[31] The old hag who lurks in the River of Souls, waylaying little children, robbing them of their clothes, and compelling them to construct huge piles of stones. Her counterfeit presentment (by Unkei) can be well seen at the Ennōji of Kamakura.
[32] An ordinary disposition of these women; who often preferred their Edo lover to such lot.
[33] Ototoi oidé: It is the salutation of the good Buddhist to the captured insect, thrown without and requested to return "the day before yesterday" = the Greek Kalends. As used above it is a gross insult to the person addressed.
[34] Damask hill: the names taken by these great hetairai were most fanciful.
[35] Next to the Ten-ō Jinja; not that of Samégabashi. To-day retired, neat and clean; without the dirty publicity of larger temples. It is a bit of country in crowded Yotsuya.
[36] A young girl's method of fixing the hair; but Ryuō uses the term. Gohei are the paper strips used as offering. Usually attached to a short stick.
[37] At the Gyōranji of Matsuzakachō in the Mita district of Tōkyō.
[38] Sanzugawa: Yama mo nakereba, hashi mo nashi; shinde no tabiji hana wa nao nashi. Sanzugawa, the river crossed by the dead.
[39] A fourth form of torture was suspension—an exaggerated infliction of "the lobster." These official forms are described by J. Carey Hall in the transactions of the Asiatic Society of Japan, vol. XLI., Part V. The native references are the "Tokugawa Seikei Shiryō," "Keizai Dai Hiroku," "Kōjiki Ruihi Horitsu-bu." Cf. article on Gōmon in the "Kokushi Dai Jiten." There were other forms. In the examination into the famous conspiracy of Yui Shōsetsu (1651 A.D.) no confession could be secured from Yoshida Hatsuémon. He was brought out, to find his thirteen-year-old son Hachitarō undergoing the torture of dropping water. At the last extremities the boy pleaded for mercy. His father drily told him to act the samurai, and not to imperil the lives of others. It was different with Matsubayashi Chuya (really the last heir of the famous Chōsokabé House of Tosa). At sight of his old, white haired, white faced, jail wearied mother threatened with the fire torture, he did for her what he would not do for himself. The old woman willingly would have undergone the torture. Chuya's confession cost the lives of seventy-five men.
[40] Hifumikwan (Tōkyō), Meiji 29th year 2nd month 15th day (28th March, 1896).