Page:Kojiki by Chamberlain.djvu/206

120 fish-hook, I did not get a single fish by angling with it; and at last I lost it in the sea.” But the elder brother required it of him [the more] urgently. So the younger brother, breaking his ten grasp sabre that was augustly girded on him, made [of the fragments] five hundred fish hooks as compensation; but he would not take them. Again he made a thousand fish-hooks as compensation; but he would not receive them, saying: “I still want the real original fish-hook.”

Hereupon, as the younger brother was weeping and lamenting by the sea-shore, the Deity Salt-Possessor came and asked him, saying: “What is the cause of the Sky’s-Sun-Height’s weeping and lamentation?” He replied, saying: “I had exchanged a fish-hook with my elder brother, and have lost that fish-hook; and as he asks me for it, I have given him many fish-hooks as compensation; but