disappointed when you see it,' said the man. 'For years past no one has been in possession and everything is tumbling to pieces. I have been making shift myself to live in a room which has indeed a kind of ceiling, but no roof! And since the spring they have been building this new hermitage for Prince Genji close by, and this has changed the whole character of the district. The place is crowded with workmen; for the hermitage, by what I can make out, is going to be a very grand affair. If what you are looking for is a quiet, unfrequented spot you will certainly be badly disappointed.' His remarks had the opposite effect to that which he had intended. To learn that at Ōi they would be living as it were under Genji's very wing was an astonishing piece of news. He ordered the man to put the large repairs in hand at once; what wanted setting to rights indoors they could see to at leisure later on. This did not at all suit the caretaker. 'If you want to know,' he said sulkily, 'I reckon this place belongs to me as much as to anyone. I have been living there quietly all these years and this is the first I have heard of anybody putting in a claim to it. When I first took things in hand the pastures and rice-fields were all running to waste, and his lordship Mimbu no Tayu told me before he died that I could have them for my very own and do what I could with them as payment of certain sums which he then owed me.' What he was really frightened of was that, if the family came into residence, they would lay claim to some of the live stock and grain that their land had produced. He had suddenly grown very red in the face, his voice quivered with anger and his whole aspect was so grim and even menacing that the old recluse hastened to reassure him: 'I am not in any way interested in the farm or its produce,' he said; 'with regard to them please go on just as before. As a matter of fact I have got the title-deeds somewhere here,
