Page:Tales from old Japanese dramas (1915).djvu/234

172 reluctantly struck off his head. He then proceeded to carefully examine the hero's person in the hope of finding something in the way of a written will. Instead of this, however, he found in his pocket a tanzaku with the following poem:

He was struck with the great beauty of the poem, and filled with admiration for Tadanori, because he had kept his poetic mood even in the midst of war. He afterwards kindly sent the tanzaku to Lord Shunzei.

This poem is still famous. It is familiar to every Japanese as the hero's masterpiece.