Shirō Hamao: 2 works in the original Japanese, with translation

Asakusa Park was Tokyo's largest popular entertainment district from the Meiji to the Taishō period. Its Sixth District had theatres, cinemas and vaudeville halls, and the park also contained Hanayashiki and other attractions. The Hyōtan (gourd) pond was a pond in the park, later filled in.

After the Meiji era, law and literature were the two main tracks at the old imperial universities: the law faculty led to elite careers in government or as lawyers, while the humanities were relatively poorly paid. Hamao Shirō himself trained in law and worked as a lawyer and a member of the House of Peers.