em the Princess, but he answered only that as he was not
her real father he could not insist on her obeying him against her
wishes.

The five Knights on receiving this stern answer returned to their
several homes, and pondered over the best means of touching the proud
Princess's heart, even so much as to grant them a hearing. They took
their rosaries in hand and knelt before their household shrines, and
burned precious incense, praying to Buddha to give them their heart's
desire. Thus several days passed, but even so they could not rest in
their homes.

So again they set out for the bamboo-cutter's house. This time the old
man came out to see them, and they asked him to let them know if it was
the Princess's resolution never to see any man whatsoever, and they
implored him to speak for them and to tell her the greatness of their
love, and how long they had waited through the cold of winter and the
heat of summer, sleepless and roofless through all weathers, without
food and without rest, in the ardent hope of winning her, and they were
willing to consider this long vigil as pleasure if she would but give
them one chance of pleading their cause with her.

The old man lent a willing ear to their tale of love, for in his inmost
heart he felt sorry for these faithful suitors and would have liked to
see his lovely foster-daughter married to one of them. So he went in to
Princess Moonlight and said reverently:

"Although you have always seemed to me to be a heavenly being, yet I
have had the trouble of bringing you up as my own child and you have
been glad of the protection of my roof. Will you refuse to do as I
wish?"

Then Princess Moonlight replied that there was nothing she would not do
for him, that she honored and loved him as her own father, and that as
for herself she could not remember the time before she came to earth.

The old man listened with great joy as she spoke these dutiful words.
Then he told her how anxious he was to see her safely and happily
married before he died.

"I am an old man, over seventy years of age, and my end may come any
time now. It is necessary and right that you should see these five
suitors and choose one of them."

"Oh, why," said the Princess in distress, "must I do this? I have no
wish to marry now."

"I found you," answered the old man, "many years ago, when you were a
little creature three inches high, in the midst of a great white light.
The light streamed from the bamb