The Boy Who Drew Cats
『猫を描いた少年』
（Neko wo egaita shonen）
英訳：ラフカディオ・ハーン（Lafcadio Hearn）
寺に預けられた小僧は経本から屏風、壁、柱に至るまで何にでも猫の絵を描いたので、和尚に家へ帰されてしまいました。途中、小僧は妖怪が住みつく古寺にそうとは知らず泊まり、寺の大きな屏風に沢山の猫を描くと疲れて眠くなりました。和尚から「夜は広い場所を避けよ」と言われていたので、狭い押し入れの中で寝ていると、外から大きな物音や恐ろしい鳴き声がしました。朝になり押し入れから出てみると、牛より大きな化け鼠が血まみれで死んでおり、小僧の描いた屏風の猫たちの口が血に染まっていたので、描かれた猫たちが化け鼠を退治したことを悟りました。
An acolyte in a temple drew pictures of cats on everything, from the priest's book to screens, walls, and pillars, and was sent home by the old priest as a result. On his way back home, he spent a night at an old temple that, unbeknown to him, was haunted by a goblin. After drawing many cats on the large screens in the temple, he became tired and drowsy. He remembered how the old priest had told him to avoid large place at night, and so crawled into a little cabinet with a sliding door. Late in the night, he heard crashing thumps and bloodcurdling screams. When morning came, he crawled out of the cabinet and found a bloodstained goblin-rat, bigger than a cow, dead on the floor. And then he saw that the mouths of the cats he had drawn on the screen were also stained with red - they had killed the goblin-rat.
