Page:Japanese plays and playfellows (1901).djvu/340

300 a poet or a daimyō, generally both. Hard by was the pine-room, whose faintly pictured canopy of serpentine boughs was the work of Kōrin. And, when the servants entered to lay the preliminary meal, they wore the same red aprons and red sleeve-cords as in the days when lyeyasu was borne in his litter to the gardens of Shoji Jinyemon.

It would seem that the routine of ambrosial nights does not greatly vary in the land of perpetual etiquette. Having sipped rather than supped, the dishes being light and fluid, we summoned the usual geisha, but among them, as the artist had forewarned me, was one of unusual distinction. O Wakatai San (her name was equivalent to "The Honourable Young Person") had long been the torture and despair of susceptible visitors. Her father was a samurai, strict and proud, who had trained her in a school of arbitrary virtue. Suitors had been one and all rejected ; even Lord W., offering bribes of incredible amount, had gone empty away. She was losing her youth, having reached the age of twenty-three, but her regular features and sunny smile helped one to forget the rather raucous tones of her voice. She had seen enough of the Shimabara life to pity its victims, and sang us some rather sad ditties on the subject, of which I transcribe two. The first refers to the prisoner's longing for liberty.

The other is a little difficult to render, since each line has a double meaning: the point turns on the