Section CXVI. Emperor Ō-jin (Part XIII.—The Youth-of-the-Glow-on-the-Autumn-Mountains and the Youth-of-the-Haze-on-the-Spring-Mountains)
So this Deity had a daughter whose name was the Deity Maiden-of-Idzushi. So eighty Deities wished to obtain this Maiden-of-Idzushi in marriage, but none of them could do so. Hereupon there were two Deities, brothers, of whom the elder was called the Youth-of-the-Glow-on-the-Autumn-Mountains, and the younger was named the Youth-of-the-Haze-on-the-Spring-Mountains. So the elder brother said to the younger brother: “Though I beg for the Maiden of Idzushi, I cannot obtain her in marriage. Wilt thou [be able] to obtain her?” He answered, saying: “I will easily obtain her.” Then the elder brother said: “If thou shalt obtain this maiden, I will take off my upper and lower garments, and distill liquor in a jar of my own height, and prepare all the things of the mountains and of the rivers [,and give them to thee] in payment of the wager.” Then the younger brother told his mother everything that the elder brother had said. Forthwith the mother, having taken wistaria-fibre, wove and sewed in the space of a single night an upper garment and trowsers, and also socks and boots, and likewise made a bow and arrow, and clothed him in this upper garment, trowsers, etc., made him take the bow and arrows, and sent him to the maiden’s house, where both his apparel and the bow and arrows all turned into wistaria-blossoms. Thereupon the Youth-of-the-Haze-on-the-Spring-Mountains hung up the bow and arrows in the maiden’s privy. Then, when the Maiden-of-Idzushi, thinking the blossoms strange, brought them [home, the Youth-of-the-Haze-on-the-Spring-Mountains] followed behind the maiden into the house, and forthwith wedded her. So she gave birth to a child. Then he spoke to his elder brother, saying: “I have obtained the Maiden-of-Idzushi.” Thereupon the elder brother, vexed that the younger brother should have wedded her, did not pay the things he had wagered. Then when [the younger brother] complained to his mother, his august parent replied, saying: “During my august life the Deities indeed are to be well imitated; moreover it must be because he imitates mortal men that he does not pay those things.” Forthwith, in her anger with her elder child, she took a jointed bamboo from an island in the River Idzushi, and made a coarse basket with eight holes, and took stones from the river, and mixing them with brine, wrapped them in the leaves of the bamboo and caused this curse to be spoken: “Like unto the becoming green of these bamboo-leaves , [do thou] become green and wither! Again, like unto the flowing and ebbing of this brine, [do thou] flow and ebb! Again, like unto the sinking of these stones, [do thou] sink and be prostrate!” Having caused this curse to be spoken, she placed [the basket] over the smoke. Therefore the elder brother dried up, withered, sickened, and lay prostrate for the space of eight years. So on the elder brother entreating his august parent with lamentations and tears, she forthwith caused the curse to be reversed. Thereupon his body became sound as it had been before. (This is the origin of the term “a divine wager-payment.”)