A picture written by a raccoon

The folk tale "Pictures written by the raccoon"

Once upon a time, Kawai in Tsuokacho, there was a highway called Nakahara Gokai.

At that time, Tokaido was the main road leading to Edo, but Nakahara departure was also popular with people as a highway leading to Edo.

Where this Nakahara departure and return approaches Shimokawai, now it is around Shimokawai on the Hodogaya Bypass, but it is a story of a hanging scroll that is transmitted to Sakurai's house surrounded by fields on both sides.

In the Edo period, Sakurai's house was called "Yasashi" and was the master of Shimokawai Village, who was allowed to use the surname sword under the control of Gorozaemon Hagimoto. In addition, we received one letter of Kurabayashi's forest, and it was named Hayashii.

This house, facing the streets of the highways, there were not many travelers seeking an overnight stay.

When the sun goes down and the area becomes lonely, you can hear the sound of knocking on the Odo in the house.

The house said, "Whoever, the one who has gone to the inn find the light of this house, and do not go to the night inn."

Then, in front of the door, there was a traveling monk in a distressed robe. "When I come to this house, the sun goes down well and I'm having trouble finding a minute ahead, and I can't find a minute ahead. I'm sorry, but would you like to rent an overnight stay?…。 If you can overcome the rain and dew, where would you like? "And carefully asked the family.

The house, who knew this, said, "It's a great deal of trouble, and I hope you stay calm and stay there."

So, the tired travel monk was generously, carried a dinner table for dinner, told him to rest slowly, and then fell to the back.

The night was over, and the next morning came. He wondered, "Isn't you be able to take a rest slowly last night?" And asked the family to see the situation, and there was no monk on the journey. On the neatly slacked floor, there was only one writing and hanging scroll.

Although he quickly opened the paper and read it, he said, "Thank you very much for your hospitality despite the sudden visit. Unfortunately, I don't have any intention. I will leave one picture as a thank you for your favor. "It was written. As soon as I spread the hanging scroll, I found a mysterious picture pattern was written in the black ink. When I looked closely at what kind of picture it was, it was like a monster, and under the shaft, there was a signature that resembled the footprint of a beast

All the people in the house who saw this were surprised, went out to the gate, looking for a monk on the journey, but it was no longer seen, and in the soil of the morning dew there were only one or two left.

Since then, as a "picture written by a raccoon that turned into a monk on a journey," the Sakurai family's scroll came to call the reputation of the villagers, and rumored rumors and spread. .

At a later date, this rumor came far as Kawasaki. Then there was a rumor that in Kawasaki, there was still a hanging scroll of a book stamped with a signature that seemed to be a footprint of a beast.

Speaking of Kawasaki, it is the path of Nakahara departure and return. Therefore, people tell rumors that a raccoon that turned into a traveling monk would have left books and pictures on the road along the road from Edo, but there was no book from Kawasaki, and it remains Is the only hanging scrolls in the Sakurai family.

In the Edo period, there were many travelers in the Sakurai family who became a monthly eater for a month, and some of them did not know anyone, and they were just a few days. In order to bury the spirits of these people, a stone pagoda has been set up as an unrelated Buddha in one corner of the cemetery of Fukusen-ji Temple's cemetery, and has been memorialized for a long time.