“ Notwithstanding the gales that roar down the pass of Ausaka I still do pass here the days of this present life of mine (i.e. the middle of the three existences—past, present, and future).”
On hearing the chant Hakuga began to weep. The singer meanwhile soliloquised, “ How I should love to converse with anyone who should visit me on so fair a night as this ! ” Then Hakuga went in and told his story, whereupon the old man was delighted and instructed him in all the lore of the lute. (
, Kodanshō, eleventh century, in Hanawa's 
, Gunshō ruishiu, ed. 1902, vol. xvii, pp. 592–3.)—M. K.
page 251 note 1 Of the fishing-boats by the island of Maki.
page 251 note 2 The copper pheasant. The Buddhist saint Gyogi, 
, has a verse upon this—
Yamadori no
horohoro to naku
koe kikeba
chichi ka to zo omou
haha ka to zo omon.
“ When the copper pheasant uttereth its cry ‘ horohoro,’ I listen and wonder whether 't is my father who crieth or whether 't is my mother who crieth.”— M. K. [The allusion is, of course, to the doctrine of transmigration.]
page 255 note 1 Koji, 
parishioner, the ‘ bourgeois ’ of Hindoo society (Eitel). Jōmyō is Vimalakīrtti, a fabulous person (?), said to have lived contemporaneously with the Buddha in the city of Viyari. He excused himself from attendance on the Buddha on the ground of sickness. Many holy men are sent to inquire into the case, but Jōmyō eludes them all. At last Mañdjuśrī appears and engages the pretended sick man in a subtle discourse. Upon this Jōmyō performs a miracle—in his one room he manages to find seats for all the 3,000 saints and 500 disciples of the Buddha. In addition, at the request of some of those present, he divides in half the remote universe of Mudō (akchōbhya, ‘ motionless ’ — containing denizens represented by a number consisting of unity followed by seventeen ciphers), and brings them, too, into the room, with the Buddha himself preaching to them. In the fourth century a Chinese traveller in India saw this very room, and found it measured 10 feet square (hōjō). Chōmei borrowed the name for his own hut; but it is not the hut, after all, that makes the saint.—M. K.
page 255 note 2 Shuri Handoku was the most foolish of all the disciples of Buddha. He forgot not only his family name, but even his own personal name. Popular rumour credited him with carrying a tablet hung round his neck with his name thereon. After his death a kind of ginger (Zingiber myoga, Rose.) grew on his grave, which makes those who eat it forget everything. This story is based upon the name 
, the characters of which mean ‘ name - bearing,’ i.e. carrying away the name. Suri or shuri, it may be mentioned, means ‘ small ’; handoku, ‘ path.’
Some additional remarks by the Rev. S. Takafuji, a well-known doctor of the Avatanisaka system :—“The mother of Handoku was the wife of a wealthy man, with one of whose slaves she eloped, and in the course of time gave birth to two sons. Her parents left all their wealth to the boys, after which the elder one became a disciple of the Buddha and attained the rank of arhat, transferring his share of the inheritance to the younger one, Handoku. The latter refused the gift, and desired to be instructed in the law, but as he was found unable to remember a single clause of the sūtra he was set to study he was expelled. On this he wept and was pitied by the Buddha, who gave him instruction on the doctrine of Nirvana, whereupon he became also an arhat.”
page 256 note 1 Not Kamo Chōmei ; the no is as necessary as any von or de. Nor must Chōmei be read japonicè—Nagaakira.
page 257 note 1 Of the stanzas in this essay, gathered from various sources and very characteristic of old Japan, the text seems worth presenting in English italics.
page 258 note 1 So in a well-known hymn with
“ Time, like an ever rolling stream,
Bears all its sons away.”
page 258 note 2 There exists a translation into English by the Rev. W. Eby, and an excellent account will be found in Dr. Aston's “ History of Japanese Literature.”
page 258 note 3 Dr. Knox's fine translation of his most interesting and characteristic autobiography in vol. xxx, Tr. As. Soc. Japan.
page 262 note 1 Of polished white metal. The restless waves are even polishing the reflected image of the moon.
page 263 note 1 The sound of beating cloth on a board to make it supple—a frequent motive in old Japanese poetry.
page 263 note 2 The hill in Hades all souls must cross.
page 264 note 1 Paradise is in the west, the moon rises in the east.