Again he augustly sang, saying:
“Driving the dyke-piles into Lake Yosami where the water collects, my heart (ignorant of the pricking of the stumps of the water-caltrop, ignorant of the creeping of the roots of the Brasenia peltata), being more and more laughable, is now indeed repentant!”[1]
Having thus sung, he bestowed [her on the Heir Apparent]. So after having been granted the maiden, the Heir Apparent sang, saying:
“Oh! the maiden of Kohada in the back of the road! though I heard of her like the thunder, we mutually intertwine [our arms] as pillows.”[2]
- ↑ The gist of the Song is: “I knew not that thou, my son, hadst conceived a secret passion for the maiden; but I am now conscious of my own mistake, and my foolish old heart is ashamed of itself.” With this explanation the elaborate comparison between the state of the monarch’s mind and the condition of the peasant driving piles for the foundation of a dyke, and having his feet either lacerated by the stumps of the water-caltrop, or made slimy by brushing against the roots of the Brasenia peltata at the bottom of the water, becomes intelligible and appropriate.—The word kuri, rendered “roots,” perplexed Motowori, who suggests that it may be but a second name of the Brasenia, appended to the first; but Moribe’s suggestion that it is to be identified with tori, and taken in the signification of “roots,” though not quite convincing, is at least more plausible. The text of this Song is corrupt in these “Records” and has to be corrected by a comparison with that of the “Chronicles.” Moribe goes into an amusing ecstasy over the picture of ancient manners which it presents, and lauds the simplicity of days when a father and son could so peacefully woo the same maiden without mutual concealment or disastrous consequences!
- ↑ The meaning of this Song is: “At first I heard of the maiden of Kohada in the furthest parts of Himuka as one hears the distant thunder; but now she is mine, and we sleep locked in each other’s arms.”—This Kohada in Himuka must not be confounded with the Kohata in Yamashiro mentioned in the preceding
stinking garlic, but the fragrant orange that the singer has met by the way, and it is the choicest young fruit in the very middle of the tree that forms a suitable comparison for the lovely young girl.—With the favourite allusion to upper, middle, and lower the reader is already familiar, and the Pillow-Word “three chestnuts” was explained in the note on the preceding Song (Sect. CVI, Note 8).
