Then feeling assured that she had put a curse upon Shuntoku, that wicked woman went home. And she said humbly, "I have returned;" and she pretended to be faithful and true.
(1) These numbers simply indicate a great multitude in the language of the people; they have no exact significance.
(2) Kago, a kind of palanquin.
(3) The ancient ryo or tael had a value approximating that of the dollar of 100 sen.
(4) Fuigo Sama, deity of smiths.
(5) "Diamond Sutra."
(6) Koban, a gold coin. There were koban of a great many curious shapes and designs. The most common form was a flat or oval disk, stamped with Chinese characters. Some koban were fully five inches in length by four in width.
(7) Public announcements are usually written upon small wooden tablets attached to a post; and in the country such announcements are still set up just as suggested in the ballad.
Now three or four months after the stepmother of Shuntoku had thus invoked evil upon him he became very sick. Then that stepmother secretly rejoiced.
And she spoke cunningly to Nobuyoshi, her husband, saying: "Sir, my lord, this sickness of Shuntoku seems to be a very bad sickness; and it is difficult to keep one having such sickness in the house of a rich man."