he found Minokichi lying senseless
beside the frozen body of Mosaku. Minokichi was promptly cared for, and
soon came to himself; but he remained a long time ill from the effects
of the cold of that terrible night. He had been greatly frightened also
by the old man's death; but he said nothing about the vision of the
woman in white. As soon as he got well again, he returned to his
calling,--going alone every morning to the forest, and coming back at
nightfall with his bundles of wood, which his mother helped him to sell.

One evening, in the winter of the following year, as he was on his way
home, he overtook a girl who happened to be traveling by the same road.
She was a tall, slim girl, very good-looking; and she answered
Minokichi's greeting in a voice as pleasant to the ear as the voice of
a song-bird. Then he walked beside her; and they began to talk. The
girl said that her name was O-Yuki [2]; that she had lately lost both
of her parents; and that she was going to Yedo (2), where she happened
to have some poor relations, who might help her to find a situation as
a servant. Minokichi soon felt charmed by this strange girl; and the
more that he looked at her, the handsomer she appeared to be. He asked
her whether she was yet betrothed; and she answered, laughingly, that
she was free. Then, in her turn, she asked Minokichi whether he was
married, or pledge to marry; and he told her that, although he had only
a widowed mother to support, the question of an "honorable
daughter-in-law" had not yet been considered, as he was very young...
After these confidences, they walked on for a long while without
speaking; but, as the proverb declares, Ki ga areba, me mo kuchi hodo
ni mono wo iu: "When the wish is there, the eyes can say as much as the
mouth." By the time they reached the village, they had become very much
pleased with each other; and then Minokichi asked O-Yuki to rest awhile
at his house. After some shy hesitation, she went there with him; and
his mother made her welcome, and prepared a warm meal for her. O-Yuki
behaved so nicely that Minokichi's mother took a sudden fancy to her,
and persuaded her to delay her journey to Yedo. And the natural end of
the matter was that Yuki never went to Yedo at all. She remained in the
house, as an "honorable daughter-in-law."

O-Yuki proved a very good daughter-in-law. When Minokichi's mother came
to die,--some five years later,--her last words were words of affection
and