Читать книгу Kibun Daizin; Or, From Shark-Boy to Merchant Prince онлайн

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ssss1.One koku equals about five bushels.

ssss1.Pronounced Ee-gar-ash’ee Boon-zy’e-mon.

ssss1.Pronounced Ee-gar-ash’ee Ko-boon’jee.

The gentleman listened to the boy’s clear account of himself and expressed his admiration. “Ah! I was right, I see, when I thought you were not the son of an ordinary man. Your ambition to become the chief merchant in Japan is a high one, certainly; but the proverb says, ‘Ants aspire to the skies,’ and anything is possible to a man who puts his whole heart into his work. You are still quite young, I should say, though you have come all the way from Kada-no-Ura by yourself, and though you talk of your affairs in a manner that would reflect credit on a grown-up man. Come, tell me, how old are you?”

“I am fourteen,” he answered.

“What, not more than that?”

And the master’s wife, who was by his side, could not repress her surprise, either.

At this point the shoji, or paper sliding doors, opened, and in ran a pretty little girl of about eleven. Her hair was drawn up into a little butterfly device on the top of her head, which shook to and fro as she ran up to her mother. Stretching out a small maple-leaf hand, with a winsome look, she said: