Picture Book of Crawling Creatures

1788

Page from a woodblock-printed book; ink and color on paper, 26.7 × 18.4 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

A tree cricket clings to a seed head by comic verses; a firefly climbs the grasses opposite.

Insects and other small creatures fill all fifteen designs.
The verses were chosen, and the preface written, by the poet-scholar Yadoya no Meshimori.
Picture books like this paired prints with verse by comic-poetry (kyōka) circles.

Image: The Met Open Access · Public domain (Met Open Access)