Now what of the bad old couple? Were they content to let well alone? Oh no.
They gathered together all the ashes that were left, and when they had put them in a basket they went about the town crying:
“We are the Hana-saka-jiji. We can make dead trees blossom.”
Presently out comes the Prince and all his company to see the show. And the bad old man climbs up into a tree forthwith and scatters his ashes.
But the tree never blossomed, never a bit. The ashes flew into the Prince’s eyes, and the Prince flew into a rage. There was a pretty to-do. The bad old couple were caught and well beaten. Sad and sorry they crept home at night. It is to be hoped that they mended their ways. Howbeit the good people, their neighbours, grew rich and lived happy all their days.
XXXVI
THE MOON MAIDEN
There was an old bamboo cutter called Také Tori. He was an honest old man, very poor and hard-working, and he lived with his good old wife in a cottage on the hills. Children they had none, and little comfort in their old age, poor souls.
Také Tori rose early upon a summer morning, and went forth to cut bamboos as was his wont, for he sold them for a fair price in the town, and thus he gained his humble living.
Up the steep hillside he went, and came to the bamboo grove quite wearied out. He took his blue tenegui and wiped his forehead, “Alack for my old bones!” he said. “I am not so young as I once was, nor the good wife either, and there’s no chick nor child to help us in our old age, more’s the pity.” He sighed as he got to work, poor Také Tori.