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Illustration　柴田伸子　　サイト　昔話で販促！

A cat that became a beckoning cat

(Japanese classical stories)(Tokyo)

Translation　ちいさな翻訳屋さん

おりがみをつくろう ( おりがみくらぶ より) こねこ　　　ねこのかお

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　A long time ago, a cat, which was kept at a grocery shop at the foot of a mountain at Ueno in Edo, gave birth to only one kitten.

　Of all things, that kitten had a face just like an angry human.

　After a few days, the master of the grocery store said,

“This cat makes me scary. It seems like the cat is blaming people.

　It will make my customers scared as well and keep them away from my store.

　Leave the cat somewhere behind now.”

　He ordered his young clerk to abandon the cat in the temple town where there were many temples around.



　The young clerk put the cat in his inside pocket and went to the temple town walking by the big pond.

“Meow.”

　The kitten began crying because it might be hungry.

“Hey, stop crying.”

　He opened his pocket to be strict with the kitten.

　Then the kitten jumped out from the pocket and placed its tiny mouth in his throat.

　Actually the kitten was nuzzling the breasts, but he misunderstood the kitten was biting him.

“Oh no! What are you doing?”

　He yelled out so and casted the kitten off.

　On listening to the clerk’s yelling, an elderly man of the teahouse by the pond came outside.

“What! What is going on?”

　As the elderly man of the teahouse heard the story about the kitten from the young clerk,

“It cannot be the reason to abandon this kitten. How poor it is.

　Well, I agree that this kitten has a little different face. But if you take a look closely, it is cute.

　All right. I will keep this kitten. You leave it here.”

　That’s what he said and he decided to keep the kitten in the teahouse.

　In the meantime, people heard that there was a funny face kitten in the teahouse.

　More and more people came to visit all the way to the teahouse.

　The kitten then became a “beckoning cat” and invited lots of people.

　And it made the elderly man’s teahouse by the pond very successful.

The end

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