Page:Brinkley - Japan - Volume 1.djvu/250

 of Kasuga at Nara, and is, indeed, constantly performed at Shintô festivals elsewhere. Towards the close of the tenth century, the chants that accompanied the kagura as then danced, were committed to writing, and found to number thirty-eight. They are almost wholly devoid of poetic inspiration and depend entirely on rhythm and cadence of syllabic pulsations, five beats followed by seven, five again by seven, and then seven by seven. Here are some examples:—

These verses, it will be seen, have no pretence to be called poetry: they merely supply the mo