d stories
of her country. Thus did the wife find consolation in work during the
lonely days of her husband's absence. While the time was thus slipping
quickly by in the quiet home, the husband finished his business and
returned.

It would have been difficult for any one who did not know the man well
to recognize him. He had traveled day after day, exposed to all
weathers, for about a month altogether, and was sunburnt to bronze, but
his fond wife and child knew him at a glance, and flew to meet him from
either side, each catching hold of one of his sleeves in their eager
greeting. Both the man and his wife rejoiced to find each other well.
It seemed a very long time to all till--the mother and child
helping--his straw sandals were untied, his large umbrella hat taken
off, and he was again in their midst in the old familiar sitting-room
that had been so empty while he was away.

As soon as they had sat down on the white mats, the father opened a
bamboo basket that he had brought in with him, and took out a beautiful
doll and a lacquer box full of cakes.

"Here," he said to the little girl, "is a present for you. It is a
prize for taking care of mother and the house so well while I was away."

"Thank you," said the child, as she bowed her head to the ground, and
then put out her hand just like a little maple leaf with its eager
wide-spread fingers to take the doll and the box, both of which, coming
from the capital, were prettier than anything she had ever seen. No
words can tell how delighted the little girl was--her face seemed as if
it would melt with joy, and she had no eyes and no thought for anything
else.

Again the husband dived into the basket, and brought out this time a
square wooden box, carefully tied up with red and white string, and
handing it to his wife, said:

"And this is for you."

The wife took the box, and opening it carefully took out a metal disk
with a handle attached. One side was bright and shining like a crystal,
and the other was covered with raised figures of pine-trees and storks,
which had been carved out of its smooth surface in lifelike reality.
Never had she seen such a thing in her life, for she had been born and
bred in the rural province of Echigo. She gazed into the shining disk,
and looking up with surprise and wonder pictured on her face, she said:

"I see somebody looking at me in this round thing! What is it that you
have given me?"

The husband laughed and said:

"