GONEMON THE POOR MAN

Once upon a time there was a man called Gonemon who was always poor, and he wore such tattered clothes that people called him Ragged Gonemon.
The man finally could no longer endure his poverty and went to the shrine of Kangamo Myojin to begin a petition lasting three times seven or twenty-one days. He prayed earnestly, "Please make me a rich man."
On the twenty-first day, the final day of petition, the deity appeared in the form of a white-haired old man. He said, "Since you have offered your prayers faithfully, I will make you rich." He held out a gold fan and a silver fan and said, "If you fan with this gold fan,
you can make the nose of anyone you wish long, and with the silver fan you can make it short again. You can use these fans any way you want, but you must never use them improperly." He gave careful
instructions.
Gonemon was delighted. He waited for a good chance to use the fans. Then he heard that the ch6ja's only daughter was going to see cherry blossoms. Gonemon went there ahead of the girl and stood
behind a cherry tree. He fanned the girl's nose two or three times with his gold fan. The girl's nose lengthened two or three feet in plain sight of everybody.
No doctor they hired could cure the girl's nose. She could only weep for shame. The ch6ja and his wife and everybody wondered how such a strange illness should befall their precious girl. They were overcome wi th grief.
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