ments."

So he went to the bath-room, and, leaving his clothes outside, he got
into the bath, with the full conviction that it would be the place of
his death. Yet he never trembled nor quailed, determined that, if he
needs must die, no man should say he had been a coward. Then
Jiurozayemon, calling to his attendants, said--

"Quick! lock the door of the bath-room! We hold him fast now. If he
gets out, more than one life will pay the price of his. He's a match
for any six of you in fair fight. Lock the door, I say, and light up
the fire under the bath;[32] and we'll boil him to death, and be rid
of him. Quick, men, quick!"

[Footnote 32: This sort of bath, in which the water is heated by the
fire of a furnace which is lighted from outside, is called
_Goyemon-buro,_ or Goyemon's bath, after a notorious robber named
Goyemon, who attempted the life of Taiko Sama, the famous general and
ruler of the sixteenth century, and suffered for his crimes by being
boiled to death in oil--a form of execution which is now obsolete.]

So they locked the door, and fed the fire until the water hissed and
bubbled within; and Chobei, in his agony, tried to burst open the
door, but Jiurozayemon ordered his men to thrust their spears through
the partition wall and dispatch him. Two of the spears Chobei clutched
and broke short off; but at last he was struck by a mortal blow under
the ribs, and died a brave man by the hands of cowards.

[Illustration: THE DEATH OF CHOBEI OF BANDZUIN.]

That evening Token Gombei, who, to the astonishment of Chobei's wife,
had bought a burying-tub, came, with seven other apprentices, to fetch
the Father of the Otokodate from Jiurozayemon's house; and when the
retainers saw them, they mocked at them, and said--

"What, have you come to fetch your drunken master home in a litter?"

"Nay," answered Gombei, "but we have brought a coffin for his dead
body, as he bade us."

When the retainers heard this, they marvelled at the courage of
Chobei, who had thus wittingly come to meet his fate. So Chobei's
corpse was placed in the burying-tub, and handed over to his
apprentices, who swore to avenge his death. Far and wide, the poor and
friendless mourned for this good man. His son Chomatsu inherited his
property; and his wife remained a faithful widow until her dying day,
praying that she might sit with him in paradise upon the cup of the
same lotus-flower.

Many a time did the apprentices of Chobei meet togeth