uttered a long moan, and thereafter ceased to struggle. It was dead. But its teeth still held the sleeve; and, for all his great strength, Kwairyō could not force open the jaws.
With the head still hanging to his sleeve he went back to the house, and there caught sight of the other four Rokuro-Kubi squatting together, with their bruised and bleeding heads reunited to their bodies. But when they perceived him at the back-door all screamed, “The priest! the priest!’’ — and fled, through the other doorway, out into the woods.
Eastward the sky was brightening; day was about to dawn; and Kwairyō knew that the power of the goblins was limited to the hours of darkness. He looked at the head clinging to his sleeve, — its face all fouled with blood and foam and clay; and he laughed aloud as he thought to himself: “What a miyagé![1]—the head of a goblin!” After which he gathered together his few belongings, and leisurely descended the mountain to continue his journey.
Right on he journeyed, until he came to Suwa in Shinano; and into the main street of
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- ↑ A present made to friends or to the household on returning from a journey is thus called. Ordinarily, of course, the miyagé consists of something produced in the locality to which the journey has been made: this is the point of Kwairyō’s jest
