presently upon the face of the sky the letters appeared, most
beautifully wrought. Then the boy said: 'Now I shall try;' and he wrote
also upon the sky as Kobodaishi had done. And he said again to
Kobodaishi: 'I pray you, write for me--write upon the surface of the
river.' Then Kobodaishi wrote upon the water a poem in praise of the
water; and for a moment the characters remained, all beautiful, upon the
face of the stream, as if they had fallen upon it like leaves; but
presently they moved with the current and floated away. 'Now I will
try,' said the boy; and he wrote upon the water the Dragon-character--
the character Ryu in the writing which is called Sosho, the 'Grass-
character;' and the character remained upon the flowing surface and
moved not. But Kobodaishi saw that the boy had not placed the ten, the
little dot belonging to the character, beside it. And he asked the boy:
'Why did you not put the ten?' 'Oh, I forgot!' answered the boy; 'please
put it there for me,' and Kobodaishi then made the dot. And lo! the
Dragon-character became a Dragon; and the Dragon moved terribly in the
waters; and the sky darkened with thunder-clouds, and blazed with
lightnings; and the Dragon ascended in a whirl of tempest to heaven.

Then Kobodaishi asked the boy: 'Who are you?' And the boy made answer:
'I am he whom men worship on the mountain Gotai; I am the Lord of
Wisdom,--Monju Bosatsu!' And even as he spoke the boy became changed;
and his beauty became luminous like the beauty of gods; and his limbs
became radiant, shedding soft light about. And, smiling, he rose to
heaven and vanished beyond the clouds.

3

But Kobodaishi himself once forgot to put the ten beside the character O
on the tablet which he painted with the name of the Gate O-Te-mon of the