[Footnote 1: Sasa-ame is a kind of rice-jelly wrapped with sasa, or the
bamboo leaves, well-known as a product of Echigo province.]

"There seems to be no 'sasa-ame' in the country where I'm going," I
explained, and she rejoined; "Then, in what direction?" I answered
"westward" and she came back with "Is it on the other side of Hakone?"
This give-and-take conversation proved too much for me.

On the day of my departure, she came to my room early in the morning and
helped me to pack up. She put into my carpet-bag tooth powder,
tooth-brush and towels which she said she had bought at a dry goods
store on her way. I protested that I did not want them, but she was
insistent.[A] We rode in rikishas to the station. Coming up the
platform, she gazed at me from outside the car, and said in a low voice;

"This may be our last good-by. Take care of yourself."

Her eyes were full of tears. I did not cry, but was almost going to.
After the train had run some distance, thinking it would be all right
now, I poked my head out of the window and looked back. She was still
there. She looked very small.



CHAPTER II.


With a long, sonorous whistle the steamer which I was aboard came to a
standstill, and a boat was seen making toward us from the shore. The man
rowing the boat was stark naked, except for a piece of red cloth girt