Japanese Children's Favorite Stories Book 1 (5 page)

Silly Saburo

Long ago there was a boy who lived on a farm in Japan. His name was Saburo, but he always did such silly things that people called him Silly Saburo. He could only remember one thing at a time, and then would do that one thing, no matter how silly it was. Saburo's father and mother were very worried for him, but they hoped he would get smarter as he grew older, and they were always very patient with him.

One day Saburo's father said to him, "Saburo, I need your help in the fields today. Please go to the potato patch and dig up the potatoes. After you've dug them up, spread them out carefully on the ground and leave them to dry in the sun."

"I understand, father," said Saburo. And he put his hoe over his shoulder and went out to the potato patch.

Saburo was busy digging up the potatoes when all of a sudden his hoe hit something buried in the earth. He dug deeper and found a big pot that had been buried there. When he looked inside it he found many gold coins. It was a great treasure that someone had buried long ago.

"Father says I must dig things up and then leave them to dry in the sun," Saburo said to himself. So he very carefully spread the gold coins on the ground. When he got home, Saburo told his mother and father, "I found a pot of gold coins and spread them out in the sun to dry."

Saburo's father and mother were very surprised to hear this. They ran back to the potato patch, but someone had already taken the coins. There was not a single coin left. "The next time you find something like this," Saburo's father said to him, "you must wrap it up very carefully and bring it home. Now don't forget!"

"I understand, father," said Saburo.

The next day Saburo found a smelly cat in the field. He wrapped it up very carefully and brought it home with him, very proud of having remembered. But Saburo's father said to him, "Don't be so silly. The next time you find something like this, you must wash it in the river."

The next day Saburo dug up a huge tree stump. He thought very hard and remembered what his father had said about the smelly cat. So he took the stump and threw it with a great splash into the river.

Just then a neighbor was passing by and said, "You mustn't throw away valuable things like that! That stump would have made good firewood. You should have broken it up into pieces and taken it home."

"I understand," said Saburo, and started on his way home. Along the way he saw a teapot and teacup that somebody had left beside the road.

"Oh, here's something valuable!" said Saburo. So he took his hoe and broke the teapot and teacup into small pieces. Then he gathered up all the pieces and took them home with him.

"Hello, Mother," he said. "Look what I found and brought home." Then he showed his mother the broken pieces of the teapot and teacup.

"Oh, my!" said Saburo's mother. "That's the brand-new teapot and teacup I gave your father to take with his lunch today. And now you've completely ruined them!"

The next day Saburo's father and mother said to him, "Everything you do, you do wrongly. We'll go out into the fields and work today. Stay home and take care of the house." So they left Saburo alone at home.

"I really don't understand why people call me Silly Saburo," Saburo said to himself. "I do exactly what people tell me to do!"

The Toothpick Warriors

Once upon a time there was a beautiful princess who had a very bad habit. Every night before she slept she would lie in bed and pick her teeth with a toothpick. That wasn't so bad, but after she was done, instead of throwing away the used toothpicks as she should have, she would stick them between the cracks of the straw mats where she slept. Now, this was not a very clean habit, and since the princess did this every night, the cracks of her straw mats were soon filled with dozens and dozens of used toothpicks.

One night the princess was suddenly awakened by the sound of fighting. She heard the voices of warriors and the sound of swords. Frightened, she sat up and lit the lamp beside her bed. She could hardly believe what she saw.

There, right beside her quilt, were many tiny warriors! Some were fighting, some were singing and some were dancing, but all of them were making a great deal of noise.

The princess thought that she was dreaming, so she pinched herself hard. But, no, she was wide awake, and the tiny warriors were still there! Though they didn't bother the princess, they made so much noise all night that she couldn't sleep at all, and when she finally did doze off, she suddenly woke up again because it was so quiet. It was morning and the tiny warriors were gone.

The princess was very afraid, but she was ashamed to tell the lord, her father, because he wouldn't have believed her. Yet when she went to bed the following night, the tiny warriors appeared again, and again the night after that.

In fact, the tiny warriors made so much noise every night that the princess couldn't get any sleep, and each day she became a little paler. Soon she became quite ill from not sleeping.

The princess' father kept asking her what the matter was, and finally she told him. At first he didn't believe,her story, but he finally decided to see for himself. He told her to sleep in his room that night and he would stand watch in hers.

And so he did. But though he remained awake all night and watched and waited, the tiny warriors did not come.

While waiting, however, the princess' father noticed a toothpick on the straw mat. He picked it up and looked carefully at it, then called the princess to him the next morning.

He showed her one of the toothpicks. It was all cut up but the marks were so tiny that the princess could barely see them. She asked her father what the marks meant. Her father explained that the tiny warriors had come to her room because of all the used toothpicks! The warriors had no swords of their own and toothpicks made the best swords, and this was why they had come to the princess' room every night!

The warriors hadn't come last night, he said, because he had been there, and they were afraid. Then the princess' father looked at her sternly and asked why there were so many used toothpicks in her room.

The princess was very ashamed of her bad habit, and she admitted to her father that it was she who had stuck the toothpicks between the cracks in the straw mats, because she had been too lazy to throw them away. She also said she was very, very sorry and promised that she would never, ever be so lazy again.

Then she picked up all the toothpicks in her room, even those at the very bottom of the cracks, and threw them all away. That night the warriors did not come because there were no tiny swords for them, and they never came again.

Soon the princess felt better again because the warriors no longer kept her awake. She became very neat about everything, and pleased her father greatly by even sweeping the garden every day. She never forgot the tiny warriors, and if she ever used a toothpick again, you may be sure that she was very careful to throw it away properly.