A long time ago, in the town of Niigata, in the province of Echizen,
there lived a man called Nagao Chōsei.
Nagao was the son of a physician, and was educated for his father’s
profession. At an early age he had been betrothed to a girl called
O-Tei, the daughter of one of his father’s friends; and both families
had agreed that the wedding should take place as soon as Nagao had
finished his studies. But the health of O-Tei proved to be weak; and in
her fifteenth year she was attacked by a fatal consumption. When she
became aware that she must die, she sent for Nagao to bid him farewell.