[Story of a Pheasant]
In the Toyama district of the province of Bishū, there formerly lived a young farmer and his wife. Their farm was situated in a lonely place, among the hills.
One night the wife dreamed that her father-in-law, who had died some years before, came to her and said, "To-morrow I shall be in great danger: try to save me if you can!" In the morning she told this to her husband; and they talked about the dream. Both imagined that the dead man wanted something; but neither could imagine what the words of the vision signified.
After breakfast, the husband went to the fields; but the wife remained at her loom. Presently she was startled by a great shouting outside. She went to the door, and saw the Jitō[1] of the district, with a hunting party, approaching the farm. While she stood watching them, a pheasant ran by her into the house; and she suddenly remembered her dream. "Perhaps it is my father-in-law," she thought to herself;—"I must try to save it!" Then, hurrying in after the bird,—a fine male pheasant,—she caught it without any difficulty, put it into the empty rice-pot, and covered the pot with the lid.
A moment later some of the Jitō's followers entered, and asked her whether she had seen a pheasant. She answered boldly that she had not; but one of the hunters declared that he had seen the bird run into the house. So the party searched for it, peeping into every nook and corner; but nobody thought of looking into the rice-pot. After looking everywhere else to no purpose, the men decided that the bird must have escaped through some hole; and they went away.
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