poor peasant man, “and what shall I do if my rice-crop fails? May the dear gods have mercy on all poor people!”
With that he sat himself down on a stone at the rice-field’s edge and fell asleep for very weariness and sorrow.
When he woke the sky was black with clouds. It was but noonday, but it grew as dark as night. The leaves of the trees shuddered together and the birds ceased their singing.
“A storm, a storm!” cried the peasant. “Rai-den Sama goes abroad upon his black horse, beating the great drum of the Thunder. We shall have rain in plenty, thanks be.”
Rain in plenty he had, sure enough, for it fell in torrents, with blinding lightning and roaring thunder.
“Oh, Rai-den Sama,” said the peasant, “saving your greatness, this is even more than sufficient.”
At this the bright lightning flashed anew and fell to the earth in a ball of living fire, and the heavens cracked with a mighty peal of thunder.
“Ai! Ai!” cried the poor peasant man. “Kwannon have mercy on a sinful soul, for now the Thunder Dragon has me indeed.” And he lay on the ground and hid his face.
Howbeit the Thunder Dragon spared him. And soon he sat up and rubbed his eyes. The ball of fire was gone, but a babe lay upon the wet earth; a fine fresh boy with the rain upon his cheeks and his hair.
“Oh, Lady, Lady Kwannon,” said the poor peasant man, “this is thy sweet mercy.” And he took the boy in his arms and carried him to his own home.
As he went the rain still fell, but the sun came out in the blue sky, and every flower in the cooler air shone and lifted up its grateful head.
The peasant came to his cottage door.
“Wife, wife,” he called, “I have brought you something home.”
“What may it be?” said his wife.
The man answered, “Rai-Taro, the little eldest son of the Thunder.”
Rai-Taro grew up straight and strong, the tallest, gayest boy of all that country-side. He was the delight of his foster-parents, and all the neighbours loved him. When he was ten years old he worked in the rice-fields like a man. He was the wonderful weather prophet.
“My father,” he said, “let us do this and that, for we shall have fair weather”; or he said, “My father, let us the rather do this or that, for to-night there will be a storm,” and whatever he had said, so, sure enough, it came to pass. And he brought great good fortune to the poor peasant man, and all his works prospered.
When Rai-Taro was eighteen years old all the neighbours were bidden to his birthday feast. There was plenty of good saké, and the good folk were merry enough; only Rai-Taro was silent and sad and sorry.
“What ails you, Rai-Taro?” said his foster-mother. “You who are wont to be the gayest of the gay, why are you silent, sad and sorry?”
“It is because I must leave you,” Rai-Taro said.
“Nay,” said his foster-mother, “never leave us, Rai-Taro, my son. Why would you leave us?”
“Mother, because I must,” said Rai-Taro in tears.
“You have been our great good fortune; you have given us all things. What have I given you? What have I given you, Rai-Taro, my son?”
Rai-Taro answered, “Three things have you taught me—to labour, to suffer, and to love. I am more learned than the Immortals.”
Then he went from them. And in the likeness of a white cloud he scaled heaven’s blue height till he gained his father’s castle. And Rai-den received him. The two of them stood upon the western rampart of the Castle of Cloud and looked down to earth.
The foster-mother stood weeping bitterly, but her husband took her hand.
“My dear,” he said, “it will not be for long. We grow old apace.”
VII
THE BLACK BOWL
Long ago, in a part of the country not very remote from Kioto, the great gay city, there dwelt an honest couple. In a lonely place was their cottage, upon the outskirts of a deep wood of pine trees. Folks had it that the wood was haunted. They said it was full of deceiving foxes; they said that beneath the mossy ground the elves built their kitchens; they said that long-nosed Tengu had tea-parties in the forest thrice a month, and that the fairies’ children played at hide-and-seek there every morning before seven. Over and above all this they didn’t mind saying that the honest couple were queer in their ways, that the woman was a wise woman, and that the man was a warlock—which was as may be. But sure it was that they did no harm to living soul, that they lived as poor as poor, and that they had one fair daughter. She was as neat and pretty as a princess, and her manners were very fine; but for all that she worked as hard as a boy in the rice-fields, and within doors she was the housewife indeed, for she washed and cooked and drew water. She went barefoot in a grey homespun gown, and tied her back hair with a tough wistaria tendril. Brown she was and thin, but the sweetest beggar-maid that ever made shift with a bed of dry moss and no supper.
By-and-by the good man her father dies, and the wise woman her mother sickens within the year, and soon she lies in a corner of the cottage waiting for her end, with the maid near her crying bitter tears.
“Child,” says the mother, “do you know you are as pretty as a princess?”
“Am I that?” says the maid, and goes on with her crying.
“Do you know that your manners are fine?” says the mother.
“Are they, then?” says the maid, and goes on with her crying.
“My own baby,” says the mother, “could you stop your crying a minute and listen to me?”
So the maid stopped crying and put her head close by her mother’s on the poor pillow.
“Now listen,” says the mother, “and afterwards remember. It is a bad thing for a poor girl to be pretty. If she is pretty and lonely and innocent, none but the gods will help her. They will help you, my poor child, and I have thought of a way besides. Fetch me the great black rice-bowl from the shelf.”
The girl fetched it.
“See, now, I put it on your head and all your beauty is hidden away.”
“Alack, mother,” said the poor child, “it is heavy.”
“It will save you from what is heavier to bear,” said the mother. “If you love me, promise me that you will not move it till the time comes.”
“I promise! I promise! But how shall I know when the time comes?”
“That you shall know. … And now help me outside, for the sweet morning dawns and I’ve a fancy to see the fairies’ children once again, as they run in the forest.”
So the child, having the black bowl upon her head, held her mother in her arms in a grassy place near the great trees, and presently they saw the fairies’ children threading their way between the dark trunks as they played at hide-and-seek. Their bright garments fluttered, and they laughed lightly as they went. The mother smiled to see them; before seven she died very sweetly as she smiled.
When her little store of rice was done, the maid with the wooden bowl knew well enough that she must starve or go and find more. So first she tended her father’s and mother’s graves and poured water for the dead, as is meet, and recited many a holy text. Then she bound on her sandals, kilted her grey skirts to show her scarlet petticoat, tied her household gods in a blue printed handkerchief, and set out all alone to seek her fortunes, the brave girl!
For