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76 She answered: ‘Though sad to have outlived him for so long, yet in this day’s return found I some peace; it was as though the world again were in his rule.’

It was not written with very great display of penmanship, but there was (or Genji fancied that there was) a peculiar distinction and refinement in the writing. It was not quite in the fashion of the moment; but that did not matter, for she had a style that was completely of her own invention.

But this, he remembered, was the day of the great masses for his father’s soul. He must put Fujitsubo out of his thoughts; and wet through by the perpetual downpour of rainy snow, he played his part in the elaborate rituals and processions.

The Service of the Eight Recitals was to be celebrated in Fujitsubo’s house on the tenth of the twelfth month and the four succeeding days. She was at great pains to render the ceremony as impressive as possible. The tents to be used on each of the five days were wound on rods of ivory; they were backed with thin silk and laid in cases of woven bamboo. All was ordered with a splendour such as had seldom been seen before. But under her management even the most trivial daily arrangements became invested with a singular beauty and completeness. It did not therefore surprise Genji that the Recitals were carried out with unequalled impressiveness and dignity. The adornments of the Buddha, the coverings of the flower-altars, all were of a beauty that made him dream he was indeed a dweller in Amida’s Land of Bliss.

The first day’s Recital was dedicated to the memory of her father; the next was on behalf of her mother, the deceased Empress; the third day was in memory of her husband, the late ex-Emperor. It is on this day that the fifth book is read; despite the disapproval of Kōkiden and