honours us with his company. Make all ready for his
reception.... Sensei, condescend to enter; please come up."

Yanagibara Kazuma dropped his clogs in the vestibule. As he entered the
room--"Pray pardon the intrusion. This Kazuma feels much in the way. He
is continually putting his neighbours of the _nagaya_ to inconvenience;
too great the kindness of Cho[u]bei San and wife." O'Taki laughed
deprecatingly. Truly this was a handsome young man. In this 6th year of
Ho[u]ei (1709) Yanagibara Kazuma was twenty-one years of age. O'Taki was
thirty odd. She appreciated masculine beauty all the more. Cho[u]bei
grunted from heat and the merest trace of discomfiture. He had his
limit, even in his business. Quickly he shook off his _kimono_, and fan
in hand squatted in his loin cloth. "Ah! 'Tis hot beyond endurance.
Business is bad--from Yoshiwara to Yotsuya." O'Taki looked up at the
last word. He continued--"The Sensei takes precedence. Kazuma Uji, deign
to enter the bath. All is ready?" His wife nodded assent. Kazuma
followed the example of Cho[u]bei. In a trice he was naked as his mother
bore him. Cho[u]bei burst out into phrases of admiration--"What a
splendid fellow! Ah! Waste of material! If a woman Kazuma San would be a
fortune to himself and to Cho[u]bei.... Taki, note the skin of the
Sensei. It has the texture of the finest paper. How regrettable!" He
drew back for the better inspection of the sum total of his subject's
charms. O'Taki drew closer for the same purpose. Cho[u]bei sighed--"It
is plain enough that Kazuma San is not a woman. An error of Nature!
Somehow the age at which a woman becomes of use, is that at which a boy
becomes a mere burden. He is fit for nothing but to be a
story-teller.... And you, Taki, what are you about?" The lady of his
affections was far advanced in the process of disrobing. She protested.
"Does not the Sensei need aid in the bath? How cleanse the back, the
shoulders. This Taki would aid him."--"Immodest wench!" bellowed
Cho[u]bei. "The Sensei needs no such aid. Why! You ... Taki ... one
would take you for a charcoal ball (_tadon_), so dark your skin. Nay!
For two of them, for a cluster piled in a box, so round the buttocks and
belly. The Sensei wants no aid from such an ugly jade. This Cho[u]bei
can do what is needed; with as much skill and better purpose than a
woman." Kazuma modestly interposed in this incipient quarrel between
husband and wife. "Nay, the matter is of no importance. Kazum