Of Old Japan
On the seventeenth, started early in the morning, and crossed a deep river. I heard that in this Province there lived in olden times a chieftain of Mano. He had thousand and ten thousand webs of cloth woven and dipped them [for bleaching] in the river which now flows over the place where his great house stood. Four of the large gate-posts remained standing in the river.
Hearing the people composing poems about this place, I in my mind:
Had I not seen erect in the river
These solid timbers of the olden time
How could I know, how could I feel
The story of that house?
That evening we lodged at the beach of Kurodo. The white sand stretched far and wide. The pinewood was dark—the moon was bright, and the soft blowing of the wind made me lonely. People were pleased and composed poems. My poem:
For this night only
The autumn moon at Kurodo beach shall shine for me,
For this night only!—I cannot sleep.
Early in the morning we left this place and came to the Futoi River[1] on the boundary between Shimofusa and Musashi. We lodged at the ferry of Matsusato[2] near Kagami's rapids,[3] and all night long our luggage was being carried over.
