"'Wretched!' he exclaimed, alluding to his poetry; and then added, 'One tune more! Stay not your hand when one is near, who so ardently longs to hear you.' Thus he began to flatter the lady, who, having heard his whispers, replied thus, in a tender, hesitating voice:
"'Sorry I am my voice too low
To match thy flute's far sweeter sound;
Which mingles with the winds that blow
The autumn leaves upon the ground.'
"Ah! she little thought I was a silent and vexed spectator of all this flirtation. She then took up a Soh (another kind of koto with thirteen strings) and tuned it to a Banjiki key (a winter tune), and played on it still more excellently. Though an admirer of music, I can not say that these bewitching melodies gave me any pleasure under the peculiar circumstances I stood in.
"Now, romantic interludes, such as this, might be pleasant enough in the case of maidens who are kept strictly in Court service, and whom we have very little opportunity of meeting with, but even there we should hesitate to make such a one our life companion. How much less could one ever entertain such an idea in a case like my own? Making, therefore, that evening's experience a ground of dissatisfaction I never saw her more.
"Now, gentlemen, let us take into consideration these two instances which have occurred to myself and see how equally unsatisfactory they are. The one too jealous, the other too forward. Thus, early in life, I found out how little reliance was to be placed on such characters. And now I think so still more; and this opinion applies more especially to the latter of the two. Dewdrops on the 'Hagi flower' of beauty so delicate that they disappear as soon as we touch them—hailstones on the bamboo grass that melt in our hand as soon as we prick them—appear at a distance extremely tempting and attractive. Take my humble advice, however, and go not near them. If you do not appreciate this advice now, the lapse of another seven years will render you well able to
