47. The Grandee Shibi

1So when the government of the Empire was about to be assumed, the Grandee Shibi, ancestor of the Grandees of Heguri, mixed in the Songs, and took the hand of the beautiful person whom His Augustness Woke was about to wed. This maiden was a daughter of one of the Headmen of Uda, and her name was Ofuwo. Then His Augustness Woke likewise mixed in the Song-Hedge. Thereupon the Grandee Shibi sang, saying:

2(IV) “The further fin of the roof of the great palace is bent down at the corner.”

3(V) “It is on account of the great carpenter’s awkwardness that it is bent down at the corner.”

4Then the Grandee Shibi sang again, saying:

5(VIII) “The great lord, on account of the magnanimity of his heart, does not enter and stand in the eight-fold hedge of branches of the child of a grandee.

6(I) “Looking on the breakers of the briny current, I see my spouse standing by the fin of the tunny that comes sporting.”

7Then the Grandee Shibi, getting more and more angry, sang, saying:

8(IX) “[Though] the eight-fold hedge of branches of the Prince the Great Lord be made fast at eight places, be made fast all round, ’tis a hedge that shall be cut, ’tis a hedge that shall be burnt.”

9(II) “Oh fisherman that spearest the tunny, the great fish! He being [there], thou must be sad at heart, tunny-spearing fisherman!”

10Having thus sung, the feast was concluded at dawn, and they all retired. Next morning the two Deities, His Augustness Ohoke and His Augustness Woke, took counsel, saying: “All the people of the Court go to Court in the morning, and assemble at Shibi’s gate at noon. So Shibi must surely now be sleeping, and moreover there will be nobody at the gate. So unless it be now, it were bard to plot against him,”—and forthwith they at once raised an army, and beleaguered the house of the Grandee Shibi, and slew him.