praise for the wife of her son. And O-Yuki bore Minokichi ten
children, boys and girls,--handsome children all of them, and very fair
of skin.

The country-folk thought O-Yuki a wonderful person, by nature different
from themselves. Most of the peasant-women age early; but O-Yuki, even
after having become the mother of ten children, looked as young and
fresh as on the day when she had first come to the village.

One night, after the children had gone to sleep, O-Yuki was sewing by
the light of a paper lamp; and Minokichi, watching her, said:--

"To see you sewing there, with the light on your face, makes me think
of a strange thing that happened when I was a lad of eighteen. I then
saw somebody as beautiful and white as you are now--indeed, she was
very like you."...

Without lifting her eyes from her work, O-Yuki responded:--

"Tell me about her... Where did you see her?"

Then Minokichi told her about the terrible night in the ferryman's
hut,--and about the White Woman that had stooped above him, smiling and
whispering,--and about the silent death of old Mosaku. And he said:--

"Asleep or awake, that was the only time that I saw a being as
beautiful as you. Of course, she was not a human being; and I was
afraid of her,--very much afraid,--but she was so white!... Indeed, I
have never been sure whether it was a dream that I saw, or the Woman of
the Snow."...

O-Yuki flung down her sewing, and arose, and bowed above Minokichi
where he sat, and shrieked into his face:--

"It was I--I--I! Yuki it was! And I told you then that I would kill
you if you ever said one work about it!... But for those children
asleep there, I would kill you this moment! And now you had better take
very, very good care of them; for if ever they have reason to complain
of you, I will treat you as you deserve!"...

Even as she screamed, her voice became thin, like a crying of
wind;--then she melted into a bright white mist that spired to the
roof-beams, and shuddered away through the smoke-hold... Never again
was she seen.

THE STORY OF AOYAGI

In the era of Bummei [1469-1486] there was a young samurai called
Tomotada in the service of Hatakeyama Yoshimune, the Lord of Noto (1).
Tomotada was a native of Echizen (2); but at an early age he had been
taken, as page, into the palace of the daimyo of Noto, and had been
educated, under the supervision of that prince, for the profession of
arms. As he grew up, he proved himself b