On the road to Yamanaka Hot Springs, we could see Shirane-ga-Take, "White Mountain," which stayed behind us all the way. In the foothills to our left was a temple dedicated to Kannon, the Goddess of Mercy. After Emperor Kazan [968-1008] had made a pilgrimage to the Thirty- Three Holy Places in the western provinces, he is said to have enshrined here an image of the Most Merciful Kannon, the Boddhisattva of Great Love and Compassion. He called this temple Nata, combining the first syllables of Nachi and Tanigumi, the first and last of the Thirty-Three Holy Places.

Amidst an assortment of curiously shaped rocks and old gnarled pines was a small sanctuary with thatched roof, built atop a rock. The age- whitened purity of these boulders gave this place a mournful beauty exceeding that of the famed Ishiyama Temple of Omi.

Ishiyama stone
Is not so white, and whiter still
Is autumn, windblown!

Yamanaka Spa We bathed in the water of Yamanaka's hot springs. In curative powers they are second only, people say, to the hot springs of Ariake.

Yamanaka's waters be
Better than chrysanthemums
For longevity!

The proprietor of our inn, still a youth, was called Kumenosuke. His father is said to have been very fond of poetry, and the story is told here of how a young aspiring poet from Kyoto was so humiliated by the innkeeper's superior poetic ability that when he returned to Kyoto he took lessons in composition from Teitoku, and went on to become the celebrated poet we know as Teishitsu. When famous and much sought after, Teishitsu would never accept payment, people say, from these villagers for criticism or correction of their poetry.

Sora was taken ill. Since he had relatives in a place called Nagashima in Ise Province, we decided he should go on ahead.

A solitary rover,
If I fall, then let me die
Amid bush clover.

Sora wrote this poem before he left.

With the sadness of one who goes and the grief of the one who is left behind, we were like a pair of wild ducks parted from each other and lost in the clouds. I wrote:

Tears of autumn dew
Will wash off my hat the words
"Travellers two."