Japanese Fairy Tales

by Yei Theodora Ozaki

“Don’t say another word!” cried out Ryn Jin angrily. “Your illness is the punishment of the gods for stealing the Mikoto’s hook.”

“It is only too true!” said the TAI; “the hook is still in my throat, and all my efforts to get it out have been useless. I can’t eat, and I can scarcely breathe, and each moment I feel that it will choke me, and sometimes it gives me great pain. I had no intention of stealing the Mikoto’s hook. I heedlessly snapped at the bait which I saw in the water, and the hook came off and stuck in my throat. So I hope you will pardon me.”

The cuttlefish now came forward, and said to the King:

“What I said was right. You see the hook still sticks in the TAI’S throat. I hope to be able to pull it out in the presence of the Mikoto, and then we can return it to him safely!”

“O please make haste and pull it out!” cried the TAI, pitifully, for he felt the pains in his throat coming on again; “I do so want to return the hook to the Mikoto.”

“All right, TAI SAN,” said his friend the cuttlefish, and then opening the TAI’S mouth as wide as he could and putting one of his feelers down the TAI’S throat, he quickly and easily drew the hook out of the sufferer’s large mouth. He then washed it and brought it to the King.

Ryn Jin took the hook from his subject, and then respectfully returned it to the Happy Hunter (the Mikoto or Augustness, the fishes called him), who was overjoyed at getting back his hook. He thanked Ryn Jin many times, his face beaming with gratitude, and said that he owed the happy ending of his quest to the Sea King’s wise authority and kindness.

Ryn Jin now desired to punish the TAI, but the Happy Hunter begged him not to do so; since his lost hook was thus happily recovered he did not wish to make more trouble for the poor TAI. It was indeed the TAI who had taken the hook, but he had already suffered enough for his fault, if fault it could be called. What had been done was done in heedlessness and not by intention. The Happy Hunter said he blamed himself; if he had understood how to fish properly he would never have lost his hook, and therefore all this trouble had been caused in the first place by his trying to do something which he did not know how to do. So he begged the Sea King to forgive his subject.

Who could resist the pleading of so wise and compassionate a judge? Ryn Jin forgave his subject at once at the request of his august guest. The TAI was so glad that he shook his fins for joy, and he and all the other fish went out from the presence of their King, praising the virtues of the Happy Hunter.

Now that the hook was found the Happy Hunter had nothing to keep him in Ryn Gu, and he was anxious to get back to his own kingdom and to make peace with his angry brother, the Skillful Fisher; but the Sea King, who had learnt to love him and would fain have kept him as a son, begged him not to go so soon, but to make the Sea Palace his home as long as ever he liked. While the Happy Hunter was still hesitating, the two lovely Princesses, Tayotama and Tamayori, came, and with the sweetest of bows and voices joined with their father in pressing him to stay, so that without seeming ungracious he could not say them “Nay,” and was obliged to stay on for some time.