98 Shadowings 



And indeed the following tiny picture is a truer 

 bit of work, according to Japanese art-principles 

 (I do not know the author's name) : 



Se'mi hitotsu 

 Matsu no yu-hi wo 

 Kakae'-ke'ri. 



Lo ! on the topmost pine, a solitary cicada 

 Vainly attempts to clasp one last red beam of sun. 



IV 



PHILOSOPHICAL verses do not form a 

 numerous class of Japanese poems upon 

 semi; but they possess an interest alto 

 gether exotic. As the metamorphosis of the 

 butterfly supplied to old Greek thought an 

 emblem of the soul's ascension, so the natural 

 history of the cicada has furnished Buddhism 

 with similitudes and parables for the teaching of 

 doctrine. 



Man sheds his body only as the se'mi sheds 

 its skin. But each reincarnation obscures the 

 memory of the previous one : we remember our 

 former existence no more than the semi remem 

 bers the shell from which it has emerged. Often 



