Page:Kojiki by Chamberlain.djvu/345

] poor man, who, thinking this occurrence strange, constantly watched the woman’s behaviour. So the woman, having conceived from the time of that midday sleep, gave birth to a red jewel. Then the poor man who had watched her begged [to be allowed] to take the jewel, and kept it constantly wrapped up by his side. This person, having planted a rice-field in a valley, had loaded a cow with food for the labourers, and was getting into the middle of the valley, when he met the ruler’s son, Ama-no-hi-boko, who thereupon asked him, saying: “Why enterest thou the valley with a load of food upon a cow. Thou wilt surely kill this cow and eat her.” Forthwith he seized the man and was about to put him into prison, when the man replied, saying: “I was not going to kill the cow. I was simply taking food to the people in the fields.” But still [the ruler’s child] would not let him go. Then he undid the jewel [which hung] at his side, and [therewith] bribed [the ruler’s child]. So [the latter] let the poor man go, brought the jewel [home], and placed it beside his couch. Forthwith it was transformed into a beautiful maiden, whom he straightway wedded, and made his chief wife. Then the maiden perpetually prepared all sorts of dainties with which she constantly fed her husband. So the ruler’s child [grew] proud in his heart, and reviled his wife. But the woman said: “I am not a woman who ought to be the wife of such as thou. I will go to the land of my ancestors;”—and forthwith she secretly embarked in a boat, and fled away across here [to Japan], and landed at Naniha. Thereupon Ame-no-hi-boko, hearing of his wife’s flight, forthwith