Japanese fairy tales
Crane Feathers
Long ago there lived an old man and old woman in a poor mountain
village who were sad for they had no children. One snowy winter day the
old man went into the forest to gather some firewood. He piled the wood
onto his back and began to descend the mountain back to the village
when suddenly he heard a plaintive cry of pain. Following the cries he
found a crane which had gotten caught in a snare and was beating its
wings and moaning in pain.
“Oh you poor thing, be patient and I’ll help you,” he told the bird.
He then freed the bird who flew happily away.
That evening when he sat with his wife to eat dinner someone knocked softly on the door.
“Who could that be at this hour,” they wondered.
The old man opened the door and saw a girl standing their covered in snow.
“I got lost in the mountains,” she told him. “Its snowing so hard that the roads aren’t visible.”
“Come in and share dinner with us,” the old woman invited.
The old man then took the girl by the hand and led her to the center of
the room where he set her down to eat supper with them. The girl was
beautiful and kind and helped the old woman around the house.
“If you want, grandmother, I will massage your shoulders and rub your back,” the girl told the old woman.
“Thank you darling, my back does really hurt,” the old woman replied. “What is your name?”
“O-Tsuru,” the girl told her.
“O-Tsuru, it’s a good name,” the old man praised her.
The next morning when the girl was getting ready to travel again the
old man told her that they did not have any children, and so he asked
her to stay with them.
“I would be pleased to stay, for I have no one on earth,”
the girl thanked him for his kindness. And all she asked for was a room
where she could weave in privet. But she told the old man and old woman
not to watch her as she worked for she didn’t like for people to
see her work. So they gave the girl a room to weave in.
Three days later she gave them a beautiful tapestry with the image a red field and flying golden cranes.
“What beautiful weaving,” the old woman admired.
“I can’t take my eyes off it, the old man agreed as he felt
the fabric which was softer then down.” The old man then looked
at the girl with concern. “It seems like your getting thin, and
you look so tired. I don’t think you should work so hard.”
Suddenly they heard a hoarse voice calling in to them from a merchant
who went from village to village buying art from peasants.
“Do you have some art for sale, some weaving that you’ve done during the winter perhaps?” he asked.
“Look at the work our daughter did,” the woman said proudly
as she showed him the scarlet cloth with the golden cranes.
“Oh, such a beautiful pattern!” the man exclaimed.
“No one in the capital will have seen something so
magnificent,” the man gushed. Your daughter is amazing.”
The man then pulled out a handful of gold coins, and said that he could sell the wonderful fabric to the prince’s palace.
The old people couldn’t believe their eyes at the site of the
real gold coins, for this was the first time they’d seen real
gold.
“Thank you, daughter, thank you,” they thanked the girl.
“Now we’ll be able to live a better life and will be able
to get you a new dress so everyone can see what beauty you have.”
Spring came, along with the warm sun. And the village children came to
the house and called for the girl to play with them. Or they would
gather around her and she would tell them tales of the various strange
birds. Then after some time the merchant came again and asked the old
man if it would be possible to buy the same cloth as before.
“Don’t ask me that,” the old man told him. “My
daughter can’t weave any longer. Doing so is to taxing on her
health.”
But the merchant shoved a purse full of gold coins into the old mans hand.
“I’ll pay even more then I did last time,” the
merchant offered. “And if you refuse it’ll go bad with you
for the prince has sent me to get more cloth so if you don’t have
it in three days it’ll be your heads,” the merchant
threatened.
So the old man and the old woman began to lament their fate but their
daughter assured them that she could have the cloth ready in time. So
Tsuru went to her room to weave and shut the door tightly behind her.
As before all they heard was the beat, beat of the loom as the girl
worked quickly. The old man and the old woman were worried about her
and how much work she was doing.
“Well are you finished?” the gruff voice of the merchant called into the house after three days time.
“We cannot show you,” they told the merchant. “For
our daughter strictly forbade that we enter the room while she was
working.”
“That’s nonsense,” the merchant told them as he pushed the elderly people aside and opened the door.
Inside the girls room at her loom was a large crane. It opened its wide
wings and plucked the most delicate and soft feathers from itself to
weave the beautiful fabric. The old man and woman shut the door quickly
as the merchant ran away with fear.
The next morning the children all came running and calling for the girl
to come out and play with them or tell them a story. But she was still
in her room. The old man and old woman were afraid to look in on her,
but at last they did so to find a tapestry lying on the floor with
crane feathers lying all around. They searched for their daughter.
That evening the children called to them, “grandma, grandpa come quick.”
So they hurried out to where the children were and saw a crane circling
about the houses, though it was struggling to fly. That’s when
the old man understood that this was the same crane he’d rescued.
“Come back, come back to us,” they called to the crane. But
it was in vain, for soon the crane disappeared into the sunset. The old
man and old woman waited a long time for their daughter to return but
she never did. And it is said that on remote islands on the large lakes
you can see the crane walking on the beach glancing back to where the
old woman and old man remain.
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