Note 33 — LAFCADIO HEARN (continued 3)

Tsuki-yo-garasu, lit.: "moon-night crows." Crows usually announce the dawn by their cawing; but sometimes on moonlight nights they caw at all hours from sunset to sunrise. The bell referred to is the bell of some Buddhist temple: the aké-no-kane, or "dawn-bell," being, in all parts of Japan, sounded from every Buddhist tera. There is a pun in the original;—the expression tsukenai, "cannot tell (a lie)," might also be interpreted phonetically as "cannot strike [a bell]."