[1] _Nowaki_ is the name given to certain destructive storms usually
occurring toward the end of autumn. All the chapters of the Genji
Monogatari have remarkably poetical and effective titles. There is an
English translation, by Mr. Kenchō Suyematsu, of the first seventeen
chapters.
[2] The Kurando, or Kurōdo, was an official intrusted with the care of
the imperial records.
[3] A _chō_ is about one-fifteenth of a mile.
[4] _Hagi_ is the name commonly given to the bush-clover. _Ominameshi_
is the common term for the _valeriana officinalis_.
[5] That is to say, there are now many people who go every night to the
graveyards, to decorate and prepare the graves before the great Festival
of the Dead.
[6] Most of these names survive in the appellations of well-known
districts of the present Tōkyō.
[7] _Katabira_ is a name given to many kinds of light textures used
for summer-robes. The material is usually hemp, but sometimes, as
in the case referred to here, of fine silk. Some of these robes are
transparent, and very beautiful.--Hakata, in Kyūshū, is still famous for
the silk girdles made there. The fabric is very heavy and strong.
[8] _Amé_ is a nutritive gelatinous extract obtained from wheat and
other substances. It is sold in many forms--as candy, as a syrupy liquid
resembling molasses, as a sweet hot drink, as a solid jelly. Children
are very fond of it. Its principal element is starch-sugar.
[9] Ōyama mountain in Sagami is a great resort of Pilgrims. There
is a celebrated temple there, dedicated to Iwanaga-Himé (“Long-Rock
Princess”), sister of the beautiful Goddess of Fuji. Sekison-San is a
popular name both for the divinity and for the mountain itself.
[10] Prices of the year 1897.
[11] _Calyptotryphus Marmoratus. (?)_
[12] _Homeogryllus Japonicus._
[13] _Locusta Japonica. (?)_
[14] Sanscrit: _Yama_. Probably this name was given to the insect on
account of its large staring eyes. Images of King Emma are always made
with very big and awful eyes.
[15] _Mushi no koe fumu._